After WikiLeaks supporters disrupted websites like Mastercard, a new Harvard report examines DDoS attacks.
Recent cyberattacks by WikiLeaks supporters targeted at companies like Visa and Mastercard have brought distributed denial of service (DDoS) - an attack in which multiple systems flood the bandwidth or resources of a targeted system in an attempt to make it unavailable - into the public consciousness, stirring up a debate as to whether or not DDoS is an acceptable tactic for civil disobedience.
In fact, denial of service (DoS) attacks emerged as a political tool in 1998, introduced by Ricardo Dominguez, co-founder of Electronic Disturbance Theatre, who built FloodNet, a tool that allowed activists to crash a variety of websites.
DDoS emerged two years later when web giants Yahoo!, Buy.com, CNN, Amazon, and others were taken down in a series of attacks so large, they had to have had multiple points of origin. Those attacks were eventually traced to Michael Calce, a 15-year-old in Montreal, Canada, who was caught after bragging about his prowess in a chat room.
Unfortunately, DDoS has become a fairly common form of attack against human rights and independent media sites, and one which shows no signs of slowing. A recent report from the Berkman Center for Internet & Society reveals that the technique has been applied to a wide range of targets worldwide, and appears to have no strong ties to any particular set of political principles.
Diverse targets
The Berkman Center's study comprised of a survey of independent media and human rights-related sites, as well as a review of media reports of DDoS and other cyberattacks over the past twelve years.
In 2010 alone, over one hundred DDoS attacks made headlines, with targets as diverse as an Israeli human rights group to an independent news site in Malawi.
In a DDoS attack, a network of computers are utilized to flood traffic on a target system, causing the site to load slowly or become disabled entirely. Often, a botnet - a network of compromised computers that can be controlled remotely - is utilised to maximize effectiveness of the attack.
Though DDoS is often propagated along with other forms of attack, it can be debilitating for small site operators. Attacks often don't require much bandwidth to adversely affect sites; rather, there is evidence that very small attacks focused on vulnerabilities in technical architectures can render some sites inoperative.
In some cases, even a single attacker can be effective in disabling a site, without the assistance of botnets or other volunteers.
No 'silver bullet'
As a result of DDoS, the Berkman Center's researchers found, some organizations may find their sites inaccessible for long periods of time, a function of inexperienced and overwhelmed system administrators, unhelpful Internet service providers (ISPs), and isolation from the technical community that works together to fend off DDoS.
Though the researchers offer recommendations for a variety of technical steps that independent media and human rights site administrators can take to reduce the impact of DDoS, there are unfortunately no silver bullets for the community.
Rather, a broad look at the hosting landscape, as well as ways in which outlying sites can be integrated into the technical community, are recommended.
The full report can be read here.
Jillian York is a writer, blogger, and activist based in Boston. She works at Harvard Law School's Berkman Centre for Internet & Society and is involved with Global Voices Online.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Veterans: The French in Algeria
A look at how bitterness provoked by the Agerian war still fuels resentment between France and its Muslim community.
Algeria, Africa's second largest country was colonised by the French in the 19th century. But unlike the neighbouring French protectorates of Tunesia or Morocco, Algeria was considered French territory, legally a mere extension of mainland France itself. And by the mid-20th century it was home to over one million European settlers. While they enjoyed the privileges of French citizenship, the overwhelming majority of the population, Arab and Berber Muslims, reaped few benefits from the French presence.
"The majority of the native population didn't have the same rights that were held by a French citizen. There was a contradiction between those supposedly egalitarian republican principles that France was supposed to be importing to Algeria as a colony, and the reality," historian Benjamin Stora says.
In 1954, a group of Algerians, determined to end France's colonial rule and achieve independence, turned to violence. On Novermber 1, the recently formed National Liberation Front (FLN) launched attacks across Algeria against French military and civilian targets.
For the French authorities in Paris the FLN's aim of independence for Algeria was unthinkable. Troups were sent in to clamp down on what was regarded as mere civil unrest. And even as the violent rebellion escalated in the coming months into an all-out conflict, France refused to admit it was entering into war.
"War can only take place when two clearly distinct national groups are concerned. Calling it a war meant admitting that Algeria wasn't France," lawyer Jacques Verges.
Algeria may have been considered part of France, but for those on the mainland the violence engulfing it often seemed distant.
"I wasn't really interested in what was happening in Algeria. I was mainly bound up with myself, sports, friends, I had a completely ordinary life," Jean-Pierre Vittori says.
But his life was soon to be touched by events across the Mediterranean Sea.
"Every French man had to carry out military service [...] if we didn't, we were considered traitors, cowards. So one day I received an official letter calling me up, and I went, just like that, without asking myself too many questions," Vittori says.
But on arriving in Algeria uncomfortable questions about the French mission were difficult to suppress.
"On one side was a few Europeans living in the region that had a lot of money, on the other was the Algerian population which had almost nothing. I started myself asking questions concerning their reasons for rebelling, wondering whether their action was in fact justified," Vittori remembers.
France's bloody eight-year war in Algeria left millions of people dead and ultimately ended in failure for the European power when the African nation declared independence in 1962.
The war left deep psychological scars in both countries and has affected relations between the two countries to this day.
For many of the one and half million French veterans the conflict is know known as "la guerre sans nom" (the war without name) and still evokes complex emotions more than 40 years on with some feeling shame and regret, others bitterness and anger.
"I lost a part of my life, I lost my mother, I lost everything, everything. And today I look at the French people and see that they have no answers to those of us who've suffered," Bernhard Salkin, one of the veterans says.
Al Jazeera examines the bitterness still provoked by France's colonial war in Algeria and how it fuels resentment between France and its Muslim community.
Algeria, Africa's second largest country was colonised by the French in the 19th century. But unlike the neighbouring French protectorates of Tunesia or Morocco, Algeria was considered French territory, legally a mere extension of mainland France itself. And by the mid-20th century it was home to over one million European settlers. While they enjoyed the privileges of French citizenship, the overwhelming majority of the population, Arab and Berber Muslims, reaped few benefits from the French presence.
"The majority of the native population didn't have the same rights that were held by a French citizen. There was a contradiction between those supposedly egalitarian republican principles that France was supposed to be importing to Algeria as a colony, and the reality," historian Benjamin Stora says.
In 1954, a group of Algerians, determined to end France's colonial rule and achieve independence, turned to violence. On Novermber 1, the recently formed National Liberation Front (FLN) launched attacks across Algeria against French military and civilian targets.
For the French authorities in Paris the FLN's aim of independence for Algeria was unthinkable. Troups were sent in to clamp down on what was regarded as mere civil unrest. And even as the violent rebellion escalated in the coming months into an all-out conflict, France refused to admit it was entering into war.
"War can only take place when two clearly distinct national groups are concerned. Calling it a war meant admitting that Algeria wasn't France," lawyer Jacques Verges.
