For Palestinians, Every Day Is Kristallnacht

Foreign Policy Journal
December 15, 2009
by Paul Craig Roberts

Israel_stealing_palestine“Settlers attack West Bank mosque and burn holy Muslim books” was a London Times headline on December 11, 2009.

These attacks, together with the demolition of Palestinian homes, the uprooting of Palestinians’ olive groves, the innumerable checkpoints that prevent Palestinians from accessing schools, work, and medical care, the Israeli Wall that denies Palestinians access to the land stolen from them, and the isolation and blockade of the Gaza Ghetto, are part of the Israeli government’s policy of genocide for the Palestinians.

The Israel Lobby has such power over America that even former President Jimmy Carter, a good friend of Israel, is demonized for using the polite term–apartheid–for the genocide that has occurred over the decades during which American “Christian” preachers, together with bought-and-paid-for politicians, justified Israel’s policy of slow genocide for Palestine.

Israelis who still have a moral conscience–a small part of the population–endeavor to use moral protests against the inhumanity of the Israeli government. Israelis Jeff Halper and Angela Godfrey-Goldstein lead the Israeli Committee Against House Demolition (ICAHD), a non-violent, direct-action group established to oppose and resist Israeli demolition of Palestinian homes in the Occupied Territories.

Under international law an occupier by military force is forbidden to steal the occupied land. The US, however, has protected Israel’s violation of international law for decades by vetoing UN resolutions. Israel has been able to steal Palestine from the Palestinians, because the US government used its power to prevent Israel from being held accountable under international law.

In March 2003 American citizen Rachel Corrie stood in front of an Israeli bulldozer, made by Caterpillar and sent to destroy a Palestinian home. Her courageous act of defiance was regarded as an annoyance, and she was run over and murdered by the Israeli bulldozer operator. Israel suffered no consequences for its murder of an American citizen who had a moral conscience.

In the Israeli-controlled American media, we hear endlessly that Palestinians are terrorists who strap on explosives in order to kill innocent Israelis and who terrorize Israeli towns by firing rockets into them. One look at the maps above is enough to make clear who the real terrorist is. The success of Israeli propaganda in the face of totally obvious facts damns the ignorance and unconcern of the American people.

The Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, which also has a moral conscience and is intelligent to boot, wrote on December 4, 2009: “Every appointee to the American government must endure a thorough background check by the American Jewish community.” Haaretz notes that any American that the President of the United States proposes for an appointment to his government is subject to the approval of the Israel Lobby, which can blackball appointees at will.

Haaretz gives the example of Charles Freeman, whom President Obama intended to appoint as head of the National Intelligence Council. The Israel Lobby proved, again, that it was more powerful than a mere American President and prevented the appointment, citing Freeman’s “anti-israel leaning.” In other words, because Freeman was not an overboard apologist for Israel’s crimes he was unacceptable to the Israel Lobby.

Haaretz reports: “The next attempt to appoint an intelligence aide, in this case, former Republican senator Chuck Hagel, also resulted in vast criticism over his not having a pro-Israel record.” The Israel Lobby has blocked Hagel’s appointment by President Obama. Hagel doesn’t want to start a war with Iran for Israel’s benefit and was blackballed by Morton A. Klein, the president of the Zionist Organization of America. Hagel, it seems, “refused to sign a letter calling on then-president George Bush to speak about Iran’s nuclear program at the G8 summit that year.”

Now it is a Jewish daughter of a Holocaust survivor, Hannah Rosenthal, whose appointment to head the US Office to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, an office that is another indication of America’s puppet state status, is under attack. Rosenthal was the head of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs during 2000-2005. Her black mark came from serving on the advisory board of the J Street Lobby, a recently-formed American Jewish organization formed in opposition to AIPAC’s murderous militarism.

The Israel Lobby’s opposition to Hannah Rosenthal shows that no moral person can survive the Israel Lobby’s blackball.

The US, “the world’s only superpower,” has no independent voice in Middle Eastern affairs. The real power rests in the hands of the settler thug, Avigdor Lieberman, Deputy Prime Minister of Israel and Minister of Foreign Affairs. This is the man who controls the Obama government’s Middle East policy. Lieberman forced the “all-powerful President of the US, Barack Omama,” to rescind his order to Israel to halt the illegal settler settlements on occupied Palestinian land. Obama was given the bird and submitted to his master.

Macho Americans who prance around as if they owned the world are nothing but the puppets of Israel. The US is not a country. It is a colony.
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Paul Craig Roberts
Hon. Paul Craig Roberts was educated at the Georgia Institute of Technology, the University of Virginia, the University of California, Berkeley, and Oxford University where he was a member of Merton College. Dr. Roberts has held numerous academic appointments, including Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and William E. Simon Chair, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University. Dr. Roberts served in the Congressional Staff in the House and Senate and was appointed Assistant Secretary of the Treasury by President Ronald Reagan. He was awarded the French Legion of Honor in 1987. Dr. Roberts is author of 'Alienation and the Soviet Economy' and 'The Supply-Side Revolution'. He is coauthor with Matthew Stephenson of 'Marx’s Theory of Exchange, Alienation, and Crisis'. He is coauthor with Karen LaFollette Araujo of 'Meltdown: Inside the Soviet Economy and The Capitalist Revolution in Latin America'. He is coauthor with Lawrence Stratton of 'The New Color Line and The Tyranny of Good Intentions'. His latest book, 'How The Economy Was Lost', will be published by CounterPunch in October 2009. Dr. Roberts is a columnist for Creators Syndicate in Los Angeles.

http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2009/12/15/for-palestinians-every-day-is-kristallnacht/

Disputed Kashmir serves China’s interest

The optimism is misplaced. With China issuing stapled visas, only Kashmiris end up on the losing side.

