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Prisoner X exposes double standards


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ON LINE opinion – Australia’s e-journal of social and political debate
Posted Wednesday, 20 February 2013

Prisoner X exposes double standards

Imagine if Prisoner X was an Australian dual citizen who was recruited and incarcerated by the Syrian Mukhabarat rather than the Israeli Mossad. Would our Zionist leaders remain silent as they are now, or demand the loyalty of Syrian dual citizens? Should those driven by their ideology be labeled as fanatical terrorists or noble nationalists, or should this depend on whether they are Arabs or Jews?

Local Arab leaders are no strangers to having their loyalty questioned after two ‘Gulf Wars’, even if they are Australian rather than dual citizens.

I have publicly urged the Australian government to interrogate Australian citizens who visit the war zones of Syria, especially those who claim to be on a humanitarian mission but are then posted and boasted on the social boast as military martyrs sacrificing for their ‘brothers in arms’. Any military, para-military or intelligence service outside Australian defense and security forces should be deemed suspicious.

This does not mean that we should treat such citizens like the US Military Commission treated David Hicks who was charged with ‘providing material support for terrorism’. But it does mean that we cannot turn a blind eye to the human traffic and ‘rites of passage’ between Australia and Israel. Prisoner X now has a name – Ben Zygier, and this illicit recruitment of Australian citizens has a name – exploitation.

The indoctrination of Australian dual citizens into Israeli identity is nothing new. The aptly named Birthright Israel Foundation offers a free ten day educational tour of Israel for 18 to 26 year olds who are first time visitors. Its local representative is the Zionist Federation of Australia which has facilitated over 3300 Australian visits.

Their itinerary is founded on the ‘birthright of all young Jews to visit their ancestral homeland [to]…build a certain future for the Jewish people’. It has no place for education about uncertain future of the Palestinian people. Nor are visitors educated about the contradiction within their definition as both Zionist and ‘democratic’ given the many exclusive rights reserved for its Jewish citizens.

By their own admission, ‘more than 60,000 young Israelis, many of whom are active IDF soldiers, have traveled with the participants’.

The active conscription into the IDF deserves sharper focus in the light of their recent plan to ‘counter the steady decline in the number of conscripts since 2005’. This has been attributed to the drop in immigration by Diaspora Jews or Aliyah. According to Haaretz news, their recruitment drive targets a 15 percent increase from abroad such as Australia, plus a lethal combination of ultra-Orthodox youth and Arab Israelis.

We already had a wake-up call two years ago in Feb 2010 when a Hamas militant Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was assassinated in Dubai by Mossad agents with a forged Australian passport. Foreign Minister Stephen Smith warned the Israeli ambassador that this was not the ‘act of a friend’, and then expelled a Mossad agent.

This incident taught us that an ‘Australian passport allows Israeli spies to travel throughout the Middle East without attracting suspicion’. But during his recent interview with ABC radio, the president of the Zionist Federation of Australia Philip Chester vehemently denied that ‘when we send Australians to live in Israel …there’s an industry that exists of harvesting …passports in any … illegal way.’

The unanswered questions about Prisoner X go beyond the peculiarities of Ben Zygier. They go to the heart of the taboo question on dual citizenship that the Zionist President evaded: ‘At what point does loyalty to Israel become disloyalty to Australia?’

Just because Australia and Israel are allies in the Middle East does not mean that there will never be a conflict of interest. The ‘anti terrorist’ ends does not justify illegal means. What about differences in the United Nations such as Israel voting against the recent vote to upgrade Palestinian status whereas Australia abstained? What about the fact that Zionist recruitments into IDF are essentially a one state solution to ethnically cleanse the land of their ‘birthright’, whereas Australia supports a two state solution?

Our dual citizenship laws need to be clear about this loyalty question. Australians fighting for the ‘Free Syrian Army’ or answering fatwas for a holy war from muftis in Saudi Arabia should be interrogated, but we have no t heard of one arrest or criminal charge. And would Australian Syrians who are recruited to fight with the national army be just as culpable or is that different? How is it different to an Australian Israeli ‘serving’ in the occupied West Bank?

