Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich: ISIL Is Waging Total War against Islam

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TEHRAN (FNA)- Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich, an American political commentator, believes that the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) falsely promotes the Western narrative of a Sunni-Shiite divide in order to weaken Iraq’s internal resistance underlining that the terrorist group is waging a total war against Islam.

“The initial occupation of Iraq and the support of anti-Assad elements had a two-fold strategy. One was to re-establish American hegemony over the region, in particular the Persian Gulf – the lynchpin of US strategy and its ambitions of global domination. In addition to its presence and control of the region, America also wanted control of the resources – oil and water,” said Sepahpour-Ulrich in an exclusive interview with Fars News Agency.
“Second, ISIL falsely promotes the Western narrative of a Sunni-Shiite divide in order to weaken the internal resistance. In fact, ISIL is killing all Moslems, Christians, and others,” Sepahpour-Ulrich further said.
She believes that the brutality of ISIL has painted a false image of Muslims and underscored – inaccurately – the Israeli narrative that it must fend itself against Islamic terrorists.
Fars News Agency has conducted an interview with Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich, a public policy scholar and political commentator based in the United States, in an attempt to study various aspects of the presence of ISIL terrorist group in Iraq and shed more light on this.
Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich has a Master’s in Public Diplomacy from USC Annenberg for Communication. She is an independent researcher and writer with a focus on US foreign policy. Her articles and writings on Iran’s nuclear program, the Middle East developments and the US foreign policy have been published by several print and online publications.
What follows is the text of FNA’s interview with Ms. Sepahpour-Ulrich:

Q: ISIL which controls parts of Syria, sent its fighters into neighboring Iraq in June and quickly seized large swaths of territory straddling the border between the two countries. The militants have terrorized entire Iraqi communities, including Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, Christians and Ezadi, Kurds while executing a large number of civilians and soldiers. What do you think are the major objectives of the ISIL?

A: To try and determine what the objectives of ISIL are, it is important to understand how they came to being. It has been widely reported and established, correctly, that had it not been for the actions of the United States, be it the illegal war against Iraq or the arming of the militants to overthrow the Assad government, there would be no ISIL threat today. America’s contribution to these terrorists included arms and training. Britain also participated in arming and training anti-Assad rebels.

In June, Obama sought hundreds of millions for dollars for “moderate rebels” in Syria! Losing arms Iraq, Afghanistan.

But the aforementioned is the most obvious fact, which even US officials openly admit to. This degree of rare honesty serves to conceal and distract from the hidden agendas of which there are many.
The initial occupation of Iraq and the support of anti-Assad elements had a two-fold strategy. One was to re-establish American hegemony over the region, in particular the Persian Gulf – the lynchpin of US strategy and its ambitions of global domination.

In addition to its presence and control of the region, America also wanted control of the resources – oil and water.

While the US import of oil from the region is negligible, the control of the system and the oil would give it the upper hand, especially with regard to Europe and Japan. In other words, US control of the oil flow from the Persian Gulf directly or through proxies, would give it leverage over its allies.
In 2012, the majority of Israel's crude oil imports came from Russia and Azerbaijan via tanker vessels.
In addition, the US would be able to safeguard Israel’s energy demand and reduce costs given that at the time, Israel relied on Russian oil. According to a 1975 Memorandum of Understanding between the United States and Israel, America guaranteed Israel’s energy demands.

A far more vital resource in that part of the world is water of course. In essence, another reason for the intervention in Iraq and Syria is water to create hydraulic security for Israel.The Tigris and Euphrates rivers provide Iraq and Syria with their water and depend essentially on agreements with Turkey where both rivers originate. Plans have been in the making to divert this water to Israel (and in some measure, to Southern Persian Gulf states). 
These resources, water and oil, demanded compliant governments in Iraq and Syria. In 2013, Netanyahu publicly hinted at arming Syrian “rebels”.
ISIL serves these agendas in many ways. Foremost, it serves to weaken the central governments. For as long as they are busy fighting an enemy within, their capacity would be too diminished to fight the greater enemy without.

Second, ISIL falsely promotes the Western narrative of a Sunni-Shiite divide in order to weaken the internal resistance. In fact, ISIL is killing all Moslems, Christians, and others.

The gruesome killings that are taking place and tweeted around the world, serve to direct hatred and anger at Moslems, regardless of the roots and origins of these terrorists. Curiously, this group does not target Israel.

The brutality of ISIL has painted a false image of Moslems and underscored – inaccurately – the Israeli narrative that it must fend itself against “Islamic terrorists”.

Perhaps the most important aspect of ISIL, in my view, is that it is waging a total war against Islam. Not long ago, the world learnt in horror that future leaders of America were being taught to wage a “total war” against 1.4 billion Muslims in order to “protect America against Islamic terrorists”.

The total war included transformation of Islam to “cult status”, bombing and starvation while reinforcing the notion that “mainstream” Muslims are dangerous, because they’re “violent” by nature. US military did concede that some of the tactics would be considered “politically incorrect”. It seems to me that ISIL has solved the problem for them.

So at the end of the day, you have to ask who created, armed and trained the terrorists? And who stands to gain from their butchery.

Q: Many experts believe that Iraq is on the verge of disintegration. Will Iraq fall apart? Is this serious?

A:The threat of disintegration of Iraq is very real and very serious.The US has long sought to balkanize the entire region, not just Iraq. There is a plethora of literature on these plans introduced by neocon Bernard Lewis who proposed a plan for redrawing the borders of the larger Middle East into a mosaic of competing mini-states, thereby weakening the power of the existing republics and kingdoms. In 2006, Joe Biden openly called for Iraq to be divided into 3 parts. Everything that is happening today has been long in the making.

We cannot lose track of the fact that none of this would have been possible without the Iraq invasion. ISIL would not be a threat had the United States (Britain and regional allies) not armed and trained them.
In January 2014, ISIL (then referred to as al-Qaeda affiliate) seized Fallujah. In February, the United States sent heavy weaponry, intelligence gathering drones, missiles, thousands of contractors to train the Iraqis and help with intelligence gathering. In spite of American training and sophisticated weaponry, a few short months later, fewer than 1000 ISIL fighters sent some 30,000 soldiers into retreat. Surely then, we must either accept that the United States with its sophisticated weaponry, its intelligence gathering and highly paid contractors is absolutely useless; in which case we must question the deployment of special forces and the aerial “humanitarian bombing”, or, concede that ISIL has been the beneficiary – deliberate or not. This only underscores America’s role in all this. Curiously, the same month that 1000 ISIL members defeated 30,000 US trained soldiers, America asked for millions more in funds to arm rebels in Syria, even as (US) government officials have conceded that the US had armed ISIL in Syria.
In spite of promoting the false narrative of a Sunni-Shiite divide, America was not able to balkanize the region. ISIL provides the opportunity to accomplish these goals – and more. If you look at everything that ISIL has accomplished to date, you will note that they have only served the United States and Israel at the expense of the region and Moslems as a whole.

