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By Stephen Lendman

7/3/07

Britain’s most despised and discredited man ended his 10 year reign June 27 when he stepped down from office transferring his ruling Labor Party’s leadership to successor Gordon Brown. He had no choice because of seething public displeasure over his allying with George Bush’s illegal wars on Iraq and Afghanistan. Most Brits oppose them, yet the vast majority of Labor and Conservative MPs, including new prime minister Gordon Brown, supported them early on, now may have second thoughts, but are constrained by close relations with Washington making them reluctant to back down from what they once disingenuously trumpeted as a noble cause.

That’s an open question; however, the London Guardian’s Jonathan Steele posed and answered June 29 if Mr. Brown was listening. Steele’s message to “The new man in No 10″ is “seize the day….break with Bush now….signal a fresh start by taking Britain out of Iraq.” Don’t bet on it. Steele says Brown is a committed “Atlanticist.” He’s likely weighing the proper way to begin engaging his US ally. Steele tells him how, pointing to other loyal NATO members as examples. France and Germany sent no forces to Iraq, and Italy, Spain and the Netherlands withdrew theirs. It caused no rupture in relations with Washington for any of them after some name calling at first. Why not Britain now? Steele stresses how refreshing a policy change at “No 10″ would be “after the subservient Blair years.”

Tony Blair began his tenure May 2, 1997 with a formidable approval rating as high at times as 90% but ended it in the mid-20% range or lower. The same is likely for George Bush already at 26% in the latest Newsweek poll suggesting it’s even lower than that. Immediately post-9/11, he was compared to Lincoln, FDR and Churchill combined. It was laughable then and seems ludicrous now for a hated man barely hanging on and trying to avoid what growing numbers in the country demand - his removal from office by impeachment along with Vice-President Cheney.

The feeling of many in Britain is that by allying with George Bush, Mr. Blair left a legacy of “dashed hopes and big disappointments, of so much promised and so little delivered.” That’s in spite of helping advance the Northern Ireland peace process, begun before he took office, and that leaders in Ireland had lots more to do with than him.

Just hours after standing down, the announcement everyone knew in advance came, surprising no one but angering most. Referring to the so-called Quartet, the BBC reported June 27: “Tony Blair is to become a Middle East envoy working on behalf of the US, Russia, the UN and the EU.” The London Guardian called him “the Quartet’s fifth horseman,” an appointment that “beggars belief.” In his new capacity, he’ll replace former World Bank president James Wolfensohn who resigned last year for lack of progress he never had a chance to achieve in the first place.

Neither will Mr. Blair, nor will he try to, as Alvaro de Soto, former UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process and envoy to the Quartet, explained in his leaked End of Mission Report. It noted Wolfensohn was originally to cover the entire peace process, but what emerged for him was a narrowly constricted role. De Soto said he was “highjacked….by US envoys and (Secretary Condoleezza) Rice.” As a result, Wolfensohn stepped down from his job in April, 2006 with “a more jaundiced view of Israel (and US) policies than he had upon entering.”

Based on his sordid war criminal record post-9/11, Tony Blair won’t likely have the qualms that got James Wolfensohn to resign his job. He’s taking it to reinvent himself, but that’s no more likely than convincing carnivores to become vegetarians. He’ll first visit Ramallah in the West Bank, showing up as a Trojan horse fooling no one about what’s behind his slick-tongued hypocrisy.

In its effort to obscure more than enlighten, BBC omitted this explanation and could barely go beyond saying Mr. Blair “faces an uphill task to address Palestinian misgivings over his ties to Israel and the US.” Left out as well were the reasons why. How can a war criminal reinvent himself as a peace envoy to the region he waged war against and have any credibility or hope of achieving anything? Further, how could he do it when his brief is quite opposite public pronouncements about it?

Under the false mantle of peacemaker, he’s Washington’s man and the West’s envoy to Israel. His job is to continue six decades of ethnic cleansing war and repression against defenseless Palestinians, support open conflict doing it if necessary, ally with an illegitimate quisling Fatah government, and outrageously claim he’s there seeking peace.

Tony Blair is a war maker, not a peacemaker. He’s a criminal and, like George Bush and Dick Cheney, should be held accountable for his crimes. He willfully partnered with the Bush administration in its wars of aggression in Afghanistan, Iraq and against the occupied people of Palestine. He joined in cutting off essential aid to the Palestinian people and renounced its democratically elected Hamas government without ever giving it a chance to prove itself. He also supported Israel’s aggressive wars against Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank, and, in short, partnered in backing war and avoiding peace. He now has a new title in his new job. His mission is the same. He’ll bring no peace to the Middle East nor does he intend to.