The Department of Foreign Affairs ‘Dual nationals ‘web page merely warns about the ‘liability for military service’ as a possible obligation, and the risk of imprisonment for defaulters. But this needs much greater elaboration, especially for countries which Australia regards as enemies.
Ironically, there has been gnashing of teeth over this one soul that we have never seen over the thousands of Palestinian men, women and children who are imprisoned, tortured and killed by the same Israeli apparatus.

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Israel’s Level Playing Field

http://bit.ly/TOYav8

There is a four letter word that blinds us every time we try to make sense of the Israeli-Palestinian reality on the ground. The word is as loaded as a suicide bomber or a cluster bomb: “side”.

We hear it when our media interviewers endeavour to avoid bias and show balance: “So to be fair, now let’s hear from the other side…”

We hear it in the public discourse and talkback that follows: “They are always blaming each other for the blockade and the rockets. I think each side is equally in the wrong.”

We hear it from politicians, such as our Foreign Minister Bob Carr, calling for “both sides to exercise a high degree of restraint”.

The word side subtly suggests equality of two nations, two armies, two peoples.

What Israelis and Palestinians share is their love of the land and their religiosity.

But beyond this, their comparative military muscle and political power is beyond “sides” because of the sheer scale of Palestinian military inferiority: one to one thousand fold.

Australian born spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister, Mark Regev, perpetuates this propaganda of parity when he asks, “How would you respond to rocket fire attacks from terrorists?”

The latest in a series of “surgical” assaults on Palestinian targets has been translated as “Operation Pillar of Defence” for Western audiences, but in Hebrew means “Pillar of Cloud”, after a story from the book of Exodus, where God adopts the form of a pillar of cloud to protect the Israelites and confuse the Egyptian army. Indeed, using the word “side” blows a pillar of cloud to obfuscate some obvious facts about the inequality.

Only one side has the backing of “the most powerful nation on Earth”, by US President Barack Obama’s own admission; a nation ready to (ab)use its power of veto to block any motions against Israeli aggression, and block any motions for Palestinian statehood, even the upcoming bid for UN non-member observer status on 29 November.

Only one side has the most sophisticated technology and weaponry, made in the US, to actually obliterate Gaza into non existence, or indeed a pillar of cloud.

Only one side deploys unmanned drones for military surveillance so that the eye in the sky is constantly invading its neighbour’s sovereign airspace.

Only one side has imposed a unilateral blockade since 2007 as collective punishment for electing a Hamas government, depriving 1.6 million people of essentials and of any semblance of a normal life.

Only one side has the infrastructure to sound the sirens so that its citizens have some advance warning to seek shelter and survive an attack.

Only one side can assassinate a leader, such as Hamas military chief Ahmed Jabari on 14 November, and escape international condemnation.

Only one side still milks the “war on terror” rhetoric to justify their “self defence” against a population under siege.

Only one side predictably unleashes an assault against its neighbours with impunity in the lead up to elections, and is more interested in the numbers of political points scored than the Palestinian people killed.

This was the case with Operation Lightning Strike one month before the March 2006 election. This was the case with Operation Cast Lead three months before the February 2009 election. And this is now the case in the lead up to the 22 January election. The incumbent Israeli prime minister plays the politics of fear while assuring his voters that only he could protect them. The incidental quota of killings is about 100 Palestinians for every Israeli.

The pillar of cloud blinds us to the growing chorus of enlightened people who refuse to be locked into sides, but are rising above the pillar, cloud, missiles and drones to see an ever shrinking Palestine.

Such people have liberated themselves from the shackles of sides. People like Israeli historian Ilan Pappe who visited Australia in September and declared, “the less Zionist I became, the more Jewish I became”. People like veteran Israeli soldiers who have confessed and denounced their inhuman abuses against occupied Palestinians in their courageous and collective testimonial “Breaking the Silence”.
Carr must privately know the truth about Gaza, but cannot admit it publicly, as he warns Israel of the “danger of the world seeing it as a disproportionate reaction”.

