Analysts Ervand Abrahamian and Gareth Porter have recently make essential points in talking about Iran's purported involvement with groups that have attacked the United States in Iraq. First, Brigadeer General Kevin Bergner, General David Petraeus and their underlings have used the slogan "Iranian-backed militia extremists" creating the utterly false impression that there is a unitary force backed by Iran that is engaging with the United States. Second, Bush administration officials have invoked the impression that Iran has some kind of uniform strategy to implement some kind of campaign. Both of these propositions appear to be completely false.
There are at least five identifiable Shi'a militia groups operating in Iraq. The Mehdi Army of Muqtada al-Sadr is perhaps the most troublesome of them--so troublesome that the United States has initiated attacks against them, prompting retaliation--hardly an Iranian plot. It is not clear who and under what conditions IED/ETFs have been planted in other areas, and as Porter has shown in a whole series of decisive articles, one must strain at gnats to demonstrate an Iranian connection. Wayne White's anecdote about some militia person going and getting some kind of arms across the Iranian border, if even reflecting a true event, only emphasizes the logical source of such weapons, namely from gun runners. What conflict has not had such people?
As deep as suspicion may run of the Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guard, no evidence exists that they have been active in Iraq, and no amount of public jawboning can eliminate the thundering lack of evidence. The formula "Hezbullah=Iranian control" as much as it has been invoked by the Bush administration, is patently false, as Hezbullah observers have been asserting for more than a decade. But beyond this, even the active involvement of Hezbullah in Iraq lacks any concrete proof, beyond the identification of a few individuals who may well be simple freebooters.
Does anyone seriously believe that Iran desires chaos in Iraq? Has anyone understood that Muqtada al-Sadr and Ali al-Sistani will never be Iranian clients--that they both oppose Iran's governmental structure, and have their own ideas about how Iraq should be constructed? These obvious questions are never asked by either press or politicians. They inconveniently contravene the dominant Bush administration Iranian plot scenario, but they are the most important analytic factors in understanding Iran's true relationship to Iraq today.
It only takes a little sober thought and a careful examination of the lack of evidence to see that this giant "plot" on the part of Iran is a total house of cards concocted to gin up an excuse for military action against Iran. I am frankly appalled at the U.S. government for promulgating such chicanery on the world. What is especially appalling is the gullibility of both the press and the American politicians, who now repeat this specious formulation as if it were fact. This can not end well.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Iran and America: Conflict, Context & Connect (Minnesota Public Radio Broadcast)
Minnesota Public Radio held a forum on July 19th entitled
"Iran and America: Conflict, Context & Connect," a discussion about the U.S.-Iranian relationship with members of Minnesota's Iranian community in which I also participated.
The discussion was broadcast on July 23, and included additional listener call-in remarks. Both broadcasts are sound-archived at the following web site.
Iran and America: Conflict, Context & Connect--Minnesota Public Radio
The discussion was highly enlightening. The Iranian members of the panel were exceptionally articulate and balanced in their views. MPR would likely be open to allowing rebroadcast of the program if anyone were interested.
"Iran and America: Conflict, Context & Connect," a discussion about the U.S.-Iranian relationship with members of Minnesota's Iranian community in which I also participated.
The discussion was broadcast on July 23, and included additional listener call-in remarks. Both broadcasts are sound-archived at the following web site.
Iran and America: Conflict, Context & Connect--Minnesota Public Radio
The discussion was highly enlightening. The Iranian members of the panel were exceptionally articulate and balanced in their views. MPR would likely be open to allowing rebroadcast of the program if anyone were interested.
Monday, July 23, 2007
How To Talk The Talk With Iran--William O. Beeman
How To Talk The Talk With Iran
by William O Beeman
Editor's Note: Face-to-face talks between Iran and the United States over Iraq's future will be fraught with pitfalls unless Washington adopts complex rules of engagement. Key will be mastering the art of "inside" as well as "outside" communication. William O. Beeman is Professor and Chair of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota and President of the Middle East Section of the American Anthropological Association. He is author of "Language, Status and Power in Iran" and "The "Great Satan" vs. the "Mad Mullahs": How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other.
Face-to-face talks between Iran and the United States have a good chance of success if the Bush administration knows how to handle their part of the exchange,
Some denizens of Washington are under the mistaken impression that the Americans can dictate the terms of the conversation and the Iranians will fall in line. They will not.
The first rule in Iranian negotiations is that both sides must exhibit mutual respect, even if they harbor virulent hatred for each other. Iran is a hierarchical society, and negotiations are stabilized by balanced reciprocity in terms of respect. Each party elevates the other party in status and humbles him or herself in turn. In this way hierarchy is preserved, but mutuality is maintained.
Politeness is an exquisite art in Iran; it is especially appreciated in difficult negotiations. One can see this demonstrated in public encounters between Iranian officials themselves. Many of Iran's political leaders and clerics hate each other with a vengeance. Their intense rivalry is always hidden behind a veil of outward respect. This system of encounter, replete with bowing, complimentary language and deference, is called "ta'arof". It is an essential political and social skill.
Second, Iranians will not tolerate accusations or accept blame except from those with whom they have a personal relationship that embodies respect because of their superior social or political position, morality or accomplishments. Even the most exalted individual will tolerate criticism from his or her parent, teacher, spiritual leader or acknowledged patron. The same person will bristle and remonstrate when faced with accusations from some unrelated party, or someone considered to be of equal or inferior status. The Revolution of 1978-79 hinged on this principle. When the Shah's army began firing on unarmed women and youths in public, his superior status vis-a-vis the public - anchored in his implicit pledge to protect his people - evaporated, and he fell like a rock in a matter of weeks.
Third, a resumption of relations after estrangement is especially difficult. Estrangement in Iran is institutionalized. It is called "qahr and involves a period of ritual non-interaction. The resumption of relations usually requires a neutral mediator and even then, reconciliation can be fraught with pitfalls. Either party can quickly test the sincerity of the other party with unreasonable or difficult demands. The only way forward in this situation is to continually demonstrate good will, and present scenarios that show the mutual benefit of the resumption of relations.
Finally, Iranians make a very clear distinction between "inside" and "outside" communication. An appeal to the "inside" values of spirituality, virtue and human feeling is always likely to win the Iranian heart; but such an appeal must be sincere. "Inside" expressions recall the mysticism of Sufi orders, and are redolent with spiritual meaning. Practiced Iranians are quick to detect insincerity, cynicism and overt flattery, all of which are definitely "outside" in nature. Cynical overtures are immediately rejected as a sign of bad faith, and can destroy any delicate negotiation. And no wonder, since the "inside" communication mode is so powerful, and its misuse so despised.
These principles can easily be implemented by the United States for any mutually useful purpose in talking with Iran.
If the talks are to be about stability in Iraq, the United States must not bias them by making pre-conditions about other issues - such as Iran's nuclear program. It must acknowledge that Iran has an equal and respected position in creating stability in the region. Language must be unfailingly polite and humble.
The United States must avoid making accusations against Iran. Frankly, from Iran's perspective, the United States has no standing to make such accusations. It is neither respected as a social or cultural superior, nor has it acted as an acknowledged patron of Iran or its people. If talks are productive, the accusatory matters can be handled once relations are on a more even keel.
In dealing with Iran, the United States must be prepared for the fits and starts that accompany the 28-year estrangement between the two nations. Iran will feint, pull back, charge forward with seemingly helpful suggestions, only to withdraw them. This is normal, expected and part of the process of reconciliation.
Finally, the United States must speak with sincerity about mutual desires to cooperate with the Iranian government on matters of mutual interest. Nothing could be more essential to both nations than stability in Iraq. There can be ho holding back here. The message must be from the heart, and unqualified.
Only then will the long chill between Iran and the United States begin to abate.
by William O Beeman
Editor's Note: Face-to-face talks between Iran and the United States over Iraq's future will be fraught with pitfalls unless Washington adopts complex rules of engagement. Key will be mastering the art of "inside" as well as "outside" communication. William O. Beeman is Professor and Chair of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota and President of the Middle East Section of the American Anthropological Association. He is author of "Language, Status and Power in Iran" and "The "Great Satan" vs. the "Mad Mullahs": How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other.
Face-to-face talks between Iran and the United States have a good chance of success if the Bush administration knows how to handle their part of the exchange,
Some denizens of Washington are under the mistaken impression that the Americans can dictate the terms of the conversation and the Iranians will fall in line. They will not.
The first rule in Iranian negotiations is that both sides must exhibit mutual respect, even if they harbor virulent hatred for each other. Iran is a hierarchical society, and negotiations are stabilized by balanced reciprocity in terms of respect. Each party elevates the other party in status and humbles him or herself in turn. In this way hierarchy is preserved, but mutuality is maintained.
Politeness is an exquisite art in Iran; it is especially appreciated in difficult negotiations. One can see this demonstrated in public encounters between Iranian officials themselves. Many of Iran's political leaders and clerics hate each other with a vengeance. Their intense rivalry is always hidden behind a veil of outward respect. This system of encounter, replete with bowing, complimentary language and deference, is called "ta'arof". It is an essential political and social skill.
Second, Iranians will not tolerate accusations or accept blame except from those with whom they have a personal relationship that embodies respect because of their superior social or political position, morality or accomplishments. Even the most exalted individual will tolerate criticism from his or her parent, teacher, spiritual leader or acknowledged patron. The same person will bristle and remonstrate when faced with accusations from some unrelated party, or someone considered to be of equal or inferior status. The Revolution of 1978-79 hinged on this principle. When the Shah's army began firing on unarmed women and youths in public, his superior status vis-a-vis the public - anchored in his implicit pledge to protect his people - evaporated, and he fell like a rock in a matter of weeks.
Third, a resumption of relations after estrangement is especially difficult. Estrangement in Iran is institutionalized. It is called "qahr and involves a period of ritual non-interaction. The resumption of relations usually requires a neutral mediator and even then, reconciliation can be fraught with pitfalls. Either party can quickly test the sincerity of the other party with unreasonable or difficult demands. The only way forward in this situation is to continually demonstrate good will, and present scenarios that show the mutual benefit of the resumption of relations.
Finally, Iranians make a very clear distinction between "inside" and "outside" communication. An appeal to the "inside" values of spirituality, virtue and human feeling is always likely to win the Iranian heart; but such an appeal must be sincere. "Inside" expressions recall the mysticism of Sufi orders, and are redolent with spiritual meaning. Practiced Iranians are quick to detect insincerity, cynicism and overt flattery, all of which are definitely "outside" in nature. Cynical overtures are immediately rejected as a sign of bad faith, and can destroy any delicate negotiation. And no wonder, since the "inside" communication mode is so powerful, and its misuse so despised.