Blair’s appointment sends a clear message to the region. Peace is not on the agenda nor will he help Palestinians get what they want most - an end to 60 years of Israeli repression, discrimination, occupation and colonization; freedom, justice, real peace and security; a sovereign integral independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital; and the guaranteed right affirmed everyone in Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that: “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and return to his country.” UN Resolution 194 mandated Palestinians that right in 1948 and reaffirmed it in the General Assembly 130 times with near-universal consensus except for Israel, the US and a Pacific Island state or two pathetically going along at times.

From “No 10″ to the Middle East - A Record of Shame

Tony Blair is despised and discredited at home, hated across the world, and the Arab street condemns him. Appointing him peace envoy to the region he warred against is a galling insult to its people, all others of conscience and all humanity. Nonetheless, he has the job and started off on his last day in office June 27 telling his Parliament: “The absolute priority is to try to give effect to what is now the consensus across the international community - that the only way of bringing stability and peace to the Middle East is a two-state solution.”

The London Independent’s veteran Middle East correspondent, Robert Fisk, summed up the feelings of many in his article dated June 23 titled: “How can Blair possibly be given this job?” He began it saying “I suppose that astonishment is not the word for it. Stupefaction comes to mind. I simply could not believe my ears in Beirut (where Fisk is based) when a phone call told me that Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara (where British forces were defeated by the Ottomans in WW I) was going to create ‘Palestine.’ “Fisk continued calling Blair “vain, deceitful, a proven liar, a trumped up lawyer (with) the blood of thousands of Arab (people) on his hands.”

He’ll not be welcomed or aided with a brief constricting him within vaguely stated areas of Palestinian governance, economics and security rather than letting him take on the entire range of issues causing the Israeli - Palestinian conflict. Unstated is what his real mission is that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert set straight by calling Mr. Blair “A true friend of the State of Israel.” Israeli foreign minister Tzipi Livni added: “Tony Blair is a very well-appreciated figure in Israel,” and an official Israeli government statement said Blair “will (be) provide(d) with all necessary assistance in order for him to carry out his duties.”

Indeed he will, and it’s to support Israeli interests by denying Palestinians theirs. Governance means by the illegitimate Fatah; economics is funding it with weapons and materials against Hamas as well as propping it up financially; and security is by hard line street enforcement and continued conflict aimed at routing the elected government and installing a quisling one over the entire Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT).

Tony Blair is the right man for the wrong job and the wrong man for the kind of job he should be sent to do. He has no interest in peace and a long sordid record of contempt for Palestinian rights and justice from his committed one-sided support for Israel. His job is to further the concocted “clash of civilizations” against “heathen Arab terrorists” blaming the victims for crimes he helped commit against them. He feigns helping Palestinians by allying with Fatah’s traitorous Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank while continuing to condemn and marginalize the democratically elected Hamas government in Gaza.

Abbas conspired with Israel and the US going back to Olso or earlier. He partnered with his western-supported paramilitary warlord muscleman, Mohammed Dahlan, for war on Hamas hoping to unseat it violently but failed. He then brazenly dismissed the legitimate Hamas government June 17, appointing an illegitimate “emergency” quisling one in its place. He’s its president and western darling and former World Bank and IMF official Salam Fayyad was made prime minister. Writer and editor Rami Khoury calls it a “government of the imagination.” He also said “Appointing….Blair….is something like appointing Emperor Nero to be the chief fireman of Rome,” and add to that the notion of having the fox look after the henhouse.

He’s mandated to back Fatah in its role as Israel’s enforcer and deny Palestinians any chance for freedom, equity and justice. Tony Blair will go to the region in a limited subservient role for Israel and the US. He’s to play frontman shoring up support for Abbas, Fayyad, and Dahlan, work against the interests of the legitimate Palestinian government and its people, and leave the heavy lifting undermining efforts to Washington and Jerusalem. He’s going in spite of being totally discredited in the region by people who despise him. He did nothing for them nor will he ever, yet this arrogant man claims he’s going to bring real peace to the region.

Fisk refers to “His unique blend of ruthlessness and dishonesty.” The Arab street understands and despises him for it, but his agenda “go(es) down quite well with our local Arab dictators.” Fisk refers to his “slippery use of language….with appeals for restraint on all sides….and moderation” while backing what US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack characterizes as a “well-governed state.” That’s one with hard line street enforcement and what Fisk calls “lots of (tough) ‘terror laws.’ ”

It’s a perfect setup for repressive rule, denying Palestinians all civil and human rights doing it. Blair’s the right frontman - from war criminal to street enforcer in the name of peace he has contempt for. The irony is galling. Applied to him, it’s “Beyond (the kind of) Chutzpah” Middle East expert Norman Finkelstein wrote about in his book by that title. Watch for him later to be nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for his “efforts.” If it gets it, he’ll join the ugly ranks of past war criminal honorees like Henry Kissinger, Menachem Begin, Shimon Perez, Yitzhak Rabin, and Kofi Annan in a pathetic weak-kneed supporting role. Mr. Blair will fit right in.