Algeria may have been considered part of France, but for those on the mainland the violence engulfing it often seemed distant.
"I wasn't really interested in what was happening in Algeria. I was mainly bound up with myself, sports, friends, I had a completely ordinary life," Jean-Pierre Vittori says.
But his life was soon to be touched by events across the Mediterranean Sea.
"Every French man had to carry out military service [...] if we didn't, we were considered traitors, cowards. So one day I received an official letter calling me up, and I went, just like that, without asking myself too many questions," Vittori says.
But on arriving in Algeria uncomfortable questions about the French mission were difficult to suppress.
"On one side was a few Europeans living in the region that had a lot of money, on the other was the Algerian population which had almost nothing. I started myself asking questions concerning their reasons for rebelling, wondering whether their action was in fact justified," Vittori remembers.
France's bloody eight-year war in Algeria left millions of people dead and ultimately ended in failure for the European power when the African nation declared independence in 1962.
The war left deep psychological scars in both countries and has affected relations between the two countries to this day.
For many of the one and half million French veterans the conflict is know known as "la guerre sans nom" (the war without name) and still evokes complex emotions more than 40 years on with some feeling shame and regret, others bitterness and anger.
"I lost a part of my life, I lost my mother, I lost everything, everything. And today I look at the French people and see that they have no answers to those of us who've suffered," Bernhard Salkin, one of the veterans says.
Al Jazeera examines the bitterness still provoked by France's colonial war in Algeria and how it fuels resentment between France and its Muslim community.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
The delusions of the peace process
The politics of the peace process have emphatically ensured that the mere prospect for producing peace is nonexistent.
It is astonishing that despite the huge gaps between the maximum that Israel is willing to concede and the minimum that the Palestine Authority could accept as the basis of a final settlement of the conflict, governmental leaders, especially in Washington, continue to pull every available string to restart inter-governmental negotiations.
Is it not enough of a signal that Israel lacks the capacity or will to agree to an extension of the partial settlement freeze for a mere additional 90 days, despite the outrageous inducements from the Obama Administration (20 F-35 fighter jets useful for an attack on Iran; an unprecedented advance promise to veto any initiative in the Security Council acknowledging a Palestinian state; and the assurance that Israel would never again be asked to accept a settlement moratorium) that were offered to suspend partially their unlawful settlement activity.
In effect, a habitual armed robber was being asked to stop robbing a few banks for three months in exchange for a huge financial payoff. Such an arrangement qualifies as a transparently shameless embrace of Israeli lawlessness on behalf of a peace process that has no prospect of producing peace, much less justice.
Justice here is conceived in relation to the satisfaction of Palestinian rights, especially the right of self–determination that has through the years been whittled down.
The continued division of Historic Palestine
The Palestinian acceptance of the 1967 borders (a decision ratified by the PLO in 1988) as the unilaterally reduced basis of the territorial claims associated with Palestinian self-determination, which is only 22 per cent of historic Palestine, and this is less than half of what the UN had proposed in its 1947 partition plan that was at that time quite reasonably rejected by the Palestinians and their Arab neighbours as a colonialist ploy in which the indigenous population was adversely affected and never consulted.
In retrospect, the Palestinian readiness to settle for the 1967 borders was an extraordinary concession in advance of negotiations that was never acknowledged by either Israel or the United States, casting real doubt on whether there was ever a credible commitment to end the conflict by diplomacy.
The shamelessness continues. Instead of castigating Israel for its refusal to show even a pretense of pragmatic flexibility that would make the Obama approach seem slightly less fatuous and regressively wimpy, the US government simply announced that it was abandoning its efforts to persuade Israel to extend the moratorium, and was now embarking on a resumption of the negotiations between the parties without any preconditions, that is, settlement expansion and ethnic cleansing could now continue uncontested.
EU: vocal on settlements and silent of statehood
This was too much even for the normally passive European Union. A few days ago a meeting of the EU Foreign Ministers in Brussels issued a statement insisting that all Israeli activity cease in what was called the "illegal settlements" and that the Gaza blockade be ended "immediately" by an opening of all the crossings to humanitarian and commercial goods, as well as to the entry and exit of persons.
The EU statement was impressively forthright for once: "Our view on settlements, including East Jerusalem, are clear: they are illegal under international law and an obstacle to peace."
Regrettably, the EU statement was silent on the issue of recognition of Palestinian statehood, losing the opportunity to reinforce the symbolically important diplomatic step taken by Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay to accord Palestine recognition within its 1967 borders.
Nevertheless, the EU did distance itself from Washington, leaving the United States to the discomfort of its lonely solidarity with Israel. By refusing a diplomatic accommodation with Turkey in the aftermath of the flagrantly criminal attack last May on the Freedom Flotilla carrying humanitarian assistance to the beleaguered people of Gaza, Israel confirms this perception of its pariah status.
Underneath these dark clouds of deception and delusion, the peoples of occupied Palestine, as well as the several million refugees, endure their harsh daily existence while the world watches and waits, seemingly helpless.
The durable American envoy to the conflict, George Mitchell, continues to say that the objective of the talks is "an independent, viable state of Palestine..living side by side with Israel." The incoherence of such an objective should be palpable. How can one honestly talk about such an envisioned Palestinian state as "viable" when the American leadership agrees with Israel that "subsequent developments" (the code phrase for settlements, land seizures, wall, ethnic cleansing, annexation of Jerusalem) need to be embodied in the outcome of negotiations?
And what sort of "independence" is being contemplated if the Palestinian borders are to be still controlled by Israeli security forces and a demilitarised Palestine is expected to live side by side with a highly militarised Israel? The American approach plays with lives as it plays with language, and yet most of the mainstream media swallows this latest bend in the river without raising even a sceptical eyebrow.
The value of retrospection
These considerations ignore some other problematic aspects of the current framework. The Netanyahu government demands PA acknowledgement of Israel as "a Jewish state," thereby overlooking the human rights of the Palestinian minority in pre-1967 Israel, numbering about 1.5 million or about 20 per cent of the total population, to live as citizens under conditions of non-discrimination and dignity.
Sometimes history is useful. Even the notorious Balfour Declaration, a pure assertion of British colonial prerogative, promised the Zionist movement only "a homeland," not a sovereign state. The workings of warfare and geopolitics and clever propaganda gradually shifted the parameters of understanding, allowing a homeland to be transformed into a sovereign state with disastrous chain of consequences for the indigenous population.
In this respect the most recent Hamas position of refusing recognition of Israel while agreeing to the establishment of a Palestinian state within 1967 borders is a reasonable effort to draw a line between affirming the illegitimate and being reconciled to political circumstances. To expect more is to drive the Palestinians into an unacceptable corner of humiliation, in effect, endorsing the nakba, and all that has followed by way of dispossession and abuse.
Of course, the issue of self-determination is not for non-Palestinians to determine. Those who call upon Washington, even now and despite its partisanship and ill-concealed alignments, to impose a solution are thus doubly misguided. Even Hilary Clinton acknowledged days ago the impossibility of adopting such an approach.
