Accept to be bullied, we’ll support you! So says our William Hague to the Palestinians

Israel-Palestine is perhaps the longest running and the most significant of International Conflicts of our time. Not only Middle East peace and stability depends on it, world peace, prosperity and stability rests on an amicable solution to the Middle East problem too. From the global super-power, the United States of America (USA) to Europe, Russia and other regional powers are equally involved. In fact, probably no other conflict has ever raised so much emotion as does this.

With Palestinians set to move for greater recognition and topping their status at the UN, certainly global powers, like the UK, is keen not to be seen to be on the wrong side. In desperate move, therefore, they push to save face with their ally, Israel, while maintain their influence over others. But the bottom line is, Israel has shown to be a blood thirsty aggressor with little regard for international law. As recently as early this month, we have seen yet again the eagerness on Israel’s part to wipe out an entire nation that is already under siege. Irony is, when the some self-appointed leaders of the world justify Israel’s heavy-handedness citing that Israel is under an existential threat from her neighbours, what they overlook, and I say deliberately, is that only Israel of any states in the modern time have demonstrated consistent willingness to subjugate neighbouring states, threatened their viability and deliberately obstruct their emergence as Independent nations though they have those rights at international law.

Coming back to my heading, I was ashamed, as a British Citizen, to see our Foreign Secretary, Mr William Hague, to come up with this most absurd line of reasoning – provide guarantee to return to negotiations unconditionally and assurance that you [Palestine] will not seek to extend Jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC) – and we [UK] will support you. Shame that despite our claim to be a nation of values, justice and fairness, our Mr Hague adopts the most unjust, unfair and irrational line. When ever you have seen justice requiring the oppressed providing guarantees?

I am afraid, my emotions like millions of other people, rise fast when it comes to Israel-Palestine/Middle East Conflict issue. But I shall refrain from making it too long. Let recite though this – Islamists are enemies of west, so we have heard, therefore prevent them from coming to power. But today, North Africa is ruled by the so called Islamists. West is keen to be in bed with them. We heard, Hamas was terrorist, so strangle them, but they are thriving, once PLO was terrorist organisation so was Mandela and his ANC. But justice may take longer to emerge victorious, but it certainly is the ultimate victor. Palestinians have a just cause and a rightful claim for which they have paid heavy price. Make no mistake, some day they will emerge as an Independent, viable and proud nation. Question is, are we ready to be on the part of justice or not? For Israel, the question is even more significant – Is Israel ready to accept a just settlement to the Palestinian cause or is it going to continue acting in its self-destruction? Only time will tell who ultimately has the wisdom to make the right, just and fair choice!

Death of US Ambassador in Libya must not be met by knee-jerk response

Controversy over a film allegedly insulting the prophet Muhammad (peace by upon him) sparked demonstrations most notably in Egypt, Libya and Yemen. In Egypt, the demonstrators stormed into the US Embassy but no casualty, while in Benghazi in Libya, the demonstrators fired rockets into the US Embassy killing, among others, the US Ambassador to Libya. Both these incidents are utterly disgraceful, wholly unnecessary, outrageous and must be condemned in the strongest terms. The respective governments of Egypt and Libya must also take responsibility for failing to understand the mood of their respective population, or rather a segment of their population and putting in place adequate measures to ensure security of the diplomatic establishments.
When I first flagged a news item on Facebook with my status indicating my disapproval of the storming of Egyptian Embassy, I was told that I was being naïve and not sufficiently understanding the hurt caused. Do not get me wrong, in recent years there seems to be an escalation – deliberate in my view – of materials designed to offend, insult, humiliate, provoke, outrage and incite anger among the world’s Muslim population. Too often, Western governments have put a blind eye and regularly defending such actions as necessary and essential in democratic society in the name of freedom of speech, thoughts and expressions. But the truth, as we all know, is that Islam and Muslims have been dominating the global airwaves in media, politics and international relations. Most of the time they are given airwave for the wrong reasons. Due to naivety, ignorance and often prejudice of many leading global media establishments – none, it’s worth noting, are driven and inspired by Islamic faith – put up coverage which are at best flawed, insensitive and often insulting. Take the Channel 4, the British Broadcasting organisation, who recently aired a “documentary” which questions the very historic foundations of Islam. While we ought to respect the right of creative minds to speculate, a documentary must be a documentary based on evidence, reason and logic. Unfortunately, the program on Channel4 lacked all of it. This shoddy, irresponsible, half-cooked mockery of history will not be tolerated about any other religion and particularly of the Jewish religion. Yet, this is normal when it comes to Islam and Muslims. Moreover, it appears clear that the broadcaster now cancelled the screening of further work on the series citing security threats received without providing any specifics or obtaining Police Advise. It seems not unreasonable to at least suspect that Channel 4 is capitalising on the prevailing anti-Muslim hatred and is fuelling such hatred for its own ego, commercial or other gains.
Therefore, let me be very clear – Freedom of expression should not and must never be an instrument or a cover for bigoted, prejudicial and phobic mind to insult, humiliate, undermine or otherwise cause hurt in the minds of people simply because of the faith they are associated with. Such action is utterly condemnable.
Does this mean that people can be so outraged that they may storm Embassies and kill diplomatic stuff? Of course not. Violating diplomatic establishment is a violation of international law and is also a violation of Islamic values, spirit and practice. What has happened in Benghazi and previously in Egypt are wrong and a disgrace no matter how sincere and innocent the motive behind the demonstrators were.
The question then is, what should the response be to such horrific development? Brining killers to justice, making those violating diplomatic premises account for their wrong action and learning lesson to ensure such incident can never happen again are right things to do. The two governments involved are relatively new and are still finding grounds beneath their feet. Understandable, that they may have lacked the right capacity, mettle and expertise to pre-empt the situation or to contain it. However, lesson must be learnt and this must never be allowed to happen again.
It must also be said that while the acts of violence are inexcusable, this must not be used to undo the changes that has taken place in the Middle East. This should not impede the development of closer relationship between parties in the Middle East. It is encouraging to see that President Obama strikes, broadly speaking, a conciliatory, measured and wise tone. That indeed is the right way. However, to conclude that this shows the danger the “Islamists” presents, and that a Western style secular government is the answer and therefore set up programs to achieve this is wrong and will be counterproductive. In the instance matter, there will be temptations to wrap up sooner, kill a few more, perhaps use the unmanned spy planes to locate and assassinate suspect will be completely the wrong thing to do.
Our hope is that newly liberated societies understand that freedom has a price and that to uphold freedom they need to pay a premium which often is restrain, calm and measured expression of anger. No matter how outraged we feel, we must learn to reflect, ponder and strategies. The purpose of anyone’s response in the circumstances must be to address the problem, bring about solutions with very little interruption.
We hope that restrain prevails and that parties find an amicable solution.

