Is prisoner exchange a beginning for U.S.-Iran negotiation?

*By Mohammad Ghaderi

Dr. Massoud Soleimani, an Iranian scientist who had been held in the U.S. for 14 months, was finally exchanged by a Chinese American spy named Xiyue Wang and released last week.

The swap took place in Zurich, Switzerland. The two prisoners were released simultaneously.

The United States, which has not softened its hostile stance on Iran, seeks an opportunity to set in motion a show at the international stage for dialogue with Iran. Washington tried to refer to the prisoner swap as a ground provided for the U.S.-Iran negotiations to gain more votes for Trump in the 2020 polls. A look at successive tweets by Trump, Mike Pompeo and Brian Hook regarding the issue shows that they have made every effort to open negotiations with Iran.

This kind of position taken by U.S. officials coupled with their efforts to open talks has at least two important dimensions:

First, an analysis of the U.S. politicians’ behavior over the past 40 years, and even earlier, suggests that they have offered to negotiate whenever they have reached a deadlock. However, the Americans change their approach as soon as they find a chance for hostility, like what happened during the recent riots in Iran.

Second, given the experience obtained due to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Iran believes that there is no need for re-negotiation. There are preconditions for a possible negotiation. First, the return of the U.S. to the JCPOA and lifting all of previous and new sanctions. Second, a complete halt to the maximum pressure campaign. However, the White House has explicitly rejected these conditions.

In fact, Iran did not accept the prisoner exchange to begin a new phase of negotiations. Rather, Iran agreed to it merely because of humanitarian issues. The exchange took place while Professor Masoud Soleimani was not a criminal. According to Donald Trump, Soleimani was held hostage despite having an official visa to visit the United States.

However, Xiyue Wang, who came to Iran as a Princeton University graduate student, was transferring an archive of the Iranian confidential documents to the Mossavar-Rahmani institution, a partner of U.S.-Israel organizations. Wang was arrested by the Ministry of Intelligence and charged with espionage.

* Author: Mohammad Ghaderi , Tehran Times editor in chief 

Boris Johnson: An unhealthy choice anywhere

By Martin Love

NORTH CAROLINA - British voters know not what they did in elevating the Tories to their biggest victory in decades, and in defeating the Labor party and eliminating a humble, good man – Jeremy Corbyn – from a further role in politics. The voters know not what they did focusing far too much on demands that the country leave the EU, which the winner, Boris Johnson, has pledged to execute early in 2020 while at the same time Labor waffled amid suggestions of holding another referendum on Brexit.

This waffling and lukewarm if not cold stance towards the Brexit question was a major factor in Corbyn’s defeat, as there are indications those who would have voted Labor foolishly switched their vote to Boris Johnson over this issue alone, disregarding other concerns about Johnson’s nefarious plans. But there were other factors, too, just as onerous and disastrous, and anyway, no one expected such a lopsided vote.

Disastrous one can say because there are many Brits and many others in the West and across the globe who literally ached for the kinds of potential changes that might have begun had Corbyn become Prime Minister. This election was the one chance the British and much of the world had to begin the establishment of policies of Hope for relief for those under the thumb of Western imperialism and the power of oligarchs like Rupert Murdoch and Sheldon Adelson, to name just two, and their obscene wealth and privileges. The next chance for real change may be in the U.S. election coming next November. And that chance may be the last for many years ahead. The defeat of Trump is for now not assured unless between now and next November the U.S. economy and markets crater. Ejection from office before then is a very bad bet.

One can strongly blame the interference of Zionists and their co-conspirators in British politics. Alleged Russian meddling anywhere is nothing compared to what the Zionists have been doing. No candidate, perhaps ever, has suffered such outrageous attacks as Corbyn did given year all false claims he was in bed with “anti-Semites” simply because he has long insisted on an equitable solution to the plight of Palestinians and the end of the apartheid system in Israel, as well an end to U.S. and NATO warmongering in the Middle East. Heck, Corbyn probably would have even released the world’s Number One journalist and chronicler of U.S. war crimes and other abuses, Julian Assange, from his torture in Belmarsh dungeon in London and thus obviated extradition to further torture and imprisonment in the U.S.

Corbyn’s advocacy for the many, for the People, versus the oligarchs and plutocrats, the very few, was nullified by the imperialists including especially the Israel lobby. But the election is done now and the question is whether the few (not the many) have gained an even stronger mandate with their allies in the corrupted and bought media, and not just in Britain, to continue wrecking the world for selfish ends. One would have to conclude “yes” for now, but perhaps, perhaps, not forever. The victory in Britain by Power and the powerful, even as they may be strengthened by the possible reelection of Trump next year, who is reaching out to bolster his base of Christian evangelicals and fundamentalists, the utterly ignorant in the U.S., may, with some luck, prove to be their undoing in time even as the Zionists and warmongers, for now, are gloating over the election results.