What seems clear at present is that both the PA and Hamas seem ready to accept a state of their own within 1967 borders, more or less along the lines set forth back in 1967 in the Security Resolution 242, which remains an iconic document that supposedly embodies a continuing international consensus. What it would mean with respect to implementation is certain to be highly contentious, especially in relation to those infamous "subsequent developments," better understood as massive encroachments on Palestinian prospects for separate statehood.
The mindlessness of diplomacy
Many in the Palestinian diaspora doubt whether a two-state solution is attainable or desirable. Instead they are calling for a single secular, bi-national democratic state that is co-terminus with the historic Palestinian mandate, and alone has the inherent capacity to reconcile contemporary ideas of democracy, human rights, and a belated realisation of Palestinian rights, including the long deferred claims of Palestinian refugees.
Geopolitics is stubborn, and is not moving in hopeful directions. Now arms are being again twisted by American diplomacy in the region to resume talks between the parties on what are being called "core issues" (borders, security arrangements, Jerusalem, settlements, refugees, relations with neighbours).
While this mindless diplomatic spinning goes forth, other clocks are ticking madly: the settlements expanding at accelerating rates, new segments of the wall are being constructed, ethnic cleansing intensifies in East Jerusalem, the apartheid practices and structures in the West Bank are being steadily strengthened, the entrapped and imprisoned population of Gaza lives continuously on the brink of a survival crisis, the refugees in their camps endure their dreary and unacceptable confinement.
Netanyahu thunderously warns that Jerusalem is Israel's capital, that never will a single Palestinian refugee be allowed to return, that Israel is a Jewish state, and that whatever Tel Aviv calls "security" must be treated as non-negotiable. Given these predispositions, combined with the disparities in bargaining power between the parties, as well as the one-sided hegemonic role of the United States, who but a fool could think that a just peace could emerge from the such a deformed pattern of geopolitical diplomacy?
Is it not better at this time to rely on the growing Palestine Solidarity Movement, peace from below, and the related success being experienced in waging the Legitimacy War against Israel, what Israel itself nervously calls "the de-legitimacy project" that is viewed by its leaders and think tanks as a far greater threat to its illicit ambitions than armed resistance?
Richard Falk is Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and Visiting Distinguished Professor in Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has authored and edited numerous publications spanning a period of five decades, most recently editing the volume International Law and the Third World: Reshaping Justice (Routledge, 2008).
He is currently serving his third year of a six year term as a United Nations Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights.
It is astonishing that despite the huge gaps between the maximum that Israel is willing to concede and the minimum that the Palestine Authority could accept as the basis of a final settlement of the conflict, governmental leaders, especially in Washington, continue to pull every available string to restart inter-governmental negotiations.
Is it not enough of a signal that Israel lacks the capacity or will to agree to an extension of the partial settlement freeze for a mere additional 90 days, despite the outrageous inducements from the Obama Administration (20 F-35 fighter jets useful for an attack on Iran; an unprecedented advance promise to veto any initiative in the Security Council acknowledging a Palestinian state; and the assurance that Israel would never again be asked to accept a settlement moratorium) that were offered to suspend partially their unlawful settlement activity.
In effect, a habitual armed robber was being asked to stop robbing a few banks for three months in exchange for a huge financial payoff. Such an arrangement qualifies as a transparently shameless embrace of Israeli lawlessness on behalf of a peace process that has no prospect of producing peace, much less justice.
Justice here is conceived in relation to the satisfaction of Palestinian rights, especially the right of self–determination that has through the years been whittled down.
The continued division of Historic Palestine
The Palestinian acceptance of the 1967 borders (a decision ratified by the PLO in 1988) as the unilaterally reduced basis of the territorial claims associated with Palestinian self-determination, which is only 22 per cent of historic Palestine, and this is less than half of what the UN had proposed in its 1947 partition plan that was at that time quite reasonably rejected by the Palestinians and their Arab neighbours as a colonialist ploy in which the indigenous population was adversely affected and never consulted.
In retrospect, the Palestinian readiness to settle for the 1967 borders was an extraordinary concession in advance of negotiations that was never acknowledged by either Israel or the United States, casting real doubt on whether there was ever a credible commitment to end the conflict by diplomacy.
The shamelessness continues. Instead of castigating Israel for its refusal to show even a pretense of pragmatic flexibility that would make the Obama approach seem slightly less fatuous and regressively wimpy, the US government simply announced that it was abandoning its efforts to persuade Israel to extend the moratorium, and was now embarking on a resumption of the negotiations between the parties without any preconditions, that is, settlement expansion and ethnic cleansing could now continue uncontested.
EU: vocal on settlements and silent of statehood
This was too much even for the normally passive European Union. A few days ago a meeting of the EU Foreign Ministers in Brussels issued a statement insisting that all Israeli activity cease in what was called the "illegal settlements" and that the Gaza blockade be ended "immediately" by an opening of all the crossings to humanitarian and commercial goods, as well as to the entry and exit of persons.
The EU statement was impressively forthright for once: "Our view on settlements, including East Jerusalem, are clear: they are illegal under international law and an obstacle to peace."
Regrettably, the EU statement was silent on the issue of recognition of Palestinian statehood, losing the opportunity to reinforce the symbolically important diplomatic step taken by Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay to accord Palestine recognition within its 1967 borders.
Nevertheless, the EU did distance itself from Washington, leaving the United States to the discomfort of its lonely solidarity with Israel. By refusing a diplomatic accommodation with Turkey in the aftermath of the flagrantly criminal attack last May on the Freedom Flotilla carrying humanitarian assistance to the beleaguered people of Gaza, Israel confirms this perception of its pariah status.
Underneath these dark clouds of deception and delusion, the peoples of occupied Palestine, as well as the several million refugees, endure their harsh daily existence while the world watches and waits, seemingly helpless.
The durable American envoy to the conflict, George Mitchell, continues to say that the objective of the talks is "an independent, viable state of Palestine..living side by side with Israel." The incoherence of such an objective should be palpable. How can one honestly talk about such an envisioned Palestinian state as "viable" when the American leadership agrees with Israel that "subsequent developments" (the code phrase for settlements, land seizures, wall, ethnic cleansing, annexation of Jerusalem) need to be embodied in the outcome of negotiations?
And what sort of "independence" is being contemplated if the Palestinian borders are to be still controlled by Israeli security forces and a demilitarised Palestine is expected to live side by side with a highly militarised Israel? The American approach plays with lives as it plays with language, and yet most of the mainstream media swallows this latest bend in the river without raising even a sceptical eyebrow.
The value of retrospection
These considerations ignore some other problematic aspects of the current framework. The Netanyahu government demands PA acknowledgement of Israel as "a Jewish state," thereby overlooking the human rights of the Palestinian minority in pre-1967 Israel, numbering about 1.5 million or about 20 per cent of the total population, to live as citizens under conditions of non-discrimination and dignity.
