The news from Iraq has been so bad, for so long, that I’ve been almost too depressed to even write about it. I’m not sure that any of us who opposed the ghastly US invasion and occupation of the country from the get-go– and even before then– can take any pleasure at all in reading the news these days.
Like this AP report today: “Police found 30 bodies bearing signs of torture Friday, the latest in a wave of sectarian killings sweeping the Iraqi capital despite a monthlong security operation… ”
On it goes. On and on and on. I weep for my friends in Iraq. (Yes, and I continue to go to our weekly anti-war demonstrations here at home, whenever I can. Yesterday, once again, we got great support from the drivers-by.)
One possible glimmer of good news: The recently reported failure of SCIRI’s scheme to create a Shiite super-region in the south and cdenter of the country. Such a scheme would surely have led to levels of Sunni-Shiite fear, hatred, and violence even higher than what already exist… plus an intensification of sectarian “cleansing”, endless battles over frontiers and access to resources, etc etc.
Iraqis already have the de-facto secession of much of Iraqi Kurdistan. An unfinished process, certainly, and one which portends a lot more violence along the way. (Kirkuk, anyone?) But I think it’s good that they’re not going to have a second splittist process going ahead within the ethnic-Arab community as well.
So that’s the glimmer of good news for Iraqis at this point. Not much to compensate for all the hundreds of other ghastly things that are going on in their country… And for which, of course, the US, as the occupying power, remains responsible.
… Anyway, I wanted to try to take a “big picture” look at what has been going on in Iraq over recent weeks. And one good jumping-off point for this is this piece by Paul Rogers, a professor of peace studies at Bradford University in the UK, which was published on Open Democracy’s website yesterday.
The article, which is titled Al-Qaida’s new terrain, looks at the current situation in both Iraq and Afghanistan. I think this is a good way to approach the subject these days, given the increasing numbers of political and strategic reverberations between the two (US-“liberated”) countries.
Regarding Afghanistan, Rogers writes of “rapidly increasing levels of insecurity” there, citing in particular, this report from the Independent on Sept. 13 in which Kim Sengupta cited a British soldier serving with the US-led ISAF force in the southern province of Helmand as saying:
- We are flattening places we have already flattened, but the attacks have kept coming. We have killed them by the dozens, but more keep coming, either locally or from across the border. We have used B1 bombers, Harriers, F-16s and Mirage 2000s. We have dropped 500lb, 1,000lb and even 2,000lb bombs. At one point our Apaches [helicopter gunships] ran out of missiles they have fired so many. Almost any movement on the ground gets ambushed. We need an entire battlegroup to move things. Yet they will not give us the helicopters we have been asking for.
In the original, that soldier then went on to say, significantly:
- We have also got problems with the Afghan forces. The army, on the whole, is pretty good, although they are often not paid properly. But many of the police will not fight the Taliban, either because they are scared or they are sympathisers.
Sounds familiar?
And this, in what was supposed to be hearts-and-minds-y, reconstruction-focused mission down there in Helmand. Small wonder that some of the Canadians who were persuaded to serve in it feel just a little disillusioned… And of course, NATO is now scurrying around looking for more warm troop-bodies to deploy there.
Rogers writes that there have also been two other disturbing developments outside Afghanistan, that will most likely also undermine the stability of the ISAF-led order there:
- The first is the decision of the Pakistani government to negotiate an agreement with paramilitary groups [including pro-Taliban groups] in North Waziristan, which borders Afghanistan… [T]he indications being that the district will become even more of a refuge, training centre and support base for militias operating across the border…
The second development is a report from a usually reliable source [Syed Saleem Shahzad, writing in Asia Times Online] that Osama bin Laden himself has now recovered from his serious kidney problems and is in sufficiently good health to take to the road again, possibly travelling from South Waziristan into some eastern Afghan provinces… [T]he very fact that he seems to have emerged from an obscurity that has lasted two years is likely [to] give a boost to the wider al-Qaida movement.
Regarding Iraq, Rogers writes,
- Iraq has experienced an increase in violence on an even more substantial scale…
In response to the increased violence in Baghdad towards the end of August, United States troops were moved from other parts of Iraq to bolster security in the city. This has exacerbated a loss of control by US forces that stretches right across Anbar province, which covers a large swathe of land right up to the Syria border and includes major centres of resistance such as Fallujah and Ramadi. An unusually frank assessment by a senior US marine-corps intelligence officer, Colonel Pete Devlin, reveals the problems the US military is facing in Anbar (see Thomas E Ricks, “Situation Called Dire in West Iraq“, Washington Post, 11 September 2006).
Devlin’s report was dated 16 August, just as the violence was escalating in Baghdad, but actually covered the province that lies to the west and north-west of the city. It describes a vacuum in which governmental institutions do not function and the writ of US forces hardly extends beyond their permanent bases. Instead, insurgent groups, including those linked with al-Qaida, have developed local power bases that effectively replace external authority.
The key point here is that Anbar province encompasses those major centres of the insurgency that have been subject to intense military action by US forces since the termination of the Saddam Hussein regime three and a half years ago. A sustained policy of “clear and hold” has been applied, based on a process of clearing a city, town or district of insurgents and then holding it with a combination of US and Iraqi security forces.