Back Home in London, It’s Business as Usual Scaring the Public Twice Over

Episode number one:

On his second day in office, new British prime minister Gordon Brown “was thrust into a new terrorism alert” as the New York Times claimed June 29. London police claimed they found two Mercedes Benz cars “filled with (a significant quantity of) gasoline and nails and a number of gas canisters parked close together in an area known for packed night-clubs and late-night bars,” according to the Times. Police also claimed they found and defused an “explosive device” in the area overnight. At once and with no evidence, Al-Queda was named suspect number one, heightened by claims that had these bombs detonated they would have caused great harm. Peter Clark, Britain’s most senior counterterrorism police officer, said “there could have been significant injury or loss of life.”

So what to do? Round up the usual kinds of suspects and pin it on them, Muslim ones, of course. The New York Times reported July 2 “investigations (were) moving (ahead) at breakneck speed, the police expanded their hunt on Sunday (July 1) for the (London and Glasgow) ‘plotters’….the British government called the work of terrorists linked to Al-Queda. Officers raided homes in three cities” bringing the total number apprehended to five (plus three more since). “Police said they had recovered a ‘rich trove’ of evidence” but presented none beyond claiming earlier to have found gasoline, canisters and nails, hardly the makings of a major terror attack.

Front and center Gordon Brown beginning to earn his bona fides saying “As the police and security services have said on so many occasions, we face a serious and continuous threat to our security. (This incident shows) the need for us to be vigilant at all times and the public to be alert at any potential incidents.” Sounding much like George Bush and Tony Blair, he added Britain “will not yield” or be intimidated by a threat from “people who are associated with al-Queda. We will not allow anyone to undermine our British way of life.” Counterterrorism expert Sajjan Gohel explained in a telephone interview he didn’t think it was “a coincidence (this happened) the day after” Brown took office replacing Tony Blair. A familiar aroma from it is emerging.

Episode number two:

In case the public missed the June 29 event, it was repeated the following day at Glasgow Airport, Scotland. Here’s how the New York Times reported it: “British officials raised the country’s terrorism threat alert to its highest level on Saturday (June 30) after two men slammed an S.U.V. into entrance doors at Glasgow Airport and turned the vehicle into a potentially lethal fireball” 38 hours after police “uncovered two cars in London ‘rigged to explode’ with gasoline, gas canisters and nails.” For the Times, the claimed presence of these items in the cars constitutes their being “rigged.”

Here’s the BBC version. Notice the important difference: “Blazing car crashes into airport” it headlined and continued saying “A car which was ‘on fire’ has been driven at the main terminal building at Glasgow Airport. Eyewitnesses have described a Jeep Cherokee being driven at speed (undefined) towards the building ‘with flames coming out’ from underneath.” The report continued saying “The car didn’t actually explode. There were a few pops and bangs which presumably was the (burning) petrol.” With no corroborating evidence, the report quoted a “maintenance worker” saying he believed the men “deliberately tried to set the car on fire (and) It looked like they had Molotov cocktails with them.”

Little attention was paid to the fact no evidence of them was found, one of the two men in the car was badly burned (a witness claimed by self-dousing with petrol), in obvious pain, required hospitalization, yet both were taken away in handcuffs. They’re both now being linked, with no corroborating evidence, to the “rigged to explode” cars found in London.

What do we make of these incidents? Do they sound like terror attacks warranting closing down parts of London and Glasgow Airport as well as heightening security alerts across the UK and US? Did they provide the government emergencies committee Cobra justifiable reason to raise the nation’s threat alert to its highest level where it might be put for an impending major terrorist event, invasion or nuclear attack? Or might there be another reason behind it? And is it possible the Glasgow incident was just an unfortunate accident or the work of a disturbed or angry solo perpetrator or two? Also, might normal items like nails, gasoline and canisters found in unattended parked London cars have had nothing to do with mischief? Some suggested answers below.

Since 9/11, Britain, under Tony Blair, chose to partner with the Bush administration’s “war on terrorism,” leaving aside the question of its legitimacy. Waging that type war or any other requires public support, and what better way to get it than by elevating fear levels with an outside threat made to seem real. Enter Al-Queda and “Enemy Number One” Osama bin Laden. Follow them up with unsubstantiated terror threats or episodes labeled terrorism. Then add color-coded alerts and round-the-clock hyperventilating news coverage with scary headlines at strategic moments like winning public support for repressive legislation, diffusing dissent, re-stoking public angst about terror threats so people don’t forget them, and giving a new administration cover to continue the same “war on terrorism” hard line agenda as the previous one.