Sometimes history is useful. Even the notorious Balfour Declaration, a pure assertion of British colonial prerogative, promised the Zionist movement only "a homeland," not a sovereign state. The workings of warfare and geopolitics and clever propaganda gradually shifted the parameters of understanding, allowing a homeland to be transformed into a sovereign state with disastrous chain of consequences for the indigenous population.
In this respect the most recent Hamas position of refusing recognition of Israel while agreeing to the establishment of a Palestinian state within 1967 borders is a reasonable effort to draw a line between affirming the illegitimate and being reconciled to political circumstances. To expect more is to drive the Palestinians into an unacceptable corner of humiliation, in effect, endorsing the nakba, and all that has followed by way of dispossession and abuse.
Of course, the issue of self-determination is not for non-Palestinians to determine. Those who call upon Washington, even now and despite its partisanship and ill-concealed alignments, to impose a solution are thus doubly misguided. Even Hilary Clinton acknowledged days ago the impossibility of adopting such an approach.
What seems clear at present is that both the PA and Hamas seem ready to accept a state of their own within 1967 borders, more or less along the lines set forth back in 1967 in the Security Resolution 242, which remains an iconic document that supposedly embodies a continuing international consensus. What it would mean with respect to implementation is certain to be highly contentious, especially in relation to those infamous "subsequent developments," better understood as massive encroachments on Palestinian prospects for separate statehood.
The mindlessness of diplomacy
Many in the Palestinian diaspora doubt whether a two-state solution is attainable or desirable. Instead they are calling for a single secular, bi-national democratic state that is co-terminus with the historic Palestinian mandate, and alone has the inherent capacity to reconcile contemporary ideas of democracy, human rights, and a belated realisation of Palestinian rights, including the long deferred claims of Palestinian refugees.
Geopolitics is stubborn, and is not moving in hopeful directions. Now arms are being again twisted by American diplomacy in the region to resume talks between the parties on what are being called "core issues" (borders, security arrangements, Jerusalem, settlements, refugees, relations with neighbours).
While this mindless diplomatic spinning goes forth, other clocks are ticking madly: the settlements expanding at accelerating rates, new segments of the wall are being constructed, ethnic cleansing intensifies in East Jerusalem, the apartheid practices and structures in the West Bank are being steadily strengthened, the entrapped and imprisoned population of Gaza lives continuously on the brink of a survival crisis, the refugees in their camps endure their dreary and unacceptable confinement.
Netanyahu thunderously warns that Jerusalem is Israel's capital, that never will a single Palestinian refugee be allowed to return, that Israel is a Jewish state, and that whatever Tel Aviv calls "security" must be treated as non-negotiable. Given these predispositions, combined with the disparities in bargaining power between the parties, as well as the one-sided hegemonic role of the United States, who but a fool could think that a just peace could emerge from the such a deformed pattern of geopolitical diplomacy?
Is it not better at this time to rely on the growing Palestine Solidarity Movement, peace from below, and the related success being experienced in waging the Legitimacy War against Israel, what Israel itself nervously calls "the de-legitimacy project" that is viewed by its leaders and think tanks as a far greater threat to its illicit ambitions than armed resistance?
Richard Falk is Albert G. Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University and Visiting Distinguished Professor in Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has authored and edited numerous publications spanning a period of five decades, most recently editing the volume International Law and the Third World: Reshaping Justice (Routledge, 2008).
He is currently serving his third year of a six year term as a United Nations Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Europe must emerge from US' shadow
The EU has allowed Washington to dominate Arab-Israeli diplomacy for far too long.
Lamis Andoni Last Modified: 13 Dec 2010 11:58 GMT
Several senior European politicians have urged the European Union (EU) to threaten Israel with sanctions if it continues to build Jewish settlements on occupied Palestinian territory.
A letter signed by, among others, Mary Robinson, the former EU commissioner, and Javier Solana, the organisation's former foreign affairs chief, calls for a European peace plan based on the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the equivalent of "100 per cent of the territory [Israel] occupied in 1967, including its capital in East Jerusalem".
The demands made by the group of 26 former European leaders are not vastly different from the EU's declared position, but this call represents a push for a more assertive policy that includes measures designed to pressure Israel to comply.
Included within this is the suggestion that the EU's informal freeze on upgrading diplomatic relations with Israel should be linked to settlement construction. "The EU has always maintained that settlements are illegal, but has not attached any consequences for continued and systematic settlement expansion," the letter, which was sent to European governments and EU institutions, said.
The EU is essentially being called upon to take some initiative and move independently from the US policy that has so far dominated all diplomatic efforts to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict - something long desired by Palestinians who have been disappointed by the EU's weakness before Washington.
Dominating the diplomatic stage
Independent EU policies, with claws, could dramatically alter the dynamics of international relations, particularly as they relate to the Middle East. But the fact that the signatories to the letter are politicians who until recently held powerful positions across Europe, indicates not only the extent of European resentment towards the status quo but also the continent's inability to break free from US foreign policy.
From the outset of Arab-Israeli negotiations, which began with the Madrid Conference in 1991, Europe has assumed an active but secondary role - leaving the US to dictate the terms of the process. Historically, the US was so keen to exclude other countries that it actively sought to prevent the convening of an international peace conference on the Middle East conflict until it was clear that the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapse. Once it had collapsed, the US was able to fully monopolise the diplomatic stage.
With this US supremacy has come the dominance of Washington's policy focus, which has always been on ensuring that Israel maintains both a military and political edge. This it guaranteed by blocking others from participating in the asymmetrical negotiations.
The central difference between the US and the EU is that most European countries, rhetorically at least, believe that a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict must be based on international law and UN resolutions, while the US seeks to negate these to ensure that any solution is based on Israeli-manufactured facts on the ground.
But despite this different political stand, the EU has, for the most part, fallen in line behind Washington - supporting and facilitating the US controlled negotiation process.
This deferral to the US as the sole superpower is not confined to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Europe has more broadly failed to meaningfully challenge US power or to seek greater parity in its alliance with the US - perhaps most notably displayed in its obedient following of Washington into the disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Time to mutiny?
It is not only Europe's weakness, however, that has enabled the US to chart the parameters of Western relations with the region. Arabs are also to blame for maintaining the illusion that the key to peace is to be found in Washington's hands.
Arab officials often complain that Europe has failed to fulfill Arab expectations and left the region vulnerable to the US, but European officials, for their part, suggest that Arab submission to the US has undermined Europe's efforts to boost its role.
Both parties appear reluctant to loosen the US' grip on international relations.
It is important to note that European positions vary - with Britain, Germany, and to some extent, France, serving as the main European enforcers of US foreign policy. However, the fact that the letter was signed by former officials from these countries - including Chris Patten, a former British member of the European Commission, Helmut Schmidt, a former German chancellor, and Hubert Védrine, a former French foreign minister - reveals the extent of European frustration with Washington's full backing of Israel.