This is a serious threat that needs to be taken seriously. I don’t believe that assistance from the US is the answer, as clearly indicated above, it would have he exact opposite effect. Without any military knowledge or training, I cannot really address what would be the best course of action. But it is important that every citizen, regardless of their ethnicity and religion see this group as a direct threat.

Q: Do you believe that the Zionist regime is funding the terrorist groups in Iraq and Syria?

A: Please see above. In 2013, in a BBC interview, Netanyahu hinted at the possibility of arming Syrian “rebels”. In fact, former Israeli Intelligence Chief, Amos Yaldin told the audience at the Israel Policy Forum in February 2013: “And this military [Syrian], which is a huge threat to Israel, is now also weakening and, in a way, disintegrating. We still have risk from Syria-- a risk of being an Al-Qaeda country, a Somalia-type country -- but from military point of view, each one of these are less dangerous than the Syrian regular army." In essence, these rebel terrorists are weakening sovereign armies while killing the populations of both Syria and Iraq (not to mention others such as Palestinians).

Q: According to the latest reports, ISIL may have up to 6,000 fighters in Iraq and 3,000-5,000 in Syria, including perhaps 3,000 foreigners; nearly a thousand are reported to hail from Chechnya, 500 or more from Britain and hundreds of others from France, the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe. What do you think?

A: The West now has the perfect excuse not to let in refugees of wars they have created, to promote fear, and to crack down on liberties in their respective countries. The threat of ISIL is a fine propaganda tool for US and allies. At a minimum, the United States and Europe can take comfort in the fact that not once has ISIL threatened Israel. Which makes ISIL all the more questionable! This lack of hostility toward Israel and what is happening in Gaza mirrors bin Laden in 200-2009. While the world was supposed to believe he was still alive and an enemy and threat to the West, he was completely silent as Israel massacred Gazans in Operation Cast Lead. Important facts are not discussed in the media.

Q: The US turned a deaf ear and blind eye to the massacre in the Gaza Strip by Israel and suddenly US President Barack Obama decided to authorize military strikes on the ISIL positions in Iraq. Obama has said that airstrikes could go on for months to protect both US personnel and religious minorities who are trapped by the militants on a mountain.

What’s behind this sudden change of approach? Is this related to the geopolitical position of Erbil? Kindly explain.

A: Possibly several reasons. There are many American forces in Erbil. And of course there is an oil and gas conference scheduled in Erbil in December 2014. There have been huge demonstrations around the world with regard to what Israel is doing in Gaza and Americans have not been immune from the news. Now once again, US is attempting to show that it is concerned with and involved in humanitarian crisis. Frankly, this is all propaganda. And America’s standing in the world relies on propaganda.

But one must also not rule out the possibility of a full scale return to Iraq. From the onset, US build enduring bases in Iraq, mini cities. These were for permanent occupation. US did not plan on leaving. The Abu Gharib scandal and American actions untied Iraq against their occupiers. Even with the false narrative of a Shiite-Sunni divide and the false flags, America was tossed out of the country by Maliki. This could be an opening for the US to return to Iraq (occupy by other means) and to justify such actions to the American people. In other words, a repeat of George W. Bush slogan: We are fighting them over there so we don’t have to fight them here!

'கிலாபத்'தை நிறுவுவது எப்படி?

 -ஜஃபர் பங்காஷ்-

 -ஜஃபர் பங்காஷ்-

 




















தக்ஃபீரி குழுவின் திடீர் வெடிப்பு. இராக் - ஷாம் இஸ்லாமிய அரசு (Islamic state of iraq and sham), (சிரியா) ISIS திடீரென வெடிக்கிறது. இப்பின்னணியில் கிலாபத் பிரகடனம் முழங்கியது. 



திடீர் வெடிப்பின் ISIS அரசும் கிலாபத் பிரகடனமும் இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களின் ஸீராவின் ஒளியில் விளங்கிக் கொள்வது மிகவும் அத்தியாவசியமானதும் அவசரமுமான தேவையாகும்.

இஸ்லாமிய அரசில் (கிலாபத்) வாழ்வது அல்லது இஸ்லாமிய அரசொன்றினை நிறுவ அயராது உழைப்பது இஸ்லாமிய கடமைகளில் ஒன்றாகும்.. இதனை அறிந்த அர்ப்பணித்த முஸ்லிம்கள் இவ்விடயத்தில் ஒன்றுபடுவர் என்பதில் ஐயமில்லை. ஆனால் இங்கு நாம் நம் கவனத்தை குவிக்க வேண்டிய அம்சம், கிலாபத்தை அடைந்து கொள்ள வேண்டிய படிமுறைகள் நன்கு விளங்கிக் கொள்ள வேண்டிய ஒன்றாகும். 

முஸ்லிம்களைப் பொறுத்தவரையில் அல்குர்ஆன் இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களின் சுன்னா, ஸீரா என்பன எல்லா வழிகாட்டல்களுக்கும் அடிப்படியானவை. குர்ஆன் இஸ்லாமிய வாழ்விற்கான பொதுவான அடிப்படை விதிகளை எடுத்துக் கூற சுன்னாவும் ஸீராவும் செயற்பாடு ரீதியான வடிவங்களை விளக்கி நிற்கின்றன. 

நபித்துவத்தின் 23 வருட கால பணியில் இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்கள் இஸ்லாமிய அரசொன்றினை எவ்வாறு நிறுவுவது என்பதை அழகாக செய்து காட்டியுள்ளார்கள். இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களும் அவர்களின் தியாகமிக்க கொள்கைக்காக தங்களை அர்ப்பணம் செய்த ஒரு சிறு குழுவினரும் மக்காவின் ஆரம்ப கால பதின்மூன்று வருட கால வாழ்க்கையில் சொல்லொண்ணா துயரங்களை அனுபவித்தனர். மக்கத்து பட்டணத்தரசு அவர்களை வதைத்து துன்புறுத்தி சித்திரவதைகள் செய்தது. மக்கத்து பட்டணத்து அரசின் அநீதி அக்கிரம் ஊழல் அடக்குமுறை என்பவற்றிக்கு மாபெரும் சவாலாக இஸ்லாத்தைக் கண்டு கொண்டமைதான் இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களும் அவர்களின் கொள்கையைக் கொண்ட தோழர்களும் பட்ட வேதனைக்கு அடிப்படைக் காரணம் என்பதை நாம் நினைவில் கொள்ள வேண்டும்.
அல்லாஹ் அவனது அன்புநபிக்கு புலம்பெயர் -ஹிஜ்ரத்- செய்வதற்கு அனுமதி வழங்கினான். மதீனத்து இஸ்லாமிய அரசு மதினாவில் நிறுவப்பட்டது. 

மக்கத்து புலம்பெயர்வு -ஹிஜ்ரத்- தன்னார்வ புலம்பெயர்வல்ல. மக்கத்து முஷ்ரிகுகள் இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களை கொலை செய்திட திட்டம் வகுத்தனர். ஆனால் தான் பிறந்த நகரத்திலிருந்து அவர்களை வெளியேறுவதற்கு அல்லாஹ் பாதுகாப்பு வழங்கினான். 