The Problems Facing Muslim Nations

I was lured into reading an article by its name, “The Problems Facing Muslim Nations”, published at the Arab News, a leading English Daily in Saudi Arabia. I thought perhaps a person with insight of the Muslim Countries’ affairs would shed light on identifying key factors adversely affecting growth, prosperity, pluralism and good governance within the Muslim land. However, I was disappointed. In fact, disappointment perhaps is an understatement. The author not only failed to grasp the challenges facing the Muslim nations, his analysis of the issues are frankly demeaning, dispiriting and devoid of realism.
In brief, the piece identified five issues – education framework not fit for purpose; our obsessions with the past; like for abstract at the expense of concrete; obsession with angels, demons, God and satan and finally, lame and illogical dislike for arts.
When one read the article and the five factors identified, it becomes apparent that the writer feels that the Islamic faith as it is practiced by the most is responsible for much of the backwardness, irrationality, illogicality and superficiality. He feels that much of our nations’ adherence to the faith is blind, literal and therefore not rational and logical. Of course, he was at pain to stress that Islamic faith need not to be blamed, and no harm can arise from study of faith but it just needs not to be at the expense of others.
For a start, the author fails to understand the Muslim nations even on the basics. While Saudi Arabia, presumably the country of the Author and may be Iran, are the only two exceptions where faith may have some kind of dominance in the governance of the state. Countries such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Egypt and Turkey, nations with most Muslim population, enjoy a political culture and class in which faith has very little direct and visible effect. People with real authority and power who has been dominating policy making and state operation are predominantly western educated, secular minded and often with little visible devotion to faith. Why then have they not adopted the curriculum, created the context for recognition of the present as oppose to dwelling in the past? As for the love of arts, we know that many of these governments had almost irrational degree of love for art – music, film, fine art etc. There is also no evidence to suggest that these governments were threatened by the “religiou fanatics” to the extent that they had to compromise in their policy making. Other than in Afghanistan, none of the other nations had much rational fear of being ransomed by religious fanatics.
The argument thus that faith and a blind obsession with it is at the heart of our demise is nothing but an irrational, illogical assertion without factual and evidential basis. Further, it serves to the prevailing global policy to scapegoat faith, and in particular Islam. It also overlooks the reality on the ground.
Now that it is clear I disagree with the piece, what then are the issues with Muslim nations? Well this is too big a question to be answered in one article by a small individual like me. However, I shall seek to briefly identify several factors that I think are important.
Firstly, education curriculum, practice and framework in our countries are a problem and no, not because of their obsession with religion, far from it. The problem at the heart of our educational systems are two fold – firstly the lack of a conceptual basis which does not provide a vision behind our educational strategies and secondly, and perhaps as a consequent of the first, that our education’s emphasis is not on analytical, critical and intellectual development of the students. Curriculum in most Muslim countries seems to emphasise on recollection, memorisation and not on critical evaluation, analysis and problem solving. This is true of the science, arts and religious curriculum. Shockingly, this is true at all level of education – primary to the university level.
The second challenge in the Muslim countries is a lack of culture to debate competing ideas. Muslim countries are notoriously polarised along political and ideological lines - whichever ideology we hold dear, we reject the notion that others are also entitled to hold their own ideology. As a result, the secular minded rejects any notion that faith and those with an ideology inspired by faith has a stake in the affairs of the state and vice versa.
Third and final issue that I would highlight is the lack of patronage of religion by the state. I know some will find it surprising and many may well see that it is the opposite. But that is not so. Yes, there are states that provide huge funds and influence to religious institutions and scholars. But my point is that state should take a pro-active role in creating an environment in which scholars, students and public take an active interest in exploring faith in its totality, engage in debates and open discussions where difference is respected, celebrated and not condemned. That will only happen if states provide patronage to research based on religion which seek to explore finding answers to modern questions that Muslims and non-Muslims alike are facing. This will create a level playing field in which dogmatic, literalist and traditionalist scholars will not dominate exclusively the sphere of religious decision making.
But at the heart of all the above must be a realisation that faith, as a separate, independent and parallel entity to daily life cannot exists and must not exist. From an Islamic perspective, faith is intertwined with a person’s belief, action and though process. Attempt to separate state from religion, Islam from life, is an artificial separation which will only create confusion, chaos and often disunity. The question that ought to be at the top of our mind-set is how we can be true to our faith while embrace the spirit of innovation, creativity, objectivity and pluralism. After all, Islam has championed these values for centuries while the present western civilisation was in darkness.