Corbyn made errors, aside from not coming out strongly for Brexit, as that has been apparently desired by a majority of Brits. He has not been one not to rage against even his opponents such as the Zionists and against the smears he has suffered. One might say that being relatively “nice” does not work against such vile detractors. So will Senator Bernie Sanders, who could be nominated by the Democrats with some luck, take a lesson from the Johnson victory in Britain? He, a Jew, is already being set up for the same kind of abuse Corbyn failed to counter effectively from the Zionist lobby, and such smears would only be amplified if somehow he wins the nomination to run against Trump. But perhaps, for now, it’s better to examine the incitements of Johnson’s victory.

At the top of the list is whether Britain overall will benefit from Johnson’s Brexit? This is unlikely, especially from an economic standpoint, but the jury may remain out on this for a long time. Also, Scotland’s nationalist party, the SNP, looks likely to fight to remain in the EU and for independence, for one thing, and the Irish seem to be studying unification with Northern Ireland and their own independence from London. Both the Irish and the Scots appear to be appalled with the election results. Moreover, Boris Johnson, an uncouth champion of the rich, has positioned Britain to become more of a poodle, if more poodle behavior is possible, to U.S. control and the Trump Administration’s malignant designs. Britain may be severed from the EU, but this merely establishes what amounts to slavery to the demands of the Republicans and Wall Street in the U.S.

Privatizing Britain’s beloved National Health Service at the behest of U.S. corporate plunderers may now be inevitable, and once that begins, even partially, and British citizens could be forced to buy health insurance, there may be a huge backlash against Johnson’s government. In sum, what happens when the public, whether in Britain or the U.S., finally wakes up to the evils of full-blown Facism (which both Trump and Johnson are essentially implementing)? And what happens when the remains of benevolent public institutions and programs in both countries are further eviscerated along with the shredding of the vital social safety nets? Is this not a recipe for revolution in some fashion in the future, especially by those who have sought peace and justice in foreign affairs and domestic relief from plutocratic predators on both sides of the Atlantic? One can only hope, but for now the British elections casts a darker pall everywhere, including over Iran.

Trump is completely controlled by criminal Zionists: Writer

US President Donald Trump stands among other leaders as he attends a NATO Plenary Session at the NATO summit in Watford, near London, Britain, December 4, 2019.

US President Donald Trump is completely controlled by criminal Zionists and he “happily does their bidding,” according to Walt Peretto, an American writer and sociopolitical analyst in Washington.

Peretto made the remarks in an interview with Press TV on Saturday while commenting on a report which said the US State Department has barred the former Saudi consul general in charge in Istanbul last year when Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi was brutally murdered and dismembered within the consulate building.

“Trump has been largely indifferent to his heinous act citing that billions of dollars in arms sales to the Saudis means something to him. This relationship between the Saudi and US governments is one of many contradictions. Like hinting that Saudi Arabia was behind 9/11 yet conducting business as usual,” Peretto said.  

“Evidence has proven that the 9/11 attacks were planned, carried out, and covered up by neocon factions in the US government with heavy Israeli impetus.  Yet the official narrative still implicates 19 fictional hijackers of which 15 were said to be Saudi nationals,” he added.

PressTV-Trump, Pompeo, and global organized criminal network

"The Trump administration has no interest in the welfare of the Iranian people," writes Walt Peretto.

“In recent years, hint, after suggestion, after innuendo, has been put forth by US politicians and controlled media that the Saudi government played a major role in the attacks,” he stated.

“In the aftermath of 9/11, the US and its allies have destroyed Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya, while they are teaming with the Saudis to destroy Syria and Yemen. While Iran has been attacked economically and through rhetoric and further innuendo,” he noted.  

“This US foreign policy makes no sense objectively or strategically if we use the premise that these operations are being carried out in the name of US security and national interests,” he said.  

‘Israel dictates American foreign policy’

“However, these operations make perfect sense for Israeli foreign policy. Since Israel has Trump, the Congress, and the official press wrapped around its finger, Israel simply dictates American foreign policy. 9/11 was used to cement this dominant/submissive relationship in place,” the analyst said.

“The ruse is that Saudi Arabia does not officially recognize Israel, yet in reality they are staunch allies. Therefore the US will continue to conduct normal relations with the Saudis despite this latest move by the State Department,” he said.  

“The US spreads the blame for 9/11 by sprinkling innuendo around among Al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, the Taliban and Afghanistan, the Saudis, and even Saddam Hussein and Iraq to a minor degree. Yet, there isn't one shred of credible evidence that any of these factions had anything to do with this attack on America and its people,” he said.  

“All the credible, independent, and objective evidence proves that Israel and the United States were behind 9/11. Despite the fact that the Zionist controlled US mainstream media simply ignores all the evidence,” the commentator noted.

“The only mention of the evidence in the mainstream is simply dismissed as 'conspiracy theory' and is now being used as an excuse to attack the First Amendment by taking initiatives to censor the free flow of ideas on the internet and in social media specifically,” he said.