Enough smoke and mirrors. The word “side” flattens a turbulent terrain into a level playing field. It blinds us to the mountains, valleys, deserts and walls that differentiate the occupier from the occupied. The only level playing fields in the past have been those homes that have been bull-dozed to a series of ground zeros to make way for settlement expansions. The level playing fields of the future will be those created by the devastating effects of Operation Pillar of Cloud.

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Carr Calls For Syria Assassination

http://bit.ly/QfnBXg
Published on newmatilda.com (http://newmatilda.com)
________________________________________
10 Oct 2012

Carr Calls For Syria Assassination

By calling for the murder of Bashar al-Assad, Foreign Minister Bob Carr has shown both his hypocrisy and his lack of understanding about our “allies” in the Syrian uprising, writes Joseph Wakim

Public figures must think twice before commenting about someone’s death.

Veteran broadcaster Alan Jones has learned this lesson after “cyber democracy” took Australian decency into its own hands. They have inscribed an epitaph for his career: you reap what you sow.

But it appears that Foreign Minister Bob Carr has learnt nothing about the volatility of the “death sentence”. His “brutal and callous” call for the assassination of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad on ABC Four Corners on Monday was utterly un-Australian, and warrants immediate sanction by Julia Gillard.

Our foreign minister represents a liberal democracy where murder is a crime and the death sentence has long been outlawed. Assassination should not be part of Australia’s strategy to end the proxy war between Iran and Israel that is fought on Syrian soil.

Carr’s comments are yet another example of the foreign minister is trying to force-fit the Libyan template over Syrian territory.

Carr’s rationale that “an assassination combined with a major defection … is what is required to get, one, a ceasefire, and, two, political negotiations” smacks of dangerous naivety. It ignores the fact that to the president and his supporters, Syria is fighting its own “war on terror” and defending its sovereign territory. This religious war has been proudly sponsored by the US and its Gulf allies — the undemocratic kingdoms of Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Rather than creating a cease fire, an assassination would escalate the war beyond the five volatile Syrian borders. Does Carr seriously think that Iran, Russia and China would sit idly by as yet another regime is militarily toppled?

Carr concludes that “we’ve got nothing to do but trust the spirit of the Arab Spring”. The embers of the Arab Spring were actually extinguished long ago by what he himself calls “religious fanatics … who want another form of dictatorship”. The “jihadists,” who answer to fatwas from Saudi sheiks for a holy war to ethnically cleanse Syria from non-Sunnis, want a Salafist theocracy, not a secular democracy. Ironically, Carr’s call for an assassination aligns him with Sheikh Muhammad al Zughbey — “your jihad against this infidel criminal and his people is a religious duty”.

When asked about the presence of Islamic extremists or al Qaeda in the uprising, Carr insists that “the truth is … nobody knows … outside Damascus, observation doesn’t exist”. His sources are all sworn enemies of the Syrian regime — The Friends of Syria, Gulf leaders and Western leaders — and of course they will not concede that extremists have hijacked the uprising.

Inside Syria, observation and monitoring does exist and the al-Qaeda presence has been repeatedly revealed. Journalist Robert Fisk interviewed so-called Syrian rebels inside a Syrian military prison in August, only to find that most were “recycled” foreign mercenaries. Inconvenient facts and counter-narratives such as this cannot be dismissed as pro-Assad propaganda, although Fisk’s piece in particular has drawn some criticism, including from Syrian political dissident Yassin Al-Haj Saleh.

Moreover, Carr has an immediate opportunity to be enlightened by a visiting Syrian nun who has been at the centre of the violence, tending to the war wounded. Despite repeated requests to meet with him, Mother Agnes-Mariam from St James Catholic monastery in Homs has been shunned. She has been forced to flee to Lebanon after being warned that the rebel forces, our allies and future assassins, plotted to abduct her.

Why? Because she was outspoken about the “aggressive armed gangs … abducting people, beheading, bringing terror even to schools”. Like Fisk, she confirms that only about one in 20 rebels are Syrian. She has witnessed how the uprising “steadily became a violent Islamist expression against a liberal secular society” and testifies to a “hidden will to empty the Middle East of its Christian presence”. This darker truth belies the “spirit of the Arab Spring” in Carr’s fantasy.