Misplaced optimism over US Anger on Israel

Joe Biden, the Vice President of the US, has expressed his displeasure at the latest plan by an Israeli Local Authority to build hundreds of new settlement homes in the Occupied East Jerusalem. In particular he criticises the timing of the declaration hinting at its effect on the eminent resumption of peace initiatives. Yesterday, the US State Department let it known through the press that Mrs Clinton has expressed her displeasure at the plan while talking to the the Prime Minister of Israel. It must be noted however, that Mr Biden appreciated the response of Mr Netanyahu, who criticises the local Jerusalem Municipality which approved the plans.
Given the close relationship between US and Israel and the strong political influence that Israel enjoys in the US, this latest expression of displeasure by the two major figures of US Administration come as surprise to many. Already, some commentators has began to express hope that perhaps time has come when US may be just about willing to harden up over Israel. They hope that US will finally show courage and free herself from pro-Israeli bias to bring genuine pressure on Tel Aviv to play fair.
However, this apparent harshness of US and the glimmer of optimism seems to be misplaced and premature, to say the least. For Israel has expressed no desire to call of the announced plan to build new settlement homes neither has the US demanded that it must stop. Furthermore, the Palestinian side remains divided and deeply engaged in internal power-fighting. The Global community, in particular EU and US is taking advantage of the disunity on the Palestinian sides to further their own ideological and hegemonic interests.
There are, of course, other more pressing issues which would make is almost impossible to reach a settlement. Million of Palestinians remain in refugee camps for three generations or perhaps even more denied of minimum standards of life. No body seems to be concerned of their conditions nor willing to play fair on their rights to return. The Palestinian Authority is weak and frail, totally dependant on the Masters in Washington, Brussels and Riyadh. Israel, for their part, is determined not to recognise Israeli Arabs living in Israel as equal to other citizens let alone allowing any more return to their homeland. The world community, for its part, seems to be too happy to forget the Palestinian refugees for now. That leaves aggrieved Palestinians convinced that only armed struggle can ultimately ensure justice for the oppressed and occupied people of the Holy Land of Palestine.
In the light of the situations on the ground, given the geo-political dynamics of our world and considering the complexity of the issue, a two-state solution with Israel and Palestine living side by side in harmony, peace and prosperity seems ever more illusional. Indeed, I, like many others, are now convinced that two-state solution is in fact impractical thinking and has always been an unrealistic expectation. Besides, a two-state solution defies established values of humanity, civility and justice. What's more is that two-state solution is an insult on the good people of Israel and Palestine where Jews, Christians and Muslims has lived for centuries in peace and harmony.
If a solution is to be achieved in the Middle East Conflict which we must, we need to redefine our values and re-formulate our strategies. We need to commit ourselves to achieving justice, human dignity and freedom for all people of the divine land. We then need to insist all the players that they accept these values and commit to them. Those who fail to live up to this demand must be confronted in all ways necessary. What this practically means is that we need to recognise the legitimate expectation of people to get back their own land, ensure equality of all citizens, establish system of governance representative of all people. Only then and then alone will we find a solution to a problem which has spanned over almost a century.