9/11 was planned in Tel Aviv and Washington, not in Kabul: Scholar

The 9/11 was not planned and directed from Afghanistan, it was planned and directed from Washington, DC and Tel Aviv, an American scholar says.

“These initiatives are often under the guise of fighting anti-Semitism as Trump recently signed an executive order to attack anti-Semitism on college campuses. The ultimate goal is to make any criticism of Israel or Zionism, and mentioning 9/11 evidence, punishable by law,” he said.

“Donald Trump is completely controlled by these criminal cabals and happily does their bidding. Donald Trump ran for office on a platform of ‘America First.’ His actions the last 3 years have clearly shown he is ‘Israel first,’” he concluded.

The original game in UK has just started !

By Hanif Ghafari

The British Conservative Party finally won the House of Representatives by winning 364 seats. Many analysts believe that Boris Johnson's victory in the election means solving the riddle of Britain's exit from the EU. Some believe the British prime minister will leave the EU by the end of January 2020 (less than two months later) on his own accord. Essentially one of the reasons why British public opinion favored the Conservative Party and Boris Johnson was their desire for agreement with the European Union. But the key question is, is this equation easily formed?

The answer is no! In the coming weeks, U.S. President Donald Trump is trying to convince Boris Johnson of "disagreement with Europe" and the "hard exit of Britain" from Europe. Trump uses a variety of methods in this regard. It should not be forgotten that Trump is not only strongly opposed to the "soft British exit of Europe", but he also sees it as the destruction of Washington's economic dominance over London in the coming years. However, if Boris Johnson succumbs to Trump and puts a tough exit from the European Union on the agenda, at least half of those who have voted for the Conservative Party will turn away from him and become angry opponents! In this case, Johnson's control of British political and social Equations is impossible.

Even if Boris Johnson puts an agreement with the European Union and a soft exit from the EU, the game won't be over! The effects of Britain's soft exit from Europe, such as declining economic growth, rising unemployment and inflation, and protest movements by Labor, Democratic Liberal Party, Scottish National Party and extremist nationalists will cause Boris Johnson to face many crises over the next year. . In the meantime, radical nationalists in Britain, such as Trump, are in favor of a "tough British exit from the European Union", becoming a tough, uncontrolled social and political force by the Johnson administration.

As can be seen, the game in UK is never over! Although with the defeat of the Labor and Liberal Democrats, another option called "Repeat New Referendum on EU Exit" has been removed from British political equations, the choice of either "soft exit" or "hard exit" option "From Europe, there will be costs and consequences for the Boris Johnson government. These costs could lead to the fall of the British government and Johnson becoming the third political victim (after David Cameron and Theresa May).

Why terrorist act by Saudi Air Force officer faced media boycott!

By Mohammad Ghaderi

On December 5, a Saudi Air Force lieutenant, named Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani, opened fire at a U.S. naval base in Pensacola, Florida

The gunman, who began training in the U.S. in August 2017, killed three people and wounded eight. Alshamrani was shot by a deputy sheriff.

Shortly after the shooting, Saudi Arabia's King Salman contacted Trump to express regret for what had happened and sympathize with families of the victims. The Saudi king insisted that the assailant did not represent the Saudi people. 

Regarding the reaction by Saudi and U.S. officials, as well as the way media outlets are dealing with the issue, some points need to be mentioned about the incident:

a. Restricted and controlled media coverage

The Saudi and U.S. media outlets have covered the incident in a restricted and controlled manner. Interestingly, Qatari media such as Al Jazeera were not also very active in this regard. These approaches can be mainly based on two main reasons:

First, the shooting by the Saudi Air Force officer can revive and intensify U.S. cynicism and hatred of Saudi Arabia by recalling the 9/11 attacks.  Therefore, U.S. media outlets’ lack of enough attention to the issue is due to Washington’s insistence to advance the maximum pressure project against Iran. Obviously, undermining Saudi Arabia’s status could disrupt the project. 

Second, it seems that the Qatari media are indifferent to the incident, as Doha and Riyadh are gradually changing their approaches toward each other, and Qatar is seeking to avoid tension with Saudi Arabia. 

b. The way that the Saudi and U.S. officials reacted 

The shooting by the Saudi Air Force officer shows that there are some radical persons among Saudi security forces, who could pose various risks. Accordingly, neither the U.S. nor Saudi Arabia have spoken about the motive behind the shooting.

However, based on numerous indications, it can be concluded that the officer was highly inspired by Wahhabism and was affiliated with terrorist groups, such as ISIS and al-Qaeda. 

On the other hand, in a stereotypical way, the assailant may be charged with mental disorders. According to the New York Times, Alshamrani posted on his Twitter account, “I’m not against you for just being American, I don’t hate you because your freedoms, I hate you because every day you supporting, funding and committing crimes not only against Muslims but also humanity.”

