Showing posts with label Security Council. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Security Council. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Pressure Upon Israel Could Resolve Iranian Nuclear Issue



             The crisis over the Iranian nuclear aspirations is really quite simple to resolve if there is political will to resolve it. The issue is not the threat of whether Iran will use a nuclear bomb against Israel but rather whether Israel will continue its hegemony over the Middle East, especially over the Palestinians.   Additionally, the hypocrisy that the West adopts visa via Israel and every other Middle Eastern country is overwhelming to the people of the region.  Putting a little pressure upon Apartheid Israel can solve many of the Middle East problems.

           
The belief that Iran will use a nuclear weapon against Israel as an offensive strategy is foolish.  It is inconceivable that any country will use a nuclear bomb against another in an offensive manner. President Harry S. Truman used the nuclear bomb against Japan because he perceived that an invasion of Japan will result in an excessive amount of US casualties. Additionally, President Truman used the atomic bomb knowing full well that there would be no retaliation as no other country had the capability to retaliate with nuclear power. This is not the case today.

            It is highly unlikely that Iran would strike Israel for several reasons.  First, Iran would be committing suicide as Israel has an enormous nuclear capability to strike Iran back with much more devastation. Thus it would be suicidal for Iran to strike the first blow.  Second, the proximity of millions of Muslims around Israel, including Iran, would cause such devastation from the atomic burst that Iran will not benefit strategically within the Muslim world.  Third, the proximity of Jerusalem, a holy site for Muslims, to any potential target within Israel makes striking Israel with nuclear weapons theologically impractical. 

            The hyperbole rhetoric emitting from Apartheid Israeli leaders against Iran is aimed to deflect news coverage about its apartheid practices against the Palestinians.  To seek the sympathies of the West, Apartheid Israel falsely portrays itself as a goldfish in a sea of piranhas. The real fact is that Apartheid Israel is the great white shark in a small pound of fat cat fishes.   As the only nuclear power in the Middle East, Israel continues its hegemony over the Middle East with unchecked arrogance.  In 1981 and 2007, Apartheid Israel attacked Iraq and Syria, respectively, in an unprovoked attempt to prevent them from developing nuclear capabilities.  Additionally, while the US and the West demand inspections of North Korea and Iran’s nuclear facilities, nothing is said about Israel’s nuclear power plants which, according to exports, have produced hundreds of nuclear weapon warheads.

            Apartheid Israel would like the West and Russia and China, as they are UN Security Council permanent members, to believe that Iran will use nuclear weapon to “wipe Israel off the face of the earth.”  In fact, Iranian President Ahmadinejad never said this statement and this translation is completely wrong.  But Israel knows that perception is reality and putting this perception into minds makes it the “perceived truth”—but this is not always the “truth”.

            President Ahmadinejad, during the speech in which he is accused of wanting to “wipe Israel off the face of the earth,” used the words words “rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods” which mean “regime occupying Jerusalem.”[1] Ahmadinejad was advocating a regime change in Israel.  But Apartheid Israel does not want the world to know this and the American press does not want to investigate Israel in fear of retaliation from the powerful Israeli lobby.  To be fair, this wrong interpretation came not from Israel but from Iran itself.  However, when Iran tried to correct the wrong terminology, the quote spiraled out of control.  Of course, Apartheid Israel made this wrongly translated term the center of its propaganda campaign to deflect coverage of its apartheid practices.

            The West’s domination over the Middle East through its proxy Apartheid Israel and the support of Arab dictators and kings who repress the people’s human spirit to be free and democratic continues to make the region unstable.  Further, the discrepancy in policy towards Arab countries and Apartheid Israel leads many in the region to wonder how America and the West could be so hypocritical.  Apartheid Israel can occupy Palestine for over 40 years and no military force is sent to remove the occupier.  Yet, Iraq’s occupation of Kuwait could not be tolerated for one day as the US and Britain rallied the world around Operation Desert Storm in 1990. Apartheid Israel has imprisoned over 1.6 million Palestinians in Gaza and bombed the population relentlessly in the 2008-2009 onslaught without a whisper from the US and the West.  Yet, the world comes to the aid of the Libyans during their Arab Spring revolution to oust Muammar Gaddafi.  The 1.5 billion Muslims cannot understand why they are treated different than the 15 million Jews.