Isn’t the timing of the above British “terror incidents” ironic at least? Don’t they raise suspicions by coincidentally occurring on days two and three of the new Gordon Brown administration at a time his predecessor’s was hated? Might it also not be important to check the record of past terror scares on both sides of the Atlantic and examine their legitimacy in hindsight? When it’s done, threats that headlined for days or longer nearly always turned out to be fakes based on cooked up intelligence or unsubstantiated claims. They continue being used, however, because they work. By the time they’re exposed as phony, it’s on to the next cooked up plot. Note Exhibit A, B and C below plus an additional Exhibit D:

Exhibit A:

There’s no need reconstructing the phony disinformation campaign about WMDs in the run-up to the Iraq war. Case closed on that one.

Exhibit B:

Around Christmas, 2003, Air France got stand down orders based on claimed evidence Al-Queda and Taliban operatives were on Flight 68. It was later exposed as a lie, but it kept Los Angeles International Airport on “maximum deployment” throughout the holiday period and FBI officials working round the clock. The nation was put on “high risk” Code Orange alert, six heavy-traffic Air France flights were cancelled for nothing, and the public was scammed. The scheme was all based on faked intelligence to heighten fear at a strategic moment when the administration felt it was needed.

This happens repeatedly like it did in Exhibit C:

In early June, hyped fake stories made headlines about a plot to blow up JFK Airport’s jet fuel tanks and supply lines some outrageous reports claimed would have been “more devastating then 9/11″ if it happened. It never did, of course, no crime was committed, but suspects were charged based on conversations between a “source” (identified as an unnamed drugs trafficker) and defendants. It was all faked to heighten fear again, and the “source” was willing to say anything in return for leniency on his pending sentence.

In his 2005 book, “America’s War on Terrorism,” Michel Chossudovsky explains the notion of a “Universal Adversary.” It’s being used to prepare the public for a “real life emergency situation” under which no political or social dissent will be tolerated. Other claimed “terrorist” events may be being used as prologue for a much greater one coming at a future time. If it happens, it will trigger a Code Red Alert in the US and something similar in Britain signaling the highest threat level of severe or imminent terrorist or other attack preparing the public for possible imposition of martial law and suspension of the Constitution.

Notice how close Britain is to that now in the wake of two claimed terrorist incidents on June 29 and 30. As stated above, the country was placed on highest level terrorism alert, based on two incidents causing only minor damage from one of them and no substantiation either one was related to terrorism. It’s likely, hindsight again will prove neither one was, but the damaging effects of heightened fear by them will have done their job. Gordon Brown is now empowered to be as hard line as his predecessor and will likely have broad support for it in the name of national security. Sound suspicious?

It should surprise no one if one or more similar incidents soon erupt on this side of the Atlantic. The Bush administration needs to reinforce the terror threat at a time popular support for its foreign wars and homeland agenda is waning. What better way to do it than by faking terror threats to heighten fear levels. What easier way is there to win over Congress and get the public to support any homeland measures put in place to “keep us safe?”

Exhibit D:

On July 1, ABC News reported a secret “US law enforcement report, prepared for the Department of Homeland Security, warns that al-Queda is planning a terror ’spectacular’ this summer.” The source is a “senior (always unnamed US) official.” The report indicated a similarity to intelligence warnings in summer, 2001 prior to September 11. It also mentioned warnings of the Glasgow Airport incident never sent to the Scottish government. Odd or by intent?

Do present and past terror scare incidents raise suspicions the public is about to be scammed again but this time end up losing what few precious rights remain? People never realize it until it’s too late to matter. Even worse, they never seem able to understand the cost. They better learn because the price for inattention and lack of diligence keeps rising and may soon become too high. Edmund Burke warned us that “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Let’s hope enough of them in America and the UK got the message.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at .

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Steve Lendman News and Information Hour at TheMicroEffect.com Saturdays at noon US central time.

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“Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, has no intention of stepping down and responded at length live on Al-Jazeera rejecting Abbas’ “hasty” moves saying 96% of Palestinians support a unity government as the best chance for peace and security. He affirmed his democratically elected government would continue functioning and maintain law and order.”

By Stephen Lendman

6/26/07

In 1984 (a year of Orwellian significance), activist and media and social critic Edward Herman wrote one of his many important books titled “Demonstration Elections.” In it, he analyzed the US-staged elections in the 1960s in the Dominican Republic and Vietnam and the 1982 one in El Salvador. In the book’s Orwellian glossary of terms, he defined the process as “A circus held in a client state to assure the population of the home country that their intrusion is well received. The results are guaranteed by an adequate supply of bullets provided in advance (and freely used as necessary to achieve the desired outcome).”

This writer calls this ugly business “democracy-engineering, American-style” backed by force to win approval of a rigged process people would never accept another way. Noam Chomsky refers to the notion of “Keeping the Rabble in Line,” the title of one of his many books. It can be through soft or hard methods to assure the public goes along with what governments want imposed.

