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27 June 2012

Arab Spring model not a Syrian reality
Published in The Drum, ABC On Line, 28 June 2012

Foreign Minister Bob Carr has adopted a pre-emptive and partisan position on the Syrian situation.

This may not reflect the will of the majority of Syrian citizens, nor the good will of the UN Special Envoy Kofi Annan, nor indeed the majority of Australian citizens of Syrian descent.
Rather than being peacemakers in a polarized situation, Carr has cornered Australia into a position of a provocateur.

After the al Houla infanticide on May 29, he jumped the gun and expelled the Syrian diplomats, long before the UN investigated the facts. This week, he has ramped up the anti-Syrian sanctions, which are largely tokenistic given the minimal trade between the two countries.

He challenges Russian president Vladimir Putin to put ‘pressure on Assad to walk off the stage’. Knowing that Russia supplies arms to Syria, why not also put pressure on the US-Saudi-Qatar axis to stop supplying arms to the fractured opposition groups? This way, his efforts to demilitarise the conflict and help bring the parties to the UN negotiating table can be taken more seriously.

On March 21, 2001, the Syrian revolution was heralded with graffiti by unarmed teenagers in Dara’a, ‘the people want the regime to fall’, a copycat mantra inspired by the Arab Spring in North Africa. This ember that drifted into Syria was swiftly snuffed by the local authoritarian guard and the youth were imprisoned. The Syrian president squandered a historic opportunity to listen to the grievances of these sons of Syria. He could have orchestrated a political evolution instead of a bloody revolution. He could have morally disarmed the opposition, both exiled and resident.

President Assad misread all the writing on the wall, and believed that he was immune from this social tsunami sweeping across the Arab region. Two months before this trigger, he declared that ‘Syria is stable’ because he was ‘very closely linked to the beliefs of the people’. In his March 30 speech to parliament, he could have opened serious dialogue to harness the angst rather than peddling conspiracy theories. Instead, he wrote off dissenting voices as terrorists which has ironically become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

By his own admission, ‘Syria is geographically and politically in the middle of the Middle East’, sharing borders with Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Israel, so he should have been ultra cautious about Syria’s vulnerability.

The unarmed teenage message has been usurped by the militant Syrian National Council (SNC), who make the teenagers look like kittens.

Today, even the voices of the SNC have been hijacked by the Salafist Sheikhs proclaiming Fatwas and jihads against all the pro-Assad infidels. The jihadists do not take man-made orders from the SNC in Istanbul. They take divine orders direct from Saudi Arabia.

Their rants are viral on YouTube and they make the fractured SNC sound like pussy cats in a lion’s den. The neat Arab Spring template of goodies and baddies fails to fit the reality on the ground in Syria.

On one hand, Assad is sanctioned for failing to exercise restraint against the armed opposition groups.

On the other hand, his citizens criticise him for failing to defend them against the invading jihadists.

It is exactly one year since Sheikh Adnan Arour declared that ‘for those [Alawites] who violated all that is sacred, by Allah the Great, we shall mince them in meat grinders and feed their flesh to the dogs’.

Similarly Sheikh Muhammad al Zughbey proclaimed that ‘your jihad against this infidel criminal and his people is a religious duty’ and that Alawites are ‘more infidel than the Jews and Christians’. It is no surprise that original teenage slogan has been replaced with a sectarian one ‘Christians to Beirut, Alawites to the grave’.

The Arab adage ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’ creates bizarre bed fellows. Last May, we celebrated when the Al Qaeda leader was buried at sea, yet now we collaborate with them as they embark upon ethnic cleansing.

The Salafists taint the reputation of the Sunni ‘guardians’ in Saudi Arabia, with their threats of hell for Assad loyalists and promises of a (promiscuous) paradise for martyrs.

With the Fatwas ‘on tap’ making mockery of his country, Sheikh Ali al-Hikmi of the Saudi Council of
Senior Scholars deployed an anti-ballistic missile with his counter-fatwa forbidding all jihad in Syria.
On February 7, Dr Yusuf al Qaradawi, president of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, issued another ‘damage control’ fatwa, co-signed by 107 other Muslim scholars, declaring the ‘need to protect the ethnic and religious minorities which have lived for more than a thousand years as part of the Syrian people’.

Ironically, the more the Salafists terrorise Syria, the more the Syrians cling to Bashar al Assad as their saviour, which feeds directly into the Salafist claim that these infidels worship Assad above Allah.
However, these jihadist calls continue to echo in Australia through the social media with impunity and their followers have sought to terrorise Australian Alawis with petrol bombs, vilifying graffiti and death threats. The targeted citizens believe that Mr Carr’s anti-Assad stance has validated and unleashed the anti-Alawi sentiments, which he needs to untangle and condemn.

There is nothing civil about the war in Syria – it is a proxy war to protect Israel from a nuclear Iran. This was confirmed when Israel’s defence minister Ehud Barak declared that toppling Assad ‘will be a major blow to the radical axis [Iran] … It’s the only kind of outpost of the Iranian influence in the Arab world … and it will weaken dramatically both Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza’.

President Assad should have treated the writing on the wall as a sectarian inscribed prophecy, not as secular erasable graffiti. Even if another UN monitored election voted Assad back into presidency. Even if a UN supervised political negotiation is brokered, where the exiled opposition can table their demands, many of which have already been met. His enemies have already written the next chapter of history, where he has been written off.

It is the height of arrogance to assume that we know the will of Syrian citizens, who are increasingly demanding stability over democracy. We cannot be hell bent on regime change and peace brokers at the same time.

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This isn’t a civil war

http://newmatilda.com/2012/06/14/this-isnt-a-civil-war

Published in New Matilda, 14 June 2012

This Isn’t A Civil War

UN peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous refers to the “civil war” in Syria, but the Assad government insists it’s “an armed conflict to uproot terrorism”. I know from the “civil war” in my birthplace Lebanon that there was nothing civil about it. The conflict was militarised by a cocktail of foreign influences peddling their own agendas. Syria is less like Libya and becoming more like war-time Lebanon.