These principles can easily be implemented by the United States for any mutually useful purpose in talking with Iran.
If the talks are to be about stability in Iraq, the United States must not bias them by making pre-conditions about other issues - such as Iran's nuclear program. It must acknowledge that Iran has an equal and respected position in creating stability in the region. Language must be unfailingly polite and humble.
The United States must avoid making accusations against Iran. Frankly, from Iran's perspective, the United States has no standing to make such accusations. It is neither respected as a social or cultural superior, nor has it acted as an acknowledged patron of Iran or its people. If talks are productive, the accusatory matters can be handled once relations are on a more even keel.
In dealing with Iran, the United States must be prepared for the fits and starts that accompany the 28-year estrangement between the two nations. Iran will feint, pull back, charge forward with seemingly helpful suggestions, only to withdraw them. This is normal, expected and part of the process of reconciliation.
Finally, the United States must speak with sincerity about mutual desires to cooperate with the Iranian government on matters of mutual interest. Nothing could be more essential to both nations than stability in Iraq. There can be ho holding back here. The message must be from the heart, and unqualified.
Only then will the long chill between Iran and the United States begin to abate.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
The Economist editorial "The Riddle of Iran" --Why was it Written?
The Economist editorial "The Riddle of Iran" --Why was it Written?
William O. Beeman
The mystery of the Economist "editorial" about Iran, entitled "The Riddle of Iran" is why it was written at all, and why now? The editorial once again attacks Iran for its nuclear development program. It contains absolutely nothing new--nothing that was not already in the press and in the editorial pages a year ago or more. It gives prominence to the demagoguery of likely future Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, spouting the same anti-Iranian rhetoric he has been pushing on Fox News for the past two years. It also contains the same falsehoods about the illegality of Iranian actions under the NPT. However, the Economist employs a trick that the New York Times and others have used. They get away with publishing outright untruths, but in an editorial, where it is "opinion" and not news reporting. The underlying "special report" referred to in the editorial is also dismally stale, containing nothing at all of note, except to advertise that the American Enterprise Institute is trying to publicize companies who are doing business with Iran in some vain hope that Washington might somehow find a way to enforce the economic sanctions against Iran, the better to generate some minimal pressure on the Iranian leadership. The sanctions are foolish and unworkable, but presenting a picture where all is copasetic is the White House line, lest they endure another dismal and embarrassing failure of strategy. We had Minnesota Republican Senator Norm Coleman in a speech here in the Twin Cities recently, accompanied by AIPAC Handlers (who reportedly sponsored the event) giving exactly the same talk to a pre-selected audience--"the economic sanctions are working, Iran is feeling the pain, etc.". Of course it is nonsense. It is wearying to hear the same tripe over and over again, and surprising in the extreme to see such a respected journal as The Economist joining in--especially with a cover story no less with virtually no news inside. But every time these lies are repeated, it makes me fearful that the administration hawks and the neocons are on a tear to soften up the American public for their cherished military strike.
William O. Beeman
The mystery of the Economist "editorial" about Iran, entitled "The Riddle of Iran" is why it was written at all, and why now? The editorial once again attacks Iran for its nuclear development program. It contains absolutely nothing new--nothing that was not already in the press and in the editorial pages a year ago or more. It gives prominence to the demagoguery of likely future Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, spouting the same anti-Iranian rhetoric he has been pushing on Fox News for the past two years. It also contains the same falsehoods about the illegality of Iranian actions under the NPT. However, the Economist employs a trick that the New York Times and others have used. They get away with publishing outright untruths, but in an editorial, where it is "opinion" and not news reporting. The underlying "special report" referred to in the editorial is also dismally stale, containing nothing at all of note, except to advertise that the American Enterprise Institute is trying to publicize companies who are doing business with Iran in some vain hope that Washington might somehow find a way to enforce the economic sanctions against Iran, the better to generate some minimal pressure on the Iranian leadership. The sanctions are foolish and unworkable, but presenting a picture where all is copasetic is the White House line, lest they endure another dismal and embarrassing failure of strategy. We had Minnesota Republican Senator Norm Coleman in a speech here in the Twin Cities recently, accompanied by AIPAC Handlers (who reportedly sponsored the event) giving exactly the same talk to a pre-selected audience--"the economic sanctions are working, Iran is feeling the pain, etc.". Of course it is nonsense. It is wearying to hear the same tripe over and over again, and surprising in the extreme to see such a respected journal as The Economist joining in--especially with a cover story no less with virtually no news inside. But every time these lies are repeated, it makes me fearful that the administration hawks and the neocons are on a tear to soften up the American public for their cherished military strike.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Beeman--The National "Intelligence" Estimate
The National "Intelligence" Estimate
William O. Beeman
I cannot begin to express my dismay at the announcement of the cowardly and anemic national intelligence estimate today. The operative sentence, reported at least in the New York Times, was “These assessments, which are based on incomplete or at times fragmentary information, are not a fact, proof or knowledge." Boy howdy. It is not only the information that is fragmentary, it is the "terrorist network" itself. The administration continues to do its best to present a monolithic picture of terrorism when all evidence points to isolated groups with intensely parochial interests operating without any central control, except perhaps a kind of franchise label to make them seem part of something bigger than they really are.
The administration has tried desperately to link the original Al Qaeda to Iran, to the Iraqi insurgency, to Hezbollah, to the Taliban, to Anwar al-Islam and even to Hamas and various North African splinter groups. The term "affiliated" should be seen for what it is when used to link Osama bin Laden to any of these other groups--a fudge factor designed to support a mythology of the Bush administration's own creation. None of these groups can be approached with the same strategies that must be applied to the others. They do not use the same tactics. They don't have the same ideologies. Most importantly, they do not have the same leadership, nor political survival strategies. Hamas and Hezbollah are political entities in their own countries. Hamas is fighting Israel and the supporters of Al-Fatah; Hezbollah is fighting Israel and its own Lebanese central government. The Iraqi insurgency is rebelling against its own central government and the United States. The Taliban once housed Al-Qaeda, but they are primarily interested in regaining control over Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda itself in the far-away hills of Pakistan may launch verbal volleys at the United States, but it still seethes at the Saudi Royal Family. And we are now to believe that all of these entities, with all of their local concerns and investments in local conflicts are ganged up with the sole purpose of attacking the United States on its shores? This may satisfy an ego- and ethno-centric American public but it makes no logical sense at all.
Of course, the all purpose logical glue for some in Washington is to claim that Iran is masterminding everything. This is either wishful thinking, or a diabolical deceit of the American public.
The very saddest realization of all is that every one of these groups pre-existed the 9/11 tragedy. Their interests and their struggles go back decades. If Americans only had minimal education about the region, they would see this charade for what it is--a serious attempt to fool and scare the American public into granting this administration yet another loan extension on our national lives, liberties and treasure--just to "get them through the next few months," when they can dump the whole mess they have created on the next poor saps, and go off to Crawford or wherever and pontificate about how they acted on "principle" rather than "politics."
William O. Beeman
I cannot begin to express my dismay at the announcement of the cowardly and anemic national intelligence estimate today. The operative sentence, reported at least in the New York Times, was “These assessments, which are based on incomplete or at times fragmentary information, are not a fact, proof or knowledge." Boy howdy. It is not only the information that is fragmentary, it is the "terrorist network" itself. The administration continues to do its best to present a monolithic picture of terrorism when all evidence points to isolated groups with intensely parochial interests operating without any central control, except perhaps a kind of franchise label to make them seem part of something bigger than they really are.
The administration has tried desperately to link the original Al Qaeda to Iran, to the Iraqi insurgency, to Hezbollah, to the Taliban, to Anwar al-Islam and even to Hamas and various North African splinter groups. The term "affiliated" should be seen for what it is when used to link Osama bin Laden to any of these other groups--a fudge factor designed to support a mythology of the Bush administration's own creation. None of these groups can be approached with the same strategies that must be applied to the others. They do not use the same tactics. They don't have the same ideologies. Most importantly, they do not have the same leadership, nor political survival strategies. Hamas and Hezbollah are political entities in their own countries. Hamas is fighting Israel and the supporters of Al-Fatah; Hezbollah is fighting Israel and its own Lebanese central government. The Iraqi insurgency is rebelling against its own central government and the United States. The Taliban once housed Al-Qaeda, but they are primarily interested in regaining control over Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda itself in the far-away hills of Pakistan may launch verbal volleys at the United States, but it still seethes at the Saudi Royal Family. And we are now to believe that all of these entities, with all of their local concerns and investments in local conflicts are ganged up with the sole purpose of attacking the United States on its shores? This may satisfy an ego- and ethno-centric American public but it makes no logical sense at all.
Of course, the all purpose logical glue for some in Washington is to claim that Iran is masterminding everything. This is either wishful thinking, or a diabolical deceit of the American public.
The very saddest realization of all is that every one of these groups pre-existed the 9/11 tragedy. Their interests and their struggles go back decades. If Americans only had minimal education about the region, they would see this charade for what it is--a serious attempt to fool and scare the American public into granting this administration yet another loan extension on our national lives, liberties and treasure--just to "get them through the next few months," when they can dump the whole mess they have created on the next poor saps, and go off to Crawford or wherever and pontificate about how they acted on "principle" rather than "politics."
Friday, July 13, 2007
Iran's Press TV to give Alternative View--LA Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-fg-presstv13jul13,1,3696911,full.story?coll=la-news-a_section&ctrack=4&cset=true
Iran's Press TV to give alternative view
The 24-hour satellite news channel will compete with Western outlets to counter what Tehran sees as propaganda.
By Ramin Mostaghim and Borzou Daragahi, Special to The Times
July 13, 2007
TEHRAN — Host Susan Modaress is trying to get London correspondent Roshan Mohammed Saleh on the satellite link to talk about the tasks ahead for Britain's new prime minister, Gordon Brown.
"Hello, London?" says the host of the show "Four Corners" on Iran's new English-language news channel, Press TV. "Can you hear me, London?"
Silence and darkness gape back.
She quickly moves on, trying to reach Tony Benn, a former member of Parliament with Brown's Labor Party. He's also not on the line. And neither is Robert Ayers, of the British think-tank Chatham House. But Modaress doesn't lose her cool.
"OK," she says in near flawless American-accented English. "We're having some technical problems. Let's take a break."
In fits and starts, Iran this month entered the business of providing 24-hour English-language satellite television news programming, competing in a field that includes BBC World, CNN International, Fox News Channel, MSNBC, Al Jazeera International and France 24.
The government aims to use Press TV to counter what it sees as a steady stream of Western propaganda against Iran as well as offer an alternative view of world news.