Following the incident, some U.S. officials, including Senators Tim Scott and Matt Gaetz, condemned the shooting and called for a revision of foreign military training standards.

Tim Scott stated that the officer was either influenced by radical Islamic ideology or suffered from a mental disorder, so there is no reason that we provide military training for those who want to harm the U.S. 

On the other hand, some evidence suggests that the close relationship between the Riyadh officials (especially Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman) and the White House has led to dissatisfaction of some extremist Wahhabis, as they are opposed to the general approach of the Salafi movement.

In this regard, two important events over the past few months can be noted, which were not reflected in media properly. First, a report, which was recently released on the military’s coup attempt against Mohammad bin Salman. Second, reporting news about the killing of King Salman’s personal bodyguard. It was later revealed that the bodyguard intended to assassinate the king so he was killed in a made-up clash. 

As a result, there are some reasons why the incident went somehow unnoticed by the media and the two countries’ officials. 

A. If the shooting is linked to the 9/11 incident, many Americans will be persuaded to vote against Trump in the 2020 election by reinforcing ties with Riyadh. 

B. The continuous effort by the al-Saud family to repair their inhuman image (especially after the killing of Jamal Khashoggi) in public opinion would fail. 

C. Saudi Arabia, as the main helper in the U.S. maximum pressure campaign against Iran, would be involved in a new issue. In this case, Riyadh could not fulfill its main task, which is undermining the stability and peace in the independent regional countries, including Lebanon and Iraq. 

D. The domestic disputes in the house of Saud would be unveiled, and the crown prince’s power would be undermined.  

E. The White House would be forced to take an action against Saudi Arabia because of the pressure by the U.S. public opinion and Democratic politicians in particular. 

Donald Trump and Israel: When Does a ‘Passionate Attachment’ Threaten National Security?

Philip GIRALDI

In his Farewell Address, of 1796 America’s first president George Washington famously warned his fellow citizens that “…a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter without adequate inducement or justification.”

In today’s United States, there is no more “passionate attachment” than that which exists with Israel. The tie that binds is assiduously cultivated by the media and the politically ambitious, so much so that the Jewish state is frequently referred to hyperbolically as America’s best friend and closest ally. But Israel, with its own regional interests driving its policies, is in reality neither a friend nor an ally.

Politicians mired in the past like Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden and Chuck Schumer can see no light between Israel and the United States. Pelosi has declared astonishingly that “I have said to people when they ask me if this Capitol crumbled to the ground, the one thing that would remain is our commitment to our aid…and I don’t even call it aid…our cooperation with Israel. That’s fundamental to who we are.” Biden has repeatedly denounced any reduction in the ridiculously high level of military assistance given to Israel to convince it to modify its behavior as “bizarre,” while Schumer has identified himself as the Jewish state’s “shomer” or guardian in the US Senate.

Many members of the Democratic Party base are no longer enchanted by Israel and one would like to know what politicians like Biden and Pelosi really think about the Jewish state, but it is unlikely that that will ever be revealed. It is nevertheless clear that the adhesion to Israel by Democrats has been far overshadowed by the constant pandering to the Jewish state that has been the hallmark of the current administration of Donald J. Trump. To be sure, the musical chairs line-up of neo-conservatives that has included John Bolton, Mike Pence and Mike Pompeo has been unstinting in its praise of the malignant Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but it is the president himself who has raised the level of adoration to heights previously not observed coming out of the White House.

Donald Trump has overturned long standing foreign policy positions to favor Israel even more than has been the case hitherto. He withdrew from the nuclear pact with Iran, has moved the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, has recognized Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights, has declared the illegal settlements on the West Bank “not illegal,” has cut off funding to the Palestinians and the United Nations and is sending signals that he will approve further moves by the Jewish state to annex much of the remaining Palestinian territory. Along the way, his Ambassador to Israel David Friedman has been making excuses for Israeli shooting of unarmed demonstrators and the everyday brutality inflicted on the hapless Palestinians.

Worse might even be coming, as Secretary of State Pompeo and Netanyahu have recently been discussing a formal defense pact which would obligate the United States to intervene on the side of Israel if it were to go to war, even if the war were initiated by the Jewish state. As Israel is now reportedly considering the value of a possible pre-emptive nuclear strike on Iran, the stakes could not be higher.

But as bad as all that is, nothing outdoes the speech delivered by Trump in Florida last Saturday in front of the Israeli American Council (IAC) National Summit. IAC is a basically right-wing group funded largely by Las Vegas casino multi-billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who is also a close adviser to the president on the Middle East. Its annual gathering included 4,000 mostly well-heeled Israelis and American Jews who cheered and periodically chanted “four more years!” as the president was speaking.

Trump spoke for 45 minutes, most of which consisted of preening over how much he has done for Israel. But he also discussed Jews in America, saying that “We have to get the people of our country, of this country, to love Israel more, I have to tell you that. We have to do it. We have to get them to love Israel more. Because you have Jewish people that are great people — they don’t love Israel enough.” He also said that his audience should be supporting him and not voting for Elizabeth Warren, whom he called “Pocahontas,” saying “You’re not going to vote for the wealth tax…Let’s take 100 percent of your wealth away.”