மதீனத்துக்கு மாநபியின் வருகையோடு நேர்மை, நீதி என்பனவற்றின் அடிப்படையில் அமைந்த இஸ்லாமிய அரசு நிறுவப்பட்டது. மதீனத்து பட்டணத்தில் வாழ்ந்த எல்லா மக்கள் தொகுதியினரும், முஸ்லிம்கள் முஸ்லிமல்லாதவர்கள் யூதர்கள் - மற்றவர்கள் எல்லோரும் ஒன்றிணைந்து வாழ மதீனத்து உடன்படிக்கை மூலம் வழி வகுக்கப்பட்டது. 
உரிமைகளும் பொறுப்புக்களும் எல்லோருக்கும் வழங்கப்பட்டன. மதீனத்து மண்ணில் வாழ்ந்த பல்வேறு வகையினரான மக்கள் தொகுதியினரை இவ்வுடன்பாட்டுக்கு கீழ் கொண்டு வர எதுவித பலப்பிரயோகமோ, வற்புறுத்தலோ மேற்கொள்ளப்படவில்லை என்பது கூர்ந்து கவனிக்கத்தக்க முக்கிய விடயமாகும். 

மக்கத்து முஷ்ரிகுகள் இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களையும்  அவர்களின் தோழர்களையும் சமாதானமாக நிம்மதியாக வாழவிட்டு வைக்கவில்லை. முஷ்ரிகுகள் இவர்களைப் பின்தொடர்ந்தனர். பல தாக்குதல்களை இவர்கள் மீது மேற்கொண்டனர். முஸ்லிம்கள் சில வேளைகளில் அவற்றை வெற்றிகரமாக முறியடித்தனர் சில வேளைகளில் பின்னடைவுகளையும் கண்டனர். ஆனால் இறுதியாக முஸ்லிம்கள் வெற்றிகொண்டனர்.
இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களுடைய ஸீராவிலிருந்து நாம் கற்றுக் கொள்ள வேண்டிய பாடம் ஹி 8ம் ஆண்டு நடைபெற்ற மக்கத்துவிடுதலை. இப்பாடம் தற்போதைய எமது தலைப்புக்கு மிகவும் முக்கியமான விடயமாகும். 

இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களுடன் மக்கத்து முஷ்ரிகுகள் செய்து கொண்ட ஒப்பந்தத்தில் சில விதிகளை அவர்கள் மீறி நடந்து கொண்டனர். ஒரு முஸ்லிமை கொலை செய்ததன் மூலம் அவ்வுடன்பாட்டு விதிகளை மீறினர். மக்காவின் புனித எல்லைகளுக்குள் இக்கொலைச் சம்பவம் இடம்பெற்றது.  இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்களும் அவர்களின் தோழர்களும் எதுவித யுத்தமும் செய்யாமல் இரத்தம் சிந்தாமல் மக்காவிற்குள் நுழைந்தார்கள். கஃபதுல்லாஹ்வில் அபயமடைந்தவர்களுக்கும் மக்காவில் வீட்டிலிருந்தவர்களுக்கும் பாதுகாப்பும் உயிர் உரிமையும் உத்தரவாதம் வழங்கப்படுமென இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்கள் பகிரங்க அறிவித்தல் விடுத்தார்கள்.
ஓப்பந்தத்தின் அடிப்படையிலும், தேச வழமைச் சட்டத்தின் அடிப்படையிலும் மக்கத்து முஷ்ரிகுகளை அணியாக நிறுத்தி அவர்களின் குற்றச் செயல்களின் பட்டியலடிப்படையில் சிரச்தேசம் செய்து கொள்ள வாய்ப்பளிக்கப்பட்டிருந்தது. முஸ்லிம்கள் அனுபவித்த வேதனைகளுக்கும் சித்திரவதைகளுக்கும் பழிவாங்கும் சந்தர்ப்பம் வாய்த்திருந்த போதும், இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்கள்; பழிவாங்கல்களுக்கும்  இரத்தம் சிந்துவதற்கும் பதிலாக மன்னிப்பைத் தேர்ந்தெடுத்தார்கள். 

ஆனால் இன்று இராக்கில் நடப்பது என்ன?  தங்களைத் தாங்களே ISIS என நாமம் சூட்டிக் கொண்டும் இராக்கில் நடத்தி வரும் பயங்கரவாதம் முற்று முழுதாக அப்பாவி மக்களை சுட்டுக் கொலை செய்யும் இந்த ISIS இற்கும் அதன் தலைவர்களுக்கும் மனித உயிரின் புனிதத்துவம் புரியவில்லை.
மிகவும் பெறுமதியான எண்ணக் கருக்களான ஜிஹாத், இஸ்லாமிய அரசு என்பனவற்றை கொச்சைப்படுத்தி தப்பர்த்தம் கற்பிக்கின்றனர். 

மனித படுகொலைகள், சரணடைந்த போர் வீரர்களை படுகொலை செய்தல் இந்த ISIS இன் கையெழுத்துக்களின் குறியீடுகளாக மாறிவிடுகின்றன. இவர்கள் தான் இஸ்லாமிய கிலாபத்தை நிறுவபாடுபடுவதாக தம்பட்டமடித்து கொள்கின்றனர். கலீமாவை பொறித்த கொடியினை ஏந்திக் கொண்டு அதன் பின் அணிதிரண்டுள்ள வாழ்வில் வெறுப்படைந்த முஸ்லிம் இளைஞர்கள் இவர்களின் இஸ்லாத்தைப் பற்றிய குறைமதியும், இஸ்லாத்திற்கெதிரான ஆட்சியாளர்களுடனான கூட்டிணைப்பும் அவர்களின் உண்மையான நிகழ்ச்சித் திட்டத்தை அம்பலப்படுத்துகின்றது. இவர்கள் முஸ்லிம் உலகின் அல்லது வெளியே உள்ளவர்களின் -பிசாசுகளின்- கைக்கூலிகளே தவிர வேறு யாருமில்லை. 

கொடுங்கோல் முடியரசுகளுடன் கூட்டுச்சேர்வதாலோ கீழத்தேய சியோனிசச் சக்திகளுடன் கூட்டிணைவதாலோ  இஸ்லாமிய கிலாபத்தை நிறுவி விட முடியாது. இது இஸ்லாத்திற்கு முற்றிலும் முரண்பாடான நடவடிக்கையாகும். 

சஊதி அரேபியா, கட்டார், குவைத் போன்ற ஆட்சியாளர்கள் உண்மையில் இஸ்லாமிய ஆட்சியை நிறுவ விரும்பினால் அவர்களின் நாடுகளை அந்த நல்ல பணியின் ஆரம்பதலங்களாக- முன்மாதிரியாக அமைத்துக் கொள்ளலாம். நேர்மை, நீதி என்வபற்றிக்கான கூக்குரல் அந்நாட்டில் ஒலிக்கின்ற போது ஊழல்களுக்கு எதிரான ஒரு முற்றுப் புள்ளியாக இஸ்லாமிய அரசை நிறுவுவதற்கான கோஷம் மாற்றத்தை உண்டாக்கும். 