"We are the target of global media war, and there is hardly any media delivering on its commitment," Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said during a July 2 ceremony marking the station's launch. "We cannot help but be attentive to the agony of our fellow human beings. Even if one day our country is not the target of a bullying power, we will not be indifferent to the world and to oppression."
Iran has eagerly used satellite television to deliver its message, usually to reach out to people in times of crisis. It has launched stations aimed at Afghans, Bosnians and Arabs in their homelands.
But Press TV, housed in a modest and drab five-story apartment building on a quiet street of north Tehran, is said to be the most expensive project ever undertaken by Iranian broadcasting, which is wholly controlled by the state.
"Now the international circumstances are changing and we want to make an impact on the international developments," said Mohammed Sarfaraz, director of the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting's foreign language department. "That is the reason we are launching Press TV."
The station has a staff of more than 400, including more than two dozen reporters around the world, to produce a total of 48 news bulletins for each 24-hour cycle. It has correspondents in Moscow, Rome, Cairo, London, Brussels and Beijing. It has bureaus in Beirut, Gaza and the West Bank and is seeking a Baghdad correspondent.
The staff also includes correspondents in Washington and New York, said Shahab Mossavat, a spokesman for the channel.
"It was very difficult to get them accredited," he said, citing a law passed during the Clinton administration.
The broadcast is available on numerous satellite frequencies but also through live streaming on its website, http://www.presstv.com . An Iranian television executive said half the 3 million hits on the Press TV site in the months before the station launched came from the United States. Videos also are posted on YouTube.
The newscast itself has surprised observers. Reporters refer to Israel by its name instead of calling it the "Zionist entity," as it is on Persian-language channels. Reports include relatively neutral updates on violence in the Middle East and Iraq, as well as on noncontroversial subjects such as an art gallery in Tehran or living conditions for Muslims in Russia.
"Copies of the Koran are readily available and many mosques are being built in areas with large Muslim populations," the broadcaster says of Russia.
During the launch ceremony, Mossavat said that the station would cover pressing domestic issues, such as human rights, "but not just from the negative side."
"We try to explore all other under-reported aspects of these issues…. We also cover human rights violation in Europe and the U.S."
William O. Beeman, an Iran expert at the University of Minnesota, appeared on a live talk show about the role of the media.
"I thought it was a fine discussion overall, involving a mix of international and very savvy Iranian commentators," he said. "The latter were extremely clever in saying things that were non-objectionable to the Iranian government, but which could easily be read by a sophisticated audience as at least questioning of the current state of the Iranian press."
But critics say that so far Press TV has provided little or no coverage of Iran's domestic troubles, including economic hardship stemming from inflation and stagnant wages.
The news headlines at the bottom of the screen include messages that present a positive picture of Iran's international relations and economy, such as "Iran, Belarus to talk expanded defense ties" or "Iran boosts oil production capacity."
But the ads for upcoming documentaries show the channel's slant. They include "Back From Iraq," a series about Western correspondents who covered the war and are critical of the conflict; "America Countdown," in which Americans speak out against the Bush administration; and "AMIA," a documentary that purports to prove that Israel had a hand in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that has been blamed on Iranian operatives.
Another documentary, "Land of Religions," is said to show how Iran's Muslims, Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians live peacefully side by side.
But observers have found themselves more frustrated by the station's irksome programming missteps than its politics.
"First impression is that it is not as slanted as one might expect," said Glenn Hauser, editor of Review of International Broadcasting, an online newsletter. However, "the news headline crawlers are too repetitive. The promos are too repetitive. The upcoming documentaries look interesting, if only we knew when to expect them."
Overall, initial reviews for Press TV in Iran and abroad were positive, but perhaps not what its founders had in mind. Hauser said his favorite segments were the colorful animations of battle scenes, using famous medieval Persian miniatures from various Tehran museums, that fill the time between segments.
At a barbershop in north Tehran, Pooya Ardaroudi said he would use the channel to sharpen his English.
"I am preparing to emigrate to Australia and work as barber there," the 25-year-old said. "I can watch the news and improve my English while I am cutting people's hair."
--
________________________________________
daragahi@latimes.com
Special correspondent Mostaghim reported from Tehran and Times staff writer Daragahi from Cairo.
Iran's Press TV to give alternative view
The 24-hour satellite news channel will compete with Western outlets to counter what Tehran sees as propaganda.
By Ramin Mostaghim and Borzou Daragahi, Special to The Times
July 13, 2007
TEHRAN — Host Susan Modaress is trying to get London correspondent Roshan Mohammed Saleh on the satellite link to talk about the tasks ahead for Britain's new prime minister, Gordon Brown.
"Hello, London?" says the host of the show "Four Corners" on Iran's new English-language news channel, Press TV. "Can you hear me, London?"
Silence and darkness gape back.
She quickly moves on, trying to reach Tony Benn, a former member of Parliament with Brown's Labor Party. He's also not on the line. And neither is Robert Ayers, of the British think-tank Chatham House. But Modaress doesn't lose her cool.
"OK," she says in near flawless American-accented English. "We're having some technical problems. Let's take a break."
In fits and starts, Iran this month entered the business of providing 24-hour English-language satellite television news programming, competing in a field that includes BBC World, CNN International, Fox News Channel, MSNBC, Al Jazeera International and France 24.
The government aims to use Press TV to counter what it sees as a steady stream of Western propaganda against Iran as well as offer an alternative view of world news.
"We are the target of global media war, and there is hardly any media delivering on its commitment," Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said during a July 2 ceremony marking the station's launch. "We cannot help but be attentive to the agony of our fellow human beings. Even if one day our country is not the target of a bullying power, we will not be indifferent to the world and to oppression."
Iran has eagerly used satellite television to deliver its message, usually to reach out to people in times of crisis. It has launched stations aimed at Afghans, Bosnians and Arabs in their homelands.
But Press TV, housed in a modest and drab five-story apartment building on a quiet street of north Tehran, is said to be the most expensive project ever undertaken by Iranian broadcasting, which is wholly controlled by the state.
"Now the international circumstances are changing and we want to make an impact on the international developments," said Mohammed Sarfaraz, director of the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting's foreign language department. "That is the reason we are launching Press TV."
The station has a staff of more than 400, including more than two dozen reporters around the world, to produce a total of 48 news bulletins for each 24-hour cycle. It has correspondents in Moscow, Rome, Cairo, London, Brussels and Beijing. It has bureaus in Beirut, Gaza and the West Bank and is seeking a Baghdad correspondent.
The staff also includes correspondents in Washington and New York, said Shahab Mossavat, a spokesman for the channel.
"It was very difficult to get them accredited," he said, citing a law passed during the Clinton administration.
The broadcast is available on numerous satellite frequencies but also through live streaming on its website, http://www.presstv.com . An Iranian television executive said half the 3 million hits on the Press TV site in the months before the station launched came from the United States. Videos also are posted on YouTube.
The newscast itself has surprised observers. Reporters refer to Israel by its name instead of calling it the "Zionist entity," as it is on Persian-language channels. Reports include relatively neutral updates on violence in the Middle East and Iraq, as well as on noncontroversial subjects such as an art gallery in Tehran or living conditions for Muslims in Russia.
"Copies of the Koran are readily available and many mosques are being built in areas with large Muslim populations," the broadcaster says of Russia.
During the launch ceremony, Mossavat said that the station would cover pressing domestic issues, such as human rights, "but not just from the negative side."
"We try to explore all other under-reported aspects of these issues…. We also cover human rights violation in Europe and the U.S."
William O. Beeman, an Iran expert at the University of Minnesota, appeared on a live talk show about the role of the media.
"I thought it was a fine discussion overall, involving a mix of international and very savvy Iranian commentators," he said. "The latter were extremely clever in saying things that were non-objectionable to the Iranian government, but which could easily be read by a sophisticated audience as at least questioning of the current state of the Iranian press."
But critics say that so far Press TV has provided little or no coverage of Iran's domestic troubles, including economic hardship stemming from inflation and stagnant wages.
The news headlines at the bottom of the screen include messages that present a positive picture of Iran's international relations and economy, such as "Iran, Belarus to talk expanded defense ties" or "Iran boosts oil production capacity."
But the ads for upcoming documentaries show the channel's slant. They include "Back From Iraq," a series about Western correspondents who covered the war and are critical of the conflict; "America Countdown," in which Americans speak out against the Bush administration; and "AMIA," a documentary that purports to prove that Israel had a hand in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that has been blamed on Iranian operatives.
Another documentary, "Land of Religions," is said to show how Iran's Muslims, Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians live peacefully side by side.
But observers have found themselves more frustrated by the station's irksome programming missteps than its politics.
"First impression is that it is not as slanted as one might expect," said Glenn Hauser, editor of Review of International Broadcasting, an online newsletter. However, "the news headline crawlers are too repetitive. The promos are too repetitive. The upcoming documentaries look interesting, if only we knew when to expect them."
Overall, initial reviews for Press TV in Iran and abroad were positive, but perhaps not what its founders had in mind. Hauser said his favorite segments were the colorful animations of battle scenes, using famous medieval Persian miniatures from various Tehran museums, that fill the time between segments.
At a barbershop in north Tehran, Pooya Ardaroudi said he would use the channel to sharpen his English.
"I am preparing to emigrate to Australia and work as barber there," the 25-year-old said. "I can watch the news and improve my English while I am cutting people's hair."
--
________________________________________
daragahi@latimes.com
Special correspondent Mostaghim reported from Tehran and Times staff writer Daragahi from Cairo.
Tuesday, July 03, 2007
William O. Beeman--Economic Sanctions Against Iran are Old Hat—and They Have Never Worked--New America Media
Economic Sanctions Against Iran are Old Hat—and They Have Never Worked
New America Media, Commentary, William O. Beeman, Posted: Jul 03, 2007
Editor’s Note: President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin are talking about putting the economic squeeze on Iran to give up its uranium enrichment program. NAM contributing writer William O. Beeman says it won’t work. Beeman is professor and chair of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota. He is president of the Middle East Section of the American Anthropological Association. His latest book is “The ‘Great Satan’ vs. the ‘Mad Mullahs’: How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other” (Praeger Publishers).
Increasing economic pressure on Iran is part of the agenda at this weekend’s meeting between President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin. One aim of these talks is to create a unified strategy of trade and economic sanctions that will eventually pressure Iran into giving up its uranium enrichment program.
The two leaders are wasting their time. This strategy will not work with the Iranians.
European attempts to control Iran’s economy and political life are part of Iran’s historic legacy going back nearly two centuries. Culturally, the Iranian people consider these attempts illegitimate, and have no compunctions about frustrating them—even if it means bending the principles of international law and trade to make sure that these efforts fail.