When Foreign Minister Bob Carr expelled Syria’s diplomats from Canberra on 29 May, he was singing his small solo in a well orchestrated international chorus demanding foreign intervention in Syria. The US squarely blamed the Syrian government for the al-Houla atrocity, even before it was revealed that fewer than 20 deaths resulted from shelling.

After the massacre at Mazraat al-Qubair, US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton reiterated her alternative to the Annan peace plan in her call for a “post Assad transition strategy, including Assad’s full transfer of power … [to a] fully representative and inclusive interim government which leads to free and fair elections, a ceasefire to be observed by all”. Contrast this with the UN Observer Mission heads who were cautious in criticising “everyone with a gun”.

Despite the presence of al Qaeda terrorists, Libyan rebels and trained mercenaries in Syria, the US alliance was adamant that only the Syrian government would have been capable committing or commissioning the massacre. Regardless of serious claims that these atrocities were engineered to incriminate the Assad government, Clinton is insistent: The international community cannot sit idly by, and we won’t.

Noting the US position on the pro-democracy movements in other Arab states such as Yemen and occupied Palestine, cynicism towards US compassion for Arab human rights is understandable.
The US “transition strategy” is a euphemism for unauthorised military intervention. It abandons UN Special Envoy Kofi Annan’s six point peace plan, which calls for a “Syrian-led political process” and “cessation of armed violence in all its forms by all parties”, not only by the Syrian government, but by “the opposition and all relevant elements”.

These elements are not only Russia and Iran, who supply arms to Syria, but also the US, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Turkey, Libya, Israel and al Qaeda who aid and abet the armed opposition groups.
The US has provided “non lethal assistance” and “communications equipment” alongside its oil-rich sheikdom allies Saudi Arabia and Qatar who committed $100 million of weapons and cash after the Syrian National Council “repeatedly called for the arming of the Free Syrian Army”.

Like the Syrian National Council who vowed “we will never sit and talk [with] Butcher Bashar”, this fits neatly into the US “transition strategy” which opposes negotiation and supports militarisation. This effectively sabotages the doomed Annan plan, as US Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice sings propagates the case for acting outside the UN Security Council’s authority once again.
Hence the recent 48 hour ultimatum to abandon the ceasefire by the Free Syrian Army’s Colonel Qassim Saadeddine was a cynical stunt. The rebels threaten civil war if the Syrian army dishonors the ceasefire they themselves have never kept.

Since the Annan ceasefire was declared on 10 April, overall casualties have decreased by 36 percent, but risen for Syrian government personnel and army troops with human rights groups estimating over 1000 Syrian soldiers killed since the theoretical ceasefire.

Clinton’s rhetoric about “free and fair elections” turns a blind eye to the 7 May Syrian elections which reformed the constitution to allow for political pluralism. 7200 candidates, including 710 women, competed for 250 seats across 15 electoral constituencies. She ignores the citizens threatened by armed opposition groups who demanded that the elections be boycotted.

The Free Syrian Army prefers a NATO-style intervention (UNSC resolution 1973) with “all necessary means” and a “no fly zone”, but the US knows that the armed opposition groups are “weak and divided”, with no territorial base, and prefers the Yemeni model; a stable and autocratic regime to control the diverse masses.
Replacing Assad with a puppet would suit the agenda of their their Saudi-Israeli sponsors, who both fear a nuclear Shi’te Iran. This wrongly assumes that Assad is the obstacle to peace, rather than the Baath party that preceded and propped him up.

The most plausible explanation for the US led call for military intervention on humanitarian grounds comes from former US Assistant Secretary of State James Rubin. In his analysis, the US led alliance is about targeting Iran to protect Israel.

Damascus is merely the bridge and missing link between Tehran and Tel Aviv. As Israel fears losing its nuclear monopoly, toppling Assad would mean that “Iran would no longer have a Mediterranean foothold from which to threaten Israel”.

This was confirmed when Israel’s Defence Minister Ehud Barak recently declared that toppling Assad “will be a major blow to the radical axis [Iran] … It’s the only kind of outpost of the Iranian influence in the Arab world … and it will weaken dramatically both Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza”.

Hence threats of looming foreign military intervention are hollow. With or without the Security Council’s blessing, proxy wars hijacked the unarmed pro-democracy movement long ago.

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Australia’s Naivety On Syria

New Matilda, 4 June 2012

http://newmatilda.com/2012/06/04/australias-naivety-syria
Australia’s Naivety On Syria

Expelling Syrian diplomats from Australia over the al Houla massacre assumes the Assad regime is to blame. The Syrian situation is too complex to act without evidence, writes Joseph Wakim

Spot the three fundamental flaws in this statement by Foreign Minister Bob Carr after he expelled the two most senior Syrian diplomats from Australia:

“Getting Damascus to move towards a ceasefire and to engage in political dialogue with its opposition is the one game plan we’ve got here.”

First, by blaming the Syrian government for the al-Houla atrocity in the Homs Province, he was at odds with the two other diplomats from the UN: Major General Robert Mood, Head of the UN Observer Mission and Joint Special Envoy for the UN/Arab League and former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Mood, in his statements after the al-Houla tragedy that saw 108 civilians killed, including 49 children, exercised caution.

“I should not jump to conclusions” he said, urging both the government and the “armed opposition to refrain from violence in all its forms”.

Likewise, Annan issued a condemnation of this “appalling crime… not only for the government but for everyone with a gun”.

If both diplomats remain unconvinced that this massacre could be attributed totally to the Syrian government while the evidence is still being investigated, why has our foreign minister jumped the gun on our behalf?