            What further perplexes many Arabs is that Israel is a nuclear power that has never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). While Pakistan and India have also not signed the Treaty, they have both publicly stated that they do have nuclear warheads.  Israel, on the other hand, has been purposely deceptive as to its nuclear capability.

India has pledged a no first use policy unless it is attacked by an adversary using nuclear weapons.  Additionally, India has expressed its commitment to non-proliferation but stated that it considers the “NPT as a flawed treaty and it did not recognise [sic] the need for universal, non-discriminatory verification and treatment."[2]  India has cooperated with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) by entering into agreements to inspect its facilities.

Israel will not cooperate with the IAEA. When called upon to open its nuclear facilities in September, 2009, Israel’s chief delegate to the IAEA conference responded “Israel will not co-operate in any matter with this resolution."[3]  Why haven’t Western countries called upon the UN to impose sanctions against Israel for its refusal to have its nuclear facilities inspected?  Why is this double standard for Israel tolerated?

Striking a balance between Iran and Israel can be one way to make Iran more cooperative and to abandon any military component with its nuclear ambitions. Having Israel submit to inspections of its nuclear capabilities and to make it pledge a no first use policy similar to India will give assurance to Iran and all Middle East countries that the West is willing to deal fairly with the people of the region. Additionally, the West needs to exert pressure on Israel to resolve Palestinian statehood aspirations by ending decades of occupation. Failing diplomatic pressure, sanctions upon Israel should be on the table.

Fair dealing in the Middle East is the only thing Arabs want to see. They do not want the West to adopt a pro-Arab policy.  Arabs want a fair policy in the Middle East that treats every country and every religion equally and with dignity.  If this was the policy, the issue with the Iranian nuclear ambitions would not be an issue.  The lack of fairness in Western Middle East policy, however, is driving the region into another major war.  Pressuring Israel to act the way the West demands Iran to act would solve the Middle East problems.

            The question is whether there  is a political will to pressure Israel?


2/25/2012 update:  I just read this article by Allan Hart, author, and found this statement quite interesting to this article: 


"From recently de-classified documents we now know that in a memorandum dated 19 July 1969, Henry Kissinger, then national security adviser, warned President Nixon that the Israelis “are probably more likely than any other country to actually use their nuclear weapons.” And as I mentioned in my post of 30 January with the headline Is Israel on the road to “self-destruction”?, Golda Meir said in an interview I did with her for the BBC’s Panorama programme when she was prime minster that in a doomsday situation Israel “would be prepared to take the region and the world down with it.”"


(© Copyright, Fadi Zanayed.  Publication or distribution of this material is allowed provided its content is not altered and the source and its author are cited.)

[1][1] ‘Wiped Off The Face of the Earth’ The Rumor of the Century, Arash Norouzi, May 26, 2007 http://antiwar.com/orig/norouzi.php?articleid=11025
[2] India seeks Japan's support, calls NPT 'flawed' By IANS, Sat, Mar 24, 2007
[3] Israel pressured on nuclear sites, Aljazeera, September 18, 2009, http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2009/09/2009918173136830771.html

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

The Arrogance of the UN Veto


            Arrogance is just one more word to describe the Apartheid Israeli government.  This time it involves the United Nations Security Council veto power which is granted to the five permanent members (United States, Great Britain, France, China and Russia). 

            This week China and Russia vetoed a UN Security Council Resolution against Syria for the second time in four months.  The reaction from the US and Apartheid Israel was typical.  U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the veto a "travesty". Members of Apartheid-in-Chief Benjamin Natanyahu’s cabinet were disappointed by the veto and Knesset members were appalled by Russia's behavior.

            This arrogant reaction by the US and Apartheid Israel comes after a February, 2011 US veto of a UN Security Council Resolution which would have condemned the settlements as “illegal” and after the US threatened to veto a proposed UN Security Resolution on Palestinian Statehood in September, 2011.