In the 19th century, Iran was virtually ruled by Russia on the north, and by Great Britain on the south. The Russians controlled customs operations on Iran’s northern borders. They paid nominal fees to the Qajar Dynasty that ruled Iran, and collected customs duties in both directions.
Great Britain by 1820 had secured a General Treaty with the small sheikhdoms of the Persian Gulf which turned them into protectorates of the British Empire. Britain’s purpose was nominally to control piracy in the transit route to India. However, from these outposts, the British wrested control of the shipping lanes and the ports from the Iranians.
At the time, the struggle between Great Britain and Russia over Iran was part of the “Great Game” for control of Asia that raged throughout the 19th century. Although Moscow and London saw this as competition, the Iranians saw it as European oppression.
Oil and technology were not the issue at that time. Commodities not grown in Iran at the time, such as tea, became the prime object of increased trade restrictions, but imported manufactured goods from Europe were also part of the mix.
The Iranian response to the economic pressure exerted by these great powers was, first, to play them off against each other. As the Russians increased tariffs in the north, the Iranians imposed their own tariffs on the British in the south to offset them. Late in the 19th century the Qajars began to sell economic concessions to the British or other Europeans to offset the Russian influence, and trade concessions to the Russians to offset Western European influence.
Additionally, the Iranians used transshipment via free ports, notably Dubai as a way to circumvent direct European economic influence. They also tolerated smuggling.
Today the United States has replaced Great Britain in the Iranian mentality, and Russia, having gone through the Soviet period, is once again Russia in Iranian eyes. For the Iranians the European oppression of the 19th century is still alive and well, and must be resisted. The sentiment was expressed once again on June 30 by Iranian spiritual leader Ali Khamene’i in a meeting with government officials, who reaffirmed that Iran would continue to take a proactive stance in foreign policy matters, and would not be controlled by European and American policy concerns.
Iran continues to play competing sides against each other today. Its first nuclear power plant, started 30 years ago with American blessings but built with Russian technology, has yet to open. This delay is due largely to obstacles arising from American objections to any Iranian nuclear development. The plant, which cannot practically generate any weapons grade material, promises to be lucrative for the Russians for many years to come, and will set the stage for future Iranian-Russian economic cooperation. President Putin knows that this prospect is in danger if he capitulates to President Bush’s demands for unified sanctions against Iran. Iran, for its part, already has a favorable trade balance with both India and China, and is ready to deal further with them despite American attempts to frustrate these relationships.
At times Iran need do nothing at all to set its rivals against each other. The Bush administration tried to use the notion that Iran posed a danger to the world, and presumably to Russia as a pretext for establishing long-range missiles in the Czech Republic. This was such a stretch that it was immediately denounced by Russian officials, including President Putin. Russian officials know that Iran poses no perceptible danger for them, and no amount of alarmist rhetoric on the part of President Bush could convince them to approve a missile base on their doorstep.
In short, Iran has many time-worn tools in its political arsenal to withstand attempts to control its economy and politics. Its enormously long borders are porous on all sides. The northern border in particular, which Iran shares with former Soviet states Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan—not to mention the vast Caspian Sea—are particularly open. Pakistan and Afghanistan to the west—both with new land routes into Central Asia and China–are uncontrolled by the West. Dubai and other Gulf free ports, as well as newly developed facilities on the Sea of Oman guarantee that needed goods will flow into the country if severe trade sanctions are enacted. Even the present chaos in Iraq guarantees free flow of goods across the Iranian border.
The lesson that the Bush administration refuses to learn is that Iran will not respond to pressure. The only route to Iranian cooperation is face-to-face dealings with no preconditions, where Iran is treated respectfully as an equal partner. This proposition sticks in the craw of the Bush administration—to the point where the irrational call for military action becomes preferable in some quarters.
However, Iran knows that historically when it is able to exercise its strength to resist control by outsiders, it eventually achieves the respect it requires. Until that time, all other strategies aimed at changing its behavior will fail.
New America Media, Commentary, William O. Beeman, Posted: Jul 03, 2007
Editor’s Note: President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin are talking about putting the economic squeeze on Iran to give up its uranium enrichment program. NAM contributing writer William O. Beeman says it won’t work. Beeman is professor and chair of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota. He is president of the Middle East Section of the American Anthropological Association. His latest book is “The ‘Great Satan’ vs. the ‘Mad Mullahs’: How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other” (Praeger Publishers).
Increasing economic pressure on Iran is part of the agenda at this weekend’s meeting between President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin. One aim of these talks is to create a unified strategy of trade and economic sanctions that will eventually pressure Iran into giving up its uranium enrichment program.
The two leaders are wasting their time. This strategy will not work with the Iranians.
European attempts to control Iran’s economy and political life are part of Iran’s historic legacy going back nearly two centuries. Culturally, the Iranian people consider these attempts illegitimate, and have no compunctions about frustrating them—even if it means bending the principles of international law and trade to make sure that these efforts fail.
In the 19th century, Iran was virtually ruled by Russia on the north, and by Great Britain on the south. The Russians controlled customs operations on Iran’s northern borders. They paid nominal fees to the Qajar Dynasty that ruled Iran, and collected customs duties in both directions.
Great Britain by 1820 had secured a General Treaty with the small sheikhdoms of the Persian Gulf which turned them into protectorates of the British Empire. Britain’s purpose was nominally to control piracy in the transit route to India. However, from these outposts, the British wrested control of the shipping lanes and the ports from the Iranians.
At the time, the struggle between Great Britain and Russia over Iran was part of the “Great Game” for control of Asia that raged throughout the 19th century. Although Moscow and London saw this as competition, the Iranians saw it as European oppression.
Oil and technology were not the issue at that time. Commodities not grown in Iran at the time, such as tea, became the prime object of increased trade restrictions, but imported manufactured goods from Europe were also part of the mix.
The Iranian response to the economic pressure exerted by these great powers was, first, to play them off against each other. As the Russians increased tariffs in the north, the Iranians imposed their own tariffs on the British in the south to offset them. Late in the 19th century the Qajars began to sell economic concessions to the British or other Europeans to offset the Russian influence, and trade concessions to the Russians to offset Western European influence.
Additionally, the Iranians used transshipment via free ports, notably Dubai as a way to circumvent direct European economic influence. They also tolerated smuggling.
Today the United States has replaced Great Britain in the Iranian mentality, and Russia, having gone through the Soviet period, is once again Russia in Iranian eyes. For the Iranians the European oppression of the 19th century is still alive and well, and must be resisted. The sentiment was expressed once again on June 30 by Iranian spiritual leader Ali Khamene’i in a meeting with government officials, who reaffirmed that Iran would continue to take a proactive stance in foreign policy matters, and would not be controlled by European and American policy concerns.
Iran continues to play competing sides against each other today. Its first nuclear power plant, started 30 years ago with American blessings but built with Russian technology, has yet to open. This delay is due largely to obstacles arising from American objections to any Iranian nuclear development. The plant, which cannot practically generate any weapons grade material, promises to be lucrative for the Russians for many years to come, and will set the stage for future Iranian-Russian economic cooperation. President Putin knows that this prospect is in danger if he capitulates to President Bush’s demands for unified sanctions against Iran. Iran, for its part, already has a favorable trade balance with both India and China, and is ready to deal further with them despite American attempts to frustrate these relationships.
At times Iran need do nothing at all to set its rivals against each other. The Bush administration tried to use the notion that Iran posed a danger to the world, and presumably to Russia as a pretext for establishing long-range missiles in the Czech Republic. This was such a stretch that it was immediately denounced by Russian officials, including President Putin. Russian officials know that Iran poses no perceptible danger for them, and no amount of alarmist rhetoric on the part of President Bush could convince them to approve a missile base on their doorstep.
In short, Iran has many time-worn tools in its political arsenal to withstand attempts to control its economy and politics. Its enormously long borders are porous on all sides. The northern border in particular, which Iran shares with former Soviet states Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan—not to mention the vast Caspian Sea—are particularly open. Pakistan and Afghanistan to the west—both with new land routes into Central Asia and China–are uncontrolled by the West. Dubai and other Gulf free ports, as well as newly developed facilities on the Sea of Oman guarantee that needed goods will flow into the country if severe trade sanctions are enacted. Even the present chaos in Iraq guarantees free flow of goods across the Iranian border.
The lesson that the Bush administration refuses to learn is that Iran will not respond to pressure. The only route to Iranian cooperation is face-to-face dealings with no preconditions, where Iran is treated respectfully as an equal partner. This proposition sticks in the craw of the Bush administration—to the point where the irrational call for military action becomes preferable in some quarters.
However, Iran knows that historically when it is able to exercise its strength to resist control by outsiders, it eventually achieves the respect it requires. Until that time, all other strategies aimed at changing its behavior will fail.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Neoconservatives Going Down--Taking Iran with them
Neoconservatives Going Down--Taking Iran with them
John Bolton, former UN Ambassador has written another screed on Iran for the Jerusalem Post, calling for Iran's destruction because it is a danger to Israel.
I must say that I am absolutely flabbergasted at the persistent obsession in the
neoconservative camp with Iran. Other neoconservatives such as American Enterprise Institute denizen Meyrav Wurmser and others reflect this. What is astonishing to me is that the predictions that Iran is the principal danger for Israel absolutely
overlook the far more important and logical challenges to Israel on its
own borders.
There is some fantasy abroad that if only Iran would disappear or cease
some political operations (financial support, supplies of military
equipment, etc.), Hamas, Hezbollah and other groups challenging Israeli
operations vis-a-vis the Palestinians would simply dry up and blow away.
Witness the focus on the $22 million allegedly supplied to Hamas by Iran,
when in the same breath, more than twice that amount was acknowledged to
have been supplied by other Middle Eastern parties.
There is still no hard evidence that Iran even has a nuclear weapons
program, and yet we have Bolton and others fulminating over something
that, even if it existed as a threat, is far in the future, compared to
the immediate dangers Israel faces today from local actors who have been
so politicized and demoralized that they engage in the extreme violent
actions that all sensible people decry. These local actors are not going
to go away, or suddenly become docile as a result of attacking Iran. The
irony is that if the United States and Israel were to nuke Iran into
oblivion, Israel would be no safer at all--indeed, it would be in greater
danger than ever.
My guess is that the neoconservatives have realized that the Bush
administration has now destroyed their chances for political dominance in
the future, and if they don't act now to force the administration into
taking military action against Iran, it will never happen. They are going
down, and by golly, they are going to take Iran with them.
John Bolton, former UN Ambassador has written another screed on Iran for the Jerusalem Post, calling for Iran's destruction because it is a danger to Israel.