There was considerable pushback almost immediately coming from Jewish groups and prominent individuals who saw Trump’s words as classic borderline anti-Semitic tropes. Trump, who often speaks to Jewish audiences in the second person, saying “you” rather than “we,” clearly sees the Jewish attachment to Israel as normal and acceptable, but there is an implicit second message about potential disloyalty to the United States. In August he said that American Jews who vote for Democrats show “either a total lack of knowledge or great disloyalty.”

And Trump also is not reluctant to link Jews with money, a generally taboo subject that he has raised before, most particularly when he was campaigning and he told an audience of Jewish Republicans that “you’re not going to support me because I don’t want your money. You want to control your politicians, that’s fine.” And, of course, the irony is that everyone who has not been asleep knows very well that the Israel Lobby in the US and Europe is indeed all about money. Money buys access to power.

For someone who has spent much of his life around Jews in the New York business world, Donald Trump is remarkably ignorant of their political culture. To be sure there is a group of oligarch billionaires that includes Adelson, Paul Singer, Ron Lauder and Bernard Marcus who are politically conservative and fund Trump as well as other Republicans. They do so not because Trump is good for the United States but because he is a gift to Israel and can easily be bought or persuaded.

But most Jews, while supporting the existence of Israel, do not exactly see things quite that way and many Jews of a liberal persuasion want to see a secure Israel that will deliver justice for the Palestinians. Plus, Trump’s authoritarianism and denigratory, abrasive style offend many Jews, so the president will not be getting many Jewish votes no matter what he does. His approval rating is 29% among Jewish voters nationwide, according to a Gallup poll while only 17% of Jews voted Republican in 2017. And one would have thought even the narcissistic president might have noticed the large number of Jewish witnesses, “experts” and congressmen who seem to be “out to get him” in the impeachment hearings.

Beyond that, Trump’s constant exaltation of the Israelis and of Jews in general as something like a gift to humanity should offend all other Americans. The president is elected to represent the interests of all Americans, not just a wealthy and powerful ethno-religious minority that is able and willing to give him a great deal of money to run his political campaigns. It is unthinkable that a national politician should mount his bully pulpit to praise interminably any specific ethnic group, and so it should be. It is offensive and completely unacceptable, particularly as in this case it is a favor bought that brings with it grave damage to genuine US interests and could easily lead to a major war in which Americans will die.

Nevertheless, the painful issue of who is loyal to what is genuine, particularly when a dedicated and powerful group affiliated with a foreign country is able to game the system to get what it wants. We are all supposed to be Americans first. In her comment on the Trump speech, conservative pundit Ann Coulter maintained that the president didn’t go far enough in impugning the loyalty of some Jews to Israel, writing, “Could we start slowly by getting them to like America?”

Philip GIRALDI

Ph.D., Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest.

The original game in UK has just started !

By Hanif Ghafari

The British Conservative Party finally won the House of Representatives by winning 364 seats. Many analysts believe that Boris Johnson's victory in the election means solving the riddle of Britain's exit from the EU. Some believe the British prime minister will leave the EU by the end of January 2020 (less than two months later) on his own accord. Essentially one of the reasons why British public opinion favored the Conservative Party and Boris Johnson was their desire for agreement with the European Union. But the key question is, is this equation easily formed?

The answer is no! In the coming weeks, U.S. President Donald Trump is trying to convince Boris Johnson of "disagreement with Europe" and the "hard exit of Britain" from Europe. Trump uses a variety of methods in this regard. It should not be forgotten that Trump is not only strongly opposed to the "soft British exit of Europe", but he also sees it as the destruction of Washington's economic dominance over London in the coming years. However, if Boris Johnson succumbs to Trump and puts a tough exit from the European Union on the agenda, at least half of those who have voted for the Conservative Party will turn away from him and become angry opponents! In this case, Johnson's control of British political and social Equations is impossible.

Even if Boris Johnson puts an agreement with the European Union and a soft exit from the EU, the game won't be over! The effects of Britain's soft exit from Europe, such as declining economic growth, rising unemployment and inflation, and protest movements by Labor, Democratic Liberal Party, Scottish National Party and extremist nationalists will cause Boris Johnson to face many crises over the next year. . In the meantime, radical nationalists in Britain, such as Trump, are in favor of a "tough British exit from the European Union", becoming a tough, uncontrolled social and political force by the Johnson administration.

As can be seen, the game in UK is never over! Although with the defeat of the Labor and Liberal Democrats, another option called "Repeat New Referendum on EU Exit" has been removed from British political equations, the choice of either "soft exit" or "hard exit" option "From Europe, there will be costs and consequences for the Boris Johnson government. These costs could lead to the fall of the British government and Johnson becoming the third political victim (after David Cameron and Theresa May).