Herman’s main theme was that “elections held under conditions of military occupation and extensive pre-election ‘pacification’ ” aren’t free at all but aim to get an occupying force’s puppet choice accepted by the people it’s installed to rule with influence wielded more by bullets than ballots to create “stability.” Herman defines that term, too, as “a political arrangement free of open warfare and satisfactory to our interests.” By that he means the “rabble” is cowed, induced or pummeled into submission.

Enter the dominant media stepping up to support the effort as lead cheerleader for a process hard to sell without heavy lifting convincing that what government is doing is for the common good. Never mind it isn’t and that destroying democracy and the will of the people to resist are the real aims. Herman’s theme works the same way today, and it’s in play now in occupied Palestine. The difference discussed below is that the US and Israel tried running a “demonstration election” there in January, 2006, but it failed. The people didn’t cooperate and the “wrong” party won.

Imperial powers never accept defeat and attempted to subvert and crush the democratically elected Hamas government ever since because it’s too democratic and refuses to be Israel’s enforcer. So anti-Hamas efforts started off by labeling it a “terrorist” organization. That was followed by political and economic isolation, cutting off all essential aid, open conflict, and on June 17 brazenly installing an illegitimate “demonstration government” with Palestinian quisling President Mahmoud Abbas illegally dismissing the elected government and appointing an “emergency” one. All this is discussed in detail below.

Imposed Illegitimate “Demonstration” Government in Palestine

The beleaguered Palestinians are one of the world’s most victimized peoples of justice delayed because it’s been so long denied them. Long under the Ottomans, they then had to endure imperial British mandate rule after WW I until it ended in May, 1948. Ever since, they’ve suffered intolerable hardships under brutal Israeli oppression and illegal occupation with little outside support to end it.

The Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was founded in 1964 as a result and Yasser Arafat became its leader in 1969 to try. At first, it was militantly, then later through negotiation and international consensus. Nothing worked because a hard line Israeli - US nexus with Western and Arab state complicity prevented it. The predictable result was festering anger in the Palestinian Territories. They’ve been occupied since June, 1967 after Israel seized them in its long-planned six day war of aggression. The illegal occupation continues and Palestinian anger boiled over in two Intifadas, first in 1987, and ever since after Ariel Sharon’s provocative visit to the sacred Al Aqsa Mosque in September, 2000.

By January 25, 2006, Palestinians had enough of Fatah’s institutionalized corruption and willingness to be Israel’s enforcer under the quisling governments of Yasser Arafat and his successor Mahmoud Abbas. They elected a dominant majority of Hamas members to Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) seats because they promised change and its candidates were untainted by corruption or willingness to serve as puppets of Israeli interests at the expense of their own people. They meant what they promised and proved it once in office, even offering to partner with Fatah at the outset in a spirit of unity. Under orders not to, Fatah refused. It guaranteed Israeli and Washington antagonism that erupted immediately once Hamas assumed office.

Palestinians endured a life and death survival struggle before the election and especially ever since, and they’ve been on their own doing it. After Hamas’ election victory, all desperately needed outside aid was cut off, and they’ve been mercilessly persecuted under repressive Israeli rule. They’ve also been attacked viciously and relentlessly by the world’s fourth most powerful military (IDF forces and enlisted Fatah-led paramilitary death squads) with only light and crude weapons and their spirit to endure and fight back.

Hamas - From Its Charter and How It Governs

Hamas in Arabic means courage and bravery. It’s also an abbreviation of the Arabic words meaning Islamic Resistance Movement. It was formed in 1987 during the first Intifada and early on was supported by Israel to counter Arafat’s PLO the Jewish state opposed at the time. Ever since, it’s been an effective resistance movement against repression and occupation providing essential social services like medical clinics; education, including centers for women; free meals for children; financial and technical help to those whose homes Israelis destroyed; aid to refugees in the camps; and setting up youth and sports clubs.

It also has the Izz Al-Din Al-Qassam Brigades, an elite military wing, headed by Abu Abieda and other forces it needs for self-defense and law enforcement. Included among them is the “special operational force” known as the Executive Force (Tanfithya) used on the streets for policing and security.

Israel, Washington and the West call Hamas’ political and social activities and its legitimate right to self-defense “terrorism” and tried to isolate and destroy its democratically elected government from birth. So far, they haven’t succeeded, or are likely to, because Hamas’ strongest assets are its will, readiness, and majority support from its people.

Hamas is a heterogeneous democratic Islamic Resistance Movement allied with all resistance fighters for the purpose of liberating Palestine from Israeli oppression and occupation. Its method of choice is through negotiation and international consensus, not war or terrorism as falsely portrayed through the dominant media. But it states in its charter it will fight for its rights if they can’t be gotten peacefully and rightfully blames Zionist Israel for its plight. They have plenty of evidence to prove it.