Unlike Carr, Mother Agnes has a peaceful solution that is gaining momentum — Mussalaha (reconciliation) — a grass roots movement for dialogue and negotiation among Syrian citizens of all ethnic and religious backgrounds who “reject sectarian violence and are tired of war”.

Unlike Carr, her method not assassination and defection, but disarmament — “freeing them of this massive foreign interference and this media instigation for violence”. As part of her international peace mission to the Vatican and the EU, she will lead a delegation of Nobel Prize laureates to Syria next month.

It is abhorrent that Carr links assassination with “what Kofi Annan said was essential”. Like Mother Agnes, Annan promoted disarmament.
Above the negotiation table, the US-Saudi-Qatar axis talked about a political solution, but under the table they sabotaged his “peace plan” with a lucrative supply chain of arms, while criticising those who vetoed more military solutions.

Why is Carr afraid to meet with Mother Agnes? Because she will disarm him of his “just war” theory, and force him to face the facts that he has put us in bed with the terrorists. She may even enlighten him that it was not Libya that endured 17 years of civil war, as he stated, but Lebanon — for 15 years. Like Alan Jones, he should know better, but chooses not to.
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Source URL: http://newmatilda.com/2012/10/10/carr-calls-syria-assassination
Links:
[1] http://www.theaustralian.com.au/media/radio-broadcaster-alan-jones-blames-cyber-bullying-for-commercials-being-pulled-from-show/story-e6frg996-1226490322476
[2] http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-10-04/interview-with-bob-carr/4302980
[3] http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/syria/120814/syria-us-proxy-war-iran-saudi-arabia-qatar-sunni-shiite
[4] http://mideastmedia.blogspot.com.au/2011/07/provocative-sheikhs-views-aired.html
[5] http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-syrias-road-from-jihad-to-prison-8100749.html
[6] http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContentP/18/51930/Books/Syrian-writer-Robert-Fisk-is-indoctrinated-by-Syri.aspx
[7] http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/christians-emptied-from-middle-east/story-e6frg6so-1226489418086
[8] http://www.un.org/apps/news/infocus/Syria/press.asp?NewsID=1236&sID=41

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Syria Needs Elections, Not Arms

http://newmatilda.com/2012/08/03/syria-needs-elections-not-arms
3 Aug 2012

Now that Kofi Annan has resigned as special envoy, the only solution left in Syria is a presidential election. But internationally sponsored violence will complicate things, writes Joseph Wakim
If Syrians re-elected their president in a free and fair election, would the rebels and their sponsors pack up and go home?

Imagine if the UN Supervision Mission in Syria extended its mandate to beyond August to monitor a national referendum on the Syrian presidency. Threats, violence and boycotts could be prevented, and all eligible citizens could vote free from fear or favour.

We have seen UN Peacekeeping missions provide security, technical, logistical and educational support for referendums and elections at polling stations in volatile areas. During the past two decades, the UN has provided such assistance to over 100 countries such as Cambodia in May 1993, East Timor in August 2001 and South Sudan in January 2011.

Syrian citizens already cast their votes at the unprecedented multi-party elections on 7 May, where 7125 candidates, including 710 women, competed for the 250 seat People’s Assembly.

But the last presidential election was held in May 2007 and “officially” gave Bashar Al-Assad 97.6 per cent approval to continue for his second seven year term. This was farcical given that he was unopposed. Yet since the Arab Spring ignited Syria in March 2011, tens of thousands of civilians, soldiers and rebels have perished in an international proxy war.

Syria has become increasingly militarised thanks to Russia, China and Iran, who are propping up and protecting the regime, while US, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and al Qaeda are arming, aiding and abetting the rebels, suicide bombers, terrorists and their mercenaries. It was revealed this week that the Obama Administration was collaborating with Saudi Arabia and Qatar to channel military and communications aid to a secret “nerve centre” in Adana, a Turkish city about 100 kilometres from the Syrian border.