In Wag the Dog Move, Indicted Israeli PM Netanyahu Moves to Annex 25% of Palestinian West Bank

Netanyahu is brazenly planning to steal a quarter of all the land in the Palestinian West Bank, forever ending any chance of a Palestinian state.

by

Juan Cole

This second case really is about destroying freedom of the press and entirely undermining what little is left of Israeli democracy. (Photo: Ben Amos Gershom/Prime Minister of Israel)

Interim Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu committed again on Sunday that his government will steal the entire Jordan Valley from the Palestinians. He had floated this plan two months ago but now seems to be determined to move ahead. It makes up 25% of the Palestinian West Bank. Israel is forbidden to annex militarily occupied territory by the 1949 Geneva Convention and by the charter of the United Nations, which were enacted to forestall a repeat of Nazi atrocities. Netanyahu would also annex the 5% of Palestinian territory on which Israeli squatter settlements have been built on land stolen from its Palestinian owners.

Netanyahu is in a world of trouble. He has been indicted on criminal offenses. The only thing that might keep him out of jail is to stay in office and tinker with the law for his own benefit. But he can’t remain prime minister because he lost the last election and hasn’t been able to form a government.

You don’t need to be a really suspicion person to see this announcement as a form of wagging the dog by Netanyahu in hopes of making himself so popular in Israel that he can manage to find a way to fix the system and stay out of jail. Of course, he has made this pledge before, and he nevertheless couldn’t win the election and form a government.

The US Congress, which tacitly supports Israeli colonization efforts, has clung to a fig leaf of an imaginary peace process and a two-state solution for decades during which far right wing Israeli governments have energetically worked to forestall any such thing.

It is rumored that Trump will announce his support for Netanyahu’s massive piece of grand larceny. Trump made waves of his own Sunday, addressing a Jewish audience and telling them that they are “not nice people” but that they will vote for him because they care about money above all else and will reject Elizabeth Warren’s plan to raise taxes. He also insisted that Jewish Americans must give Israel their blind support. He managed to hit all the highlights of anti-Semitism, from caricatures of Jews as money-grubbers with no thought for the public weal to inaccurate charges of dual loyalty.

Israel may well go to the polls again for a third time in a year this spring. The electorate is divided between the far-far-right Likud Party of Netanyahu and the center-right Blue and White coalition of Benny Gantz. So it keeps returning a hung parliament. Gantz refuses to form a government of national unity with Netanyahu. Actually, either of the two blocs could form a government if they allied with the largely Palestinian-Israeli Joint List, but the racist rules of Israeli politics do not permit allowing persons of Palestinian heritage into the cabinet.

If Netanyahu loses again, it is possible that his party will dump him or that his enemies will form a government without him, leaving him in the dragnet of the police.

I explained earlier two of the cases against him:

In one case, Netanyahu allegedly accepted a couple hundred thousand dollars in bribes from an Australian businessmen in return for favorable treatment of his business and attempting to get him a US visa.

In the other case, Netanyahu is alleged to have offered a deal to Arnon Mozes, the publisher of Israel’s biggest-circulation newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth. Netanyahu supporter and shady casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson had begun a free pro-Netanyahu newspaper, Yisrael Ha-Yom, and it obviously was eating into the profits of the other newspapers in the country. (How this is not illegal as “dumping” baffles me.) Netanyahu allegedly told Mozes that he could persuade Adelson to reduce the publication run of Yisrael Ha-Yom, which would help his bottom line. In return, Mozes should report more favorably on Netanyahu.

This second case really is about destroying freedom of the press and entirely undermining what little is left of Israeli democracy.

Israel never had a claim on the Palestinian West Bank or the Gaza Strip. In 1967 Israel invaded these areas and occupied them even though the Palestinians took no role in the 1967 War. Nearly 3 million Palestinians now live in the West Bank under Israeli military control. Another 2 million live in the Gaza Strip, which is occupied via blockade. Violating international law, Israel long since annexed some of this Palestinian territory and added it to the Israeli district of Jerusalem, settling some 350,000 Israelis on this stolen Palestinian land. Israel has also sent 400,000 squatters to take property away from Palestinian families in what is left of the West Bank.

Now Netanyahu is brazenly planning to steal a quarter of all the land in the Palestinian West Bank, forever ending any chance of a Palestinian state.

The US Congress, which tacitly supports Israeli colonization efforts, has clung to a fig leaf of an imaginary peace process and a two-state solution for decades during which far right wing Israeli governments have energetically worked to forestall any such thing.

Juan Cole teaches Middle Eastern and South Asian history at the University of Michigan. His new book, The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation Is Changing the Middle East (Simon and Schuster), will officially be published July 1st. He is also the author of Engaging the Muslim World and Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East (both Palgrave Macmillan). He has appeared widely on television, radio and on op-ed pages as a commentator on Middle East affairs, and has a regular column at Salon.com. He has written, edited, or translated 14 books and has authored 60 journal articles.