Israel, which was quick to condemn the letter, has always argued that Europe's "hostility" towards it impacts its leverage in the peace process, while the US has similarly employed the argument that its 'special relationship' with Israel better equips it to encourage Israeli compliance. But this argument is only partially true. Israel must be influenced by Europe, for it cannot sustain any standing in the world with US support alone.
Continuous Israeli lobbying in Europe and Israel's sensitivity towards popular European campaigns in solidarity with the Palestinians have repeatedly revealed that Israel is using the 'leverage' argument in a bid to blackmail Europe and undercut international pressures.
It is difficult to gauge the impact of the letter, but its timing suggests that the signatories believe that growing popular European campaigns against Israel's actions warrant an EU shift from words to deeds. It is time for Europe to regain its role, for Palestinians do not stand to be the only losers from continued European subordination to Washington.
Now that the US has abandoned its efforts to achieve a settlement freeze as a prelude to negotiations, Europe must put an end to the US monopoly of peace diplomacy. Arab states and the Palestinians must also stand up to support this mutiny by Europe's grandees, as the Guardian calls them, and should start by removing some of their eggs from Washington's basket.
Lamis Andoni is an analyst and commentator on Middle Eastern and Palestinian affairs.
Lamis Andoni Last Modified: 13 Dec 2010 11:58 GMT
Several senior European politicians have urged the European Union (EU) to threaten Israel with sanctions if it continues to build Jewish settlements on occupied Palestinian territory.
A letter signed by, among others, Mary Robinson, the former EU commissioner, and Javier Solana, the organisation's former foreign affairs chief, calls for a European peace plan based on the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the equivalent of "100 per cent of the territory [Israel] occupied in 1967, including its capital in East Jerusalem".
The demands made by the group of 26 former European leaders are not vastly different from the EU's declared position, but this call represents a push for a more assertive policy that includes measures designed to pressure Israel to comply.
Included within this is the suggestion that the EU's informal freeze on upgrading diplomatic relations with Israel should be linked to settlement construction. "The EU has always maintained that settlements are illegal, but has not attached any consequences for continued and systematic settlement expansion," the letter, which was sent to European governments and EU institutions, said.
The EU is essentially being called upon to take some initiative and move independently from the US policy that has so far dominated all diplomatic efforts to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict - something long desired by Palestinians who have been disappointed by the EU's weakness before Washington.
Dominating the diplomatic stage
Independent EU policies, with claws, could dramatically alter the dynamics of international relations, particularly as they relate to the Middle East. But the fact that the signatories to the letter are politicians who until recently held powerful positions across Europe, indicates not only the extent of European resentment towards the status quo but also the continent's inability to break free from US foreign policy.
From the outset of Arab-Israeli negotiations, which began with the Madrid Conference in 1991, Europe has assumed an active but secondary role - leaving the US to dictate the terms of the process. Historically, the US was so keen to exclude other countries that it actively sought to prevent the convening of an international peace conference on the Middle East conflict until it was clear that the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapse. Once it had collapsed, the US was able to fully monopolise the diplomatic stage.
With this US supremacy has come the dominance of Washington's policy focus, which has always been on ensuring that Israel maintains both a military and political edge. This it guaranteed by blocking others from participating in the asymmetrical negotiations.
The central difference between the US and the EU is that most European countries, rhetorically at least, believe that a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict must be based on international law and UN resolutions, while the US seeks to negate these to ensure that any solution is based on Israeli-manufactured facts on the ground.
But despite this different political stand, the EU has, for the most part, fallen in line behind Washington - supporting and facilitating the US controlled negotiation process.
This deferral to the US as the sole superpower is not confined to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Europe has more broadly failed to meaningfully challenge US power or to seek greater parity in its alliance with the US - perhaps most notably displayed in its obedient following of Washington into the disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Time to mutiny?
It is not only Europe's weakness, however, that has enabled the US to chart the parameters of Western relations with the region. Arabs are also to blame for maintaining the illusion that the key to peace is to be found in Washington's hands.
Arab officials often complain that Europe has failed to fulfill Arab expectations and left the region vulnerable to the US, but European officials, for their part, suggest that Arab submission to the US has undermined Europe's efforts to boost its role.
Both parties appear reluctant to loosen the US' grip on international relations.
It is important to note that European positions vary - with Britain, Germany, and to some extent, France, serving as the main European enforcers of US foreign policy. However, the fact that the letter was signed by former officials from these countries - including Chris Patten, a former British member of the European Commission, Helmut Schmidt, a former German chancellor, and Hubert Védrine, a former French foreign minister - reveals the extent of European frustration with Washington's full backing of Israel.
Israel, which was quick to condemn the letter, has always argued that Europe's "hostility" towards it impacts its leverage in the peace process, while the US has similarly employed the argument that its 'special relationship' with Israel better equips it to encourage Israeli compliance. But this argument is only partially true. Israel must be influenced by Europe, for it cannot sustain any standing in the world with US support alone.
Continuous Israeli lobbying in Europe and Israel's sensitivity towards popular European campaigns in solidarity with the Palestinians have repeatedly revealed that Israel is using the 'leverage' argument in a bid to blackmail Europe and undercut international pressures.
It is difficult to gauge the impact of the letter, but its timing suggests that the signatories believe that growing popular European campaigns against Israel's actions warrant an EU shift from words to deeds. It is time for Europe to regain its role, for Palestinians do not stand to be the only losers from continued European subordination to Washington.
Now that the US has abandoned its efforts to achieve a settlement freeze as a prelude to negotiations, Europe must put an end to the US monopoly of peace diplomacy. Arab states and the Palestinians must also stand up to support this mutiny by Europe's grandees, as the Guardian calls them, and should start by removing some of their eggs from Washington's basket.
Lamis Andoni is an analyst and commentator on Middle Eastern and Palestinian affairs.
Friday, December 3, 2010
WikiLeaks: US-Iran Relations "Now What" Moment?
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
By: Reza Marashi
Lost in the clamor and commotion of WikiLeaks releasing 251,287 diplomatic cables is the perspective of those who currently or have recently served in government. For four years, I served in the Office of Iranian Affairs at the State Department during the period in which most of the Iran-related cables are from. We worked hard to find constructive solutions toward peace. When President Obama took office in 2009, we launched the most serious attempt since 1979 to begin dialogue with Iran. Clearly, our diplomatic efforts were not perfect, but trying to predict Iranian politics is often a humbling experience. With the benefit of twenty-twenty hindsight, it would have been more effective if we had done a few things differently. Wikileaks may highlight this, or confirm previously held suspicions. Regardless, it has brought three key issues to the fore:
1. This unprecedented violation will strategically weaken America in ways that are currently impossible to predict. If nothing else, government officials, businessmen, students and others around the world may think twice before confiding in their American counterparts -- if they are still willing talk. And weakening American diplomacy lessens its credibility as an alternative to political, economic and military conflict.