It is no surprise that UN Special Envoy Kofi Annan has announced his resignation from the post. He must have been tempted to lose his diplomatic demeanour and overturn the “negotiation table”. These key stakeholder nations talk about a political solution but under the table they sabotage his “peace plan” with a lucrative supply chain of arms. Hence he criticised the “clear lack of unity” and “finger pointing and name calling in the Security Council”. In case there was any question about which side Annan was referring to, White House spokesman Jay Carney was quick to blame Russia and China.

While the disparate rebel groups and their sponsors demand that Assad must step down to save Syria from further bloodshed, the terror tactics of the rebels have alienated citizens who support the president. A circuit breaker could be brokered if all parties disarm and the next presidential election is brought forward from 2014.

If the Syrian National Council ostensibly represents the majority, then it must honour the free will of the citizens and look forward to greater legitimacy. If the Assad regime ostensibly retains the confidence of its citizens, then it should have nothing to hide or fear, and should look forward to vindication.

It is already on the public record that the president will only stay if it is the will of his people, not the Baath Party. In a February 2012 referendum that saw the end of the Baath Party monopoly, Assad also ushered in a reform that would cap any president to two seven-year terms.

Assad should order his supporters to fully cooperate with the UN Monitors. If he fails to gain the majority of votes, he should honour the will of the citizens and step down, facing the consequences under national and international laws — whether it be amnesty, exile or trial.

Similarly, the Syrian National Council should order the Free Syrian Army and all its international collaborators to back off, so the voice of the people can prevail. If Assad is re-elected, then those claiming to be the legitimate opposition must equally honour the will of Syria’s citizens.

It means the Syrian National Council may become a political party in the new pluralistic political system. The Free Syrian Army would disarm, perhaps with an amnesty, and disband immediately. The remaining Salafists, terrorists, suicide bombers and mercenaries would “return to sender”.

Most importantly, their international sponsors such as the USA, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey would have to honour the UN monitored result and immediately cut supply to the rebel militias. Who could argue with this fair proposal?

The USA does. While they are ostensibly interested in democracy and peace, their unspoken agenda has nothing to do with Syria. It has everything to do with two other countries: Iran and Israel, which were prominently in the news before the Syrian uprising but have since disappeared off the radar.

The US insists Iran is making a nuclear weapon, despite the country’s insistence that their nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. Israel is threatened by the possibility of another nuclear power in the region, especially given Iran’s allies on its border — Syria and Hezbollah.

So if the US does not wish to provoke the ire of a potentially nuclear Iran, as it may indirectly endanger Israel, what is the next best contingency to protect Israel? Weaken Syria by engineering a “civil war” so that Syria’s army, president and borders are exhausted, and the country self implodes into a non threatening neighbour.

Of course, what will be said in public would be more benevolent: we cannot accept the outcome of the UN monitored presidential election because those in exile or who have sought asylum in Turkey could not vote. The Syrian people have lived in fear under a dictatorship for over 40 years, when voting against the president was suicidal.

Only in hot water can we flush out the true colors of this “civil war”.

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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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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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Imposed Regime Change Is Not The Answer

http://newmatilda.com/2012/02/15/imposed-regime-change-not-answer

Imposed Regime Change Is Not The Answer

There was a fundamental problem with the Arab League’s UN Security Council proposal that the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, step down: it was not borne out of its own Observer Mission report.

The proposal was tabled by the only Arab state in the UNSC, Morocco, and also asks for a national unity government within two months. Such proposals suggest that there is growing faith in the opposition parties and less faith in the Syrian president.

While imposed regime change fits neatly into the Arab Spring narrative, the gap between the Observer Mission report and the failed UNSC resolution is as wide as the Arabian Gulf.

The Observer Mission covered the period from 24 December to 18 January, and their report is available online in English for anyone with a serious interest in the facts. The mission comprised 166 individuals from 13 Arab countries, including civilian and military experts, NGOs and human rights organisations. The observers were divided into 15 groups covering 20 cities, giving daily reports to their 24-hour operations room in Damascus.