After the Syrian National Council “repeatedly called for the arming of the Free Syrian Army” the United States pledged “non-lethal” communications equipment while the oil rich states of Saudi Arabia and Qatar committed US$100 million. The military toys are now in the hands of the boys, many of whom are non-Syrian youth recruited from neighbouring countries.

How can we “move towards a ceasefire” if Annan’s six week old, six point plan is undermined by this foreign funding to militarise the conflict? Similarly, Russia should cease to supply arms to the Syrian government.

Second, after Syrian National Army founder Osama al-Munjid vowed “we will never sit and talk” with “butcher Bashar”, how can our foreign minister seriously advocate the possibility of political dialogue? If the SNA are hell bent on toppling this “murderous regime”, they have no interest in negotiation, and will seek every opportunity to incriminate the government to trigger a Libya-style NATO intervention.

Hence the recent 48-hour ultimatum to abandon the ceasefire by the Free Syrian Army’s Colonel Qassim Saadeddine was a cynical stunt. They have no serious intention to engage in political dialogue, yet demand the government “hand over power to the Syrian people”. This is ironic given the 7 May parliamentary elections in Syria. They threaten civil war if the Syrian army does not honour the ceasefire which they themselves have dishonoured.

The stalemate is compounded when the Syrian president insists that there would be “no dialogue” with opposition groups which “seek foreign intervention”.

Our foreign minister needs to use the word opposition in the plural, for Syria’s rebel forces are far from united in their goals and strategy. The original youth who staged an unarmed protest have had their cause hijacked by everyone from Marxist intellectuals to the Muslim Brotherhood, Saudi Salafists, foreign mercenaries, and Jihadists linked with al Qaeda — ironically now “in bed” with the USA. Some want democracy, others theocracy. Some want urban guerrilla warfare or a bloody overthrow of Assad and others oppose all violence.

It appears the US prefers a Yemen style revolution, maintaining the established secular regime to control the masses, but replacing the president with a puppet who they can control to suit the agenda of their Saudi-Israeli sponsors.

This undermines the goals of political dialogue is indeed the best outcome; it is naïve and hypocritical to push for discussion while the US and our other allies condone an increasingly militarised and divergent “opposition”.

Third, the “game plan” advocated by our foreign minister appears to have misread the more complex reality on the ground in Syria. Modelled on the Libyan rebels, opposition groups seek to create strongholds by setting up road blocks and consolidating pockets of territory.

Once this is achieved, foreign funding can be funnelled in and anti-government attacks can be launched. The Syrian government then overreacts, moving in to smash the potential pocket.

Although the Syria debate is becoming more polarised, critics of the opposition groups are not, by default, Assad apologists. The government’s predictable propaganda and claims of a “tsunami of lies” from the Western media is useless without offering a tsunami of credible evidence to support its claim to truth.

It is insufficient to say the army has “taken an oath to protect civilians” from a foreign armed invasion, and then respond heavy-handedly, rolling army tanks into residential areas. The Syrian government has created a rod for its own back and cannot continue to blame armed gangs and terrorists every time an atrocity is committed.

For example, it needs to explain what its army was doing during the infanticide from 2pm until 11pm on Friday 25 May when the al-Houla area was “guarded by the government forces at five points”, according to Syrian Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi, who also announced a “military judicial committee” to investigate the incident?

President Assad’s speech to the newly elected People’s Assembly on Sunday reiterated his siege mentality as he referred to “a war from abroad, to destroy the country”. Hence he has not pitched the violence as a civil war between his own citizens, but as a foreign invasion of Syria’s sovereignty by terrorists and a conspiracy.

Ironically, this has become a self fulfilling prophecy as the more protracted the conflict, the more foreign forces take root. His speech offered nothing new, and the only circuit breaker to the spiralling violence is unconditional political negotiations, as all armed soldiers in Syria are ultimately supplied by foreign forces.

Like the twin suicide car bombs in Damascus which killed 55 people on 10 May near the Syrian military intelligence building, we may never know the truth about these terrorist acts. The close-range shootings and stabbings are atypical to the Syrian army’s methods. It is probable over time that opposition will not have a monopoly on splinter groups and proxies; vindictive pro-Assad militia will likely emerge and commit atrocities in the government’s name.

During his press conference, our Foreign Minister appeared besieged by journalists who appeared to have a more sophisticated understanding of Syria than he did, as he repeatedly retorted: “I need to get advice on that”.

Indeed, he should have been advised not to copy allies who are enemies of the Syrian government. The only message expelling diplomats sends is that we are pre-empting the emergence of conclusive evidence on the many monsters behind the al Houla massacre. By joining the US-led chorus pushing for regime change regardless of the facts, we become followers, not leaders.

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We must break the silence that surrounds bikie warfare

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/opinion/we-must-break-the-silence-that-surrounds-bikie-warfare-20120422-1xesk.html?skin=text-only

We must break the silence that surrounds bikie warfare
Published in Canberra Times, 23 April 2012

The antithesis of a cold call is a hot coffee. And this may be the best way to penetrate the wall of silence that has enabled the spate of drive-by shootings as Hells Angels and Nomads escalate their ”turf war”.

Frustration is mounting by police, politicians and the public as we wake up to news of more midnight shootings by cowardly criminals.

But a major change in the publicity for these shootings cannot go unnoticed, as it contrasts with the shootings peak a decade ago.

There has been a prevalence of Arabic names in the media reports about suspects and victims. There have also been anonymous claims by former bikies about ”older bikies leaving in droves” because of younger ”Middle Eastern criminals” infiltrating bikie gangs because of their connections with guns and money laundering, but no interest in motor bikes.

Despite all this, politicians and police have been wisely advised to focus on the criminal culture, not the ethnic culture this time around.