While many view this massive security breach as an exciting and unique glimpse into foreign policy, the bottom line is that it is illegal. And while some may hope that these leaks serve as a catalyst for policy adjustments and greater government transparency, Americans should ask themselves: at what cost? Simply put, U.S. diplomats -- many of whom are my friends and former colleagues -- have been put in harm's way as a result of this illegal act. America has these security and confidentiality rules in place to protect those who serve.
2. It should now be clear that U.S. policy has never been a true engagement policy. By definition, engagement entails a long-term approach that abandons "sticks" and reassures both sides that their respective fears are unfounded. We realized early on that the administration was unlikely to adopt this approach. Instead, we pursued a "carrot and stick" strategy similar to the Bush administration, utilizing positive and negative inducements to convince Iran that changing its behavior would be its most rewarding and least harmful decision. The key difference between the Bush and Obama approach is an effort by the latter to fix tactical mistakes of the former. By disavowing regime change, striking diplomatic quid pro quos with key allies, and dropping preconditions to diplomacy with Iran, Obama changed tactics, but maintained an objective similar to his predecessor -- making Iran yield on the nuclear issue through pressure. By changing tactics, the U.S. managed to build a consensus for international sanctions after talks collapsed in 2009 -- something the Bush administration was unable to achieve.
Moreover, as the leaked cables show, the highest levels of the Obama administration never believed that diplomacy could succeed. While this does not cheapen Obama's Nowruz message and other groundbreaking facets of his initial outreach, it does raise three important questions: How can U.S. policymakers give maximum effort to make diplomacy succeed if they admittedly never believed their efforts could work? Why was Iran expected to accept negotiation terms that relinquished its greatest strategic asset (1200 kg of LEU) without receiving a strategic asset of equal value in return? And what are the chances that Iran will take diplomacy seriously now that it knows the U.S. never really did? The Obama administration presented a solid vision, but never truly pursued it.
3. Paradoxically, WikiLeaks may have caused a "Now What?" moment in U.S.-Iran relations. For America, the strategic ambiguity in its status-quo Iran policy is no longer tenable. Wikileaks has provided Iran with clarity on the U.S. "carrot-stick" strategy. Now, Obama must choose between continuing the existing policy that has been unevenly applied (where are the carrots?), or recalibrating his policy to seriously consider the political, economic, security and nuclear incentives sought by Iran that any diplomatic solution will have to address. This does not imply that concessions must be made to Iran on each of these four fronts. Only robust diplomacy can determine whether it is in America's interest to address Iranian concerns. But if Iran's interests are not addressed in negotiations, diplomacy will be deemed one-sided and fail without being executed in good faith. This increases the likelihood that the aforementioned international coalition will begin to fragment -- and that Iran will likely exploit those fragmentations.
For Iran, WikiLeaks should make it clear -- it has no real friends, in the region or elsewhere. At best, it has leverage that is facilitated by business arrangements. Trust is in short supply. Going forward, this is likely to affect its strategic calculus vis-à-vis the U.S. and its nuclear program. While it is currently unclear whose hand will be strengthened in Tehran by these recent developments, one of two scenarios seems likely. Iran's new-found sense of isolation may exacerbate existing domestic and international pressures to the point where it feels compelled to cut a deal. Indeed, Iranian decision-makers may decide that the WikiLeaks damage suffered by the U.S. and Iran have leveled the playing field, making it easier to reach an agreement without losing face. Conversely, the information gleaned from WikiLeaks could emasculate pragmatic conservatives in Iran, embolden hardliners and their preconceived notions of "foreign plots," and reinforce Iran's "don't trust anyone" mentality that has become increasingly visible in its foreign policy since 2005.
As negotiations in Geneva commence this weekend, it would be wise for both sides to utilize lessons learned -- from the previous round of diplomacy, and from the WikiLeaks debacle -- to maximize the chances for successful diplomacy. Ambassador John Limbert, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Iran during my time at the State Department, used to (half) joke about doing whatever it took to keep some form of rationality in our Iran policy. If any good is to come out of the inexcusable WikiLeaks security breach, perhaps it will be something as simple as taking Ambassador Limbert's advice to heart.
Reza Marashi is director of research at the National Iranian American Council and a former Iran desk officer at the U.S. State Department.
This article orginally appreared in The Huffington Post.
By: Reza Marashi
Lost in the clamor and commotion of WikiLeaks releasing 251,287 diplomatic cables is the perspective of those who currently or have recently served in government. For four years, I served in the Office of Iranian Affairs at the State Department during the period in which most of the Iran-related cables are from. We worked hard to find constructive solutions toward peace. When President Obama took office in 2009, we launched the most serious attempt since 1979 to begin dialogue with Iran. Clearly, our diplomatic efforts were not perfect, but trying to predict Iranian politics is often a humbling experience. With the benefit of twenty-twenty hindsight, it would have been more effective if we had done a few things differently. Wikileaks may highlight this, or confirm previously held suspicions. Regardless, it has brought three key issues to the fore:
1. This unprecedented violation will strategically weaken America in ways that are currently impossible to predict. If nothing else, government officials, businessmen, students and others around the world may think twice before confiding in their American counterparts -- if they are still willing talk. And weakening American diplomacy lessens its credibility as an alternative to political, economic and military conflict.
While many view this massive security breach as an exciting and unique glimpse into foreign policy, the bottom line is that it is illegal. And while some may hope that these leaks serve as a catalyst for policy adjustments and greater government transparency, Americans should ask themselves: at what cost? Simply put, U.S. diplomats -- many of whom are my friends and former colleagues -- have been put in harm's way as a result of this illegal act. America has these security and confidentiality rules in place to protect those who serve.
2. It should now be clear that U.S. policy has never been a true engagement policy. By definition, engagement entails a long-term approach that abandons "sticks" and reassures both sides that their respective fears are unfounded. We realized early on that the administration was unlikely to adopt this approach. Instead, we pursued a "carrot and stick" strategy similar to the Bush administration, utilizing positive and negative inducements to convince Iran that changing its behavior would be its most rewarding and least harmful decision. The key difference between the Bush and Obama approach is an effort by the latter to fix tactical mistakes of the former. By disavowing regime change, striking diplomatic quid pro quos with key allies, and dropping preconditions to diplomacy with Iran, Obama changed tactics, but maintained an objective similar to his predecessor -- making Iran yield on the nuclear issue through pressure. By changing tactics, the U.S. managed to build a consensus for international sanctions after talks collapsed in 2009 -- something the Bush administration was unable to achieve.