மட்டமான இஸ்லாமிய அறிவைக் கொண்ட ஒரு முஸ்லிம் கூட குர்ஆன், இறைத்தூதர் (ஸல்) அவர்கள் ஆதரவு வழங்காத, வழங்கமுடியாத, நியாயப்படுத்தமுடியாத ISIS இன் காட்டுமிராண்டிதனமான கொடுஞ் செயல்களை எவ்வாறு நியாயப்படுத்த முடியும்.? இஸ்லாமிய அரசு அப்

பாவி மக்களின் எலும்புக் கூடுகளின் மீது நிறுவப்படுவதல்ல. அவர்களின் இரத்த வெள்ளத்திலே இஸ்லாமிய அரசை ஓட்டி விடவும் முடியாது. இந்த விதியின் கீழேதான் கீழைத்தேயவாதிகளினதும் சியோனிஸ்ட்களினதும் அரசுகள் நிறுவப்படுவதை நாம் வரலாற்று நெடுகிலும் கண்டு வருகின்றோம். 

எனவே இஸ்லாத்தின் முக்கியமான எண்ணக் கருக்களை கடத்திச் செல்வதற்கு வழிபிறழ்ந்த இந்த ISIS கூட்டத்தினருக்கு முஸ்லிம்கள் அனுமதி வழங்க முடியாது. அவர்களுடன் எவ்வித சமரச போக்கையும் கைக்கொள்ள முடியாது.
எனவே ISIS என்ற தீவிரவாத இயக்கம் இஸ்லாமிய சாயம் பூசப்பட்ட அமெரிக்க இஸ்ரவேலின்; கூட்டுக் கலவை. இது இஸ்லாத்தின் பெயரில் இஸ்லாத்தையும் இஸ்லாமிய விழுமியங்களையும் இல்லாதொழித்து முஸ்லிம்களை அழித்தொழிப்பதற்காக புறப்பட்டுள்ள இயக்கம். இவ்வியக்கம் நீண்டகாலம் நிலைத்து நிற்கப் போவதில்லை. இருப்பினும் இதன் செயற்பாடுகள் இஸ்லாத்திற்கு பாரிய தாக்கத்தை ஏற்படுத்துகிறது. இதனை தெளிவாக அடையாளம் காண்பது முஸ்லிமான ஒவ்வொருவரினதும் தலையாய கடமையாகும். 

Professor Ilan Pappé: Israel Has Chosen to be a "Racist Apartheid State" with U.S. Support

Access the following URL for video report. http://www.democracynow.org/2014/7/28/professor_ilan_pappe_israel_has_chosen

As the Palestinian death toll tops 1,000 in Gaza, we are joined from Haifa by Israeli professor and historian Ilan Pappé. "I think Israel in 2014 made a decision that it prefers to be a racist apartheid state and not a democracy," Pappé says. "It still hopes that the United States will license this decision and provide it with the immunity to continue, with the necessary implication of such a policy vis-à-vis the Palestinians wherever they are." A professor of history and the director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter, Pappé is the author of several books, including most recently, "The Idea of Israel: A History of Power and Knowledge." TRANSCRIPT This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form. AMY GOODMAN: As we continue our coverage of the crisis in Gaza, we go to Haifa, Israel, to speak with Ilan Pappé, a professor of history and the director of the European Centre for Palestine Studies at the University of Exeter in Britain. He’s the author of a number of books, including, most recently, The Idea of Israel: A History of Power and Knowledge, joining us by Democracy Now!video stream from Haifa. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Professor Pappé. At this point, over a thousand Palestinians have been killed, as well, I believe the number is 45 Israeli soldiers, and three civilians have been killed in Israel. Can you talk about the latest negotiations over a ceasefire and what you think needs to happen? ILAN PAPPÉ: It’s good to be on your show, Amy. There is no sign for a ceasefire on the ground itself. And there are sort of two competing initiatives still going on: The Egyptian-Israeli initiative that actually wants to dictate to the Hamas a return to the status quo and sort of marginalize and disregard everything that Hamas was fighting for, and there is a more serious effort that the secretary of state was trying to push forward, John Kerry, with the help of the Qataris and the Turks, to try and address at least some of the issues that are at the heart of this present wave of violence. But so far, none of the two has affected the reality on the ground, apart from a certain lull in the last few hours compared to the last 20 days. AMY GOODMAN: There were protests in Tel Aviv. How many people came out at those protests, as well as Haifa this weekend? Were you there at the protest in Haifa, Professor Pappé? ILAN PAPPÉ: Yes, yes, I was. Haifa, there were about 700 people. In Tel Aviv, there were 3,000. I should say that, of course, a large number of the protesters are Palestinian citizens of Israel. So the number of Israeli Jews who are courageous enough to come out and demonstrate is even smaller than these numbers indicate. And they were met by a very vicious reaction both from right-wing demonstrators and very harsh—and were harshly treated by the police. AMY GOODMAN: What do you think it’s most important for people to understand about the conflict? ILAN PAPPÉ: I think the most important thing is the historical context. When you listen to mainstream media coverage of the situation in Gaza, you get the impression that it all starts with an unreasonable launching of rockets into Israel by the Hamas. And two very basic historical kind of backgrounds are being missed. The very immediate one goes back to June this year, when Israel decided, by force, to try and demolish the Hamas politically in the West Bank and foil the attempts of the unity government of Palestine to push forward an international campaign to bring Israel to justice on the basis of the agenda of human rights and civil rights. And the deeper historical context is the fact that ever since 2005, the Gaza Strip is being—or people in the Gaza Strip are being incarcerated as criminals, and their only crime is that they are Palestinians in a geopolitical location that Israel doesn’t know how to deal with. And when they elected democratically someone who was vowed to struggle against this ghettoizing or this siege, Israel reacted with all its force. So, this sort of wider historical context, that would explain to people that it is a desperate attempt to get out of the situation that your previous interviewee was talking about, is at the heart of the issue, and therefore it is soluble. One can solve this situation by lifting the siege, by allowing the people of Gaza to be connected with their brothers and sisters in the West Bank, and by allowing them to be connected to the world and not to live under circumstances that no one else in the world seems to experience at this moment in time. AMY GOODMAN: Professor Pappé, over the weekend, BBC correspondent Jon Donnison reported on what was called an Israeli admission that Hamas was not responsible for the killing of the three Israeli teenagers in the West Bank in June. On Twitter, Donnison said Israeli police spokesperson Micky Rosenfeld told him the suspects who killed the three teenagers were a lone cell affiliated with Hamas but not operating under its leadership. What is the significance of this? ILAN PAPPÉ: It’s very significant, because this was, of course, known to the Israelis the moment they heard about this abduction and the killing of the three young settlers. It was very clear that Israel was looking for a pretext to try and launch both a military operation in the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip in order to try and bring back the situation in Palestine to what it was during the failed peace process, with a sort of good domicile, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, in a way that they could forget about it and continue with the colonization of the West Bank without the need to change anything in their attitude or policies. And the depression in the West Bank, the frustration, the anger, especially in May 2014, of the killing of five young Palestinians by the Israeli army, burst out in this local action, this local initiative, that had nothing to do with the strategy of the Hamas, that was willing to try and give Abu Mazen leeway to create a unity government and to try the new initiative—going to the United Nations, going to international bodies, in order to make Israel accountable for more than 46 years of colonization and occupation. So it really highlights the connection between a pretext and a policy and a strategy which has wreaked such carnage in Gaza today. AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Professor Pappé, you worked in Israel for years as a professor. You left Israel and now teach at the University of Exeter in Britain. You’ve returned to Haifa. Do you see a change in your country? ILAN PAPPÉ: Yes, unfortunately, a change for the worse. I think the Israel is at a crossroad, but it has already made its decision which way it is going from this junction. It was in a junction where it had to decide finally whether it wants to be a democracy or to be a racist and apartheid state, given the realities on the ground. I think Israel, in 2014, made a decision that it prefers to be a racist apartheid state and not a democracy, and it still hopes that the United States would license this decision and provide it with the immunity to continue with the necessary implication of such a policy vis-à-vis the Palestinians, wherever they are. AMY GOODMAN: What do you think the U.S. should do? ILAN PAPPÉ: Well, the U.S. should apply the basic definitions of democracy to Israel and recognize that it is giving, it’s providing an unconditional support for a regime that systematically abuses the human rights and the civil rights of anyone who is not a Jew between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean. If America wants clearly to support such regimes—it had done it in the past—that’s OK. But if it feels that it wants to send a different message to the Middle East, then it really has a different agenda of human rights— AMY GOODMAN: We have two seconds. ILAN PAPPÉ: Yeah, human rights and civil rights in Palestine.