In its founding charter, it states it “draws its guidelines from Islam; derives from it its thinking, interpretations and views about existence, life and humanity; refers back to it for its conduct….adopts Islam as its way of life….Its ultimate goal is Islam, the Prophet its model, the Qur’an its Constitution….In the absence of Islam, conflict arises, oppression reigns, corruption is rampant and struggles and wars prevail….(The Movement) will do its utmost to….support….the weak, (and defend) all the oppressed.

(It) regards Nationalism (Wataniyya) as part….of the religious faith.” Peace initiatives and international conferences are rejected if their intention is renunciation of Palestinian land. It rejects Zionist intentions to destroy Palestinian society, its values and “wipe out Islam.” It describes itself as “a humane movement, which cares for human rights and is committed to the tolerance inherent in Islam as regards attitudes towards other religions. It is only hostile to those who are hostile towards it….(Under Islam) it is possible for the members of the three religions: Islam, Christianity and Judaism to coexist in safety and security” as long as other religions “desist from struggling against Islam over sovereignty in this region.”

It believes “World Zionism and Imperial forces have been attempting….to push the Arab countries” to end conflict with Zionism “to isolate the Palestinian people.” It states its members don’t seek “fame….nor material gains, or social status….It will never set out against any Muslims….or non-Muslims who make peace with it.” Overall, Hamas has moderate political and religious views in contrast to militant hard line ones by ruling Israeli governments and the current one in Washington and other past ones.

It wants peace, equity and justice for all Palestinians while Israel and the Bush administration pursue an agenda of conflict, imperial domination and firm intention to deny Palestinians all rights they’re entitled to and the UN General Assembly adopted in December, 1948 in its Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This historic (non-binding) document guarantees them to everyone regardless of “race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status (including) the right to life, liberty and security of person.”

Hamas has always called for peace with Israel and is willing to negotiate on the basis of “hudnah” or temporary truce. Its founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, said Hamas was willing to end its struggle for the legitimate rights of Palestinian people “if the Zionists ended its occupation of Palestinian territories and stopped killing Palestinian women, children and innocent civilians.” As the elected Palestinian government, it declared a unilateral cease-fire with Israel, ended all suicide bombings, wants to negotiate, and is willing to recognize the Jewish state if Israel accepts and recognizes a Palestinian one. After being elected, it governed in good faith and agreed to a national unity government with Fatah to share power it democratically won to have alone. Israel, the US and West rejected all good faith efforts opting instead for a divide and conquer strategy.

A New Stage of Occupation for Palestinians

Israel, Washington and the West, pursued an aggressive agenda for months through armed conflict causing many deaths. From the start, Washington’s point man has been Iran-Contra criminal and now deputy national security adviser, Elliot Abrams. Documents have surfaced in Middle East capitals with evidence of Abrams’ role in an anti-Hamas “hard coup” strategy of violence and armed insurrection. They call for “maintain(ing) President Abbas and Fatah as the centre of (Palestinian) gravity….avoid accommodating (Hamas), undermine Hamas’ political status (and) strengthen the Palestinian president’s authority to be able to call and conduct early elections by autumn 2007.”

The document also called for Mahmoud Abbas to reject Saudi Arabia’s Mecca agreement leaving Hamas in charge. It further indicated $1.27 billion would be allocated to Abbas to add seven special battalions of 4700 new security forces to his 15,000 in place for “safeguard(ing) decisions such as dismissing the cabinet and forming an emergency government.”

This all played out violently on Gaza streets leading up to Hamas’ defeating opposition insurgent forces and seizing control of the Territory to establish law and order. As planned in Washington and Jerusalem, Palestinian Authority (PA) President Abbas then conspiratorially declared a “state of emergency.” He dismissed Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniyeh and his national unity government replacing it with his own illegitimate “emergency” one.

It’s illegally headed by newly appointed prime minister Salam Fayyad whose electoral list posted a 2.4% showing in the January, 2006 PLC elections Hamas won overwhelmingly. Fayyad’s a pro-Western former IMF and World Bank official chosen by Washington and Jerusalem. His job is to do their bidding the way he served capital interests during his tenure at the international lending agencies. There he did it by forcing borrowers into debt slavery and their people into extreme poverty and deprivation for the sake of profit. That made him a western darling now promoted to enforce imperial domination on his people who want freedom and won’t likely tolerate his portfolio to deny it to them.

Abbas, Fayyad and others in the “emergency” government are shamelessly partnered with Israel and Washington as their coup d’etat-installed puppets working against the interests of their own people. They control the West Bank alone with Hamas firmly in charge of Gaza unless or until Israel intervenes which now seems likely. It suggests a repeat of last summer’s mass assault on the Territory and it’s sure to follow dreadful consequences for its near-defenseless people.