Published on The Financial Express on 20 March 2010.

New Dimension to Global Politics

Only two days ago the UK officials and parliamentarians were outraged by the decision of a TV channel to broadcast alternative view of the most powerful Middle Eastern leader for the benefit of the viewers to make their mind in a free society. The core argument supporting their outrage was the ‘potential danger’ that individual leader posses to Israel. Of course some attempted to attribute crimes such as genocide and mass killing to him but of course little hard evidence they had to support such assertion. The bigotry, prejudice and very one sided political understanding was clearly present in the reaction of those officials and politicians, however, there was one hope too which was that at least these people are against injustice and shall come to the aid of the suffering, oppressed and helpless people wherever they may be.
Now that the Zionist war machine brutally humiliate a nation, subjugate an entire human civilisation and ruthlessly kill dozens, surprisingly these voices for justices are remarkably silent. Perhaps their silence is not so surprising if we dig a little deeper into discovering their true identity. They are united in their love for the Zionist war machine in Israel, they are blind in their support for Zionist oppression and they are united in their hatred of Arabs. For they are unable or perhaps unwilling to accept Palestinians as having any right to exists, perfectly happy to deny all sorts of human rights to these Arabs and wholeheartedly supportive of killing these people.
More importantly however, their attitude is no different from that of the majority of western leaders in positions to make a difference. They are fearful of freedom for people, flourishing democracy that offers real choices and potentially challenges the status quo of a very one sided concept of western democracy. Such fear instilled deep inside their heart guard them from the influence of reason and logic and make them ignorant of the concept of justice yet have the audacity to claim to be civilised. Such are the states of many of our leaders. Let us hope that in a new year we will be better equipped to distance ourselves for them and pave the way for a new dimension to global politics, a trend underpinned by spirit of justice, freedom and equality for all human.

Modern Concentration Camp

I watch with greatest sadness and to some degree anger the plight of innocent men, women, children, elderly and other vulnerable individuals made to suffer from an illegal occupation. The illegal occupier, committer of grave war crimes, defeating all sense of civility and defying all levels of morality, Israel imposes blockades on a small piece of Land, Gaza, forcing its population to live under the most inhumane condition. The treatment of the people of Palestine in general and the Gazans in particular is nothing short of the treatment experienced by the helpless Jewish people in Nazi Germany’s concentration camps. The strength of feeling felt inside me learning about the horrors of the concentration camps, I thought was heavy, almost unbearable. However, the horrendous conditions in Gaza beats all imagination and makes me wonder how low can any collection of human kinds can go.
Of course Israel should expect to live in peace and harmony and feel secure within its borders. Of course Israel should have the right to defend itself against aggression. But what must also happen is that it should expect others to expect the same. All nations take pride in their nationalities, all states wish to live in peace, harmony and security within their borders and retain the right to defend themselves against aggression. And it seems this is where the problem is. Hamas, a resistant movement, not afraid to exercise its rights and stand for its people, retaliate against the mighty Israeli war machines causing fear at the heart of the Israeli people is utterly hated by the Zionist xenophobes. They take every opportunity to strike on Hamas in whatever shape and form they can. But every time they fail to break them, in fact the attacks by the war mongers and war-criminals in Tel Aviv only strengthens the resolve of the movement and empowers its leadership with increasingly popularity. Failing in almost all of its attempts, Israel successfully plotted to break the unity among the Palestinians and now trying its latest tactics, to starve the people for their political support and exercising their democratic right by supporting Hamas.
Today however, I shall not spend any longer looking at the issues with Israel. For Israel is not the only party in play at the scene. The concentration camps in 2008 may have been caused by the illegal state of Israel, but the ‘custodians’ of our civilisation and the bearer of ‘justice’, ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’ have failed the people of Palestine too. In fact, the custodians, now the so called quartet, shamelessly sided with the butchers in Israel and the plotters in Palestine. Instead of bringing peace, they have assisted to bring about ever more carnage and chaos giving legitimacy to the continuing concentration camp in the once beautiful lands of Palestine. I shall seek to briefly look at the duplicities and inconsistencies of these states who are the source of power behind Israeli might.
To understand the role played by the global community, we must first understand the issues and the conditions on the ground. In a nutshell, the whole matter took a dramatic turn when the popular Hamas Movement came to dominate the PLA through a landslide victory burying the previously dominant force, Fattah of the late President Yasir Arafat. Many quarters for their own vested interested failed to come to term with this outcome and began look for ways to deny Hamas its rightful share in the governance of Palestine. But the matter did not end there. The most dramatic episode began when Hamas decided to go it alone and take over Gaza sending Fattah into a kind of exile into the West Bank.
Meanwhile, reacting to the rise of Hamas to the political institutions of the Palestinian Authority, israel and the most powerful nations decided to take a tough stand to punish the people of palestine for their democratic choice in the first ever true election. US and the European Union stoppped their fund and diverted some of it to their puppet agencies. The legitimate government of popular Hamas forced to fail in its effort to bring about stability and normalise the situation. However, all this failed to stop Hamas from increasing their popularity and influence. They did not fail under pressure from the major donors, and continued to serve their nations despite the absence of the economic lifeline. In between, efforts being made to save face of the ‘partners’ through attempted deals between Hamas and Fattah, but all of them ultimately failed.
The issue at stake is the issue of freedom, justice and ‘democracy’. Hamas, whatever one may feel about them, certainly has the legitimate political right to claim stake in the governance of Palestine for so long as the people of Palestine supports them. No one must act to deny such right to Hamas. The Palestinian people have the absolute right to decide who should lead them, yet again no one must act otherwise. The Palestinian state has the right to claim its sovereignty and reserve the right to retaliate against any aggressions and incursion and no one should meddle with it. These are issues of justice, fundamental rights of a nation, a state and her people. To deny such rights is to deny justice, humanity and civility. Such forces must be resisted in the most appropriate mean.
The US, the European Union, Russia and others who uses the issues of Hamas and likes as an excuse are nothing more than mere collaborators of Israel. More than once they have most spectacularly demonstrated their inability to live peacefully and often violates their own slogans of peace, justice, equality and democracy. US for example invades nations, ousts regimes, sponsors terrorists and funds illegal entities to further her desire to impose her will over the global community. Most strangely, she does all these in the name of Democracy and Freedom. When US and EU together forms the lifeline of Israel’s economy, defence and various other strategic areas, it is hard to have confidence on them to bring peace in the Middle East. Their insincerity and duplicity have been further emphasised in the appointment of the most biased and one-sided leader of recent Memory, Mr Tony Blair.
Of course there is the issue of attacks from Hamas, but this should not be made a condition for Israel to give People of Palestine their legitimate rights. Hamas operates its legitimate resistance movement under the illegitimate occupation of Israel. For the global community to ask Hamas to act first is to give Israel best reward for the most atrocious acts, the gravest of war crimes. The genuinely committed peace negotiators must first force Israel to withdraw from the occupied lands, seriously negotiate on the future of the both states and only than ask for peace and security and not before that. Israel must be made to pay for her crimes, criminals must be brought to justice and Palestine must be allowed to operate freely, viably and independently.
We the global community must show our commitment to peace and justice. We must demonstrate our determination to support the oppressed and must speak for them. Let us demand to our governments to stand for justice, to stand for Palestinians and to stop cooperating with Israel until her war machines stops killing innocent people.