Fallujah, in particular, was the site of a major marine-corps action right back in April 2004, and this was repeated on a much larger scale in November of that year when a joint US army/marine corps force took over the entire city in the largest single action since April 2003; this killed around 5,000 people and destroying three-quarters of the city’s infrastructure.
At the time, the Bush administration expressed a solid conviction that Fallujah was the most important centre of the whole Iraqi insurgency, but insurgents took control of much of the city of Mosul even as the US operation in Fallujah was still underway. Moreover, within months of the November 2004 operation, and despite a secured perimeter and well-armed roadblocks, insurgents were proving able to manufacture car-bombs within the city. Elsewhere in the province, including the city of Ramadi, attempts to control the insurgency were failing.
The problems in Anbar province actually go well beyond insecurity in particular cities because Colonel Devlin’s report implies that the province has essentially been “lost” from US control. This throws into question the whole “clear and hold” policy that has underpinned the US military approach to winning the war in Iraq. There have been occasional reports that CIA assessments of the situation in Iraq have been negative in recent months, but US military intelligence reports have tended to be more positive. Devlin’s is clearly an exception, and appears to be much more in line with the CIA…
I have never been convinced that “Al-Qaeda” has been responsible for most of the anti-US armed activity in Iraq. And nor am I now. But it does seem evident to me that Qaeda-linked networks and cells have a much greater presence in Iraq today than they ever had before March 19, 2003. Well, actually, there were virtually no Qaeda cells in Iraq when Saddam was still in charge– only that little groupuscule that Abu Musaeb al-Zarqawi was running up in an area of Kurdistan that was more under US control than it was under Saddam’s.
But matters have changed now. Qaeda-linked groups almost certainly have a non-trivial presence in western Iraq, though it remains as hard as ever to estimate what proportion of the anti-US “resistance” in those areas these groups actually comprise. What does seem clear is that repeated US efforts forcibly to “pacify” majority-Sunni cities like Fallujah, Ramadi, Tel Afar, etc etc have had the– quite predictable– effect of radicalizing the population in an anti-US direction.
Paul Rogers, in his piece, adduced the two examples of Iraq and Afghanistan in order to compare the veracity of the claims about those political situations made by, respectively, Qaeda strategist Ayman al-Zawahiri, and President George W. Bush. Bush had said Sept. 11, “Today we are safer but we are not yet safe.” (He also once again used the argument that, “we have to fight the terrorists over there in Iraq so we don’t have to fight them at home”, and in general, did everything he could to associate the US mission in Iraq with the “Global War on terror”.) And Zawahiri recently declared that the US is “facing defeat” in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
In the conclusion to his piece, Rogers writes:
- Uncomfortable though it may be to western analysts, al-Zawahiri may be closer to telling the truth about this situation than President Bush. The first phase of George W Bush’s war on terror is essentially about taking control in Afghanistan and Iraq while destroying the al-Qaida movement. The second phase will then be about regime change in Pyongyang and Tehran and the creation of a pro-American “greater middle east” that will secure Gulf oil supplies for decades. As of now, he is losing, not winning, that first phase.
I agree with this assessment. I agree, even if I don’t think that Qaeda is necessarily doing as well inside Iraq as Rogers seems to…. I just think the situation there is far more complex and fluid than being just a two-party “US vs. Qaeda” game. (That is more the case inside Afghanistan than Iraq, I think– though even there, there are many other parties and interests also involved.)
But anyway, for me this raises a huge question as to what we in the global peace movement plan to do about all this. I don’t think it’s sufficient any more just to make the argument– which I have made many times before– that if only the Bush administration had not been “distracted” by Iraq, then it could have undertaken a serious, post-war stabilization and reconstruction effort in Afghanistan.
Even though that is now revealed today as being truer than ever. There are, as Paul Rogers reminds us, 36,000 foreign triios in Afghanistan– but there are now 147,000 U.S. troops in Iraq! (Hat-tip to Juan C. for that. See you in Ann Arbor on Sunday, Juan.)
But I don’t want to be in a position where my activism contributes to a resurgence of Taliban/Qaeda rule inside Afghanistan.
We can of course also note that it has overwhelmingly been the actions and decisions that the Bush administration has made that have led– almost directly– to the present resurgence of the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan/Pakistan, and that has led to the birth and some growth of a Qaeda presence inside Iraq.
But again, just saying that doesn’t seem to me to be enough at this point.
I think we need to go back to some first principles regarding the US presence and actions in both those countries, and say first of all that the US’s active exercise of its militaristic policies there has inflicted great suffering on the peoples of both countries. (And both those peoples were anyway very vulnerable, having already been badly traumatized by preceding events, even before the US went and imposed its militarism on them.)
Therefore, we peace-minded US citizens need to call for:
- (1) the withdrawal of US military power from both those countries, and for
(2) the complete– or any way substantial– demilitarization of our country’s interaction with the rest of the world. (If the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem will look like a nail. Surely we can see the truth of that at this point?)
Those are our primary responsibilities. Those are things that we US citizens could and should do.