Attack on Gaza by Saudi Royal Appointment

Why do Saudi Arabia and Israel make such comfortable bedfellows? For decades each country has had a similar feeling in their gut when they look around them: fear. Their reaction was similar. Each felt they could only insure themselves against their neighbors by invading them (Lebanon, Yemen) or by funding proxy wars and coups (Syria, Egypt, Libya).They have enemies or rivals in common – Iran, Turkey, Qatar, Hamas in Gaza, and the Muslim Brotherhood. And they have common allies, too – the US and British military industrial establishments, Fatah strongman and US asset Mohammed Dahlan who tried to take over Gaza once, and will probably be at hand when next required. By David Hearst There are many hands behind the Israeli army’s onslaught on Gaza. America is not unhappy that Hamas is getting such a beating. As footage of the scenes of carnage on the streets of Shejaiya was coming through, John Kerry said on NBC’s Meet the Presson Sunday that Israel had every right to defend itself and the US ambassador Dan Shapiro told Israel’s Channel 2 news that the US would seek to help moderate forces become stronger in Gaza, meaning the Palestinian Authority. Nor is Egypt overcome with grief. Its foreign minister Sameh Shoukry held Hamas responsible for civilian deaths after their rejection of the ceasefire. Neither matter to Netanyahu as much as the third undeclared partner in this unholy alliance, for neither on their own could give him the cover he needs for a military operation of this ferocity. And that can come not from a handwringing but impotent parent like the US. Such permission can only come from a brother Arab. The attack on Gaza comes by Saudi Royal Appointment. This royal warrant is nothing less than an open secret in Israel, and both former and serving defense officials are relaxed when they talk about it. Former Israeli defense minister Shaul Mofaz surprised the presenter on Channel 10 by saying Israel had to specify a role for Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in the demilitarization of Hamas. Asked what he meant by that, he added that Saudi and Emirati funds should be used to rebuild Gaza after Hamas had been defanged. Amos Gilad, the Israeli defense establishment’s point man with Mubarak’s Egypt and now director of the Israeli defense ministry’s policy and political-military relations department told the academic James Dorsey recently : “Everything is underground, nothing is public. But our security cooperation with Egypt and the Gulf states is unique. This is the best period of security and diplomatic relations with the Arab.” The celebration is mutual. King Abdullah let it be known that he had phoned President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi to approve of an Egyptian ceasefire initiative which had not been put to Hamas, and had the Jerusalem Post quoting analysts about whether a ceasefire was ever seriously intended. Mossad and Saudi intelligence officials meet regularly: The two sides conferred when the former Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi was about to be deposed in Egypt and they are hand in glove on Iran, both in preparing for an Israel strike over Saudi airspace and in sabotaging the existing nuclear program. There has even been a well sourced claim that the Saudis are financing most of Israel’s very expensive campaign against Iran. Why do Saudi Arabia and Israel make such comfortable bedfellows? For decades each country has had a similar feeling in their gut when they look around them: fear. Their reaction was similar. Each felt they could only insure themselves against their neighbors by invading them (Lebanon, Yemen) or by funding proxy wars and coups (Syria, Egypt, Libya).They have enemies or rivals in common – Iran, Turkey, Qatar, Hamas in Gaza, and the Muslim Brotherhood. And they have common allies, too – the US and British military industrial establishments, Fatah strongman and US asset Mohammed Dahlan who tried to take over Gaza once, and will probably be at hand when next required. The difference today is that for the first time in their two countries’ history, there is open co-ordination between the two military powers. Abdullah’s nephew Prince Turki has been the public face of this rapprochement, which was first signaled by the Saudi publication of a book by an Israeli academic. The prince flew to Brussels in May to meet General Amos Yadlin, the former intelligence chief who has been indicted by a court in Turkey for his role in the storming of the Mavi Marmara. It could be argued that there is nothing sinister about Prince Turki’s wish to overcome ancient taboos that his motives are both peaceful and laudable. The prince is a staunch supporter of a laudable peace initiative proposed by the Saudi King Abdullah. The Arab Peace Initiative supported by 22 Arab States and 56 Muslim countries would indeed have been a basis for peace had Israel not ignored it some 12 years ago. Prince Turki waxed lyrical about the prospect of peace in an article published by Haaretz. In it he wrote: And what a pleasure it would be to be able to invite not just the Palestinians but also the Israelis I would meet to come and visit me in Riyadh, where they can visit my ancestral home in Dir’iyyah, which suffered at the hands of Ibrahim Pasha the same fate as Jerusalem did at the hands of Nebuchadnezzar and the Romans. Its the means, not the end, which expose the true cost of this alliance. Prince Turki’s promotion of the Arab Peace Initiative comes at the cost of abandoning the kingdom’s historical support of Palestinian resistance. The well connected Saudi analyst Jamal Khashogji made this very point when he talked in coded language about the number of intellectuals who attack the notion of resistance: Regrettably, the number of such intellectuals here in Saudi Arabia is higher than average. If such a trend continues it will destroy the kingdom’s honorable claim to support and defend the Palestinian cause since the time of its founder, King Abd Al-Aziz Al-Saud. Peace would indeed be welcome to everyone, not least Gaza at the moment. The means by which Israel’s allies in Saudi Arabia and Egypt are going about achieving it, by encouraging Israel to deal Hamas a crippling blow, calls into question what is really going on here. Turki’s father King Faisal bin Abdulaziz would be turning in his grave at what the son is putting his name to. This Saudi Israeli alliance is forged in blood, Palestinian blood, the blood on Sunday of over 100 souls in Shejaiya. Huffington Post

Why House of Saud fears/hates Iran

Saudi spy chief Prince Bandar bin Sultan 

By Finian Cunningham

In countless media interviews and statements, it is clear that the Saudi rulers have an abiding obsession with Iran - an obsession that betrays an intense fear and hatred.