For so long the illegal Israeli occupation remains, our support for Palestine shall continue

Israel is an evil impetus causing enormous grief an incredible hardship and suffering for millions of people. The Zionist empire based in a dream that demeans all people but those of Jews ancestry seeks to impose its will and hegemony over the defenceless people of Palestine and continues to exert whatever pressure, however draconian and ruthless the consequence may be, on the people of Palestine and others in the immediate neighbourhood. The criminality of unprecedented scale some times directly inflicting chaos and destruction on others, and often via hidden means continues to be a major issue on world peace. It would not be too much to say that was it not for the Zionist policies of the Israeli evil empire, the whole of Middle East and indeed the world would have been a much better, secure and stable place. So when I see an article on a news monitoring site of Bangladesh ‘articulating’ how Bangladesh is loosing out from a principles stand to boycott Israel it indeed saddens me.

The article published on NFB presents to us the ‘human and caring’ face of Israel, a site which often is unseen! Israel has acquired some of the ‘best’ best facilities in cardiovascular treatment, agriculture and other important areas. The author informs us of the enormous ‘good’ the effort of Israeli government brings to the world through sharing their expertise in training and helping the people in the poor world. The author tells too of the offer by Israelis to help Bangladesh for no apparent interest to Israel which the BNP led government apparently refused to take. I should have been of course annoyed at the government of my country for depriving the poor and needy people of the chance to be treated by some of the best professional in health, agriculture and other infrastructure development! But sadly I cannot.

It seems that the author’s main argument was to present the kind heartedness of the Israeli government and a genuine desire by them to be a force for good. I wish I could accept such attempt, instead I find it incredible that author felt us to be so foolish that we will not understand the clever stunt by the Israeli to gain some cheap sympathy in its mission to wipe our Palestine.