Netanyahu And Trump, Joined At The Hip

Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu (Shealah D. Craighead)

By Paul Pillar 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, under indictment for corruption, has been launching vociferous counterattacks that sound quite familiar to anyone (including editorial pages of the mainstream U.S. press) who has been following a parallel story of high-level wrongdoing in the United States. Netanyahu said that earlier reports of the conduct that led to charges against him were “fake news.” He has labeled investigations into the matter a “witch hunt.” Now he is saying that the indictments are part of an “attempted coup.” The similarities between a beleaguered Netanyahu and Donald Trump extend beyond such rhetoric to larger habits of never admitting wrongdoing and constantly attacking their accusers. Their common objective has been retention of power free of any introspection about larger values.

Both heads of government have long histories of demagoguery, with an apparent disregard for possibly violent consequences. Netanyahu’s history includes stirring up hatred against political rivals who participated in the Oslo peace process—rabble-rousing that the family of the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin believes, with good reason, was partly responsible for Rabin’s assassination by a right-wing Jewish Israeli.  More recently, Netanyahu’s racist rhetoric has featured warnings about Arabs turning out to vote “in droves.” Trump’s well-known racist rhetoric has included calling white supremacists at Charlottesville “very fine people” and calling Mexican immigrants rapists. No U.S. leaders have been assassinated as a result, but such demagoguery encourages violence against immigrants and members of ethnic groups associated with immigration.

The parallel attitudes and habits of Netanyahu and Trump underscore what has become a more direct political link between the two. Netanyahu’s government has pursued policies toward Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians that have been increasingly and blatantly indefensible in terms of peace, justice, and international law. As such, support for Israel and its policies in the United States has been narrowing to a political base on the right dominated by evangelical Christians who bestow their support partly according to religious doctrine that gives a special God-given place to Israel. Trump’s political strategy on this and many other issues is focused on the same narrow base. Accordingly, the Trump administration’s policies toward Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have consisted of one gift after another to Netanyahu’s government, unaccompanied by any benefit to U.S. interests. The gifts have included movement of the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the occupied Golan Heights, diverse forms of Palestinian-bashing, and the repudiation of international law regarding colonization of conquered territory.

The offenses of both Netanyahu and Trump have involved bribery and corruption of democratic elections. The indictment of Netanyahu mentions such traditional mediums of corrupt exchange as luxury goods (in Netanyahu’s case, expensive cigars and champagne) given in return for policies that favor the business interests of those giving the goods. In the other cases that the incitement covers, the benefit Netanyahu is accused of seeking in return for policy favors to business interests is favorable treatment in the newspapers or online news outlets those interests control. Trump, who had welcomed and openly invited Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, attempted to coerce Ukraine into interfering in the 2020 U.S. election by making U.S. military aid and a presidential meeting contingent on Ukraine publicly incriminating a rival presidential candidate.

An obvious difference in the two leaders’ election-corrupting activities is that the offenses covered by the indictment of Netanyahu all took place within Israeli domestic politics, whereas Trump’s case has involved interference by foreign powers. Even here, however, is a political link between the two. Notwithstanding the significance of Russia’s interference in U.S. politics and Trump’s attempt to get Ukraine to interfere, the biggest foreign interference in U.S. politics has for years been that of Israel. That’s what the string of gifts that the Trump administration has bestowed on Netanyahu’s government, and the hoped-for electoral implications of those gifts, is about (in addition to personal and religious inclinations of some members of the Trump administration involved in the gift-giving). Benjamin Netanyahu has been directly involved in some of the most blatant foreign interference in U.S. politics, including denouncing policies of the then-incumbent U.S. administration from the rostrum of the U.S. House of Representatives, at the invitation of the opposition party.

As the corruption case against Netanyahu has gathered attention, Trump has tried to play down his relationship with the prime minister, saying, “Our relations are with Israel, so we’ll see what happens.” That line should be given no more weight than any of Trump’s many other attempts to distance himself from Trump collaborators who became public relations liabilities. The same was true of Trump saying of Gordon Sondland—a central figure in implementing Trump’s attempt to coerce Ukraine, who gave incriminating testimony about that attempt—that “I don’t know him very well.”  And it was true of Trump saying he didn’t know whether Rudy Giuliani, his chief dirt-digger in Ukraine, was still his attorney.

The indictment against Netanyahu, and the recent impeachment hearings about Trump and Ukraine, by no means include all the suspect activity by either leader that is worth scrutinizing or that raises parallels between the two men. Although not covered in the recently announced indictment, Israel’s attorney general also has been investigating a case involving Netanyahu, a cousin of his, possible bribery, and the purchase of some German-made submarines that Israeli military leaders say they don’t need. This affair—apparently involving a political leader ignoring the judgment of military leaders—evokes Trump’s recent interference in the case of a Navy SEAL convicted of misconduct.