Clause 13 paints a dark picture of the city of Homs, reporting: “an escalation in violence perpetuated by armed groups in the city… instances of kidnapping … sabotage of Government and civilian facilities … food was in short supply owing to the blockade imposed by armed groups”.

Clause 26 extends this to Dera’a, where the Mission observed “armed groups committing acts of violence against Government forces, resulting in death and injury among their ranks … armed groups were using flares and armour-piercing projectiles … Government forces responded to attacks against their personnel with force.”

Clause 27 covers Hama and Idlib, where the observers witnessed “acts of violence being committed against Government forces and civilians … bombing of a civilian bus … bombing of a train carrying diesel oil … a police bus blown up … small bridges were also bombed”.

The report notes media exaggeration of numbers of people killed. Moreover, the total number reported to the western media does not discern between pro and anti government fatalities, so it has been wrongly assumed that the Syrian Government is the killing machine.

Clause 35 confirms that the Government had honoured its commitment to grant amnesty for crimes perpetuated from 15 March 2011 by “periodically releasing detainees”.

Clause 44 reports that a “French journalist was killed by opposition mortar shells”, although the opposition condemned and blamed the government.

Clause 54 notes legitimate concerns by the observers regarding their own safety given “the unavailability of armoured vehicles and protection vests”, and that 22 left the mission prematurely.

Clause 71 expresses concern regarding an “armed entity that is not mentioned in the protocol”, and also regarding the “excessive use of force by the Syrian Government forces in response to protests … demanding the fall of the regime”.

Clause 74 confirms that “the citizens believe the crisis should be resolved peacefully through Arab mediation alone, without international intervention”.

With this body of evidence from the authorised personnel, based on first hand and eyewitness accounts, the Qatar-led call for the president to step down is not only illogical but shows gross misreading of the situation. President Assad is a product of the ruling Baath Party, not the other way around. Rallies in Syria are testament to his personal popularity, and any forced ousting by the sponsored opposition militia will unleash a civil war.

Russia and China have been accused of abusing their veto power as permanent members of the UNSC in pursuit of a selfish national agenda rather than global humanitarian agenda, as was intended by the United Nations.

Where were these noisy critics when the United States threatened to abuse its veto power to support Israel in blocking the Palestinian bid for statehood status last year?

Two wrongs never made a right, and Assad has failed to win any friends with his litany of conspiracy theories and excuses for failing to implement civil reforms in a timely manner.

Sanctions are ineffective for an Arab republic that is highly self-sufficient.

Suspension from the Arab League is ineffective when most of the Gulf states are Sunni monarchies who scoff at the Syrian Alawite elite as un-Islamic. It is also highly hypocritical to be judged by these states whose respective human rights record with women, Christians and minorities is conveniently ignored.

The Observer Mission expresses repeated concerns over the “armed entities” who provoke the Syrian Government who in turn use excessive force.

The circuit breaker is surely border control to stop the flow of armour, mercenaries and extremist clerics, followed by a timetable for implementing all the enacted reforms such as multi-party elections.

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Hidden truths, contradictions in Syria’s quagmire

Published in Canberra Times, 1 December 2011

http://bit.ly/rSKVhc

When the Arab Spring becomes a dense canopy, many shady truths hide among its bushy foliage.

The Obama administration was recently caught out, tangled in the Syrian quagmire.

In August, US President Barrack Obama condemned the violence against the ‘peaceful protestors in Syria’ and this was echoed by Secretary of State Hilary when she referred to ‘slaughtering thousands of unarmed Syrian citizens, including children’.

If this principled stand was applied across all states in the Middle East, including US allies, it would have attracted integrity rather than cynicism.

However, it was contradicted earlier this month after the Syrian Interior Ministry announced an eight day amnesty for surrendering weapons as a concession to mark the Muslim feast Eid al Adha between 5 and 12 November. It invited the people ‘who carry weapons, sell, distribute, purchase or finance the purchase and who do not commit murder to hand over their weapons to the nearest police station’.

Rather than supporting the amnesty to end the bloodshed, and supporting dialogue with the anti-government protestors, the US State Department’s spokeswoman Victoria Nuland declared “I wouldn’t advise anybody to turn themselves in to regime authorities”.