I must say that I am absolutely flabbergasted at the persistent obsession in the
neoconservative camp with Iran. Other neoconservatives such as American Enterprise Institute denizen Meyrav Wurmser and others reflect this. What is astonishing to me is that the predictions that Iran is the principal danger for Israel absolutely
overlook the far more important and logical challenges to Israel on its
own borders.
There is some fantasy abroad that if only Iran would disappear or cease
some political operations (financial support, supplies of military
equipment, etc.), Hamas, Hezbollah and other groups challenging Israeli
operations vis-a-vis the Palestinians would simply dry up and blow away.
Witness the focus on the $22 million allegedly supplied to Hamas by Iran,
when in the same breath, more than twice that amount was acknowledged to
have been supplied by other Middle Eastern parties.
There is still no hard evidence that Iran even has a nuclear weapons
program, and yet we have Bolton and others fulminating over something
that, even if it existed as a threat, is far in the future, compared to
the immediate dangers Israel faces today from local actors who have been
so politicized and demoralized that they engage in the extreme violent
actions that all sensible people decry. These local actors are not going
to go away, or suddenly become docile as a result of attacking Iran. The
irony is that if the United States and Israel were to nuke Iran into
oblivion, Israel would be no safer at all--indeed, it would be in greater
danger than ever.
My guess is that the neoconservatives have realized that the Bush
administration has now destroyed their chances for political dominance in
the future, and if they don't act now to force the administration into
taking military action against Iran, it will never happen. They are going
down, and by golly, they are going to take Iran with them.
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Friday, June 08, 2007
Perry: U.S. eyed Iran attack after bombing, but Al-Qaida was the likely perpetrator--United Press International - Security & Terrorism - Briefing
United Press International - Security & Terrorism - Briefing
Perry: U.S. eyed Iran attack after bombing
Published: June 6, 2007 at 4:25 PM
E-mail Story Print Preview License
WASHINGTON, June 6 (UPI) -- A former U.S. defense secretary says he now believes al-Qaida rather than Iran was behind a 1996 truck bombing at an American military base.
Former Defense Secretary William Perry said he had a contingency plan to attack Iran if the link had been proven, but evidence was not to either his nor President Bill Clinton's satisfaction.
The attack would have struck "at a number of their military facilities that would have weakened -- substantially weakened ... the Iranian navy and air force," he said in New York Tuesday during a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations.
The Khobar Towers bombing at a U.S. air base in Saudi Arabia is often referred to by the Bush administration as one of the first salvos in the war with terrorism. It killed 19 service members. The Sept. 11 commission suggested a connection between al-Qaida and the attack, the first time the group has been linked to the bombing.
"I believe that the Khobar Tower bombing was probably masterminded by Osama bin Laden," Perry said. "I can't be sure of that, but in retrospect, that's what I believe. At the time, he was not a suspect. At the time ... all of the evidence was pointing to Iran."
He said al-Qaida did not emerge as a major threat until Clinton's second term.
"We probably should have been more concerned about it at the time than we were but in the first term we did not see Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida as a major factor, or one that we were concerned with," he said.
In 2001, the U.S. Justice Department announced a 46-count indictment against 13 Saudis and one Lebanese man in the bombing. All were allegedly connected to Hezbollah, a terrorist group the United States believes is linked to Iran.
Perry said the FBI strongly believed at the time the bombing was ordered by Iran, but Saudi officials tried to discourage that theory.
"They feared what action we would take. They rightly feared it. In fact, I had a contingency plan for a strike on Iran, if it had been if it had been clearly established. But it was never clearly established, and so we never did that," Perry said.
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© Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved.United Press International, UPI, the UPI logo, and other trademarks and service marks, are registered or unregistered trademarks of United Press International, Inc. in the United States and in other countries.
Perry: U.S. eyed Iran attack after bombing
Published: June 6, 2007 at 4:25 PM
E-mail Story Print Preview License
WASHINGTON, June 6 (UPI) -- A former U.S. defense secretary says he now believes al-Qaida rather than Iran was behind a 1996 truck bombing at an American military base.
Former Defense Secretary William Perry said he had a contingency plan to attack Iran if the link had been proven, but evidence was not to either his nor President Bill Clinton's satisfaction.
The attack would have struck "at a number of their military facilities that would have weakened -- substantially weakened ... the Iranian navy and air force," he said in New York Tuesday during a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations.
The Khobar Towers bombing at a U.S. air base in Saudi Arabia is often referred to by the Bush administration as one of the first salvos in the war with terrorism. It killed 19 service members. The Sept. 11 commission suggested a connection between al-Qaida and the attack, the first time the group has been linked to the bombing.
"I believe that the Khobar Tower bombing was probably masterminded by Osama bin Laden," Perry said. "I can't be sure of that, but in retrospect, that's what I believe. At the time, he was not a suspect. At the time ... all of the evidence was pointing to Iran."
He said al-Qaida did not emerge as a major threat until Clinton's second term.
"We probably should have been more concerned about it at the time than we were but in the first term we did not see Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida as a major factor, or one that we were concerned with," he said.
In 2001, the U.S. Justice Department announced a 46-count indictment against 13 Saudis and one Lebanese man in the bombing. All were allegedly connected to Hezbollah, a terrorist group the United States believes is linked to Iran.
Perry said the FBI strongly believed at the time the bombing was ordered by Iran, but Saudi officials tried to discourage that theory.
"They feared what action we would take. They rightly feared it. In fact, I had a contingency plan for a strike on Iran, if it had been if it had been clearly established. But it was never clearly established, and so we never did that," Perry said.
Del.icio.us Digg it RSS
© Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved.United Press International, UPI, the UPI logo, and other trademarks and service marks, are registered or unregistered trademarks of United Press International, Inc. in the United States and in other countries.
The Great Satan spars with the Islamic Republic - Deccan Herald - Internet Edition
The Great Satan spars with the Islamic Republic - Deccan Herald - Internet Edition
ANALYSIS
The Great Satan spars with the Islamic Republic
From Michael Jansen
Washington’s backing for the Shah, the presence of US forces and firms, the granting by the shah of extra-territorial status to US citizens, soldiers has transformed Iran into a US client state.
The confrontation between Washington and Teheran over Iran’s nuclear programme can be expected to continue because neither side can afford to back down without losing face. However, this confrontation is unlikely to escalate into a full blown crisis. The parties themselves, the countries trying to mediate between them, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) striving to defuse tensions seek to avoid this possibility. The US, beleaguered by the insurgency in Iraq, cannot court a fresh disaster in neighbouring Iran by taking military action. Teheran would like to end its international isolation and attract foreign investment. Germany, France and Britain are trying to secure Iran's agreement to halt its efforts to enrich uranium in order to avert further US adventurism. India, which, apparently, has also attempted to calm the situation, has close ties with Iran and is improving relations with the US and does not want to be forced to choose between them. Teheran’s refusal to suspend the conversion of raw uranium into gas, the first step in developing an independent fuel cycle, means that Iran is unlikely to resume negotiations with the three European states before the meeting of the IAEA's 35-member board in November. During this gathering the US, the Islamic Republic’s inveterate antagonist, plans to press for Iran to be brought before the UN Security Council. However, China and Russia, which is building Iran’s Bushehr reactor, do not favour referral to the Council and could use their vetoes if the US tables a resolution calling for the imposition of sanctions on Tehran.
Washington argues that Tehran must not be permitted to develop the nuclear fuel cycle which could transform Iran into an independent nuclear power capable of manufacturing atomic weapons. Therefore, Iran must abandon its programme and accept that any nuclear power plants it builds will acquire fuel from established nuclear powers and undergo close IAEA monitoring. This view has been accepted by Britain, Washington’s closest ally, and the rest of the Europeans and, to a certain extent, by the Agency, which is, after all, governed by a board where the US is the most powerful and influential member. Iran argues that the US is trying to deprive it of its rights under the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty and is not prepared to capitulate. Its view was spelt out by former president Hashemi Rafsanjani, who now heads the powerful Expediency Council. “Iran is ready to negotiate but not when preconditions are attached.” Iranians call Washington's attempts to dictate to others “power-mongering.” The more the US attempts to tell Teheran what to do, the more determined it is to resist bullying. The more Iran resists, the greater becomes the US desire to tame Teheran. The deep antagonism between these two countries developed in 1979 when the mullahs overthrew Washington’s loyal ally the shah. US scholar William O Beeman writing in his book The ‘‘Great Satan’’ vs the "Mad Mullahs:" How the United States and Iran Demonise Each Other, says the defining event was the seizure by radical students of the US embassy in Teheran and the holding of 50 diplomats based there for 444 days. Iranians saw the saga of the “hostages” as payback for years of US domination but Americans were humiliated and infuriated by their government’s inability to secure the release of the diplomats. Since the two countries did not pose a direct political and military threat to one another until the US occupied Iraq in 2003, Beeman says that the conflict was more contrived than real. Thus, he writes, “...both nations construct the 'other' to fit an idealised picture of an enemy.” The constructs they produced – the “Great Satan” and the "Mad Mullahs" – were for home consumption rather than used for name-calling. The “Great Satan” is a religious and cultural symbol for Iranians. The term was applied to Britain at the end of the 19th century and early 20th century when it was intervening in Iranian politics. Beeman says that after the revolution this image was adopted to show Iranians that the "United States and all it supported (in Iran), principally Shah Muhammad Reza Pahlavi, was a force alien to Iran and its civilisation – a force that was attempting to corrupt the Iranian people." Washington’s backing for the shah, the presence of US forces and firms in the country, and the granting by the shah of extraterritorial status to US citizens, soldiers and companies transformed proud Iran into a US client state. The clerical regime adopted a confrontational stance in order to curry to popular sentiment. Angered by the ouster of one of its major political and economic assets in West Asia and stung by Teheran's rejection, Washington, which refuses to accept that Iranians could object to its pre-revolutionary policies, argued that Iran's clerical rulers were irrational and mentally unstable, that is "Mad Mullahs." Washington was doubly insulted when Teheran conditioned a resumption of relations on a demand for dialogue on the basis of "equality." The US expects other countries to bow to its demands and accept inferiority and subservience. Now that US troops are in Iraq, the two countries do pose a threat to each other. The US can use its military assets against Iran while Iran can exploit for political gain its close ties with Islamic Dawa and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the dominant parties in the government which are determined to transform that country into an Islamic state. This means that "Great Satan," which has, so far, rejected dialogue with Iran, will have to come to terms with the "Mad Mullahs" to avoid payback in Iraq if, as seems likely, their Shia allies secure control of the full-term parliament in the December poll. An authoritative source in Dubai told The Deccan Herald that Teheran is not worried about Washington's threat of sanctions because the Iran is cooperating with the US in Afghanistan and Iraq. US bluster and bullying and Iran's defiance are meant to camouflage the cooperation between the Great Satan and the Mad Mullahs. This hoax is essential if the two governments are to maintain the current climate of tension and sustain the campaigns of demonisation which both regimes find useful.