And then after that, do we have any “special” responsibilty as to what happens inside Afghanistan and Iraq once US military force has been extracted from those two situations? Yes, we do. The responsibility to do whatever we can to repair the citizens of those countries from the many traumas we have helped to inflict on them. But helping to “repair” their situation does not come with any concomitant “responsibility” (far less, any “right”) to tell those peoples how they should rule themselves in the future. That is honestly up to them… So long as they don’t do anything to threaten any other countries.
But honestly, right now, whether between the US and Iraq or between the US and Afghanistan: which country’s actions are threatening the other country the worst? To me, it seems very clear in Iraq: the US’s actions threaten Iraqis much more than the actions of any Iraqi (individual or institution) threatens the US. So we have zero “right” to tell the Iraqis, post- a US withdrawal from the country, what kind of policies they they should pursue.
And the same in Afghanistan. Though honestly, matters seem a little more ethically complex there. There, after all, the presence of the US and allied forces already has some legitimacy from the UN…
In both Iraq and Afghanistan, however, a non-catastrophic “end-game” to the present US entanglement looks possible only with much, much more active involvement from the UN. And this will require Washington to try to find a lot of goodwill from all around the world… We peace- and equality-minded US citizens certainly have a huge job to do, to try to turn round this lumbering and currently very destructive “ship of state” of ours before it crashes into the shoals of global catastrophe.
Helena
You omitted to follow through on your comment on Nato scurrying around trying to find bodies for the front. This is about the reluctance of other nations to get sucked into the US morass.
NATO have been trying to dress up a planned contribution by the Poles of a battallion as the solution to a lack of a brigade.
We are starting to see a shortage of riflemen all around the world. The difficulty of finding 5,000 men for Lebanon illustrates the problem.
The situation is starting to resemble 1914-15 when the small highly trained British Army was insufficient to match the numbers of the German army. Kitchener decidied to raise a massive volunteer army, which was sent partly trained to the slaughter of the Western front culminating in the massive losses on the first day of the battle of the Somme and the squalor of Paschendael.
The concept of the small highly trained well equipped professional Army is starting to creak a bit.
In consequence the military are faced with two choices.
1 Withdraw from all the widespread conflicts and deployments they are involved in and concentrate on the one or two places where it is really important they win.
2 Expand the forces available by means of selective service or other compulsory measure with a consequent dilution of the quality and ability of the formations.
I feel that the picture is starting to resemble the Russian fronts after the loss of Sixth Army at Stalingrad or the Kingdom of Jerusalem as the crusader castles fell one by one.
Withdrawing from Iraq and Afghanistan might not be enough to restore the status quo ante.
There will have to be a Peace Settlement much as Prince Hassan of Jordan proposed that recognises the new realities. The US will have to eat significant amounts of crow because the interests and Grand Strategy of the European nations is different to the US.
We Europeans are closer to the fighting than the US. We are more concerned with the continued secure supply of natural gas from Russia and Central Asia than we are with the interests of Texas oil companies.
We are more concerned that the 2% to 5% of our populations who are muslim do not become so radicalised that we have a significant chance of being killed on a tube or metro journey.
What we lack is a clear picture of what the Peace Settlement might look like.
I suspect the most important thing the Peace Movement in the US can do is challenge the concept of a “Long War” (thirty years or a hundred years?) on a concept.
How do you know you have won a war on Terror?
What’s up with this –
Pakistan frees Taliban fighters
I remember back when this all started that people in the know where discussing the need to inject huge sums of money into Afghanistan to rebuild institutions and infrastructure. I don’t know whether the Western peoples have the stomach for the expenditures necessary to follow through with those early ideas, but exiting Afghanistan without leaving behind something positive would seem to be asking for more trouble further down the line. Money, not bombs, I think is part of the answer.
“The Iraqi government plans to seal off Baghdad within weeks by ringing it with a series of trenches and setting up dozens of traffic checkpoints to control movement in and out of the violent city of seven million people, an Interior Ministry spokesman said Friday.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/16/world/middleeast/16iraq.html?hp&ex=1158465600&en=df2aba469798e11d&ei=5094&partner=homepage
To me this looks like Green Zone will be extended to include all Baghdad area.
Why they do a concrete wall like the one Israel built in west bank and lives behind it?
Is it this democracy they believe in?
Helena,
I disagree with your view about Al-Qaeda in Iraq, I think all theses links and talk about Al-Qaeda and Abu-Musa’ab Zarqawe its either hoax or replanted, the reality is Iraqi felt and wakeup after six months of the invasion with the country start be looted and all the asset was in process as Bremer planed to be sold and taken by US and other ails and any Iraqi saw he was threaten and cheated by believing what GWB, and his promises that Iraq will be free and democracy specially after Bremer chosen those groups ethically selected to saw the division between Iraq and to destabilise the society then US can do what the plane and succeeding in that, but Bremer flee the case and went back after he saw he ignite the fire and he can not control it he flee the fire taken him also.
So let be clear here Iraqis they resisting invasion not just Al-anbar or west Iraq in fact there are more in Al-Dewaniyah south Al-Umarah, Sumawah and other south cities but the blocking of news heavy handed by those Iranians/Iraqi Mullah kept thinks not reaching the level we seeing west Iraq, in fact in Dewaniayah two days ago there are clashes and demonstrations on the street of the city, I forgot Basra the city its boiling there.