If for the sake of argument I accept that the effort by Israel to help others is genuine and therefore should be commended, it is only natural to look at the greatest contribution that Israel can may to the humanity. Thousands of people killed by illegal and barbaric Israeli aggression in Palestine, Lebanon and other places, Israel continue to randomly arrest, detain and imprison people of Palestinian origin for months and years. As I write this article, illegal Israeli incursion in the Gaza strip results in the arrest of democratically elected government ministers among others. It is clear that Israel has no regard for the lives of the Palestinian, no desire to end the illegal occupation and no plan to stop their land grabbing policy. Clearly too that Israel wishes never a stable middle east in which each nation flourish with full potential as such outcome will threaten Israel’s superiority. The position taken, however old or ‘antiquated’ the ban may be, it was a decision taken in solidarity of our Palestinian brothers and sister and to show our support for their cause. The ground on which the decision was taken has not change, if any it has gone worse. Of course it is true that many other countries have changed their position. But that is only because those countries lost its courage and have now converted into ‘American out Posts in the Middle east’. It is unfortunate of course to see the last lines in that article that seeks to threaten Bangladesh of US wrath. But I am not at all surprised as US has shamelessly supported the illegal state of Israel and will continue to do so. It is true that country like Bangladesh rely heavily on the goodwill and support of countries like the United states of America, true too that the people of Bangladesh value the friendship with US people, but that does not follow that Bangladesh and her government will be willing give way to bullying by people like Hannah Brown in accepting the state of Israel’s ill and evil destructive actions.

The people of Bangladesh have suffered for centuries in the hand of foreign masters and are fully aware of the humiliation, and hardship of life under occupation. The heroic nation that is my Bangladesh knows too of the difficulties and price often required staying on the ‘wrong’ side of the powerful. But our people also knows to remain firm and steady on the face of injustice and have fought and stood against injustice. For so long as the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestine will remain, the solidarity and support of the people of Bangladesh will also continue to be with the Palestinian brothers and sisters. To even think of luring us and bullying us to form ‘noble ties’ with Israel is if anything an insult to our feeling, our values and our principles.

Behind the Attacks lies a greater ambition to build an American Empire

History has been made today with a landmark meeting in Bagdad, the meeting between US envoy and Iranian Ambassador. This is the first high level contact between the countries in 30 years. Whatever the outcome may have been the meeting itself is a step towards the right direction which must be commended. Hopefully more meetings of this kind in the future will eventually bring about normal relationship between the two countries both with distinct history.

The meeting reported on BBC’s website as ‘US warns Iran over arming Iraqis’. Following the positive gloss on the meeting above it is unfortunate that a major news corporation fails to report an important event more positively. On a broader point however, reading the US feedback on the meeting, they very characteristically attacks the Iranian and warns them to ‘stop arming Iraqis’.

The US attack on the independent sovereign Iraq has been a blunder, the greatest mistake of George Bush’s career. The war on Iraq has come to haunt the neo-cons in spectacular fashion marred in controversy and perhaps incompetence though many would say rather arrogance failed their intelligence. What is clear however now is that amid increasing dissatisfaction and eroding support for the president and his project at home and isolated and ridiculed image of the US administration abroad left the master at the White House and Pentagon wonder for solutions. Their failure of astronomical magnitude costing lives and money at a frightening even to think. No body knows of the total death tolls of Iraq civilians and every day dozens more are dying. The country and its infrastructure are in tatters leaving a one time rich and advance nation in ruins. The failure to manage Iraq and bring about normalisation is increasingly frustrating the US administration who now finds an easy escape goat on Iran, an isolated nation being victim of US imperial vision.

But should we be surprised at the US’s hypocritical role with regards to Iran? Let’s briefly list some of the issues that US has with Iran: Nuclear, Arming Insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan and supporting Hezbollah and the likes. Of course the neo-cons and their allies also allege the Iranian regime to be theocratic who are suffocating the people of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Iran was labelled as member of the ‘Axis of Evil’ pronounced by the president in a famous speech. I shall seek to address each of these in brief below.

The issue of Nuclear energy and suspected military motives by the Iranian regime is one of total and utter nonsense, indefensible by any logic. To start with, the forces demanding the Iranian regime to give up their nuclear ambition themselves are armed with most sophisticated nuclear technology perhaps would not be possible for Iran to ever match and they continue to increase and enhance their capability both at the civil and military arena. To prevent Iran and to bully them to stop nuclear activities is the greatest hypocrisy of our time. There are other unstable regimes with nuclear bombs who instead of being forced to give up their weapons are being helped actively and empowered to strengthen their capability, India just one such nation who have a history of fighting with its neighbours, continues to have interesting relationship with most of its neighbours. India is also a country entrenched into sectarian fighting and many of her provinces are unstable as a result of ‘independence movement’ by various groups. How than is it justifiable that a nation who have been engaged in unprovoked war on more than one occasion with more than one nation is allowed to be empowered with nuclear forces and aided by the US yet when Iran, relatively small nation who never fought an aggressive war and clearly states no desire to acquire military nuclear technology be forced to abandon her projects? Why should there be a ban on Iran’s effort when clearly they have neither broken any role nor threatened or shown any sign of aggression? The only answer is Iran refuses to be a US poodle in a region where most others are happy to do so thus represent a threat to US-Israeli dominance in the oil rich region of our world which also happens to be the heart of a major religion with a global vision.