ANALYSIS
The Great Satan spars with the Islamic Republic
From Michael Jansen
Washington’s backing for the Shah, the presence of US forces and firms, the granting by the shah of extra-territorial status to US citizens, soldiers has transformed Iran into a US client state.
The confrontation between Washington and Teheran over Iran’s nuclear programme can be expected to continue because neither side can afford to back down without losing face. However, this confrontation is unlikely to escalate into a full blown crisis. The parties themselves, the countries trying to mediate between them, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) striving to defuse tensions seek to avoid this possibility. The US, beleaguered by the insurgency in Iraq, cannot court a fresh disaster in neighbouring Iran by taking military action. Teheran would like to end its international isolation and attract foreign investment. Germany, France and Britain are trying to secure Iran's agreement to halt its efforts to enrich uranium in order to avert further US adventurism. India, which, apparently, has also attempted to calm the situation, has close ties with Iran and is improving relations with the US and does not want to be forced to choose between them. Teheran’s refusal to suspend the conversion of raw uranium into gas, the first step in developing an independent fuel cycle, means that Iran is unlikely to resume negotiations with the three European states before the meeting of the IAEA's 35-member board in November. During this gathering the US, the Islamic Republic’s inveterate antagonist, plans to press for Iran to be brought before the UN Security Council. However, China and Russia, which is building Iran’s Bushehr reactor, do not favour referral to the Council and could use their vetoes if the US tables a resolution calling for the imposition of sanctions on Tehran.
Washington argues that Tehran must not be permitted to develop the nuclear fuel cycle which could transform Iran into an independent nuclear power capable of manufacturing atomic weapons. Therefore, Iran must abandon its programme and accept that any nuclear power plants it builds will acquire fuel from established nuclear powers and undergo close IAEA monitoring. This view has been accepted by Britain, Washington’s closest ally, and the rest of the Europeans and, to a certain extent, by the Agency, which is, after all, governed by a board where the US is the most powerful and influential member. Iran argues that the US is trying to deprive it of its rights under the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty and is not prepared to capitulate. Its view was spelt out by former president Hashemi Rafsanjani, who now heads the powerful Expediency Council. “Iran is ready to negotiate but not when preconditions are attached.” Iranians call Washington's attempts to dictate to others “power-mongering.” The more the US attempts to tell Teheran what to do, the more determined it is to resist bullying. The more Iran resists, the greater becomes the US desire to tame Teheran. The deep antagonism between these two countries developed in 1979 when the mullahs overthrew Washington’s loyal ally the shah. US scholar William O Beeman writing in his book The ‘‘Great Satan’’ vs the "Mad Mullahs:" How the United States and Iran Demonise Each Other, says the defining event was the seizure by radical students of the US embassy in Teheran and the holding of 50 diplomats based there for 444 days. Iranians saw the saga of the “hostages” as payback for years of US domination but Americans were humiliated and infuriated by their government’s inability to secure the release of the diplomats. Since the two countries did not pose a direct political and military threat to one another until the US occupied Iraq in 2003, Beeman says that the conflict was more contrived than real. Thus, he writes, “...both nations construct the 'other' to fit an idealised picture of an enemy.” The constructs they produced – the “Great Satan” and the "Mad Mullahs" – were for home consumption rather than used for name-calling. The “Great Satan” is a religious and cultural symbol for Iranians. The term was applied to Britain at the end of the 19th century and early 20th century when it was intervening in Iranian politics. Beeman says that after the revolution this image was adopted to show Iranians that the "United States and all it supported (in Iran), principally Shah Muhammad Reza Pahlavi, was a force alien to Iran and its civilisation – a force that was attempting to corrupt the Iranian people." Washington’s backing for the shah, the presence of US forces and firms in the country, and the granting by the shah of extraterritorial status to US citizens, soldiers and companies transformed proud Iran into a US client state. The clerical regime adopted a confrontational stance in order to curry to popular sentiment. Angered by the ouster of one of its major political and economic assets in West Asia and stung by Teheran's rejection, Washington, which refuses to accept that Iranians could object to its pre-revolutionary policies, argued that Iran's clerical rulers were irrational and mentally unstable, that is "Mad Mullahs." Washington was doubly insulted when Teheran conditioned a resumption of relations on a demand for dialogue on the basis of "equality." The US expects other countries to bow to its demands and accept inferiority and subservience. Now that US troops are in Iraq, the two countries do pose a threat to each other. The US can use its military assets against Iran while Iran can exploit for political gain its close ties with Islamic Dawa and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the dominant parties in the government which are determined to transform that country into an Islamic state. This means that "Great Satan," which has, so far, rejected dialogue with Iran, will have to come to terms with the "Mad Mullahs" to avoid payback in Iraq if, as seems likely, their Shia allies secure control of the full-term parliament in the December poll. An authoritative source in Dubai told The Deccan Herald that Teheran is not worried about Washington's threat of sanctions because the Iran is cooperating with the US in Afghanistan and Iraq. US bluster and bullying and Iran's defiance are meant to camouflage the cooperation between the Great Satan and the Mad Mullahs. This hoax is essential if the two governments are to maintain the current climate of tension and sustain the campaigns of demonisation which both regimes find useful.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
SOCIAL DRAMA / There's nothing funny in black and white
SOCIAL DRAMA / There's nothing funny in black and white
In the past year, more and more famous white men have gone berserk, spewing venom at the rest of American society. First, there was Mel Gibson mouthing off in a drunken anti-Semitic rage. Then there was Michael Richards' meltdown, in which he screamed a racial epithet at his comedy audience. Now Don Imus' comments about the Rutgers women's basketball team have resulted in his being pulled off the air. Before these incidents, we had the Michael Jackson and Kobe Bryant cases, but the most recent ones have been of white men gone wild.
Why?
Cultural anthropologist Victor Turner, who died in 1984, coined the term "social drama," which describes what's going on here. Turner defined a social drama as a process that has four stages: breach, crisis, redressive action and reintegration.
Let's walk through the stages.
First, there's the breach: a rupture between society and one of its participants. In each case -- Richards, Gibson and Imus -- the breach was triggered by an ethnic slur or ethnic joke, and decent people in the larger society became aware of the incident.
Next, the crisis. According to Turner's theories, the crisis cannot be ignored, lest society threaten to come undone. As Americans watched the coverage of the Imus incident, they had the feeling that something must be done.
The third stage is redressive action, "the culturally defined process that resolves the crisis," according to Brown University anthropologist William O. Beeman. Although he had already been fired, society didn't begin its collective sigh of relief until after Imus' apology to the Rutgers women was accepted.
Finally, there is reintegration, which, Beeman writes, "eliminates the original breach that precipitated the crisis. This can be done in two ways -- by creating a permanent split in society, or by healing."
The emotional gain for both the joke teller and those to whom he offers forbidden humor is the thrill of "getting away with it," a staple of white male humor, from plantation owners to Quentin Tarantino to Imus.
For generations, it has been known by the name of the location where men gathered: "locker room humor," "club house humor" or "frat house humor." Invariably, the vicious put-down of black men at the mercy of the "superior" white man is called the "n -- joke," whether it's at a golf course, a country club or in movies like "The Jerk'' or "Pulp Fiction.''
Next up, of course, is "the black woman joke," in which the woman is stripped naked and put into sexual situations with licentious white men, as seen in minstrelsy, literature and films.
Imus' calling the basketball team "nappy-headed hos" should be blamed, not on hip-hop, but on blackface white performers and the culture of white male humor.
In the first half of the 19th century, white men put on cork and acted out black behavior onstage. This became blackface minstrelsy.
In 1822, a white English actor visiting America observed an audience asking a black performer to sing "Pussum up a tree." When the black man didn't comply, the actor put on black cork and sang the song himself. The white public grew up around this form, which was intended to show blacks as small, inferior, despicable and comic.
"Minstrelsy was the first example of the way American popular culture would exploit and manipulate African Americans and their culture in order to please and benefit white Americans," observes Robert Toll, author of "Blackening Up: The Minstrel Show in 19th Century America.''
"Minstrel blacks did not have hair, they had 'wool'; their hair [had] to be filed, not cut," according to Toll.
African American hairstyles have been a subject of discussion since white slave owners took away slaves' African combs. Whore was what many black women were under slavery: If a white man desired her, she became a whore who didn't get paid.
Minstrelsy was a way of allowing whites to live with themselves by venting the pressures of being racist. After the emancipation of blacks, minstrels lost their power.
Minstrelsy served as a release, what the late UC Berkeley folklore Professor Alan Dundes called "the safety-valve function of oral humor."
Imus' show shared a similarity to minstrelsy in form and content. In minstrelsy, the interlocutor acted as the master of ceremony. "With a pompous command of the language, an extensive vocabulary, and a resonant voice, the interlocutor personified dignity, which made the raucous comedy of the endmen even funnier," Toll writes.
Imus' end man was Bernard McGuirk, who, Imus told a "60 Minutes" producer, was hired to tell racial jokes.
Just like Imus' format, minstrelsy mixed racist and obscene humor with commentary on the social issues of that day.
The most appalling result of the Imus' affair is how the literary establishment wilted under his redneck charm. New York Times Book Review editor Sam Tanenhaus was a frequent visitor to the show, where Imus helped market his book on Whittaker Chambers.
"Of course, I was hearing the slurs against black athletes ... and Clarence Thomas ... and the almost continual soundtrack of leering sexual comments," Tanenhaus writes retrospectively. "But I also had been summoned into the exotic presence of mass, or mob, culture, with its populism and prejudices."
This concept of popular culture is what minstrelsy depended upon, a culture of white male humor that is not popular because most people like it but because it is about white men versus the rest of us.
Novelist and author Cecil Brown's most recent work, "Dude, Where's My Black Studies Department: The Disappearance of Black Americans From Our Universities'' (North Atlantic Books), will be available in May.
This article appeared on page F - 2 of the San Francisco Chronicle
In the past year, more and more famous white men have gone berserk, spewing venom at the rest of American society. First, there was Mel Gibson mouthing off in a drunken anti-Semitic rage. Then there was Michael Richards' meltdown, in which he screamed a racial epithet at his comedy audience. Now Don Imus' comments about the Rutgers women's basketball team have resulted in his being pulled off the air. Before these incidents, we had the Michael Jackson and Kobe Bryant cases, but the most recent ones have been of white men gone wild.