Plans to weaken and oust Hamas have been in place for months with Washington supplying the Abbas leadership tens of millions of dollars in aid and weapons. It’s gone to paramilitary militia death squad groups like Gaza-based Fatah warlord and another Israeli-Western darling Mohammed Dahlan (Fatah’s security chief now in the West Bank) and his “Preventative Security Force.” It’s part of a conspiratorial coup d’etat effort headed by traitorous Palestinians on the take for their own gain. Abbas is their nominal leader. Dahlan has the muscle and real power as it chief enforcer. All newly appointed members of Abbas’ sham “emergency government” share equal guilt. They’re junior quislings serving their puppet-masters in Jerusalem and Washington, but events are just beginning, the struggle is far from over, and its outcome very much uncertain.

Money and weapons will continue flowing into the West Bank, and from what Hamas already seized in a Gaza stash it found, it should be plenty. Unncovered were huge amounts of mounted machine guns, assault rifles, ammunition, armored personnel carriers, jeeps, armored cars and trucks, military-sized bulldozers, water cannon-dispersing trucks, large quantities of munitions including rocket-propelled grenades and launchers, explosives and various other supplies and equipment.

In total, it appears enough to equip a small army of fighters and may be worth as much as $400 million. It’s sure to be replaced so Fatah traitors are heavily armed to continue fighting Israel’s proxy war and acting as its West Bank enforcer against their own people. They almost certainly will resist with Hamas leading them courageously. It means Fatah’s hold on power is tenuous at best and Abbas’ fate equally shaky. His shameless act may in the end cost him all credibility, his job, and eventually make him liable to be held to account for his open betrayal of his own people.

Hamas prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, has no intention of stepping down and responded at length live on Al-Jazeera rejecting Abbas’ “hasty” moves saying 96% of Palestinians support a unity government as the best chance for peace and security. He affirmed his democratically elected government would continue functioning and maintain law and order. He also called for an end to conflict and a general amnesty. He stressed his fight is not with Fatah, but only with rogue traitorous elements in it like the dominant one headed by warlord Dahlan firmly doing Israel and Washington’s bidding.

He explained Hamas’ takeover was no coup and only a last resort attempt to end lawlessness, conflict and a Dahlan-led conspiracy against all Palestinians. He spoke of conciliation, unity, and conflict resolution to heal divisions in contrast to Abbas’ traitorous behavior as Israel and Washington’s pawn. He followed Israeli and Washington-dictated orders responding by denouncing Hamas as terrorists, refusing to negotiate, and saying he’ll (illegally as explained below) order new elections that will exclude Hamas.

At this stage, Hamas’ task is daunting as Haaretz reports. Israeli Labor Party Chairman, former prime minister, and new Olmert government defense minister Ehud Barak, plans to launch a large-scale military operation on Gaza in weeks. It will include 20,000 troops and an air assault aimed at destroying Hamas’ military capabilities quickly. Haaretz cited a close Barak aide saying Israel won’t allow a “Hamastan” in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) and an attack on it is certain. Air attacks are now ongoing daily, border crossings are closed, and Israel cancelled Gaza’s commercial customs code. That cuts off essential supplies like food and medicines from entering the territory. Israel is now increasing its collective punishment against 1.4 million Palestinians already enduring unbearable hardships in what’s considered the world’s largest open-air prison with a population density three times that of Manhattan.

Israeli-Washington-Directed Fatah Declared Coup Illegal under Palestinian Law

Virginia Tilley is a South African-based political science professor. On June 18, her article appeared on The Electronic Intifada titled “Whose Coup, Exactly?” It documented in detail that according to the Basic Law of Palestine, serving as the PA’s constitution, “Abbas has violated a whole stream of Articles as well as the spirit of its checks and balances” limiting the power of the presidency. He “badly trashed numerous provisions” in it “with full US and Israeli support.” The Basic Law states:

– Under Article 45, the President can remove a Prime Minister but can only appoint a new one from the majority party - Hamas.

– Under Article 83, if the Prime Minister is removed, the serving (Hamas-led) Cabinet is to govern until the (Hamas-led) Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) appoints a new one.

– Only the PLC has authority to confirm a new Prime Minister and Cabinet.

– Under Article 43, in emergencies, the President can rule by decree subject to all decrees approved by the PLC.

– Under Article 113, in emergencies, the President cannot suspend the PLC.

– The Basic Law gives the President no power to call for early elections.

– No provision in the Basic Law authorizes an “emergency government.”

Conclusion: Abbas’ actions constitute a lawless coup d’etat usurpation of power, or as Tilley puts it: “The (Fatah) Fayyad government is the step-child of an extra-legal process with no democratic mandate. The whole manoeuvre is not precisely a palace coup,” but enough like one, in fact, to be one. She also notes “the diplomatic landscape is now in utter disarray” with the extra-legal Fayyad government only a “facsimile” of the real thing.