Iran seen a change over three decades ago, a change that brought an end to the most ruthless and autocratic regime in her entire history. The Islamic revolution was a mass movement of the people who reclaimed their right to govern themselves free from the suppression of ruthless dictator. Ever since the revolution the regimes in Iran have been elected democratically by the popular vote of her citizens contrary to the picture painted in the west. Iran is the only Middle Eastern country to have a thorough democratic system where man and women all participate. Contrary to the claims made by the neo-cons, the government in Iran has better democratic credential than President Bush for it was Bush who ashamed great American democracy by loosing the popular vote yet gaining the presidency.

The rise of the current Iranian political elites to the power came as a result of a stated commitment to fight aggression and help others to free themselves from occupation and dictatorship. As such Iran committed itself to help occupied people of Palestine and Lebanon to mobile their numbers to force occupiers out of their land. Most nation in history have done so, there is nothing inherently wrong in doing so. Even to date, US continue to arm support and fund more rebel and other groups to destabilise more countries than Iran can ever dream of doing. US’s role in funding extremist armed groups is well known and continues to date including currently funding an Iranian dissident group which has been branded ‘terrorist’ organisation by various international entities. Most recently, they have also actively supported a quo against the democratically elected government of Venezuela. The support for Israel and its illegal occupation continues to be a shame on American nation.

The arguments can be built, fact however is that the arrogance of American administrations means little does these arguments means. In affect however, beneath all the words and arrogance lies an ambitious desire to build a new empire spanning the whole world in which only America and her allies will have the ultimate say. Countries like Iran are an obstacle in achieving such vision thus prevented from pursuing legitimate means to strengthen and advance their national interests.

Birth of a new Dawn is inevitable

During the summer of 2006 the people of Lebanon found themselves caught in the midst of fire. The memories of brutal war made a come back destroying live, infrastructure and indeed the whole of Lebanon. Beautiful suburbs and lively streets in Beirut came to a standstill amid the devastation of astronomical scale caused by mighty Israeli shelling from air, sea and land. Though the war raged in full swing for weeks, and despite clear military advantage to Israel, the will of the people of Lebanon, the determined defence of highly committed Hezbollah forces meant Israel came out of the war as the wounded lion that lost its pride. The people of Lebanon and indeed the whole of Arab for first time in modern age felt proud of their strengths, not the governments and leaders but the people found heroes in the men of Hezbollah. These experiences undoubtedly led the leadership of Hezbollah confident who immediately after the war attempted to strengthen their grips in the corridors of power in Beirut.

A year later now that we approach the summer once again, people in Lebanon yet again finds themselves in the midst of war-noises. This time the attacks and the parties of the war no longer are the old enemies, the Israelis against defenceless Lebanese, but rather, the Lebanese Army laying siege against Palestinian refuges apparently taken hostage by a militant group. This development brings about yet again bitter memories of the past when multi racial, multi-faith Lebanon was engulfed in horrific civil war primarily fought along the religious lines. Already Hezbollah made their views known while the government continuing to show their determination to go ahead with ‘finishing’ their business. Recognising the strengths of the militants and potential support from powerful political blocks, military equipments and other necessary resources have already been channelled to the Lebanese army from the US and other Middle Eastern countries. Irony of course is that the Americans only last summer supported the Israeli effort in all forms against this very government even on the face of massive civilian casualties and clear violation of international laws by the Israeli warmongers. Although they argue to help the Lebanese army to increase and improve its capacity, reality is the result of a strengthen Lebanese army and continued siege on the refugees camp will only weaken the Lebanese government and bring about destruction of Lebanese infrastructure and society. There is no interest to be served by the Lebanese as far as the USA is concerned. The only outcome that will satisfy the US and in turn their masters in Tel Aviv is the outcome that will ensure a fragile Lebanon divided along sectarian lines, this latest crisis will go much far into achieving such objectives.

Interesting it is to see how this crisis unfolds. The effort of the Lebanese army is seen as a war against al-Qaeda necessary to defeat the forces of ‘evil’ threatening our global stability. Interesting too to see how other major obstacles to US ambition to control the Middle East are shown to be ‘engaged’ in this conflict. I of course am talking about Iran and Syria. Only this morning Walid Jumblatt, the leader of the Druze Community pronounced the lines so loved by the USA unchallenged by BBC in the Sunday AM programme where he sensed active Syrian and Iranian hands behind the escalation of the current crisis. Irony of course is that these are the lines also expresses the views of Neo-conservative ideologues in the Washington and beyond. It would be significant therefore to see how this latest crisis unfolds in Lebanon. What is clear however that certain forces with deep interest in the region will continue to see an unstable middles east to further their interest. What we of course do not hear is the potential gain by the USA from this conflict. Let’s just look at two such gains.