So the reality I can say 90% of Iraqi appose the invasion and they don’t like US/UK inside their country or on their land.
What your CIA, US military intelligent and all those specialists to some degree you talking about the Qaeda in Iraq just talk you invented and I or the Iraqi can not digested at all.
Helena,
question as to what we in the global peace movement plan to do
Have Peace Activists Ever Stopped a War?
by Lawrence S. Wittner, January 16, 2006
It’s perfect, they call the real name for it now, so let’s be clear here who did creating the “death squad”?
What the purpose of this “death squad”?
Who get benefits from the dirty work of “death squad”?
Yes its bad news and very sad to see our home country our people killed for no reasons, we hear this under the name of Freedom and Democracy but incants Iraqi killed each minute now, the occupier should leave with BIG Shame for you…
Frank – good points and food for thought. Our wars are now being fought to maintain the dominant position of a handful of multi-national energy companies and weapons manufacturers at the top of the food chain. What meager public support exists for them is based on fear of losing a level of luxury that we know deep down is unsustainable and unsupportable in contrast to the living conditions of most of the world’s population. People will stick yellow ribbon magnets on their SUV’s to support wars like this, but they will not flock to their local military recruiter’s office to sign up. These are all essentially mercenary wars, since the “volunteer army” is made up mostly of people who view military service as a job or career or way to pay for college, as opposed to the WWII variety. That makes it ever more expensive to stay in the fight, because as the risk level rises, other opportunities naturally look more attractive. Utlimately, we will defeat ourselves and the “war on terror” will recede into history.
“”The Iraqi government plans to seal off Baghdad within weeks by ringing it with a series of trenches”
Salah, there is a very profound lesson in this about the nature of human conflict, don’t you think? In the age of nuclear weapons, orbiting satellites, wireless digital communication, laser-guided smart bombs, etc., the Israelis are defending themselves by building a big wall, and the US and its puppet government in Baghdad are defending themselves by digging a big trench.
Let’s just all meditate on that for awhile.
What about Taiwan? Is US military interaction there OK?
Dear Mrs Cobban,
Besides the Paul Roger’s article (a very good one), I am even more frightened, depressed or both, by his sixth so-called SWISH report (known to readers of OpenDemocracy). His conclusion (slightly rewritten) reads as :
…. In pursuit of its dangerous and counterproductive policies, the Bush administration risks generating precisely that clash of civilisations whose responsibility has been attributed to movements such as [Al-Qaeda]. But such a clash already has many diverse components and is increasingly unlikely to acquire coherent definition in the real world.
In conclusion, then, the influence of [Al-Qaeda] and [its] leader is considerable, but [Al-Qaeda] [is] not in control of [its] own strategy; rather, [Al-Qaeda] forms just one part of a wider process that is as diffuse and unpredictable as it is potent. [Al-Qaeda] could point to the United States failure to control its global war on terror and [they] would be correct to do so. [Al-Qaeda] could then claim that it is [their] movement that is setting the pace – but [they] would be wrong. The truly revealing development of recent months is that we have reached a point, five years after 9/11 where NO ONE, BUT NO ONE, IS IN CONTROL. (emphasis added).
I believe that that is the crux of the matter. Once the dogs of war have been unleashed….
I think the problem is as much the U.S. as it is Iraq or Afghanistan. If the U.S. were run by decent people then something might be done fix this mess.
edq, I submit that if the U.S. were run by decent people there would not be this mess at all.
War ON Terror? War OF terror! The enemy wants you to be terrified and your government insists you do you best to comply. What kind of war is that, who are the victims and who are the protagonists exactly?
So you civilians are supposedly under threat of devastating attacks? So with fortunes spent on “homeland security” has your basic civil defence been improved to respond to man made or natural cataclsyms?-go ask Katrina. But then we can’t have people feeling safer I guess.
What were the “four freedoms” Rooseveldt talked about in 1941? Maybe this “war” isn’t just a rerun of Pearl Harbour after all. To paraphrase another blog does being able to vote compensate for the loss of those four freedoms-for the Middle East OR USA?
Illusion and Reality
By Flynt Leverett is senior fellow at the New America Foundation and a visiting professor of political science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
GW Bush The Great
“He opened the session by declaring, “Let me just first tell you that I’ve never been more convinced that the decisions I made are the right decisions,”
He asked us to think about what the world could look like 50 years from now, with Islamic radicals either controlling the world’s oil supply or not. “I firmly believe that some day American presidents will be looking back at this period in time, saying, ‘Thank goodness they saw the vision,’ ” he said.
Any one have some intelligent or have mind in his head ask this cowboy “But the oil belong to them! Isn’t?
What they can do with it?
They like to live as any human on this earth they not can drink it and watch you die”
Iraq For Sale
What you can do:
Here’s where we’re at: Sen. Leahy, Sen. Dorgan, and Rep. Waxman have all introduced legislation (6/14/04, 11/9/05, 3/16/06, 6/14/06, 6/16/06) to add either oversight or explicit penalties for war profiteering. Nothing has happened, and all the bills have been voted down.
So vote on November 7th for senators (previous votes) and representatives (previous votes) who will hold hearings and enact legislation to end profiteering.