So far, its illegitimate creation hardly seems to matter to Israel, the US and European Union shamelessly flouting Palestinian and international law. They’re ending their political and economic PA West Bank (only) embargo to bolster Fatah and Abbas while continuing to isolate Hamas in Gaza. It’s an outrageous effort rewarding lawlessness and continuing to crush democratic movements when they become too democratic as Hamas did. Hamas spokesperson Sami Abu Zuhri denounced it accusing the West of hypocrisy. He noted Hamas was democratically elected and added “This confirms the falseness of the international community’s support for democracy.”

From Dublin, Ireland at a human rights conference, former President Jimmy Carter denounced it as well. He accused the US, EU and Israel of harming and seeking to divide the Palestinian people by aiding Abbas in the West Bank while withholding similar help to Hamas in Gaza. Carter stressed Hamas is entitled to be the ruling Palestinian government because it was democratically elected. Representatives from his Carter Center observed the election and judged it free, open and fair. He urged the international community to work toward reconciliation of Hamas and Fatah but sees nothing being done to do it.

He condemned US, EU and Israeli efforts to undermine Hamas as “criminal.” He continued saying “The United States and Israel decided to punish all the people of Palestine and did everything they could to deter a compromise between Hamas and Fatah.” He then added Washington and others supplied Fatah security forces with superior weapons aimed at “conquer(ing) Hamas in Gaza, but the plan failed because of Hamas’ “superior skills and discipline.”

A Hopeful Look Ahead

Everything happening in the Middle East in Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon and Afghanistan in Central Asia is interconnected. In all of it, Washington is partnered with Israel and the EU aiming to subdue the people in both regions, control their resources, and rule over this vast area in colonial-occupier fashion directly on the ground or ideally with puppet-installed governments. Washington leads the effort and intends taking the lion share of what it can plunder provided things go as planned. The EU is tagging along led by Britain and Israel in key roles with the Jewish state getting huge amounts of funding to do it. According to a James Tucker American Free Press May, 2003 report it was at a level of $10 billion a year then with Israel wanting it upped to $12 billion.

This figure came from a Library of Congress “briefing paper” titled “Israel: US Foreign Assistance.” It listed categories including direct funding aid, huge amounts in loans and loan guarantees, military aid, R & D help, and considerably more that noted academic and author James Petras documented in his important 2006 book “The Power of Israel in the United States.” In total, Israel, with 5.2 million people in 2005, about the size of a large US or other city, receives more in total aid in all forms than all other nations in the world combined. It uses it to seize Palestinian lands for Jewish resettlement, build separation/apartheid walls, and wage illegal wars of aggression in pursuit of its own imperial agenda for regional dominance as an adjunct to its US partner and very generous funder.

Despite considerable effort and huge amounts of financial and other resources employed, US and Israeli imperial adventurism hasn’t fared too well giving reason to hope more of it will turn out as badly for both nations. Palestinians have endured everything Israel’s thrown at it for six repressive decades. In spite of it, they’re still holding up maintaining their courageous struggle for equity, justice and a free and independent state they intend one day to have and likely will regardless of Israel’s determination to prevent it. History is on their side.

In just the last century, nations around the world struggled for the same rights and prevailed, though for many it took decades or longer and what was gained was far from perfect or even unacceptable too often like in South Africa. The end of apartheid there was replaced by neoliberal “Thatcherism” resulting in greater poverty and hardship for the poor majority than in the earlier era. However, progress usually comes slowly and rarely without setbacks or disappointments. The point is it can come when people seeking it never stop believing it will or working for it until it does. Palestinians have been doing it since 1948, and one day they’ll have what they and all others deserve everywhere, their own state in which to live free from foreign occupation secure at last on their own land.

An early hopeful sign was reported in Haaretz by correspondent Shlomo Shamir June 22. He noted in spite of US, British and French pressure (with new UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s shameless backing) for a Security Council declaration of confidence in the Abbas government, it was withdrawn before its drafting stage because of strong protests against it by Russia, South Africa, Indonesia and Qatar. These countries objected to anti-Hamas policies and attempts to characterize it as a terror organization and isolate it. In addition, Russia and South Africa questioned the emergency government’s legitimacy arguing instead for a unity government as the solution to the conflict in occupied Palestine.

It’s a small, maybe temporary victory, but important one nonetheless. It shows mighty America, Israel and the EU can be challenged and forced to back down giving Palestinian people hope more victories will follow and in time the one they want above all others. With faith, courage, patience and redoubtable will, one day they’ll prevail, their Nakba will have ended, and their right to live freely on their own land will be affirmed and recognized.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at .

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Steve Lendman News and Information Hour on TheMicroEffect.com Saturdays at noon US central time.

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