Rewind to October 2003, following drive-by murders in Greenacre in Sydney’s west, when the NSW premier at the time, Bob Carr, issued an ultimatum for deportation: ”Obey the law of Australia or ship out of Australia … that is what the average Australian thinks … we’re not going to see, step by step, our civilisation dragged back to medieval standards of revenge cycles. Simple as that.”

His police minister, John Watkins, amplified the dichotomy, saying ”these people are not part of our community. They’ve stepped outside civilised behaviour”. Their Hansonite leadership filtered down to the police culture, signalling a green light to perceive the crimes through race-tinted glasses, even though the perpetrators were Australian-born citizens.

With one fell swoop and broad brush, they alienated the local Middle Eastern communities who could have been part of the solution as partners, rather than the target of the crude cultural cop-out.
Fast forward to April 2012, and the current drive-by shootings have elicited more sober responses.
NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell announced a new strike force to deal with shootings between feuding gangs – no mention of race.

NSW Deputy Police Commissioner Nick Kaldas used the word culture appropriately to describe cowardly criminals: ”It’s really a criminal culture, it’s a culture where instead of having it out with someone, do this thing almost behind their back, because they can’t cope with doing it face to face.”
NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione maintained the correct context: ”These attacks are targeted.
This is criminal on criminal.”

This is definitely a step in the right direction where our leaders have stayed focused and endeavoured to keep the community on side, at least in words. As O’Farrell concluded: ”What we need to do is support and recognise the progress that police have made. Since the start of this year, 74 arrests state-wide in relation to firearm offences, 147 weapons seized and 21,500 rounds of ammunition.”

However, to support the police, it needs more than words and avoiding provocative language. It needs action and engagement, relationships and trust with community ”elders” and those in the social network on the ground, not in cyberspace. Such fostered links could become the best informers who share the police mission to flush out the criminal elements.

Community engagement does not mean issuing one-way directives such as ”call Crime Stoppers”, ”dob in a terrorist”, ”be alert but not alarmed” or distributing multilingual brochures. It means regular two-way dialogue and confidence-building, even over a hot drink. It means that these social networks can be activated in a crisis. Policing becomes warm conversations rather than cold calls to suspicious strangers.

The current spate of shootings is also different to the 2002 peak in that media publicity had forced the culprits to go underground. This time, the media appears to be inadvertently aiding and abetting by amplifying their message of revenge and bravado. Ironically, the unabated shootings may have forced possible informants rather than criminals to go underground, in fear of being added to the hit list.

With the current shootings, there is diffusion of responsibility among local witnesses, fearful to risk reprisal to their family when so many other neighbours should have heard the same thing.

Informants may be aware of the bikie gangsters who evidently use tattoo shops as a front to launder money, which could lead to an urgent review of licensing of tattoo shops.

While the newly formed Strike Force Kinnarra will target the shootings linked to outlawed motorcycle gang conflict, NSW Police’s state crime commander, Acting Assistant Commissioner Mal Lanyon, said police were again facing a ”wall of silence” in their efforts to investigate the shootings: ”There are members of the community who have information about these shootings and the people involved …”

But police and politicians were repeatedly warned about this wall of silence 10 years ago when racist language and crude descriptors such as ”Middle Eastern appearance” were the bricks building this wall.

The circuit breaker to break the cycle of revenge shootings is surely building trust by engaging with these communities, and converting the new cooperative language into new cooperative action. It is never too late.

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A question of character of racism?

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/3983324.html
A question of character or racism?

JOSEPH WAKIM

Last week, Prime Minister Julia Gillard pondered what the “character and conduct” of the Anzac legend “did to shape our nation”, and how “a worthy foe [Turkey] has proved to be an even greater friend”.

This all sounds noble until we learn that the sixth question in the “character assessment” for those seeking to enter “our nation” appears to be shaping a new enemy: “Are you of Arabic descent?”

The question leaps loudly from the page and is also striking because of the silence surrounding this slur on our national character. There are no other questions pertaining to descent, race or religion.

Imagine someone wanting to visit our home, and we swiftly check if they are of Turkish or Japanese descent.

Surely, if we have serious concerns about someone’s character, there are many sophisticated and subtle ways to assess their “personal particulars” through their criminal records and Interpol.

The front page of the character assessment declares that the information may be disclosed to relevant law enforcement agencies in Australia and overseas, and should render the Arabic descent question redundant.

The last section of Form 80, question 57, is a checklist of “character details”. It asks if the applicant has ever had training from an organisation engaged in violence, involvement in insurgency, freedom fighting, terrorism or protests?

If answered honestly, surely these questions should be sufficient to filter out criminal characters after corroborating with relevant intelligence agencies internationally.

The checklist even asks about involvement in a “program related to the development of weapons of mass destruction”. Given the current fears about Iran and North Korea, neither of whom are Arab states, the descent question appears removed from reality, and a hangover from the Howard era “alert but not alarmed” Arabphobia.

With Al Qaeda’s ‘birthplace’ being in non-Arab Afghanistan and its net spreading to non-Arab countries such as Jamaa Islamia (translates as the Islamic Society) in South East Asia, the descent question drifts from seriousness to silliness.

The character assessment is guided by the Public Interest Criteria 4001 of the Migration Act regulations which never mention Arabic descent.

The regulations broadly outline the ‘discretionary powers’ of the immigration minister to grant or refuse a visa on character grounds on a case-by-case basis. The minister may weed out persons whose presence may be “contrary to Australia’s foreign policy interests … vilify a segment of the Australian community … incite discord in the Australian community … represent a danger … pose a significant risk … hold extremist views … or insensitive in a multicultural society”.

This is ironic given the insensitivity of the Arabic descent question to citizens in our multicultural society.

In the aftermath of the Al Qaeda attacks of 9/11, the immediate reaction by the USA and its allies was understandable with enhanced security, border protection, racial profiling and strategically recruiting Arabic employees.