Also, the Brave New Foundation put together a fantastic action guide featuring ten different organizations with all kinds of things you can do to end war profiteering. Download the action guide as a Word Document or Adobe PDF file.
JohnC
Thanks for the kind comments.
I notice as I read this morning’s Observer that Mr Bush wants a Division (20,000 troops) for Darfur and Royal Irish or 2 Para are to be sent to Afghansistan.
http://www.independent.co.uk/
Where do all these troops come from? Who is going to reinforce UNIFIL in Lebanon if they fire on the Israelis?
The US will have to eat significant amounts of crow because the interests and Grand Strategy of the European nations is different to the US.
Indeed. In contrast to our European allies, we encourage American Muslims to assimilate in our embracing, historic melting pot. No head scarf bans here. No insulting, religion-baiting political cartoons. No car burning protests. No Papal-like suggestions about Mohammed and “evil”.
It is not altogether surprising for that reason that many of the most egregious acts of terror in recent years trace back to Hamburg, Finsbury Park, Clichy-sous-Bois and Leganés…and, tellingly, not to Dearborn or Jersey City.
Truesdale
On the other hand you have George Bush, Dick Cheney, Newt Gingich and FrontPage magazine.
We dont make speeches about countries being the Axis of Evil.
That kind of statement went out with Emperor Manuel II Paleologus.
Truesdale
On the other hand you have George Bush, Dick Cheney, Newt Gingrich and FrontPage magazine.
We dont make speeches about countries being the Axis of Evil.
That kind of statement went out with Emperor Manuel II Paleologus.
Truesdell,
Actually, the 1993 WTC bombers lived in Jersey City.
But I do generally agree that America has done a much, much better job of integrating its Muslim community than Europe.
Europe has done a miserable job in this regard. This in part explains the attempt by some quarters of Europe to try to blame Israel and the U.S. for the state of unrest. Rather than own up to their own failures (which in some cases were based on incrediblt patronizing views) they can say that it’s “imperialist” foreign policy that is radicalizing those communities.
The Pope found his voice and said what had to be said,although timidly through an obscure quote. The beasts react again towordwith violence.A nun killed, churches attacked,and efigial burning, and the usual poison in their tongues. We are being blackmailed by you know who.
“The Pope found his voice and said what had to be said…”
Rubbish! First, what the Pope was quoting was false Islamophobic nonsense uttered by a disgruntled Byzantine emperor who had an axe to grind, and had no clue what he was talking about. Mohammad did notcommand his followers or anyone else to “spread Islam by the sword”. (Nor was Islam “spread by the sword” any more than Christianity was.) Second, the Pope’s remark has been irresponsibly – one might almost say in this case, criminally – quoted out of context in a way that utterly obscured the point he was making his message, and was guaranteed to inflame a certain element.
And while we are on the subject of bloody violent religions, and “spreading by the sword”, shall we talk about the history of Christianity, and the Catholic church in particular? No, you’d rather not? Gee, why not, I wonder?
“they can say that it’s ‘imperialist’ foreign policy that is radicalizing those communities”
Those Europeans are always looking for excuses not to drop more bombs on Muslim countries, aren’t they Josh? Obviously the destruction of Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine has nothing to do with the “unrest” in Europe, and the destruction of Iran will have even less to do with it, right?*
Yes, we’ve done a swell job of “integrating” our Muslim communities, haven’t we? Just read some of the lovely things being said by Minnesota Republicans about Keith Ellison, who will become the first Muslim member of Congress, if he lives long enough.
http://www.startribune.com/587/story/679618.html
*irony alert
John C.
Just read some of the lovely things being said by Minnesota Republicans about Keith Ellison, who will become the first Muslim
Q Morning President. I have a more general question about the United States’ work to democratize the rest of the world. Many have viewed the United States’ effort to democratize the world — especially nations in the Middle East — as an imposition or invasion on their sovereign rights. Considering that it was, in fact, the Prophet Mohammed who established the first known constitution in the world — I’m referring to the constitution he wrote for the city of Medina –and that his life and the principles outlined in his constitution, such as the championing of the welfare of women, children and the poor, living as an equal among his people, dissolving disputes between the warring clans in Arabia, giving any man or woman in parliament the right to vote and guaranteeing respect for all religions, ironically parallel those principles that we hold most precious in our own Constitution. I’m wondering how might your recently formed Iraq Study Group under the U.S. Institute for Peace explore these striking similarities to forge a new relationship with Iraqis and educate Americans about the democratic principles inherent in Islam?”
“قال عبد الرؤوف إن القوات الأميركية والرئيس الأفغاني حامد كرزاي كانوا يقولون إنهم سوف يخرجون القاعدة وطالبان من جحورهم.
ولكن بعد خمس سنوات، يضيف القائد “نرى أنهم هم الذين يختبئون في الجحور وليس نحن، فالشعب يقف معنا ماديا ومعنويا ويساعدون إخوانهم ضد الاحتلال وقوات الكفر”.
http://www.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/88A806A1-A3BD-4C67-B734-71AE3937F98F.htm
Salah-
W’s response to that question included the following unscripted remark:
“And I found the elections that Hamas won very instructive and very interesting. It was — to me, it was a final condemnation of the Arafat era, where people said, we’re sick of corruption; we want better health care and better education; we want — we actually want our leaders to focus on the people, not on their self interests.”