Senior members of the House of Saud have let it be known that their real focus in Syria, for example, is not primarily the government of Bashar al Assad, and their desire for regime change, but rather the main target is Assad's closest regional ally - Iran.

Everywhere in the region, the paranoid House of Saud sees the hand of Iran. In an oped piece in the New York Times in December, the Saudi Ambassador to Britain, Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdulaziz al Saud, accused Iran without any evidence, saying that it "has financed and trained militias in Iraq, Hezbollah terrorists in Lebanon and militants in Yemen and Bahrain." This is, of course, ironically crass, coming from the House of Saud, which is provably the sponsor of terrorists or terror regimes, such as the al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al Nusra in Syria, ISIS in Iraq and the ruling Al Khalifa despots in Bahrain.

But the main point here is that Saudi Arabia, or at least its rulers led by the aging King Abdullah, is transfixed in animosity towards Iran. That obsession is driven by a visceral hatred. Why?

The short answer is self-preservation. But there are at least three specific reasons for this hatred, and they are inter-related.

The first is religious. The official religion of Saudi Arabia is Wahhabism. In this extreme deformation, Shia Islam is viewed as an intolerable apostasy. It is not just Shia that are perceived as "infidels". All forms of Muslim faith, including Sunnis, as well as Christians and other religions, that are deemed to not conform with the Wahhabi fundamentalist doctrine are considered infidels and are subject to merciless attack, even to the point of death.

In the warped Wahhabi belief Shia Muslims are the worst kind of "infidels". This explains why Shia and the closely related Alawite are subject to the most barbaric forms of violence in the Syrian conflict, where the anti-Syrian government militants are mainly driven by Wahhabi ideology - also known as Takfiris.

For historical reasons, Iran is the centre of Shia Islam in the region and the world. Iran therefore qualifies as the centre of Saudi hatred.

The second factor goes back to the Islamic Revolution in Iran. When the Iranian revolution succeeded in 1979 to kick out the US-backed dictator, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, that turmoil threatened all autocratic rulers in the region from the inspirational impact it conveyed to other populations to rise up against oppressive regimes. The House of Saud felt particularly threatened. That is why the Saudi rulers responded immediately by setting up the Persian Gulf Defense pact in the early 1980s, which comprised the other monarchies of Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Oman.

Indeed, the Saudi rulers' hatred of Iran has only intensified since the Iranian revolution. The House of Saud views Iran's demonstratively more democratic credentials as a mortal threat to its despotism. The more Iran's political influence grows in the region, the more the Saudi rulers fear an existential threat. This explains the paranoid mindset of the House of Saud towards Iran, as expressed by its ambassador to Britain cited above, which suspects that Iranian subversion is everywhere, even when it isn't.

The third factor is more mundane, but perhaps is the ultimate concern for the House of Saud - the vital issue of oil and gas economics.

Of the 12 OPEC member states, the top three producers are Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran. Of most significance is Iran's enormous gas wealth, which is as yet hardly tapped as an economic resource. Natural gas is the fuel of the future for the next century, being more efficient as an energy source in terms of transport via pipelines and in terms of calorific output. Environmentally, natural gas is a much cleaner fuel than oil, giving off much less harmful byproducts from combustion.

Iran is reckoned to hold the largest known reserves of natural gas on Earth in its Pars Field. If Iran's international relations were normalized by the removal of trade sanctions, the country stands to become an even more formidable global source of energy. Of particular strategic importance is the European market for which Iran would be a top supplier, along with Russia (a non-OPEC member).

This development, which has an inexorable trajectory owing to irrepressible human need, is seen by the House of Saud as an imperative threat. Saudi Arabia is endowed with oil, but much less so with natural gas. Saudi strategic value as an energy producer is therefore on the wane, whereas Iran is bound to grow owing to its vast natural gas deposits.

At all costs, from the Saudi point of view, Iran must be prevented from developing its potential energy wealth. Saudi Arabia is living on borrowed time. Its oil reserves will eventually be surpassed by Iran's gas riches. Already, the Saudi rulers are sitting atop a demographic time bomb of an increasing and unemployed youth population, which so far has been placated with state fiscal handouts from its oil exports. The days for those handouts are numbered.

What will happen when Saudi's oil economy goes into demise, and is sidelined with the new global energy economy of natural gas in which Iran is a leading nation? That will translate into greater Iranian political influence in the region and a diminishing hold on power by the sclerotic Saudi autocrats.

The political and economic fate of the United States is closely tied to the Saudi petrodollar economy and that of the other Persian Gulf monarchies. The bankrupt American dollar is already largely on life-support due to the Saudis and their related sheikhdoms dealing in the commodity with the greenback and funneling profits into the US Treasury, propping up the dollar.

If Iran were to develop to its full potential, trade in oil and more importantly natural gas would most likely be denominated in Euro, Ruble, Yen or Yuan. That is a doomsday scenario for the US dollar and its long overdue collapse.

Ultimately, Washington shares the intense antipathy of the House of Saud towards Iran's unfettered political and economic freedom. Not for arcane Wahhabi reasons, but for vital economic self-preservation. Hence, the sharp rebuke from Washington this week when a French business delegation visited Iran to explore possible partnerships. US Secretary of State John Kerry reportedly phoned his French counterpart Laurent Fabius in a panic to protest at the delegation. The last thing the Americans want to see is Iran doing independent trade with Europe without the dollar.

The Saudi despots and their American patrons cannot afford Iranian development as an economic power. That directly threatens the House of Saud, politically and economically, which in turn threatens Washington to its very core.

For all of the above reasons, the Saudi rulers fear Iran above all else. The Zionist Israeli regime and its desecration of Islamic sanctities in East Al Quds (Jerusalem) does not even raise a single heckle for the Al Saud - the self-proclaimed Custodians of Islam. Their only fear and hatred are expressed in waging covert war against Iran and its allies, including Syria and the people of Bahrain, Iraq, Yemen and anywhere else. They want Iran contained, thwarted, sanctioned at all costs, and Washington by geopolitical necessity is on the Saudi side.