But more than a decade later, should Australia’s official checklist to weed out bad characters include such a blunt question? Not once but repeatedly – asking for the ‘full name of your father’s father’, and then the same questions repeated for the applicant’s partner, mother, father, brother and sister. This is bizarre as surely if a parent is of Arabic descent, so is the applicant.

This question was brought to my attention by an American seeking to enter Australia. The message it sent her was that our lucky country, one of the most multicultural societies in the world, advocates racial profiling rather than fair go.

What it implied is that while applicants must be of good character to enter Australia, anything Arabic must be of suspicious character or the antithesis of the Australian character.

While nationality is a characteristic of a person – as is marital status, age, sex, visa class, and occupation – it certainly should not define the character.

Arab as a characteristic may be a question of race, but Arab as a character is a question of racism.

The defenders of the Arabic descent question would presumably argue that most terrorists are of Arabic descent, that the question is merely filtering suspect characters to refer to our anti-terrorist agencies on the balance of probabilities, and that the question is hurting no-one but protecting everyone.

Really? Try replacing question six with Jewish descent to assess character. The silence will be replaced with screams of anti-Semitism and Nazi branding.

An Immigrant Department spokesman advised me that this descent question “should be viewed in the context of clear identification of an individual where there are diverse naming practices”. This explanation is illogical as questions of linguistics are completely different to questions of ancestry.

Such antagonistic messages on such official documents are tantamount to a declaration of an anti-Arab foreign policy. They wave a welcoming Australia flag with one hand but a red flag to Arabs with the other. They fuel the friction and propaganda between otherwise friendly nations and render them a “worthy foe”.

The question needs to be removed as redundant and ridiculous.

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Syrian opposition must heed Annan’s call for dialogue

Published on The Drum, 29/3/2012

Syrian opposition must heed Annan’s call for dialogue

In the 1979 Monty Python comedy film Life of Brian, the Judean People’s Front scoff at the People’s Front of Judea.

In the lead up to the April Fool’s Day conference in Istanbul by the splintered motley crew of opposition groups, there are already echoes of this aerial stone throwing which trivialise a serious on the ground situation in Syria.

It is difficult to avoid cynicism about this opportunistic ‘enemy of my enemy is my friend’ logic. It has even brought the US and Al Qaeda on the same side of the bedlam. Around 200 ‘Friends of Syria’ have been invited to this conference by host country Turkey and Al Jazeera country Qatar, who have no love lost with the Syrian regime. The ‘friends’ would include those who may prefer a theocracy than a democracy such as the Muslim Brotherhood, the Salafi Jihadists, Al Qaeda and the Khomeini movement.

It would include ‘lone warriors’ such Rami Abdulrahman whose London-based front the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has successfully sold a Syrian narrative to the western media while the Syrian government repeatedly peddled its ‘armed gangs’ excuse for stalling reform.

However, the Syrian National Council (SNC) is ambitious to be the ‘sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people’, and this arrogance may lead to more enemies than friends.

In Monty Pythonesque manner, a founding member of SNC, Osama al-Munjid, told ABC radio that the National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change ‘does not represent anyone but themselves’.

His ‘legitimate’ organisation ostensibly works towards a ‘peaceful transition to free, democratic rule’ but undermines its pacifist goals with its violent slogans that the current Syrian government is an ‘illegitimate occupying militia’ and a ‘murderous regime’ led by ‘butcher Bashar’. He has conjured up all the comparisons with Saddam
Hussein and Moamar Gaddafi, both of whom were ousted by foreign military force and militia groups that cannot be disarmed. The SNC now appears hell bent on wanting a repeat of the NATO-Libyan Rebels model.

This was reinforced this month when SNC president Dr Burhan Ghalioun announced the formation of a Military Bureau to coordinate the ‘brave factions of the armed resistance’ including the Free Syrian Army ‘under one central command’. The SNC unashamedly declares that ‘all forms of intervention are on the table… to bring down the Assad regime’.
This is ironic given that the SNC started in 2005 as a non-violent political movement by Syrian expatriates, ‘headquartered’ in Washington DC .

Recognising the inherent illegitimacy of Diasporic voices, United Nations and Arab League special envoy Kofi Annan told the SNC that that they needed to have continuous and open communication with people ‘inside and outside of Syria’.

Already, Ammar al-Qurabi who chairs the Syrian National Conference for Change declared that he welcomed the ‘unified vision’ but not ‘under the umbrella of the Syrian National Council’.

Five senior members of the SNC resigned earlier this month, including human rights lawyer Catherine al-Talli who then formed the Syrian Patriotic Front, and former judge Haitham al-Maleh who lost patience in ‘working to arm the rebels’.

Another opposition to the SNC, the National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change, intends to boycott the ‘friends’ conference.
Kofi Annan’s six-point plan, approved by UNSC, includes political dialogue, yet SNC’s Osama al-Munjid told ABC that ‘we will never sit and talk’.

Unsurprisingly, the SNC refuses to acknowledge any of the reforms implemented by the Syrian government, even though many mirror the SNC’s own stated goals such as abolishing emergency laws, abolishing laws restricting rights to establish political parties, licensing of media outlets, and specific terms governing the election of the president.
Herein lies one of the tragedies of stubbornness where the most vocal opposition group insists on revolution from outsiders, rather than evolution from within Syria.

Foreign intervention by the kings on this chessboard come with a price tag and reduce the SNC to future pawns indebted to new masters – not a government that will only answer to the Syrian people. The SNP should come clean about its sponsors, who are most likely the Gulf States and their US-Israeli allies.

Already the US and turkey have pledged ‘non lethal’ assistance such as communications equipment.

Given its alliance with the Free Syrian Army, the SNC may be an accomplice to the atrocities committed.