One wonders where W’s stream of consciousness would lead him, if it were not being directed by Cheney, Rice, et al.
John C,
Talking about “sick of corruption” and all these words in regards the ME countries, lets not forget those US$9.0 Billions money went missing during ONE YEAR during Sheikh Paul Bremer III when he was seating in Baghdad any Regime in ME run with this a mount of corruption in ONE YEAR? I doubt it. More read this pls…
Green Zone Full Brownies in Miers
“The article notes that the main qualification for approval to work in Iraq in a variety of capacities was loyalty to the administration. Some candidates were asked who they voted for in 2000, how they viewed Bush’s strategy in the war on terror and even their view on Roe v. Wade.
Appointees included a 24 year old who never worked in finance but applied for a White House job and was sent to reopen the Baghdad stock exchange. The daughter of a prominent neoconservative commentator and a recent graduate from an evangelical university for home-schooled children were tapped to manage Iraq’s $13 billion budget, even though they didn’t have a background in accounting.”
It’s disgusting and vomiting behaviors its smears ugly corruption like those from Zimbabwe, or any corrupted regimes every day US and its administration talking about in Meddle East.
“Obviously the destruction of Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine has nothing to do with the “unrest” in Europe, and the destruction of Iran will have even less to do with it, right?*”
Although you tagged this, “irony alert” I think in fact the above is more or less accurate. And while I would not say that the above has “nothing” to do with the unrest in Europe, it is really not the primary factor.
And yes, I think America has done a pretty good job of integrating its Muslim communities. Republicans will be republicans, so what they say about Keith Ellison (who seems like a good guy as far as I can tell, even if he got mixed up with some unsavory NOI types earlier in life) doesn’t really reflect on much, except how desperate that party is getting.
Joshua wrote :
But I do generally agree that America has done a much, much better job of integrating its Muslim community than Europe.
Europe has done a miserable job in this regard. This in part explains the attempt by some quarters of Europe to try to blame Israel and the U.S. for the state of unrest. Rather than own up to their own failures (which in some cases were based on incrediblt patronizing views) they can say that it’s “imperialist” foreign policy that is radicalizing those communities.
You can keep your arrogance for yourself. One can only compare what is comparable. The Arab/Muslim community living in the US is not the same as that living in EU. In the US they are better educated, owns better position in the social hierarchy and get higher revenue than the mean of Americans. It is because the US migration policies favors people with higher education and because in order to travel to America and migrate there, you need more money than to go to EU. In the EU you have exactly the reverse : the Muslim population there came from former colonies and they are poorer than the average EU citizen. When you add the xenophobic component and latent racism, you have lots of discriminated people, who have social reasons of discontent, unlike in the US.
Further, denying the fact that the US invasion and occupation of Iraq doesn’t create more insatisfaction and more hate toward the West is just refusing to see reality. And yes, we in the EU are bound to suffer more from the bullying policy the US is waging toward ME, a policy that most of the EU opinion refused.
When the unrests broke in France last years, the American were quick to point to a failure of the French model of integration. Apparently you didn’t read a recent
Pew Report showing that your interpretation doesn’t held. Go and read it and stop putting on our shoulders a fault which isn’t ours. French suburbs have a social problem. The French unrest had nothing to do with religion or what so ever. Here is the lead of the Pew report which is well worth reading :
When Muslim youth rioted in the suburbs of France late last year, commentators were quick to fault the French “color-blind” assimilation model. “The unrest in France’s cities shows that social and policing policy has failed, as well as integration,” read the headline on an article in the Economist magazine on November 12, 2005.
But findings from the latest Pew Global Attitudes Survey, which included over-samples of Muslims in four European countries,1 suggest that the French model can claim some success, however mixed. Some aspects of that relative success are especially striking when compared with the attitudes and experiences of Muslims in Great Britain, where police last week foiled a home-grown plot by Islamic terrorists to blow up U.S.-bound airliners.
I kind of figured Christiane would feel compelled to respond. She is the classic example of the patronizing arrogant and racist European who likes to try and shift the blame to other white people to show how “understanding” she is of other cultures.
Your characterization of American immigrants is simply inaccurate. American immigrants come in all types, both highly educated and uneducated, rich and poor. You have immigrants who came as refugees (which means they are not technically immigrants, but that’s besides the point), immigrants who won the diversity lottery, immigrants who were able to receive a work visa due to skills, and so on.
When it comes to immigrants from Arab and Muslim countries, there is incredible diversity which I have seen up close. It is not simply “cream skimming” but the fact that while America has its racism, it also grants significantly more opportunity for success and is simply a more diverse country than any European nation.
One other suggestion. You should learn to read more carefully. I did not say that the invasion of Iraq had no effect on how Muslims reacted. What I did say is that it was not the primary factor.
Christiane, I understand it is very difficult for you to come to terms with your racism, particularly since I sense that you mean well (even if in a somewhat patronizing sense). But it’s something that you will have to addresss ultimately, because your Pavlonian response to rant and rave about the U.S. and Israel really isn’t accomplishing anything, either on an individual or collective level.