Rising Kashmir
Ghulam Nabi
On November 12, Indian Foreign Affairs Ministry declared it officially that no stapled visa issued by Chinese Embassy in Delhi will be entertained. Before that, it was only at the international Airport where Kashmiri people who had stapled visa would be informed that they can’t board the flight because of having different visa; which does not say anything different from normal visa except that it is not pasted, but stapled on the passport.
The issue is not as simple as it seems. Why China started issuing separate visas to Kashmiris now when it has always treated it as a disputed region? Though a section of Kashmiri society is jubilant about it thinking that China might be a saviour to help Kashmir secure its independence, but if we look into history then it seems a hoax. Though China has never treated Kashmir as part of India, but it has always adopted different policies vis-à-vis Kashmir, shaped according to her interest.

During 1950’s China adapted neutral policy, but in 1960’s and 1970’s the country towed her position towards Pakistan because of the deteriorating relations between USSR and China. Their relations aggravated first because of lack of support of USSR to China in 1962 Sino-India war, and later turned worse during the time of Cultural Revolution. So there was no love relation for Pakistan, which made China to modify their stand in favour of her “all weather ally”. As the old saying goes, my enemy’s enemy is my friend. With the shift in China’s overall foreign policy during Deng Xiaoping’s period who unlike his predecessor without any doubt gave more importance to economic reformation than sticking to a political ideology. China tried to build its business relations with different foreign countries including India. With the revival of business linkages with India, China’s stand on Kashmir also changed, it went back to its 50s position – ‘Kashmir is a bilateral issue between India and Pakistan’. Thus it secured its business interests while at the same time maintained its relation with Pakistan.
China continued with its post-1980 policy towards Kashmir issue till this year with little variations every now and then. However, it is pertinent to mention here that China alongside the US pushed Pakistan to withdraw from kargil war in 1999. Why China pushed Pakistan to withdraw from Kargil? Either, it does not want war in its neighborhood and if Kargil war could go worse it might affect China also or was it something else?
Coming back to visa controversy, with Chinese embassy in India is issuing separate visas to Kashmiri students and businessmen, some political commentators in Kashmir believe it is good for Kashmir, but if we give it a deep thought, it is the Kashmiri who is on the losing side.
There are 23 resolutions pending with the United Nations on Kashmir issue. There is an armed conflict, which is supported by peaceful non-violent resistance movement - going on from the last 20 years. The disputed nature of conflict is being discussed in every important forum. Even political commentators go on to say the road for peace in South Asia goes through Kashmir. But that has turned into rhetoric. So how would stapled visa help solve Kashmir issue? All it does is that it bars Kashmiri students to get their education in China. Similarly, when whole world is trying to build their business relations with China, Kashmiri business community can’t take benefit of it unlike the Indian business community which doesn’t face such restrictions. China has emerged as India’s largest trading partner in 2008, while surpassing United States. Just one decade ago, the bilateral trade between the two Asian giants was $2 Billion, and it has reached $51.8 billion in 2008.
If China was sincere to help Kashmir, it would help Kashmiri students to get admission and scholarship in Chinese universities on priority bases. It would also give concession to Kashmiri traders, which would not only help China to connect with Kashmiri people, but would also boost deteriorated Kashmiri economy. However, it is doing entirely opposite.
The very jubilance in Kashmir about China is coming is like “aaya aaya Lashkar aaya”. Lashkar is coming, Jaish is coming and now China is coming. These comings neither helped in the past nor they are going to help in the future. It might be of the interest of Indian business community (excluding trigger-happy FCCI people who formed task force of retired army generals and bureaucrats, which proposed to wage war in Pakistan, without knowing consequences of it) to have good relation with Pakistan if the Kashmir problem is solved. India which is not able to get access to Central Asian market will not only get that, but the solution will also help to build a successful South Asian block, which is in a way threat for China. So if China wants to fulfill its dream to rule Asia, it is in her benefit to have conflict like Kashmir in South Asia. This argument can be also looked in the context of a recent article titled “If China takes a little action, the so-called Great Indian Federation can be broken up” published by a Chinese writer Zhong Guo Zhan Lue Gang on 8th of August, 2009 which says China should use its forces and take support from countries like Pakistan, Nepal etc to split India. The fragmentation of India would only help China to be sole economic power in the region.
Though at the political level, China does not have good relations with India, but it does not want its politics effect its economic cooperation with India. And at the same time it’s getting free hand to do any kind of business in Pakistan. The all-weather ally and sweeter than sugar friendship with Pakistan is strategically important for China. On one hand Pakistan recognizes Xinjiang as part of China and on the other hand China is getting access and enormous support in Muslim we of its friendship with Pakistan. However, it cannot be negated that China has been relatively good with Muslim world compared to many western countries, but it remains to be seen how long this good-will remains.
Finally it has to be seen from one of my Pakistani friend’s perspective, who says whenever he visits China if he sees two people, one is Indian and the other is Chinese. He adds that he prefers to talk to Indian than Chinese. I can relate something to him; we share same culture, language, tradition, food habits. The day Kashmir problem is solved we will have more close relations with India than China. So will it be in the Chinese interest to solve Kashmir problem when it sees its competitor, India, without having a proper trade relation with South Asia and Central Asia and yet chasing him in every direction, and if they get access to this area that can be the threat to the Chinese market, and that too when USA is going to provide India every kind of support to contain China.
The author is a social activist and can be contacted at gkashmiri @gmail.com