The SNC has many admirable aspirations such as a ‘truth and national reconciliation commission’, presumably modelled on post Apartheid South Africa – something that many Palestinians seek in a shared and post Apartheid Holy Lands.

Perhaps before the SNC and other ‘fronts’ embark on a bloody path to wipe the Syrian government off the map, with ‘assistance’ from above and beyond, it would be wise to listen to the will of Syrians on Syrian soil. Ask them a question along the lines of ‘What have the Romans ever done for us?’ Only then will the SNP begin to earn legitimacy and the Syrian government be relegated to history.

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Turn the T-Way into a Truck Way

Turn the T-Way into a Truck Way

http://www.tandlnews.com.au/2012/03/29/article/Turn-the-T-Way-into-Truck-Way/WMCUXLBKVM.html

While Sydney’s monorail will be replaced by light rail, it is time to review another mode of transport.

As a manager of a national road freight company, and a parent who carpools children to school, my thoughts on traffic collide at a dangerous intersection.

On one hand, I am acutely aware of the ‘deadlines’ that truck drivers are given by the powerful retailers in the supply chains to arrive at allocated timeslots and avoid prohibitive penalties. The invidious trucks are at the mercy of the traffic laws and the retail lords.

On the other hand, I visualise an aerial view of the gridlock traffic where each truck is a bull elephant in the room, hogging up too many car spaces.

Every morning, every vehicle from motor cycles to cars to trucks share the same carriage ways, with toxic smoke bellowing out of exhaust pipes and human nostrils.

Then it dawned on me, from above. I am not referring to some divine epiphany but the beautiful T-Way, arching over the highway like a rainbow, but void of the flashing colours.

While the main roads are over-crowded, are the T-ways underutilised?

The 1998 NSW government report ‘Action for Transport 2010’ recommended seven T-Ways, which are rapid transit networks. They were considered more flexible than rail because buses can join and leave the T-Way anywhere along its route. So far, there is a 31 km link from Parramatta to Liverpool, a 17 km link from Parramatta to Rouse Hill, and a 7 km link from Blacktown to Parklea.

According to the NSW RTA web-site, the T-way benefits include links with industrial and commercial areas, reducing travel time and reducing traffic congestion.

Ironically, this mirrors the routes of many large trucks, picking up from industrial areas, delivering to commercial areas, but inevitably increasing travel time and traffic congestion for other motorists along the way.

This begs pertinent questions: Would travel time increase for the buses if the T-way were shared by large trucks? And the corollary question: would travel time decrease on main roads in these areas if the large trucks used the T-way?

We could start by piloting B-double trailers on T-ways. If it proves not to slow down the buses, then semitrailers could be considered as phase two

According to the RTA, average vehicle lengths for B-doubles are 25 meters, semi-trailers 19 meters, buses 12.5 meters and cars 4.1 meters. This means that every B-double removed from main roads equates to over 6 car spaces, which should equate to less congestion.
The NRMA’s own ‘Decongestion Strategy Report’ in May last year outlined a 10-point plan to tackle Sydney’s traffic, primarily by appointing more human resources to manage it. The majority of responses published on its own website have cynically dismissed the plan as a ‘waste of time’ as ‘none of the NRMA points go to the core of the problem’.

The NRMA proposal highlights the ‘forgotten transit lanes’ so that they permanently remain an exclusive bus zone, yet on its website readers complain that transit lanes are ‘underutilised and are empty most of the time’.

Instead, the NRMA could have recommended a review of the transit lane utilisation, and potential for further utilisation with a view to ‘decongestion’. A cost benefit analysis would reveal the threshold point at which trucks on T-ways would actually slow down the buses.

While it is recognised that buses should be prioritised because they could carry 80 customers, and public transport needs these incentives, trucks also carry the necessary daily supplies for hundreds of customers.

Traffic congestion has hit home to my family with the current M2 upgrade in the Hills area. According to the RTA report in 2010, the Hills Shire Council was ‘concerned about potential impacts …on local road congestion’. The RTA response was that ‘Traffic and transport related impacts during the construction phase of the M2 upgrade project are not expected to cause significant congestion on the local road network’.

The reality for local residents is absolute gridlock, as any eye in the sky would see between 7 and 9 AM every weekday. My own family’s travel time to school has more than doubled from 15 minutes to about 40 minutes, which has had a domino effect on bed time, wake up time, and fatigue even before we reach our destination.

The research by RTA on this occasion was clearly erroneous.

Along our route, we encounter numerous 40 km school zones where most students appear to be driven to the school by parents or buses. These safety zones are also cash cows for hidden cameras for those exceeding the speed limit during the push and shove. Like the T-Ways, it begs the questions that point to further RTA research: are the school crossings underutilised? Is there a solution above, such as overhead pedestrian bridges that would redress both child safety and traffic congestion?

My experience suggests that more creative and robust research needs to be undertaken by RTA to redress traffic congestion. Sometimes we need to think outside the grid.

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Focus on talent, not torture

FOCUS ON TALENT, NOT TORTURE

‘Those who have stepped forward [pregnant pause] will move [another pregnant pause] to the next round [screams and tears], but for the rest of you, it is the end…[contestant collapses]…quick! call the medics!’

After the coroner’s report confirmed that the contestant tragically died of a heart attack, another report is inquiring into what they call ‘torture tactics’ used in TV talent shows.

Of course this has not happened. Yet.

But the recent Hollywood group rounds of American Idol saw contestants fainting and collapsing during rehearsals and performances and medics were called in [http://realityrewind.com/american-idol-2012-more-contestants-faint-during-dramatic-american-idol-episode-video-352189/]. And this is long before the final announcements. The drama was trivialised as ‘not for the faint of heart’.

Such dramas boost ratings and the TV programs would have contractual terms and conditions that would legally indemnify them from any personal stress or injury associated with the contestants’ experiences.