Given her president’s insistence on unarmed peaceful civilians, surely her more logical response should have been ‘what weapons’? This couched admission of armed forces is as ‘knee-deep’ as the US fertilising the armed uprising.

It would have been interesting to ask Nuland and her bosses to explain the weapon sources for last weekend’s bombing of the Baath Party’s main building in Damascus.

Dr Bashar Al Assad did not initially chose to be in politics. He and his Sunni British wife were recalled from his apthamology career in London to be groomed for the Syrian presidency after his brother died Basil in an accident in 1994. But this is no excuse for several strategic blunders. His vague hour long speech to the Syrian parliament on 30 March, two weeks after the protests began, blamed international conspiracies for the uprising and blamed the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq for failing to implement his overdue domestic reforms. The legitimate aspirations of his own citizens were drowned out by applause, chants and standing ovations. He squandered his opportunity to prevent the cross pollination of the Arab Spring, and prevent future accusations of ‘too little to late’.

In his recent interview with London’s The Sunday Times, the president would have been wiser to detach himself from the rhetoric of the condemned and slain Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.

It was Gaddafi who declared that ‘we will fight to the last drop of blood’, and now Assad has declared that ‘each spilt drop of blood concerns me personally’. Gaddafi vowed that ‘Tripoli would burn’, while Assad warned that Syria is a fault line in the region and ‘if you play with the ground you will cause an earthquake’.

However Assad’s openness to genuine reform and an evolution rather than a revolution was evident in his declaration that the February 2012 elections would vote for a parliament to create a new constitution and this would include not only how to elect a president but indeed “if they need a president” at all. And this is where his faith in his people and putting his nation first differs dramatically from Gaddafi.

Assad cannot be blamed for treating the Arab League’s ultimatums with cynicism. If the member states, dubbed the ‘dictators club’, were genuinely concerned about ‘killing and violence against civilians’, then surely it would extend such suspensions and sanctions to US allies and oil rich states such as Yemen and Bahrain for their brutality against their own civilians.

In August, US President Obama called on his Syrian counterpart to ‘step aside’ because ‘his calls for dialogue and reform have rung hollow’. But the Obama administration’s anti-Syria sanctions also ring hollow. Banning petroleum products of Syrian origin and freezing the Syrian government assets would have more impact in Russia, but very little in the USA. Unlike the Tunisian, Egyptian, Libyan and Yemeni leaders who were renown for their greed and personal assets, such clench-fisted threats amount to less than a slap to Assad.

While the number of deaths since the Syrian uprising has exceeded 3000, what is hidden by the ‘book cover’ of the Arab Spring foliage is the number of soldiers and security police who have been murdered by the armed gangs.

What is also hidden is the admission by foreign funded terror groups of their violent exploits and provocations in Syria. In televised confessions on Syrian TV, terrorist Khaled Ibrahim al-Taleb confessed to committing several crimes in Homs including killing protestors in order to accuse the army soldiers of doing so. He confessed to attacking military checkpoints and abducting citizens to terrify them, and their collaboration with terrorists groups.

What is hidden in combat gear within the foliage are foreign suppliers of arms and finance, including Saudi Salafists seeking a theocracy not a democracy. What is hidden are images of the rising resolve of the silent majority Syrians to defend their country from foreign intervention.

It may be time to prune the foliage of the Arab Spring and expose those lurking parasites. They should be caught red-handed before a dark winter descends on Syria.

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Lebanon’s history presents two important lessons

Lebanon’s history presents two important lessons
Published in The Canberra Times, 5 Feb 2011
http://bit.ly/tuvq1x

The current uprising in Egypt begs a compelling question of the American pro-democracy champions. In their narrative, their ally and benefactor, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, is ostensibly one of our good guys.

The corollary is that the pro-democracy demonstrators must be the bad guys.