Please circulate this appeal widely. For more information contact: info@brusselstribunal.org
URL for this page: http://www.brusselstribunal.org/Bedrani.htm
“The BRussells Tribunal today demands that the US government immediately release Dr Fadhil Al-Bedrani and all members of his family who were taken into US military custody 12 September 2006.
After detaining the Iraqi writer and Journalist Gulshan Al Bayaty, here is the US occupation in Iraq at it again, detaining the courageous journalist and writer Mr. Fadhel al Badrani when he was attending the Fatiha funeral prayers on the soul of his martyred brother Fayez, organized at the city of Resistance and Combat Falluja.”
Dr Fadhil Al-Bedraniis a professor of journalism and a prominent patriotic writer known for his anti-occupation stand and whose reports appear on Al-Jazeera as well as Reuters and the BBC. When talking about the difficulty of getting news out of Iraq and into mainstream media, he said: “we report but they censor.”
Little information is yet available, but some reports say that as many as 65 members of Dr Al-Bedrani’s family were arrested with him. It is also reported that US forces killed Dr Al-Bedrani’s brother, Fayez Al-Bedrani, a student at the Islamic Sciences College. Another brother, Abdul Qadir Mohamad Al-Bedrani, also a reporter for Reuters, was shot by the US and Iraqi troops in Fallujah in August 2005.
Please circulate this appeal widely. For more information contact: info@brusselstribunal.org
URL for this page: http://www.brusselstribunal.org/Bedrani.htm
The BRussells Tribunal today demands that the US government immediately release Dr Fadhil Al-Bedrani and all members of his family who were taken into US military custody 12 September 2006.
ANOTHER IARQI JONRALIST HE IS IN CASTUDY BY AMARIACNS ALSO FOR 5 MONTHS AND STILL UNDER ARREST WITHOUT CHARGES
U.S. Holds AP Photographer in Iraq 5 Mos
By ROBERT TANNER
AP National Writer
The U.S. military in Iraq has imprisoned an Associated Press photographer for five months, accusing him of being a security threat but never filing charges or permitting a public hearing.
Military officials said Bilal Hussein, an Iraqi citizen, was being held for “imperative reasons of security” under United Nations resolutions. AP executives said the news cooperative’s review of Hussein’s work did not find anything to indicate inappropriate contact with insurgents, and any evidence against him should be brought to the Iraqi criminal justice system.
“We want the rule of law to prevail. He either needs to be charged or released. Indefinite detention is not acceptable,” said Tom Curley, AP’s president and chief executive officer. “We’ve come to the conclusion that this is unacceptable under Iraqi law, or Geneva Conventions, or any military procedure.”
Helena, all our friends here help these two Iraqi guys, do what you can do to help the release of them from the Americans they working both with US media so please send a letter, call your Senator to help them urgently and thanks for your help…
Christiane, your social profile revisionism is nonsense. Are the muslim and arab taxi drivers in all major US cities rich elites selected by INS for their wealth and skills? Look frankly in the mirror, you cannot shake the centuries old Euro disease of xenophobia. Many of your victims have found a refuge in North America and made new lives for their families. It somehow bothers you, and you spit across the Atlantic to try and soil them from the distance.
Accusing Christiane of racism is disgusting, and Joshua ought to be banned for that.
The plain and simple difference between Europe’s experience of Islam and the American one, is that there are very few Muslims in the United States, and you don’t hear from them very often. In Europe, the proportion of Muslims may be highest in France (I haven’t checked the figures), but there are still a lot in Britain, the inevitable consequence of the imperial experience,which, you will remember, was quite popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Joshua quoting the Economist against Christiane is also out of court. The Economist is a right-wing rag which tries to sell in the United States by sucking up to the Republicans and often to neocons. There is a lot of analysis, but you have to filter it these days (it was a lot better when I was a kid). The riots in France were not religion/race related (they were round my house), but based on economic deprivation.
I don’t agree that Muslim integration in Europe is a failure. The real problem is the United States (and Israel) stirring up hatred of Islam for their own private (and contemptible) political ends. Some of that is bound to filter into Europe. There are always people in any country who are willing to stir up conflict, and they latch onto the highly partisan propaganda that is coming over the water.
In the European context, it is inevitable that there will be a somewhat strained relationship between Christianity and Islam, in view of the millennium of confrontation. The situation is precisely comparable to the relationship between Britain and France, where there has been a history of six centuries of confrontation. You would be really amazed, if you read the British media, how often public figures make anti-French statements, or suggest that the French are underhand in some way (it is not true now, by the way, of the attitude of the French towards the Brits). Nevertheless the two countries get on quite well together. There is no reason why the relationship between Christianity and Islam in Europe should not be the same. It will certainly end up that way, live and let live, and would easily, if it were not for the large quantities of virulent propaganda coming over the Atlantic, and the small quantity coming from Afghanistan.
By ‘coming over the Atlantic’, I meant from USA to us in Europe. It’s a lesson that one should not be too allusive in these posts.
Helena
I referred in an earlier post on this topic to the problem of where to find reinforcements if the IDF fire on UNIFIL.
Jerusalem Post poses the same question.
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1157913650398&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
at least the French have brought a regiment of Anti aircraft misle batteries with them.
The European Experience of Islam includes two sieges of Vienna by the Turks.