But such a scenario may be the wake up call needed to temper the drama when judges announce winners and losers.

The advent of this new genre of TV programs where contestants are progressively eliminated or voted off has been a magnet for ratings and advertising revenue. Programs such as American Idol, The X Factor, Australia’s Got Talent, Dancing with the Stars, Australia’s next top model all capitalise on a cliff-hanger climax that maximises adrenalin among both contestants and viewers.

In a recent episode of American Idol, contestants actually passed out when the prolonged pauses and suspense was almost literally killing them.

Of course such commercially successful shows deliberately seek to milk the moment of judgement by enhancing the drama and emotion. They capitalise on the ‘edge of your seat’ pauses, zoom in on tears, add heart-thumping music, use a cryptic script to intensify the suspense, and separate contestants into ‘torture chambers’ where they try to comfort each other as they wait for the approaching footsteps of their judges. This is a painful price to pay for their desire to participate in what they thought was a TV talent quest.

These torture tactics have evolved into art forms within themselves (‘and the winner…will be announced after this break’). And the focus on the celebrity judges is detracting from the focus on the contestants’ talents. But how long must these drum rolls continue before we bang the gong?

For decades, hosts of similar contests such as beauty pageants have drawn out their announcements with a high degree of emotion. Some may argue that if the contestants cannot handle the heat (pun intended), they should get out of the kitchen. After all, it is intended as a game for entertainment, not a life or death sentence.

Elimination rounds, short lists, second interviews and rejection announcements are a fact of life in job applications, sporting tournaments and business tenders. The sleepless nights and stress levels are not peculiar to TV talent shows. However, the commercial and public exploitation of these humiliations and exaltations have become part of our entertainment. We hold our breath with our favourite contestants and share their emotional outburst as we exhale with them.

But if something tragic occurred, would the game accept any blame?

Has the elimination announcement morphed into commercial cliff-hanger that is exploited by sadistic judges and voyeuristic viewers?

It was not until Princess Diana Spencer and Dodi Fayed were tragically killed in a high speed car chase to escape the paparazzi in 1997 http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/august/31/newsid_2510000/2510615.stm]”> that the tactics of intrusive tabloid photographers attracted public outcries and law reform in Europe and California [http://voices.washingtonpost.com/celebritology/2009/10/will_californias_new_anti-pap.html].

Such tactics had to be tamed in order to protect privacy and respect curfews. Similarly, the nail biting tactics in these TV talent shows may continue to chew all the way to the bone until or unless the public demand temperament.

There is nothing wrong with ‘Congratulations to all contestants, but there can only be one winner, who is …’, and focusing more on the talents than the torture.

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Was KRudd dog whistling to faithful flock?

WAS RUDD ‘DOG WHISTLING’ TO FAITHFUL FLOCK?

One cannot serve two masters, otherwise one will receive devotion and the other will be despised.

This may be the take home message after the Labour leadership catharsis. Not so much for the Caucus members who voted between two leaders, but for KRudd himself.

As a professed Christian, KRudd had to choose between his messiah complex and his morality, but it appeared that the latter was temporarily suspended.

The ‘messiah’ mockery was of KRudd’s own making, when he announced that he would contest for leadership: ‘I want to finish the job the Australian people elected me to do when I was elected by them to become prime minister’. Not only was he exploiting the disconnect between popular opinion polls and his political colleagues, but also shunning the Christian principle of humility.

While his predecessor John Howard was often accused of playing the race card in his dog whistle politics, it appears that Rudd played the religion card throughout this ‘soap opera’.

In his recent speeches, the Honorable KRudd repeatedly referred to himself as honorable: ‘the only honorable thing and the only honorable course of action is for me to resign’. This was presumably intended to contrast him with the ‘dishonorable’ actions of Julia Gillard and her ‘faceless men’ when they deposed him from the ‘job the Australian people elected me to do’. The repeated references to honor may have been mischievous dog whistling to the faithful flock reminding them that an atheist and Godless leader who does not believe in marriage may not believe in honor or morality either.

During his resignation speech from Washington, the capital of the great bastion of presidential elections, Rudd positioned himself squarely in the camp of the morally right. He condemned those who were ‘party to a stealth attack on a sitting prime minister elected by the people…We all know what happened then was wrong and it must never happen again’.

This reads like a new covenant, evoking religious parallels that he was robbed of his rightful throne and we had been robbed of our elected leader in order to satisfy the hunger of the ‘thieves in the night’, all in the guise of ‘moving forward’. Ironically, KRudds’s own king-hit was launched after midnight, but we were not supposed to notice that hypocrisy.

His self-portrait evokes sacred images of the sacrificial lamb, and the one who had to personally pay for the sins of his faction-driven party. His dramatic departure from the prime minister role was like some passion play where he was betrayed by his own followers, reduced to tears, publicly humiliated, relegated to a foreign ministry and then awaiting his second coming.

On ABC TV’s QandA in April 2011, KRudd proclaimed that he never wanted to abandon his covenant for the emissions trading scheme but some wanted to ‘kill it for good’. And again pleading for forgiveness in martyr style: ‘It was a wrong call for which I was responsible’. Hence he fuelled the prophetic speculation that he would soon seek to right the wrongs: ‘I might have learnt a thing or two for the future’.

KRudd’s repeated references to ‘the truth is’ echoes of gospel readings from a pulpit. It exploits the Ju-liar smear campaign where he is juxtaposed as an honest man who is ‘plain speaking’.

When responding to the You-Tube video of the old Rudd, who appeared more like a bully than a wounded bull, he insisted that he had learned not to control every aspect in his office and to consult more broadly. Perhaps this was his act of contrition that he wanted his parliamentary colleagues to forgive him in a similar spirit to his ‘stolen generations’ apology.