Moreover, as the leaked cables show, the highest levels of the Obama administration never believed that diplomacy could succeed. While this does not cheapen Obama's Nowruz message and other groundbreaking facets of his initial outreach, it does raise three important questions: How can U.S. policymakers give maximum effort to make diplomacy succeed if they admittedly never believed their efforts could work? Why was Iran expected to accept negotiation terms that relinquished its greatest strategic asset (1200 kg of LEU) without receiving a strategic asset of equal value in return? And what are the chances that Iran will take diplomacy seriously now that it knows the U.S. never really did? The Obama administration presented a solid vision, but never truly pursued it.
3. Paradoxically, WikiLeaks may have caused a "Now What?" moment in U.S.-Iran relations. For America, the strategic ambiguity in its status-quo Iran policy is no longer tenable. Wikileaks has provided Iran with clarity on the U.S. "carrot-stick" strategy. Now, Obama must choose between continuing the existing policy that has been unevenly applied (where are the carrots?), or recalibrating his policy to seriously consider the political, economic, security and nuclear incentives sought by Iran that any diplomatic solution will have to address. This does not imply that concessions must be made to Iran on each of these four fronts. Only robust diplomacy can determine whether it is in America's interest to address Iranian concerns. But if Iran's interests are not addressed in negotiations, diplomacy will be deemed one-sided and fail without being executed in good faith. This increases the likelihood that the aforementioned international coalition will begin to fragment -- and that Iran will likely exploit those fragmentations.
For Iran, WikiLeaks should make it clear -- it has no real friends, in the region or elsewhere. At best, it has leverage that is facilitated by business arrangements. Trust is in short supply. Going forward, this is likely to affect its strategic calculus vis-à-vis the U.S. and its nuclear program. While it is currently unclear whose hand will be strengthened in Tehran by these recent developments, one of two scenarios seems likely. Iran's new-found sense of isolation may exacerbate existing domestic and international pressures to the point where it feels compelled to cut a deal. Indeed, Iranian decision-makers may decide that the WikiLeaks damage suffered by the U.S. and Iran have leveled the playing field, making it easier to reach an agreement without losing face. Conversely, the information gleaned from WikiLeaks could emasculate pragmatic conservatives in Iran, embolden hardliners and their preconceived notions of "foreign plots," and reinforce Iran's "don't trust anyone" mentality that has become increasingly visible in its foreign policy since 2005.
As negotiations in Geneva commence this weekend, it would be wise for both sides to utilize lessons learned -- from the previous round of diplomacy, and from the WikiLeaks debacle -- to maximize the chances for successful diplomacy. Ambassador John Limbert, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Iran during my time at the State Department, used to (half) joke about doing whatever it took to keep some form of rationality in our Iran policy. If any good is to come out of the inexcusable WikiLeaks security breach, perhaps it will be something as simple as taking Ambassador Limbert's advice to heart.
Reza Marashi is director of research at the National Iranian American Council and a former Iran desk officer at the U.S. State Department.
This article orginally appreared in The Huffington Post.
Wiki weakens Iran war drive
The Saudi endorsement could be the kiss of death for Netanyahu's push for a military strike on Iran.
MJ Rosenberg Last Modified: 03 Dec 2010 15:35 GMT
Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, is ecstatic. He has come to the conclusion that a diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks, revealing that the Saudis privately favour a military strike on Iran, has vindicated Israel's hawkish stance. With Saudi Arabia aboard the war train, how can it possibly be derailed?
Of course, he is totally wrong. The revelation that the Saudi royals agree with the Israeli position adds exactly nothing to the case for war. The House of Saud? Whom exactly do they speak for? Not even the Saudi people, let alone anybody else in the Muslim world. In fact, the Saudi endorsement could be the kiss of death for Netanyahu's plans.
A more significant revelation is that the Obama administration has no intention of resorting to force to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. A host of cables indicate that in private, as in public, only sanctions and diplomacy are on the table.
That is why right-wing Israelis (and their neocon cutouts in the US) hope that the Republicans win in 2012 - preferably former half-term Alaska governor Sarah Palin - and that the nuclear stalemate remains unresolved until she can order "Bombs Away".
Netanyahu's wishful thinking
Nothing in WikiLeaks can be legitimately used to advance the case for war despite Netanyahu's wishful thinking. This is from Ha'aretz:
"Our region has been hostage to a narrative that is the result of 60 years of propaganda, which paints Israel as the greatest threat," Netanyahu said.
"In reality leaders understand that that view is bankrupt. For the first time in history there is agreement that Iran is the threat," he said.
"If leaders start saying openly what they have long been saying behind closed doors, we can make a real breakthrough on the road to peace."
By that, he means, a real breakthrough on the road to war.
But even if the Saudis agree with the Israelis that a military strike is warranted, it really amounts to little more than nothing. That is because neither Israel nor Saudi Arabia considered US interests when coming to this conclusion, which is the only thing a president of the US should consider.
Saudis and Israelis support policies which they believe are in their interests. That is how foreign governments invariably behave and it is how the US would behave toward Israel but for the unique political considerations that impel our national leadership to march in lockstep with Israeli leaders.
Diplomacy, not war
Nothing in WikiLeaks affects the clear US national interest which dictates, above all, that we resolve our differences with Iran through diplomacy and not through war.
That assertion hardly requires proving. The US is involved in two wars in the Middle East already, in which 5,840 Americans (and countless Iraqis and Afghans) have been killed. And we still have well over 100,000 troops in that part of the world.
A strike on Iran by the US or by Israel would not only put our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan at greater risk, it would destroy the US' standing throughout the Muslim world. It would also vastly increase the threat of terrorism against American civilians at home and abroad. It could even trigger a regional war.
Sure, a few royals and unrepresentative autocrats would privately cheer us on, but those regimes would ultimately either join the opposition to us or be swept away by popular fury.
The Wiki-revealed knowledge that the Israelis and the Saudis are tacitly working in concert against Iran would only make things worse, given that among most Arabs and Muslims, the Saudi regime is only a little more popular than the Netanyahu government. A US/Israeli/Saudi tripartite alliance against Iran could be the US' Suez, and could finish us off in the region the way the United Kingdom and France were finished by their anti-Egypt alliance with Israel in 1956.
In addition, of course, no one believes a strike on Iran would eliminate its nuclear facilities.
Nobody wants to see a nuclear-armed Iran. But few are particularly happy with nuclear weapons in the hands of Pakistan, or for that matter, India. And, believe it or not, the Muslim world has never been particularly comfortable with Israel's uninspected nuclear arsenal. And then there is North Korea which, unlike Iran, has demonstrated its crazy recklessness over and over again. (Iranian recklessness has been confined to repulsive rhetoric, not impulsive actions.)
Israelis say that they do not want to live under a nuclear shadow. But that does not make them any different than anyone else, or more vulnerable either. There is a gigantic hole in the middle of Manhattan which provides ample evidence that Americans do not need any lectures from anyone on that score.
The good news is that, unlike al-Qaeda, Iran is a nation that can be engaged in serious negotiations. It is not a nihilist terror group; it is not a suicide cult. Rather, it is a nation that has been a key player in its region for thousands of years.