            Apartheid Israeli supporters point to the Russian naval base in Syria and to the sale of jet fighters to the Assad regime to state that Russia has some sort of culpability in the Syrian murderous crackdown of the Arab Spring in Syria. This position would suggest to any logical person that the US, which is working closely with Apartheid Israel on military exercises and sells (gives is a better word) jet fighters to Israel, is then complicit with Israel in the occupation of Palestine.

            The problem with the US foreign policy is that it does what it will not allow others to do. The US can support the illegal settlement of Palestine by Apartheid Israel but Russia and China cannot support the brutal Syrian murderous actions against its own people.  Apartheid-in-Chief Netanyahu is conspicuously silent on the Russian and Chinese veto. However, he did state recently before a cabinet meeting:

At the end of last week we received a reminder about the environment we're living in. We heard Iran's ruler talk about Israel's destruction, we saw the Syrian army massacring its own people. Some leaders have no compunctions about harming their people or their neighbors.[i]

Zvi Bar’el, the writer of the Haaretz opinion article in which this quote was taken, then stated:

True, it's a lousy environment. Only one sentence is needed to complete the picture: "And there are governments that don't mind continuing to occupy other nations for nearly 50 years.

            This arrogance of expressing moral outrage at the atrocities of other countries while committing atrocities yourself is typical of how repugnant the world political stage has succumbed.  This indignation comes down to the use of the UN veto by the five permanent nations.  The US cannot use the veto to allow Israel to continue its apartheid occupation of Palestine and its obnoxious suppression of the Palestinian human spirit to be free; and then condemn the Russians and Chinese for vetoing the condemnation of the Syrian brutal suppression of the Syrian people’s human spirit to also be free.  One cannot support the condemnation of one human suppression and veto the condemnation of another human suppression.  It just is not morally right.

            While the veto in the UN Security Council is a power that will not be so easily given up by the five permanent members, it is time to rethink this awesome power. At this juncture, however, it would be better if the five permanent members of the UN Security Council would rethink their use of the veto.  Instead of using the veto to advance one’s self-interest, they should use the veto on a consistent basis that will advance the human spirit to be free.   I understand that this may be asking too much from China, but the US, as the sole super power, needs to lead with a moral conviction.  The US needs to be consistent in its foreign policy.



(© Copyright, Fadi Zanayed.  Publication or distribution of this material is allowed provided its content is not altered and the source and its author are cited.)

[i] Veto Morality, Zvi Bar'el, February 8, 2012, http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/veto-morality-1.411637

غطرسة للامم المتحدة النقض

(قمت بترجمة هذه المقالة على Google. محدودة كما هو قدرتي على قراءة اللغة العربية،أنا لا يمكن أن تضمن دقة الترجمة)

            
غطرسة واحد فقط أكثر كلمة لوصف حكومة الفصل العنصري الإسرائيلي. هذه المرة أنها تنطوي على الأمم المتحدة حق النقض في مجلس الأمن السلطة التي تمنح إلى الدول الخمس الدائمة العضوية (الولايات المتحدة وبريطانيا وفرنسا والصين وروسيا).

            
هذا الأسبوع حق النقض ضد الصين وروسيا على قرار مجلس الأمن الدولي ضد سوريا للمرة الثانية في اربعة اشهر. كان رد الفعل من جانب الولايات المتحدة وإسرائيل الفصل العنصري نموذجي. دعت وزيرة الخارجية الاميركية هيلاري كلينتون في ذلك حق النقض على "مهزلة". أصيبوا بخيبة أمل من أعضاء مجلس الوزراء بنيامين نتنياهو الفصل العنصري في ورئيس من قبل أعضاء الكنيست، واستخدام حق النقض قد هالهم سلوك روسيا.

            
هذا رد فعل متعجرف من قبل الولايات المتحدة وإسرائيل الفصل العنصري يأتي بعد فبراير، 2011 الولايات المتحدة حق النقض لقرار مجلس الامن الدولي الذي من شأنه أن يدين المستوطنات بأنها "غير قانونية" وبعد الولايات المتحدة هددت باستخدام الفيتو ضد القرار المقترح الامن الدولي بشأن اقامة دولة فلسطينية في سبتمبر ، 2011.