The last one was raised by John Sobieski and the Hussaria when they were down to their last 5000 fighting men with the walls in ruins.
I rather like the way the Austrians maintain their Russian war memorial. It is a sermon in stone that basically says “Dont upset the chaps to the East”. It is also a lesson for the chaps from the East. If you read the inscription “It finishes by saying “We will never forget your sacrifice” Not quite a promise that was kept.
As it looks like the Vietnam Memorial didn’t work, I wonder if the peace movement might like to design something that can be seen from the Capitol.
I leave it to your imagination to choose what to erect.
Joshua,
Your definition of racism seems to be very special, not the one we find in dictionnaries. I’m always marvelled by the way the right wing guys manage to call white what is black and black what is white. That was also the tactic of Goebbels : reapeat a lies as often as possible, in the end it will be taken for the truth. The Bushites are doing that quite well.
You are also twisting what I said. I was not speaking of all the immigrants, only of those who come from the ME. I know perfectly well that the situation of the latinos is far worse than that of the Americans, in all the points I considered (aka education level, position in the social hierarchy and medium income). Concerning the situation of ME immigrants living in the US, compared to those living in the EU, I didn’t invent it. I just read it in the Atlantic Monthly, in an essay written by James Fallows and entitled “Declaring victory
(Sorry, this is for subscriber only). Fallows was quoting someone named Sageman on this point.
BTW, James Fallows analysis bring us back to the main theme of Helena’s entry, aka : what should the US do next with Iraq and Afghanistan. It is well worth reading : Here is the leader of his article : The United States is succeeding in its struggle against terrorism. The time has come to declare the war on terror over, so that an even more effective military and diplomatic campaign can begin.
PS : Thank you Alastair for your support
Excuse me, but where is the history of “imperialism” in Sweden, Norway and Denmark?
The majority of Muslims in Germany are Turkish. When was Turkey “colonized” by Germans (or any other Europeans for that matter)?
The Netherlands hasn’t been having most of its problems with Muslims from its former colonies in Indonesia. Rather, the violence has mainly been perpetrated by immigrants from North Africa. So what is the connection with “colonialism” and “imperialism”?
The fact that the Economist is “right-wing” (whether or not it is a “rag” is debatable) is not an argument at all. Irrespective of where a person happens to have lived in relation to the riots last summer has nothing to do with their nature or the degree to which they were based on race/religion or socioeconomic factors – which are not necessarily mutually exclusive, by the way.
And this brings us right back to Joshua’s point, which was, I believe, quite correct in the first place. After all, he never said – or even implied – that Islam or Arabs were the problem. It is a socioeconomic problem and it does appear to stem from the fact that many Europeans, while quite anxious to realize all the benefits of an advanced welfare state, were, for decades, equally reluctant to work in many of the jobs that were required to maintain an economy to support such a welfare state. This is the reason that they quite willingly opened their doors to Muslims in the first place, and it the frustration that the children of those Muslims feel with a perceived lack of social mobility that is probably a much more important and attributable cause of the riots than some imagined reaction to US actions in Afghanistan or Iraq.
(BTW, the Swiss are just as guilty as the rest of Europe, although on a smaller scale. Lena Wurtmueller’s “Bread and Chocolate” is a nice dpepiction.)
“It is a socioeconomic problem and it does appear to stem from the fact that many Europeans, while quite anxious to realize all the benefits of an advanced welfare state, were, for decades, equally reluctant to work in many of the jobs that were required to maintain an economy to support such a welfare state.”
This thread has taken an interesting direction, and seems about to come around full circle. Indeed, the current climate of violence is rooted in the increasing dependence of “first world” countries on cheap imported fuel and labor. This is what connects the wars in the ME with the riots outside Paris.
But Helena’s question was, what should we do about it? JES, Joshua, what are your answers?
Alistair,
When did I quote the Economist? It’s not a bad publication, even if it’s a bit to the right. But I never cited it.
Christiane,
I’m not sure what is relevant about what “right wing guys” say. I’m not a “right wing guy” whatever it is. (Get this, I’ve never even voted Republican!) And I’d tell you more about my line of work, my friends, my beliefs, etc. Except, of course, that it’s none of your business.
You are trying to slide out of the subject. I checked my last post, and I clearly referred to Muslim immigrants in America. They span the social spectrum. Sure you have the well educated elite. But there are many more working and middle class immigrants from that country. Construction laborers, cab drivers, small business owners. I happen to live in a city which has one of the highest concentrations of Muslim immigrants in the country. (Of course, it also happens to be among the most ethnically diverse countries in America).
Being from Christian Europe, that’s probably a foreign concept to you. That’s ok. No shame. What is shameful is when you start insisting that it is somehow America and Israel that are responsible for the mess you guys have created (even if it’s not intentional and the racism behind it was just latent).
One other note. The “classes” I referred to above are not static. In many cases, a working class immigrant family will, over the course of a couple of generations (sometimes less) better themselves. In fact, many Muslim immigrants have been particularly good at this, as the average Muslim is in fact wealthier and more educated than the average american. Again, that concept of social mobility may be foreign to you, as Europe is significantly more stratified and static in those terms. But maybe if you weren’t so insistent on placing blame elsewhere, you could learn from it.