Why?
Cultural anthropologist Victor Turner, who died in 1984, coined the term "social drama," which describes what's going on here. Turner defined a social drama as a process that has four stages: breach, crisis, redressive action and reintegration.
Let's walk through the stages.
First, there's the breach: a rupture between society and one of its participants. In each case -- Richards, Gibson and Imus -- the breach was triggered by an ethnic slur or ethnic joke, and decent people in the larger society became aware of the incident.
Next, the crisis. According to Turner's theories, the crisis cannot be ignored, lest society threaten to come undone. As Americans watched the coverage of the Imus incident, they had the feeling that something must be done.
The third stage is redressive action, "the culturally defined process that resolves the crisis," according to Brown University anthropologist William O. Beeman. Although he had already been fired, society didn't begin its collective sigh of relief until after Imus' apology to the Rutgers women was accepted.
Finally, there is reintegration, which, Beeman writes, "eliminates the original breach that precipitated the crisis. This can be done in two ways -- by creating a permanent split in society, or by healing."
The emotional gain for both the joke teller and those to whom he offers forbidden humor is the thrill of "getting away with it," a staple of white male humor, from plantation owners to Quentin Tarantino to Imus.
For generations, it has been known by the name of the location where men gathered: "locker room humor," "club house humor" or "frat house humor." Invariably, the vicious put-down of black men at the mercy of the "superior" white man is called the "n -- joke," whether it's at a golf course, a country club or in movies like "The Jerk'' or "Pulp Fiction.''
Next up, of course, is "the black woman joke," in which the woman is stripped naked and put into sexual situations with licentious white men, as seen in minstrelsy, literature and films.
Imus' calling the basketball team "nappy-headed hos" should be blamed, not on hip-hop, but on blackface white performers and the culture of white male humor.
In the first half of the 19th century, white men put on cork and acted out black behavior onstage. This became blackface minstrelsy.
In 1822, a white English actor visiting America observed an audience asking a black performer to sing "Pussum up a tree." When the black man didn't comply, the actor put on black cork and sang the song himself. The white public grew up around this form, which was intended to show blacks as small, inferior, despicable and comic.
"Minstrelsy was the first example of the way American popular culture would exploit and manipulate African Americans and their culture in order to please and benefit white Americans," observes Robert Toll, author of "Blackening Up: The Minstrel Show in 19th Century America.''
"Minstrel blacks did not have hair, they had 'wool'; their hair [had] to be filed, not cut," according to Toll.
African American hairstyles have been a subject of discussion since white slave owners took away slaves' African combs. Whore was what many black women were under slavery: If a white man desired her, she became a whore who didn't get paid.
Minstrelsy was a way of allowing whites to live with themselves by venting the pressures of being racist. After the emancipation of blacks, minstrels lost their power.
Minstrelsy served as a release, what the late UC Berkeley folklore Professor Alan Dundes called "the safety-valve function of oral humor."
Imus' show shared a similarity to minstrelsy in form and content. In minstrelsy, the interlocutor acted as the master of ceremony. "With a pompous command of the language, an extensive vocabulary, and a resonant voice, the interlocutor personified dignity, which made the raucous comedy of the endmen even funnier," Toll writes.
Imus' end man was Bernard McGuirk, who, Imus told a "60 Minutes" producer, was hired to tell racial jokes.
Just like Imus' format, minstrelsy mixed racist and obscene humor with commentary on the social issues of that day.
The most appalling result of the Imus' affair is how the literary establishment wilted under his redneck charm. New York Times Book Review editor Sam Tanenhaus was a frequent visitor to the show, where Imus helped market his book on Whittaker Chambers.
"Of course, I was hearing the slurs against black athletes ... and Clarence Thomas ... and the almost continual soundtrack of leering sexual comments," Tanenhaus writes retrospectively. "But I also had been summoned into the exotic presence of mass, or mob, culture, with its populism and prejudices."
This concept of popular culture is what minstrelsy depended upon, a culture of white male humor that is not popular because most people like it but because it is about white men versus the rest of us.
Novelist and author Cecil Brown's most recent work, "Dude, Where's My Black Studies Department: The Disappearance of Black Americans From Our Universities'' (North Atlantic Books), will be available in May.
This article appeared on page F - 2 of the San Francisco Chronicle
Thursday, April 05, 2007
Inter Press--Iran: Lessons in Capture, Release of Britons
POLITICS-IRAN:Lessons in Capture, Release of Britons
Inter Press News Service Agency
Analysis by Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON, Apr 5 (IPS) - The drama surrounding the release of 15 British sailors and marines after 12 days in Iranian captivity was designed to convey two key messages that the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush would do well to heed, say experts here.First, the Britons' original capture by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard near the entry to the disputed Shatt-al-Arab waterway was meant to demonstrate that, despite its conventional military weakness and diplomatic isolation, Iran retains the ability to strike at western interests when it feels sufficiently provoked. Second, when western powers engage Iran with respect and as an equal, they are more likely to get what they want than when they take a confrontational path designed to bully or humiliate the regime. While neither message is likely to be well received either at the White House or among the neo-conservative and other right-wing pundits who have tried hard to depict the incident as the latest sign of Islamic or Persian barbarism, properly understood, they could form the basis of a new approach capable of yielding results, according to Juan Cole, a regional expert at the University of Michigan. ''The British have now opened a channel,'' he told IPS. ''Although this incident really did constitute a crisis -- one that might have escalated to very dangerous levels -- the resolution was diplomatic, and that diplomatic resolution could contain the seeds for future diplomacy, if the British and the Americans are so inclined.'' The announcement on Wednesday, that the sailors and marines were being released in honour of the Prophet Mohammed's forthcoming birthday and the Christian Easter holiday, was made by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who then met with the captives personally. ''Our government has pardoned them; it is a gift from our people,'' he said, adding that the gesture had ''nothing to do'' with Tuesday's release in Iraq of a senior Iranian diplomat who was abducted two months ago reportedly by a special Iraqi intelligence agency that works closely with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). ''We approached the subject on a humanitarian basis. It was a unilateral decision on our end,'' he insisted. Nonetheless, the diplomat's release, as well as reports that Tehran also just received assurances that it would be given consular access to five alleged Revolutionary Guard officers seized by U.S. forces at an Iranian liaison office in Arbil nearly three months ago, suggested that Wednesday's events were more than just coincidence, although both London and Washington, like Ahmadinejad, insisted there were no quid pro quos. ''I personally believe that the U.S. action (in Arbil) .accounts for why Iran chose to stage its capture of the British sailors,'' noted Gary Sick, an Iran expert at Columbia University who served in White House under former President Jimmy Carter. ''Iran appears to have gained something from its pressure tactics.'' That assessment was shared by Trita Parsi, president of the U.S. National Iranian American Council (NIAC). ''By taking the (British) soft targets, the Iranians put pressure on the U.S..'' In addition to collecting bargaining chips, the original capture had other purposes, as well, including rallying nationalist sentiment behind the regime just as it faced the imposition by the UN Security Council of a new round of sanctions for rejecting demands to suspend its uranium enrichment programme. As important, however, was the message Tehran wished to convey to the West that it could indeed respond to what it saw as U.S. provocations in ways that could harm or embarrass its allies. ''In seizing the Iranians, who after all, had been invited by the Iraqi authorities, the Americans were seen as behaving aggressively,'' according to Cole. ''Now, the Iranians have demonstrated that the Anglo-American forces are not in a strong enough position to afford to do these things. They can play tit for tat.'' ''It is a reminder that Iran has quite an array of asymmetrical options available to it to counter indirectly the actions of the U.S. forces in Iraq and elsewhere,'' Sick agreed. At the same time, according to Sick, Tehran's behaviour during much of the crisis -- including both the seizure itself, the precise location of which remains a matter of dispute, and its use of ''confessions'' by the British captives and threats to put them on trial -- will probably have cost it much-needed international support. ''I suspect that recognition of this fact accounts for Iran's desire to end this dispute as promptly as possible,'' said Sick. ''For the same reason, I suspect that this ploy will not be repeated any time soon.'' ''I think the Iranians thought it was better to declare victory and put an end to the crisis before there was any further escalation,'' noted Parsi. At the same time, however, Parsi and other analysts said that the point at which victory could be declared was reached because of important changes in the British approach to the crisis. While London officials have said the turning point came Monday, when Iran's national security chief, Ali Larijani, gave a conciliatory interview to Britain's Channel Four television -- an interview that was followed by a critical conversation between Larijani and Blair's top foreign-policy adviser, Sir Nigel Sheinwald, according to 'The Independent' -- Cole points to a shift in the British stance from one of threats and demands to a more diplomatic approach over the weekend, including confirmation by British Defence Secretary Des Browne that London was ''in direct bilateral communication with the Iranians.'' ''These sorts of incidents are always to some extent about face, and apparently the Iranians felt that when Britain agreed to enter into direct bilateral negotiations, Iran had gained enough face to be magnanimous,'' he said. ''On Sunday, they were admitted as equals, not scolded as little children. That created the opening for (Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali) Khamenei and Ahmadinejad to climb down and save face.'' ''Iranians have been signalling repeatedly, and not just during this crisis, that they will engage diplomatically, but without preconditions and on the basis of equality,'' said William Beeman, an Iran expert at the University of Minnesota. ''So now they say, 'You see, when we have the upper hand, you see how magnanimous we are; we are a charitable, civilized people. We are reasonable. You can talk with us'.'' ''The Iranian message is that if you deal with us respectfully, through incentives, then things can get resolved rather quickly,'' said Parsi. ''If you only resort to force or impose sanctions at the UN Security Council, then you'll only get stuck, and Iran will respond in kind. They're hoping that the West gets the impression that that is the incentive structure through which it can make progress with Iran. Whether that will be understood in the West is obviously a complete different question.'' The Bush administration's relative silence during the crisis may also have conveyed, inadvertently perhaps, another message -- that, despite widespread speculation that its recent military build-up in the Gulf was intended to prepare the grounds for an attack on Iran, it had no wish to do so, at least for the moment. ''The Iranian capture of 15 (British) military personnel could certainly have been used as .a pretext (for a military strike), since it could easily have escalated to a full-fledged military crisis,'' according to Sick. ''I regard the absence of unbridled escalation in this case as a significant indicator that the U.S. desire for a strike may be more muted than it has been portrayed.'' (END/2007)
Inter Press News Service Agency