While the Lebanese siege continues, Israel suffocates the Palestinians, arrests the members of democratically elected government and continues to strengthen its grips on the Palestinian territory. In fact, it is evident that while the media spotlight continues to be away from Gaza, Israel aims to force the Palestinian government of Ismael Hniya to become dysfunctional by arresting his ministers and threatening to kill as many of his activist as possible. All these happen of course while media, especially in the west continues to avoid giving any coverage on the issue. The middles eastern powers too seem to be not bothered by the developments.

It would not be a bad thing to get rid of the ‘evil forces’ if it was to ensure peace and stability in the Middle East forever. The difficulty of course is that the forces identified by the Us-Israeli axis and their allies to be the ‘forces of evil’ continues to enjoy popular support by standing for the rights of the oppressed on the face of mighty enemy while the self proclaimed ‘forces of good’ remains deeply attached to committing evil deeds. Their allies hoping silently to see the end of the popular movements on the other hand continues to lose their grips on power and becoming increasingly unpopular. If this story continues, we shall continue to go round the cycles without ever finding a solution for the deeply troubled region that has so much influence in our lives, in deciding our future.

The peace loving people of the world must demand, and the self proclaimed leaders of the ‘civilised world’ must first stop associating themselves with the evil regime of the Zionists in Israel. Justice must be put before any other consideration regardless of the potential consequences. As an immediate step, Israeli incursion and continued detention of Palestinian people must come to an end and the Unity Government of Ismael Haniya must be given a chance to bring about order, run his country and rebuild the economy. The government of the Palestinian people must be allowed to rule their country free of interference from the outer world. Once the current situation is neutralised, tension reduced and normality return on the streets of Palestine, pressure must be brought about on Israel to give up its settlement of the west Banks and return to internationally recognised borders. Pressure must also be ensured on Israel to force her in accepting the refugees or compensate them if they so wish to be duly which will bring an end to lifelong imprisonment of generations of Palestinians spread all over the world.

There are of course those, in fact the dominant factions of global power, who argues that Israelis must be given assurance of security and left unattacked and undisturbed for any settlement to take place. This argument defies common logic and runs contrary to commonly accepted protocol. The people of Palestine are desperate, under occupation they have lost their loved ones, their homes, their lands and of course their freedom, what hope do they have of living a fulfilling life in an independent Palestine? How can we demand desperate people living in total despair accepting responsibility for situations in which they never played any major rule? The response from the Palestinian side, however harsh may look, is a response that should reasonably be expected from any occupied people, they are merely defending and in most cases seeking to regain the lost honour, dignity and pride, their country and their homes. Surely, for them to stop a clear progress must be made in ensuring their return to their homes, their freedoms must be brought in sight for them to stop fighting for it.
Coming back to the original issue, I was talking of two gains by the Israel-US and their allies from keeping Middle East chaotic. I mentioned one above with regards to Israel Palestine. The other major gain is that given the role of the USA in the middle eastern politics and their biased and totally unjustified stand over many years in supporting Israeli aggression, the continued biased of USA against Muslims and those who aspire to see Islam prevail, even the name of USA should have caused enormous anger in the middles east. The infighting within Middle Eastern society ensures that USA is in demand. As mentioned before, despite the USA role in Israel’s attempt to destroy Lebanon, Lebanese government turn to USA for help in its internal fight, Saudi Arabia remains dependant on USA fearing potential uprising bringing an end to the rule of the House of Saud, Fattah relies on US support to regain its control over Palestinian people and the list can continue. It is not in the interest of the US and indeed the ‘west’, therefore, to see an end to Middle Eastern violence. On this backdrop, therefore, it is not realistic to expect a solution with US at the driving sit. On the other hand, without the US involvement a solution is unthinkable, thus the conclusion is that there is no solution to Middle East problem. The only way out therefore is a new renaissance in the middles east, a renaissance bringing about empowerment of people, true democracy that ensures people’s participation in the governance of their country. For such time to become reality, a new grass root level activity must now be the focus of all peace loving determined people of the Middle East. Only when the puppets are driven out power will we see a truly stable middle east. Of course in the process there will be bloodshed, chaos and conflicts, there will be bitterness and pain. But the pain and bitterness is like the unbearable suffering of a mother prior to birth, once the birth of the new dawn takes place, all pain shall wane away ushering a new era of peace, stability and humanly love and kindness. Of course, there will be the death of the ‘birth giving mother’ as it so happens in real life, but the success if inevitable, however long it may take.