Trump, a teetotaling non-smoker, will not be selling any favors in return for cigars and champagne, but the counterpart to that portion of Netanyahu’s offenses is Trump’s mixing of private and government business in defiance of the U.S. Constitution’s emoluments clause. Trump’s obstruction of justice, as catalogued in Robert Mueller’s report and with the catalog growing larger during the current impeachment investigation, finds a counterpart in Netanyahu’s efforts to obstruct justice by impeding the investigation of his own case.

Activities that fall under the label of corruption do not constitute the most damaging malfeasance by Netanyahu. That distinction would belong to his government’s policies regarding the use of armed force and subjugation of the Palestinians—policies that can genuinely be regarded as crimes. Trump’s administration, by unreservedly supporting and abetting those policies, makes the United States share all the more in the ill consequences of permanent conflict and injustice and the killing of any chance of peace in that part of the Middle East.

The bad effects of corruption in high places in both Israel and the United States include compromising the national security interests of each country. This can include waste from letting personal financial interests interfere in military procurement decisions. It can include weakening order and discipline in the armed services by letting politics interfere in the military justice system.

Even more serious is the damage to representative democracy from corruption of the electoral process. Here, the United States has farther to fall, given that Israel has long been a democracy only for a portion of the population it rules, and not for the other substantial portion that is denied political rights. American democracy already had its own flaws, such as gerrymandering and voter suppression laws, before Trump’s arrival on the political scene. But the active encouragement of involvement by foreign governments constitutes substantial further damage to that democracy—one that the Founding Fathers warned against as an ill consequence of passionate partisanship.

PAUL PILLAR

Paul R. Pillar is Non-resident Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Studies of Georgetown University and an Associate Fellow of the Geneva Center for Security Policy. He retired in 2005 from a 28-year career in the U.S. intelligence community. His senior positions included National Intelligence Officer for the Near East and South Asia, Deputy Chief of the DCI Counterterrorist Center, and Executive Assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence. He is a Vietnam War veteran and a retired officer in the U.S. Army Reserve. Dr. Pillar's degrees are from Dartmouth College, Oxford University, and Princeton University. His books include Negotiating Peace (1983), Terrorism and U.S. Foreign Policy (2001), Intelligence and U.S. Foreign Policy (2011), and Why America Misunderstands the World (2016).

'This Isn't How You End the Endless War': Trump Weighs Plan to Send 14,000 More US Troops to Middle East

"Trump ran on ending these endless wars. But he's sending more troops to the Middle East, making yet another war there more likely."

by

Jake Johnson

President Donald Trump speaks to U.S. troops during a surprise Thanksgiving day visit at Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan. (Photo: Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images)

The Pentagon is reportedly considering deploying as many as 14,000 additional U.S. troops to the Middle East in order to confront the alleged threat posed by Iran, a move critics said would further expose the hollowness of President Donald Trump's vow to end America's perpetual wars.

"Trump ran on ending these endless wars," tweeted Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.). "But he's sending more troops to the Middle East, making yet another war there more likely."

"Congress has not authorized any 'Countering Iran' mission."
—Matt Duss, foreign policy adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders

After the Pentagon on Wednesday officially denied a Wall Street Journal report that the Trump administration is weighing a plan to send thousands of additional troops to the Middle East, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy John Rood told the Senate Armed Services Committee Thursday that the Defense Department is in fact considering "changes to our force posture" in the Middle East.

"We're concerned about the threat stream that we're seeing," Rood told lawmakers, referring to Iran. "It is possible that we would need to adjust our force posture, and I think that would be a prudent step based on what we observe."

The Journal, citing anonymous U.S. officials, reported late Wednesday that the Trump administration "is considering a significant expansion of the U.S. military footprint in the Middle East to counter Iran, including dozens more ships, other military hardware, and as many as 14,000 additional troops."

"The deployment could double the number of U.S. military personnel who have been sent to the region since the start of a troop buildup in May," the Journal noted. "President Trump is expected to make a decision on the new deployments as soon as this month."

Matt Duss, foreign policy adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders, noted that Congress has not authorized deployment of additional U.S. troops to "confront Iran:

Matt Duss

@mattduss

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Dec 5

Congress has not authorized any “Countering Iran” mission.

Quote Tweet

Andrew Restuccia

@AndrewRestuccia

· Dec 5

Breaking from @glubold @nancyayoussef The Trump administration is considering a significant expansion of the U.S. military footprint in the Middle East, including as many as 14,000 additional troops to counter Iran, U.S. officials said. https://on.wsj.com/369wRZT

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A new deployment of troops to the Middle East would not be the first time Trump has reneged on his pledge to bring American soldiers home.

As Common Dreams reported in October, Trump ordered 1,800 troops and advanced weapons systems to Saudi Arabia less than 24 hours after tweeting that he is "trying to end the ENDLESS WARS."

In response to the latest possible deployment, anti-war group CodePink tweeted, "This isn't how you 'end the endless war.'"