But as the tectonic plates of global energy needs shift inexorably over the coming decades, the Saudi rulers and their American patrons will find themselves on the losing side. In a very real way, this spells death to al Saud and the American Empire. Hence, the hatred.

Finian Cunningham (born 1963) has written extensively on international affairs, with articles published in several languages. He is a Master’s graduate in Agricultural Chemistry and worked as a scientific editor for the Royal Society of Chemistry, Cambridge, England, before pursuing a career in journalism. He is also a musician and songwriter. For nearly 20 years, he worked as an editor and writer in major news media organisations, including The Mirror, Irish Times and Independent. Originally from Belfast, Ireland, he is now located in East Africa as a freelance journalist, where he is writing a book on Bahrain and the Arab Spring, based on eyewitness experience working in the Persian Gulf as an editor of a business magazine and subsequently as a freelance news correspondent. The author was deported from Bahrain in June 2011 because of his critical journalism in which he highlighted systematic human rights violations by regime forces. He is now a columnist on international politics for Press TV and the Strategic Culture Foundation.

Palestinian Peace Talks – How to Fail without Really Trying

  Jim Dean

“The American peace initiative has ground to a halt. The full truth about it can and must now be told. It was doomed to failure before it even started. There was not the slightest chance of its bearing fruit.” – Uri Avnery, Israeli peace activist, ex-Irgun and Knesett member

The Palestinian peace talks concluded with their expected end… a dead one. The reasons are many, but mainly fall into the historical negotiation record where failure really was the goal, and then the planned smokescreen reasons particular to this round of talks.

First up is why should the Israelis want peace when the never-ending “no peace” situation has been such a gold mine for them? The list of benefits is too long to cover here so I will just mention a few highlights. One of the constant glues holding the Israeli multiparty fractious political system together is the age-old outside enemy, which keeps them all on the plantation so to speak.

The Knesset is legendary for its infighting and nasty debates, which international media has bent over backwards not to publicize all the nasty names used by Jews against Jews. It got so bad that years ago they had to literally compile an official list of nasty names that could not be used during debates. It is buried on an old hard drive somewhere, but I distinctly remember it reading like an encyclopedia of nasty name calling, quite humorous really.

With peace would come the lessening of security tensions in the Mideast, where Israel is by far the biggest threat. The Israeli would have to start saying goodbye to all the US money that has kept the failed socialist state afloat with its various underclasses.

In the US we have some in jail, those administering the funds, for taking bribes for accepting false applications, and I mean a lot of them… something in the 5000 range. Their attitude was “the more the merrier.”

US money comes to Israel in multiple ways, starting with the public amount that is published every year, which Israel never has to account for how it was spent. And then there is the lesser known back door funding right out of the Pentagon budget.

This includes goodies like the Army Corps of Engineers having chipped in to build the big confinement cage for the Gazans, and the huge, nuclear-hardened underground command centers on the scale of what we have here. Americans would riot if they knew the true amount over the years… tens of billions. Do the militant Israelis want to say goodbye to that? No way.

And last, there is that little problem of the Israelis being the biggest WMD depot in the Mideast. They know that with peace would come much stronger pressure to turn over all of those stockpiles to international supervision. Iran is out in front of this issue by calling for the entire region to do so, with no free pass for Israel.

I have also been astounded how there has not been a peep from anyone about the Israelis’ joint ICBM program with India to build five warhead MIRV’d rockets that can hit anywhere from China and Russia to the US. I wonder who is helping to pay the tab for that?

The Kerry leadership of the talks was a disaster from the start, beginning with the choice of Martin Indyk as the negotiations coordinator. He was an old AIPAC employee, and like they used to say with the Italian Mafia… you are in it for life. So the US Israel Lobby, doing all they could to defeat Obama’s Mideast peace efforts, had a seat at the table with one of their most obvious agents. This was an open display of their power, despite Obama giving them the stiff arm on their wanting to wreck the Iran talks.

Kerry was angry with the Israelis, but that was the expected cover story. Any intelligent person knows that the Israelis will not make peace until forced to do so. The Likud party running the government knew that Washington would never use the sanctions card on Israel. Congress and AIPAC would have any president blocked on that. I won’t say the Jewish Lobby has America totally compromised, but I will say “very compromised”. And that includes their massive espionage operations here with our Congress at the top of the target list.

The final talks-killer was Netanyahu’s refusing to release the last batch of prisoners previously agreed upon. This was a dual lightening rod. The first part being how large the ex-prisoner constituency is among the Palestinians, its biggest fraternity. The numbers are close to 40% of the men having been imprisoned, about 800,000.

They have their own multiparty government inside the prison system and join a tight community when released, despite the harsh restrictions on their not engaging in any political activism. The purpose is to neuter them politically. Recently near Ramallah, 38 people were arrested for collecting money to help build a house for a PFLP member’s widow.

Two of the tightest bonds I know of among men is those who have been in a lot of combat together, and those who have survived harsh imprisonment, especially where torture was routine as it was in Israel. Netanyahu knew he could hold back the prisoner release card and cause the Palestinians to walk out of proposed talks.

Kerry knew it, too. So what did he do about it? He used the “A” word on the Israelis… apartheid, and we know how the Israelis like to control the vocabulary, as a display of power. And Kerry had been mentioning all along that the boycott pressure would increase with no peace agreement, and it will. The Israelis obviously considered the boycott to be the lesser of two evils, as they still have the US on the hook for the ten-year advance funding agreement that was George Bush’s going away present to them.

But when it came to punishing Abbas for not accepting political suicide, the sanctions card was played immediately with the threat of US funding cut offs for the PA. And no, the hypocrisy of that did not embarrass the US State Department in the slightest. It is top heavy with dual Israeli-American citizens.

The Palestinian Authority had anticipated the Israeli move. They went ahead with their UN membership requests, which will include access to the international legal forums to pursue the numerous Israelis participating in war crimes and crimes against humanity. I hope to see those trials in my lifetime.

The second motivation for the Israelis to kill the talks by reneging on the prisoner release was having the PA make up with Hamas to form a coalition government. Much fanfare was made of this in the media when it was announced, but it is a task easier discussed than done, as power sharing in any Mideast country is like tightrope walking on a windy day.

Left out of the coverage about the talks breakdown was something so obvious that I found hard to believe it could have been purposefully overlooked. And that is, how can anyone continue investing in a peace negotiation, which requires confidence that the other party will live up to its terms, when that party is already in breech of their agreements made before going into the talks? How stupid would that investment be?

It is mind boggling this was not front-page news. Could the reason be that the Israel-friendly corporate media does not want to publicize the track record of Israel not living up to agreements any time it wants, simply by “reinterpreting” them? This is the elephant sitting in the living room, which everyone pretends not to smell.

In closing, there is another “don’t even go there” aspect that everyone seems afraid to discuss publicly. And that is the large oil and gas reserves off the coast of Gaza, which could be a Mother Earth’s monetary reparations fund for the inestimable economic devastation inflicted on the Palestinians for 66 years.