            
أنصار الفصل العنصري الإسرائيلي تشير إلى القاعدة البحرية الروسية في سوريا، وعلى بيع طائرات مقاتلة لنظام الأسد أن أذكر أن روسيا لديها نوعا من اللوم في حملة القمع التي شنتها القاتل السوري من الربيع العربي في سوريا. هذا الموقف أن أقترح على أي شخص منطقي أن الولايات المتحدة، والتي تعمل بشكل وثيق مع إسرائيل الفصل العنصري في مناورات عسكرية وتبيع (يعطي هو أفضل كلمة) طائرات مقاتلة إلى إسرائيل، ومن ثم متواطئة مع إسرائيل في احتلال فلسطين.

            
المشكلة مع السياسة الخارجية الأميركية هو أن يفعل ما لن تسمح للآخرين للقيام به. يمكن للولايات المتحدة يمكن أن تدعم الاستيطان غير الشرعية في فلسطين من قبل إسرائيل الفصل العنصري لكن روسيا والصين لا تؤيد وحشية الإجراءات القاتل السوري ضد شعبه. الفصل العنصري في ورئيس نتنياهو الصمت بشكل واضح على الفيتو الروسي والصيني. بيد أنه في الآونة الأخيرة دولة قبل اجتماع مجلس الوزراء:رأينا في نهاية الأسبوع الماضي تلقينا تذكيرا حول البيئة الذي نعيشه. سمعنا الكلام الإيراني الحاكم حول تدمير اسرائيل، الجيش السوري ذبح شعبه. بعض القادة ليس لديهم الندم عن إيذاء الناس، أو جيرانهم. [أنا]تسفي Bar'el، وكاتب المقال في صحيفة هآرتس الرأي الذي اتخذ هذا الاقتباس، وقال بعد ذلك:صحيح، انها بيئة رديء. وهناك حاجة فقط جملة واحدة لاستكمال الصورة: "وهناك حكومات التي لا تمانع في استمرار لاحتلال دول أخرى منذ ما يقرب من 50 عاما.

            
هذه الغطرسة للتعبير عن الغضب الأخلاقي في الفظائع التي ارتكبت في دول أخرى، وارتكاب الفظائع نفسك نموذجا للكيفية بغيض الساحة العالمية السياسية واستسلمت. هذا السخط ينزل إلى استخدام حق النقض من قبل الأمم المتحدة والدول الخمس دائمة. لا تستطيع الولايات المتحدة استخدام حق النقض للسماح اسرائيل لمواصلة احتلالها الفصل العنصري في فلسطين، وقمعها البغيض من روح الإنسان الفلسطيني في التحرر، ومن ثم إدانة الروس والصينيين عن الاعتراض على إدانة القمع الوحشي السوري من الإنسان للشعب السوري روح ليكون أيضا مجانا. يمكن للمرء أن لا يعتمد على إدانة واحدة قمع الإنسان ونقض إدانة آخر قمع الإنسان. انها ليست مجرد حق من الناحية الأخلاقية.

            
في حين أن حق النقض في مجلس الامن الدولي هو القوة التي لن يتم بسهولة لذلك تخلت من قبل الدول الخمس الدائمة العضوية، فقد حان الوقت لإعادة النظر في هذه القوة الهائلة. في هذه المرحلة، ومع ذلك، سيكون من الأفضل إذا كانت الدول الخمس الدائمة العضوية في مجلس الامن الدولي وإعادة التفكير في استخدامها حق النقض. بدلا من استخدام حق النقض لدفع الفرد للمصلحة الذاتية، ينبغي لها استخدام حق النقض على أساس ثابت من شأنها أن تقدم الروح البشرية أن يكون حرا. وأنا أفهم أن هذا يمكن أن يطلب الكثير من الصين، ولكن الولايات المتحدة، باعتبارها القوة العظمى الوحيدة، يجب أن تؤدي مع الإدانة الأخلاقية. الولايات المتحدة تحتاج إلى أن تكون متسقة في سياستها الخارجية.

(Zanayed فادي © حقوق الطبع والنشر،. يتم السماح نشر أو توزيع هذه المواد شريطة أن لا تغيير محتواها وأشار المصدر وصاحبه.)[ط] الأخلاق حق النقض، تسفي Bar'el، 8 شباط 2012، http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/veto-morality-1.411637