By definition, democracy must always be bottom up, bringing forth what the population wants not the American engineered top-down democracy, showering citizens with what they are deemed to need. How could successive American diplomats be so out of touch with the fact that Mubarak was so out of touch with his own people? Rather than spending America’s $1.3 billion to fatten Egypt’s armoury each year, and indeed defend Israel’s borders, the Americans could have stipulated that conditions apply. For example, feed the 40 million Egyptians (nearly half the population) who live on $2 a day, and educate the 30million Egyptians who are illiterate. The free-speech champion could have stipulated that ”emergency law” be abandoned so that legitimate opposition parties could emerge without fear of arrest and imprisonment.

Mubarak’s cloaked scaremongering about the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood ”adhering to their own agendas … [and] taking advantage of the protesters” is ironic. During his autocratic rule, the more dissidents were arrested and imprisoned, the more likely they would resort to religious movements. Mubarak had inadvertently empowered an underground movement of disgruntled citizens.

It takes an act of courage and desperation for the Egyptian protesters to risk their lives in public protests, knowing that they could be arrested.

Neighbouring country Lebanon, where I was born, understands people power and the slogans such as ”30 years enough is enough”. When the Cedar Revolution or ”million-strong march” took place in Martyrs Square in Beirut, on March 14, 2005, it led to the end of the 30-year Syrian occupation. The revolution was a direct reaction to the assassination of prime minister Rafik Hariri, where fear was replaced with a fight for freedom. It was not until this bottom-up manifestation of democracy took place and the international spotlight zoomed in that the 15,000 Syrian troops withdrew from Lebanon.

There are two historic lessons to be learned from the Lebanese experience. The first is that it is not until bottom-up democracy manifests itself en masse and people are killed that calls for regime change are taken seriously. The same calls by individuals had been met with persecution or assassination. The double standards of the pro-democracy Western allies are exposed and galvanised, showing the world that a government by, of and for the people is not a modern Western model, but a universal human aspiration.

Hence, the powerful images of the Cairo marches that were beamed across the globe had increased the temperature on Egypt’s President to respond honourably. It is tragic that it takes a bloody revolution for cries of fellow humans to be heard.

This is what irks me about a selfish focus on rescuing Australians who are ”trapped” in Egypt. The protesters are not just crying out to their president in Arabic; they are crying out to all of us in English. My children and I were caught up in Lebanon in 2006, during the Israeli-Hezbollah war. More than 1200 Lebanese were killed, so our relatives were more trapped than us. They had no other homeland to flee to via a waiting aeroplane. Such emotive language about Australians risks reducing the Arab land to a quagmire that is not worth understanding. It is as if once ”our Aussies” are back home, we can heave a collective sigh of relief, and the rest can be relegated to the rear pages of our news bulletins or someone else’s history books.

The second lesson is that the young pro-democracy Lebanese voices in the crowd on March 14, 2005, were not necessarily reflected in the eventual new government, a fragile coalition of political puppets, sovereign nationals, genuine intellectuals and anointed sons. We did not see the likes of the young generation of protesters elected into the new parliament. But after six years, this coalition was outnumbered. On January 26, a new Prime Minister, Najib Mikata, was elected, supported by the opposition parties, including Hezbollah. It is a chilling coincidence that the Tunisia-inspired Jasmine Revolution in Tahrir Square in Cairo commenced on the same day.

The aspirations of the courageous youth are not necessarily echoed in the eventual government and those waiting in the wings. It is not a forgone conclusion that an interim government would be led by Dr Mohamed ElBaradei, former director-general of the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency. He has been living in self-exile in Vienna for over a decade and might not have the endorsement of the major opposition party, the Muslim Brotherhood, who in turn would need to work with the Coptic Christian representatives.

Ironically, United States President Barack Obama warned in his historic speech at Cairo University on June 4, 2009, ”There are some who advocate for democracy only when they’re out of power; once they’re in power, they are ruthless in suppressing the rights of others … you must respect the rights of minorities … elections alone do not make true democracies.”

The ancient Arabic proverb ”the enemy of my enemy is my friend” may be useful as a short-term strategy. Leaders are appointed as the enemy of the enemy, until they themselves become the enemy, or, as another Arabic proverb says, ”arrogance diminishes wisdom”.