KRudd prides himself as a passionate Christian who proudly integrates his faith into his politics. He conceded this when he resigned as prime minister: ‘It is probably not the occasion for high statements of theology, but I’m sure you’d be disappointed if I didn’t add something, given it’s been the subject of comment over the years in which I’ve led this party’.

It is a relief that his recent litany of religious dog whistling fell on deaf ears. There was a disturbing disconnect between the Christian preaching and KRudd’s practice. His faith, and indeed my faith, teaches us to love our enemy, never to exact revenge and to be humble: ‘he who humbles himself will be exalted (in heaven) and he who exalts himself will be humbled’.

His call for a phone referendum to reinstate the people’s popular choice of prime minister was not revolutionary, but delusional, and the antithesis of humility. This chapter saw KRudd not as serving God, but playing God and serving his own Messiah complex. Thank God most of us could see right through that.

In the 1994 Disney animated classic Lion King, we meet a baboon named Rafiki who is the king’s wise adviser. Rafiki nudges the main character Simba to return to the Pridelands ‘to challenge his uncle to take his place as king’. This begs the outstanding question: who was the baboon who nudged KRudd to challenge the prime minister?

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The great orator does the great grovel

OBAMA: THE GREAT ORATOR DOES THE GREAT GROVEL

‘There should be no shred of doubt by now – when the chips are down, I have Israel’s back’

The lullaby from the mouth of US President Obama was music to the ears of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. It rang more like an annual report by a CEO to his shareholders, trumpeting about his return on their investment.

Obama was demonstrating how he ticked all boxes of his key performance indicators so he could secure sponsorship for his next presidential election campaign ‘during this political season’.

But one could tear shreds off his predictable and pathetic grovel.

When Obama reiterated a two state solution with ‘a secure Israel that lives side by side with an independent Palestinian state’, did he forget that security should be ‘sacrosanct’ for both sides, yet only one was the nuclear superpower of the Middle East region? Did he forget that when Palestine applied to the United Nations Security Council for independent statehood within its pre-1967 borders last September, his administration threatened to (ab)use its permanent member status and veto their bid?

When Obama was chest beating that ‘Israel’s place as a Jewish and democratic state must be protected’, did he overlook the oxymoron? The enshrined ‘privileging of one ethno-religious group over another cannot be seen as compatible with democratic values’, as documented by a new book by Ben White ‘Palestinians in Israel’. Moreover, Israel can no longer claim to be the sole ‘democratic state’ in the Middle East given the recent ‘Arab Spring’ elections.

When Obama concedes that ‘the United States and Israel both assess that Iran does not yet have a nuclear weapon’, why are no alarm bells ringing about his predecessor’s invasion of Iraq on the defunct ‘weapons of mass destruction’ premise? His provocative language of possibilities should be frightfully familiar: ‘There are risks that an Iranian nuclear weapon could fall into the hands of a terrorist organisation’.

While the Obama administration depicts Iran as a real and present danger, the November report by the International Atomic Energy Agency depicts circular arguments: Its intelligence sources are unnamed ‘Member States’, presumably the USA, and its summary is dubious: ‘The agency is unable to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities’.

When Obama laments that ‘a nuclear-armed Iran would thoroughly undermine the non-proliferation regime that we’ve done so much to build’, does he forget that its opposite number Israel refused to sign the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1970, which puts Israel in the same camp as India, Pakistan and ex signatory North Korea? Does he forget that unlike the signatory Iran who is now indicted by the IAEA for failing to honour its ‘safeguards’ agreement, Israel operates a policy of ‘nuclear ambiguity’, refusing to confirm or deny having atomic weapons? Does he forget that Israel’s over 200 nuclear warheads and weapons of mass destruction were mostly ‘made in USA’? Does he forget that in 2009, the IAEA passed a resolution which ‘calls upon Israel to accede to the NPT and place all its nuclear facilities under comprehensive IAEA safeguards’ and that Israel refused with impunity and without sanctions? Does he forget that he asked Israel to sign the Treaty during the 2010 nuclear summit, and they still refused?

When Obama grandstands about ‘nuclear weapons in the hands of a regime that denies the Holocaust, threatens to wipe Israel off the map and sponsors terrorist groups committed to Israel’s destruction’, why does he turn a blind eye to the hypocrisy of Israel denying the Palestinian dispossession (al Naqba) of 1948? Israel does not need to threaten to wipe its Arab neighbours off the map, but flex its military muscle as it did when Gaza was reduced to an inhuman abattoir in December 2008. With over 1300 Gazans bombed through collective punishment, an overkill of one hundred times more than the Israelis, there was no question about who could seriously be wiped off the map.

With the five Iranian nuclear scientists killed in Iran since 2007, US secretary of State Hilary Clinton hastened to ‘categorically deny any United States involvement in any kind of act of violence inside Iran’. However, proxies and dissidents can be paid like sponsored terrorists. With Israel intent on maintaining its regional nuclear weapons monopoly and Obama pledging that ‘we will do what it takes to preserve Israel’s qualitative military edge’, does the truth lie behind another policy of ‘terrorist ambiguity’?

When Obama annunciates an ultimatum for Iran between ‘a path that would allow them to rejoin the community of nations if they meet their international obligations, or a path that leads to an escalating series of consequences if they don’t’, does he forget that it is Israel that has abandoned their international obligations? By his own admission, Obama concedes that ‘the United States will stand up against efforts to single Israel out at the United Nations’ even if ‘there was not a lot of applause’ by the UN General Assembly. Obama has ensured that Israel was protected from any consequences, unlike Iran who has endured four sets of US-led sanctions.

Obama’s oration should be shredded as evidence of his desperation to appease his shareholders. In his rhetoric about building ‘a better world…where our people can live free from fear’, it is clear who he fears if they do not butter his bread, which should make us all more fearful.