If such a thing had been inflicted on Jews anywhere on the planet, they would have had worldwide support for reparations. So what remains to be answered is who is going to pay the Palestinian reparations? I don’t mean just the Israeli Jews. Those who aided and abetted them, like the American Christian ones — who give more money to Israel every year than American Jews do — have directly funded the crimes against the Palestinians.

For the CZ’s, this includes the persecution of the Christian Palestinians, the “living stones” of Christianity whose numbers have dwindled from 20% of the population down to 2%. This has been an ethnic cleansing so shameful that hardly anyone dares mention it.

But I mention it because I hold these actions in utter contempt. One of the great benefits of independent journalism is that we get to tell folks exactly how we feel. It is a wonderful freedom that is worth all the struggles that accompany this work. And I will keep doing it until my last breath.

Jim W. Dean, managing editor for Veteran Today, producer/host of Heritage TV Atlanta, specially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

Saudi Arabia’s approach to terrorism, hypocritical

File photo shows Saudi-backed militants in Syria.

By Dr. Kevin Barrett

On Friday, the government of Saudi Arabia listed five groups as "terrorist organizations." Two of those groups – Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) – actually are terrorist organizations. They have engaged in a policy of indiscriminate killing, including targeting civilians, in Syria.

The odd thing is that the Saudi government has long been the main supporter of both groups! 

Now, by royal decree, any Saudi citizen fighting abroad must return within two weeks, on pain of imprisonment. And any member of Jabhat al-Nusra or ISIL faces 20 years in prison.

The first Saudi who ought to go to prison is Prince Bandar Bin Sultan, former head of Saudi Intelligence "Bandar Bush," as he is affectionately known in American organized crime circles, ran the main conduit of arms to the terrorists until he was relieved of his Syria duties two weeks ago.

Bandar should be arrested and charged in connection with the false-flag chemical weapons attack in al-Ghouta last August. The whole Obama Administration, along with several top Israeli leaders, should be also arrested as suspected accessories.

But the Saudi government is hardly in a position to prosecute terrorists. If laws against terrorism were enforced in the kingdom, the whole Saudi elite would have to go to jail.

Come to think of it, that might not be such a bad idea.

The new Saudi "anti-terror" move is a virtual admission of defeat in Syria. By firing Bandar, and then outlawing Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIL, the Saudis apparently have given up on overthrowing the Syrian government. Saudi withdrawal from Syria may help open the door for a diplomatic solution.

But will the Saudis really stop funding Syrian terrorists? Or is the new Saudi "war on terror" merely cosmetic?

One indication that the new Saudi "anti-terror" policy is phony: Three of the alleged "terrorist" organizations banned by the Saudis are not really terrorists at all.

There is no evidence that the Muslim Brotherhood, Saudi Hizbollah, or the Yemeni Houthis have a policy of indiscriminate violence or attacks on civilians. The Saudi claim that these groups are "terrorists" is a self-serving lie.

Saudi Hizbollah has been blamed for attacks on property and on occupation forces. But even if these disputed claims are true, it has never engaged in indiscriminate attacks on civilians.

The Houthis in Yemen, likewise, do not engage in indiscriminate violence or attacks on civilians. The Takfiris they oppose, not the Houthis themselves, deserve the terrorist label.

But of all the hypocritical aspects of Saudi Arabia's anti-terror proclamation, the most outrageous is the claim that the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is a terrorist group. The MB, by far the biggest international Islamic organization, does not even have an armed militia. Since the 1970s, its official policy has been strictly non-violent activism. Even the MB's Western enemies, who consider virtually all Muslims as likely terrorists, concede that the Brotherhood has followed a policy of non-violence for decades.

Tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of peaceful Muslim Brotherhood activists have disappeared and been tortured in Egypt during the decades of vicious repression by the Zionist-backed Mubarak and al-Sisi dictatorships.

Will Saudi Arabia follow Egypt's lead and begin disappearing and torturing Muslim Brotherhood activists and intellectuals?

The new wave of persecution should concentrate the minds of MB leaders. They ought to reconsider the organization's alliances and methods.

While ostensibly non-sectarian and pan-Islamic, the Muslim Brotherhood has been strongly influenced by Salafism, a puritanical, intolerant, politically-quietist strain of Islam. Saudi money has promoted Salafism in the MB. Mohamed Morsi, Egypt's first-ever democratically-elected president and still its legitimate leader, was hamstrung by the need to placate the Saudi-funded Egyptian Salafis.

Now that Saudi Arabia is turning against the MB, perhaps the Brotherhood will escape the Salafi influence and become a genuine brotherhood of all Muslims – and a promoter of brotherhood between Muslims and all mankind. A good first step would be for the MB to launch a global campaign against sectarian violence. By demonstrating and speaking out against sectarian violence not just in Syria, but also in Yemen, Iraq, Nigeria, Myanmar, and elsewhere – and intensifying its opposition to the genocidal persecution of non-Zionist people in Palestine – the MB could gain support from progressive forces around the world.

The MB needs to learn how to build bridges among people of good will, beginning with Muslims of different orientations, and then reaching out to include justice-seeking non-Muslims. What Gandhi said of "Western Civilization" is also true of Muslim Brotherhood: It would be a good idea.

The MB should intensify its dedication to social justice, and reconsider its traditional policy of cooperation with oppressors – not just Saudis but also Western governments. The Saudis and the West are in bed with the Zionists. The MB needs to preserve its integrity and independence; it must not allow itself to be bought.

The ridiculous Saudi assertion that the MB is a "terrorist" group could turn out to be the best thing that ever happened to the Brotherhood. It could wean the group of Saudi government money and influence once and for all.

The Saudi turn against the MB could create a new set of alliances in the Middle East. On one side, the house of Zionism, Takfiri fanaticism, social injustice, dictatorship, and submission to empire: Israel, Saudi Arabia, and their acolytes. On the other side, the house of anti-Zionism, anti-imperialism, democracy, social justice, and inclusive Islam: Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas, a more inclusive Muslim Brotherhood...a newer and broader "Axis of Resistance" that could spread across the region as it gradually democratizes and wins genuine independence.

When that happens, the Saudi and Zionist regimes will be tossed in the proverbial dustbin of history, and remembered as the two biggest sources of terrorism in the region since the Mongol invasion.

KB/SS

Dr. Kevin Barrett, a Ph.D. Arabist-Islamologist, is one of America's best-known critics of the War on Terror. Dr. Barrett has appeared many times on Fox, CNN, PBS and other broadcast outlets, and has inspired feature stories and op-eds in the New York Times, the Christian Science Monitor, the Chicago Tribune, and other leading publications. Dr. Barrett has taught at colleges and universities in San Francisco, Paris, and Wisconsin, where he ran for Congress in 2008. He is the co-founder of the Muslim-Christian-Jewish Alliance, and author of the books Truth Jihad: My Epic Struggle Against the 9/11 Big Lie (2007) and Questioning the War on Terror: A Primer for Obama Voters (2009).