We have grievances with them and they have grievances with us. That means that we must enter into comprehensive negotiations on all those grievances - starting with their nuclear programme and our attempts at overthrowing their government, along with the whole host of issues that divide us, including the security of Israel.
Remember, back in 2003, the Iranians sent the Bush administration a two-page document stating that they were ready for comprehensive negotiations and we refused to even acknowledge the offer. Obama has done better than his predecessor, but not by much.
He offers friendly greetings to the Iranian people, but like Bush, he mainly issues demands and sets time-tables. (See this column.) A better model would be Nixon, who treated a dangerous adversary, China, with respect and an outstretched hand, and changed the world. Is Iran really worse than the place we used to call Red China? More fanatical? What is Iran's equivalent of invading Korea in 1950 to install a puppet state? (No, we installed Iran's puppet regime in Iraq for them.)
In short, we can do business with Iran, if we want to - and if we block out the endless war-mongering from the neocons. (AIPAC's spring conference will be almost entirely dedicated to hyping the Iran threat, with half of Congress in attendance, dutifully memorising AIPAC talking points.)
There is no alternative to negotiations. Either get serious about them or prepare to live with a nuclear armed Iran. In either case, we will be better off following Nixon's example and not George W. Bush's.
MJ Rosenberg is a senior foreign policy fellow at Media Matters Action Network. The above article first appeared in Foreign Policy Matters, a part of the Media Matters Action Network.
MJ Rosenberg Last Modified: 03 Dec 2010 15:35 GMT
Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, is ecstatic. He has come to the conclusion that a diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks, revealing that the Saudis privately favour a military strike on Iran, has vindicated Israel's hawkish stance. With Saudi Arabia aboard the war train, how can it possibly be derailed?
Of course, he is totally wrong. The revelation that the Saudi royals agree with the Israeli position adds exactly nothing to the case for war. The House of Saud? Whom exactly do they speak for? Not even the Saudi people, let alone anybody else in the Muslim world. In fact, the Saudi endorsement could be the kiss of death for Netanyahu's plans.
A more significant revelation is that the Obama administration has no intention of resorting to force to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. A host of cables indicate that in private, as in public, only sanctions and diplomacy are on the table.
That is why right-wing Israelis (and their neocon cutouts in the US) hope that the Republicans win in 2012 - preferably former half-term Alaska governor Sarah Palin - and that the nuclear stalemate remains unresolved until she can order "Bombs Away".
Netanyahu's wishful thinking
Nothing in WikiLeaks can be legitimately used to advance the case for war despite Netanyahu's wishful thinking. This is from Ha'aretz:
"Our region has been hostage to a narrative that is the result of 60 years of propaganda, which paints Israel as the greatest threat," Netanyahu said.
"In reality leaders understand that that view is bankrupt. For the first time in history there is agreement that Iran is the threat," he said.
"If leaders start saying openly what they have long been saying behind closed doors, we can make a real breakthrough on the road to peace."
By that, he means, a real breakthrough on the road to war.
But even if the Saudis agree with the Israelis that a military strike is warranted, it really amounts to little more than nothing. That is because neither Israel nor Saudi Arabia considered US interests when coming to this conclusion, which is the only thing a president of the US should consider.
Saudis and Israelis support policies which they believe are in their interests. That is how foreign governments invariably behave and it is how the US would behave toward Israel but for the unique political considerations that impel our national leadership to march in lockstep with Israeli leaders.
Diplomacy, not war
Nothing in WikiLeaks affects the clear US national interest which dictates, above all, that we resolve our differences with Iran through diplomacy and not through war.
That assertion hardly requires proving. The US is involved in two wars in the Middle East already, in which 5,840 Americans (and countless Iraqis and Afghans) have been killed. And we still have well over 100,000 troops in that part of the world.
A strike on Iran by the US or by Israel would not only put our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan at greater risk, it would destroy the US' standing throughout the Muslim world. It would also vastly increase the threat of terrorism against American civilians at home and abroad. It could even trigger a regional war.
Sure, a few royals and unrepresentative autocrats would privately cheer us on, but those regimes would ultimately either join the opposition to us or be swept away by popular fury.
The Wiki-revealed knowledge that the Israelis and the Saudis are tacitly working in concert against Iran would only make things worse, given that among most Arabs and Muslims, the Saudi regime is only a little more popular than the Netanyahu government. A US/Israeli/Saudi tripartite alliance against Iran could be the US' Suez, and could finish us off in the region the way the United Kingdom and France were finished by their anti-Egypt alliance with Israel in 1956.
In addition, of course, no one believes a strike on Iran would eliminate its nuclear facilities.
Nobody wants to see a nuclear-armed Iran. But few are particularly happy with nuclear weapons in the hands of Pakistan, or for that matter, India. And, believe it or not, the Muslim world has never been particularly comfortable with Israel's uninspected nuclear arsenal. And then there is North Korea which, unlike Iran, has demonstrated its crazy recklessness over and over again. (Iranian recklessness has been confined to repulsive rhetoric, not impulsive actions.)
Israelis say that they do not want to live under a nuclear shadow. But that does not make them any different than anyone else, or more vulnerable either. There is a gigantic hole in the middle of Manhattan which provides ample evidence that Americans do not need any lectures from anyone on that score.
The good news is that, unlike al-Qaeda, Iran is a nation that can be engaged in serious negotiations. It is not a nihilist terror group; it is not a suicide cult. Rather, it is a nation that has been a key player in its region for thousands of years.
We have grievances with them and they have grievances with us. That means that we must enter into comprehensive negotiations on all those grievances - starting with their nuclear programme and our attempts at overthrowing their government, along with the whole host of issues that divide us, including the security of Israel.
Remember, back in 2003, the Iranians sent the Bush administration a two-page document stating that they were ready for comprehensive negotiations and we refused to even acknowledge the offer. Obama has done better than his predecessor, but not by much.
He offers friendly greetings to the Iranian people, but like Bush, he mainly issues demands and sets time-tables. (See this column.) A better model would be Nixon, who treated a dangerous adversary, China, with respect and an outstretched hand, and changed the world. Is Iran really worse than the place we used to call Red China? More fanatical? What is Iran's equivalent of invading Korea in 1950 to install a puppet state? (No, we installed Iran's puppet regime in Iraq for them.)
In short, we can do business with Iran, if we want to - and if we block out the endless war-mongering from the neocons. (AIPAC's spring conference will be almost entirely dedicated to hyping the Iran threat, with half of Congress in attendance, dutifully memorising AIPAC talking points.)
There is no alternative to negotiations. Either get serious about them or prepare to live with a nuclear armed Iran. In either case, we will be better off following Nixon's example and not George W. Bush's.
MJ Rosenberg is a senior foreign policy fellow at Media Matters Action Network. The above article first appeared in Foreign Policy Matters, a part of the Media Matters Action Network.
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