Analysis by Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON, Apr 5 (IPS) - The drama surrounding the release of 15 British sailors and marines after 12 days in Iranian captivity was designed to convey two key messages that the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush would do well to heed, say experts here.First, the Britons' original capture by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard near the entry to the disputed Shatt-al-Arab waterway was meant to demonstrate that, despite its conventional military weakness and diplomatic isolation, Iran retains the ability to strike at western interests when it feels sufficiently provoked. Second, when western powers engage Iran with respect and as an equal, they are more likely to get what they want than when they take a confrontational path designed to bully or humiliate the regime. While neither message is likely to be well received either at the White House or among the neo-conservative and other right-wing pundits who have tried hard to depict the incident as the latest sign of Islamic or Persian barbarism, properly understood, they could form the basis of a new approach capable of yielding results, according to Juan Cole, a regional expert at the University of Michigan. ''The British have now opened a channel,'' he told IPS. ''Although this incident really did constitute a crisis -- one that might have escalated to very dangerous levels -- the resolution was diplomatic, and that diplomatic resolution could contain the seeds for future diplomacy, if the British and the Americans are so inclined.'' The announcement on Wednesday, that the sailors and marines were being released in honour of the Prophet Mohammed's forthcoming birthday and the Christian Easter holiday, was made by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who then met with the captives personally. ''Our government has pardoned them; it is a gift from our people,'' he said, adding that the gesture had ''nothing to do'' with Tuesday's release in Iraq of a senior Iranian diplomat who was abducted two months ago reportedly by a special Iraqi intelligence agency that works closely with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). ''We approached the subject on a humanitarian basis. It was a unilateral decision on our end,'' he insisted. Nonetheless, the diplomat's release, as well as reports that Tehran also just received assurances that it would be given consular access to five alleged Revolutionary Guard officers seized by U.S. forces at an Iranian liaison office in Arbil nearly three months ago, suggested that Wednesday's events were more than just coincidence, although both London and Washington, like Ahmadinejad, insisted there were no quid pro quos. ''I personally believe that the U.S. action (in Arbil) .accounts for why Iran chose to stage its capture of the British sailors,'' noted Gary Sick, an Iran expert at Columbia University who served in White House under former President Jimmy Carter. ''Iran appears to have gained something from its pressure tactics.'' That assessment was shared by Trita Parsi, president of the U.S. National Iranian American Council (NIAC). ''By taking the (British) soft targets, the Iranians put pressure on the U.S..'' In addition to collecting bargaining chips, the original capture had other purposes, as well, including rallying nationalist sentiment behind the regime just as it faced the imposition by the UN Security Council of a new round of sanctions for rejecting demands to suspend its uranium enrichment programme. As important, however, was the message Tehran wished to convey to the West that it could indeed respond to what it saw as U.S. provocations in ways that could harm or embarrass its allies. ''In seizing the Iranians, who after all, had been invited by the Iraqi authorities, the Americans were seen as behaving aggressively,'' according to Cole. ''Now, the Iranians have demonstrated that the Anglo-American forces are not in a strong enough position to afford to do these things. They can play tit for tat.'' ''It is a reminder that Iran has quite an array of asymmetrical options available to it to counter indirectly the actions of the U.S. forces in Iraq and elsewhere,'' Sick agreed. At the same time, according to Sick, Tehran's behaviour during much of the crisis -- including both the seizure itself, the precise location of which remains a matter of dispute, and its use of ''confessions'' by the British captives and threats to put them on trial -- will probably have cost it much-needed international support. ''I suspect that recognition of this fact accounts for Iran's desire to end this dispute as promptly as possible,'' said Sick. ''For the same reason, I suspect that this ploy will not be repeated any time soon.'' ''I think the Iranians thought it was better to declare victory and put an end to the crisis before there was any further escalation,'' noted Parsi. At the same time, however, Parsi and other analysts said that the point at which victory could be declared was reached because of important changes in the British approach to the crisis. While London officials have said the turning point came Monday, when Iran's national security chief, Ali Larijani, gave a conciliatory interview to Britain's Channel Four television -- an interview that was followed by a critical conversation between Larijani and Blair's top foreign-policy adviser, Sir Nigel Sheinwald, according to 'The Independent' -- Cole points to a shift in the British stance from one of threats and demands to a more diplomatic approach over the weekend, including confirmation by British Defence Secretary Des Browne that London was ''in direct bilateral communication with the Iranians.'' ''These sorts of incidents are always to some extent about face, and apparently the Iranians felt that when Britain agreed to enter into direct bilateral negotiations, Iran had gained enough face to be magnanimous,'' he said. ''On Sunday, they were admitted as equals, not scolded as little children. That created the opening for (Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali) Khamenei and Ahmadinejad to climb down and save face.'' ''Iranians have been signalling repeatedly, and not just during this crisis, that they will engage diplomatically, but without preconditions and on the basis of equality,'' said William Beeman, an Iran expert at the University of Minnesota. ''So now they say, 'You see, when we have the upper hand, you see how magnanimous we are; we are a charitable, civilized people. We are reasonable. You can talk with us'.'' ''The Iranian message is that if you deal with us respectfully, through incentives, then things can get resolved rather quickly,'' said Parsi. ''If you only resort to force or impose sanctions at the UN Security Council, then you'll only get stuck, and Iran will respond in kind. They're hoping that the West gets the impression that that is the incentive structure through which it can make progress with Iran. Whether that will be understood in the West is obviously a complete different question.'' The Bush administration's relative silence during the crisis may also have conveyed, inadvertently perhaps, another message -- that, despite widespread speculation that its recent military build-up in the Gulf was intended to prepare the grounds for an attack on Iran, it had no wish to do so, at least for the moment. ''The Iranian capture of 15 (British) military personnel could certainly have been used as .a pretext (for a military strike), since it could easily have escalated to a full-fledged military crisis,'' according to Sick. ''I regard the absence of unbridled escalation in this case as a significant indicator that the U.S. desire for a strike may be more muted than it has been portrayed.'' (END/2007)
Monday, April 02, 2007
Attack on Iran is the next step in divide and conquer of Middle East--Daan de Wit
Attack on Iran is the next step in divide and conquer of Middle East
Monday, 02 April 2007
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by Daan de Wit
The Dutch in this article was translated into English by Ben Kearney.
The march towards war with Iran continues unabated. As time goes by, the possibility that Iran will be attacked is not lessening, but growing. It will increase the level of chaos in the Middle East, but the question is whether this is an unfortunate consequence or a means to an end.While expansive war games are being conducted off the Iranian coast and new sanctions are being imposed on Iran, the heat is being turned up in other ways as well. Under the headline US funds terror groups to sow chaos in Iran, The Sunday Telegraph writes: 'In the past year there has been a wave of unrest in ethnic minority border areas of Iran, with bombing and assassination campaigns against soldiers and government officials. [...] Fred Burton, a former US state department counter-terrorism agent, [...] said: "The latest attacks inside Iran fall in line with US efforts to supply and train Iran's ethnic minorities to destabilise the Iranian regime." [...] Funding for their separatist causes comes directly from the CIA's classified budget but is now "no great secret", according to one former high-ranking CIA official in Washington who spoke anonymously to The Sunday Telegraph.' The current situation involving Iran and the 15 British Marines is reminiscent of the situation prior to the Vietnam War, when the U.S. was provoking Vietnam by way of Operation 34A. It was then that the American government seized upon an alleged incident in the Gulf of Tonkin in order to demonstrate Vietnamese agression, after which Congress gave President Johnson its approval to attack the country. For more details see this article by DeepJournal. Also see: Fake Maritime Boundaries, written by Craig Murray, former Head of the Maritime Section of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
U.S. troop build-up in Persian GulfOn Tuesday of last week 'a high-ranking security source' told the Russian RIA Novosti that 'U.S. Naval presence in the Persian Gulf has for the first time in the past four years reached the level that existed shortly before the invasion of Iraq in March 2003. Col.-Gen. Leonid Ivashov, vice president of the Academy of Geopolitical Sciences, said last week that the Pentagon is planning to deliver a massive air strike on Iran's military infrastructure in the near future.' Professor A. Richard Norton, advisor to the Iraq Study Group, made a good point back in mid-February in reference to the American show of power in the Persian Gulf: 'Remember that in 1990-91 and then again in 2003 the very fact that the United States assembled a formidable array of forces in the Gulf region became an argument for using those forces and launching wars. The United States will soon have two carrier task forces on station, and perhaps a third carrier task force will soon be deployed. It will be difficult for the United States to step down from its combative perch without Iran accepting some fairly significant concessions. While many leading Iranian officials fully understand the gravity of the situation, it is nonetheless possible to imagine a series of real or contrived clashes that lead, perhaps unintentionally, to a serious aerial and naval campaign against Iran. Or - to put it simply - to yet another U.S. war of choice.' Tony Blair in a speech to the U.S. Congress: 'September 11th was not an isolated event, but a tragic prologue. Iraq; another Act; and many further struggles will be set upon this stage before it's over.'Religious strife Middle East: unintended fire to the flames or means to an end?From the moment he first gained any significance, right up until his death, the life of Saddam Hussein was intertwined with the West, as I wrote previously. Saddam provided his country with the order that the West desired, and together they saw how the country descended into chaos following the overthrow of the Baath regime. There are different viewpoints circulating as to how the Bush administration might be able to create order in Iraq. Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh sees what he calls 'the redirection' of the Bush Administration: Out of fear for Shiite Iran, the U.S. would actively support the Sunnis in the region. Previously it were the Iraqi Shiites who received their support, to the detriment of the Sunni minority, which in general is seen as the core of the Iraqi resistance. The question though is whether or not there is any discussion of an adjustment to American plans. On the one hand, the fact that American plans have been frustrated by the resistance could indeed be an explanation for a reevaluation, but it could also be an explanation for the fact that, contrary to all predictions, Iran hasn't been attacked yet (the newest predictions are talking about this month). On the other hand, there are indications that the discord that exists between the two Muslim groups is the result of a preconceived plan: divide and conquer, culminating in an evenly divided future Middle East. And while two dogs are fighting for a bone... If there really is a 'Redirection', then the U.S. will end up profiting from the divisions that it itself brought about which resulted from the decision, often described as a blunder, to dismiss the constituent Sunni elements of the police and army en masse. In response to the Sunni insurgency, the Shiites were supported by the U.S. from the beginning. They received military support via Task Force 121, a team of specialists from Special Operations and the CIA. Additional American support came in the form of the coordination and cultivation of a large Iraqi militia. It may be this group that called itself 'Black Flag' in 2004 and took the fight to the insurgents. The resulting internecine conflict between the two Muslim groups not only divided Iraq, but it also put pressure on the situation in the region. Questions surrounding attack on Golden MosqueA relatively important moment in the fighting between the Sunnis and the Shiites was the attack on the Golden Mosque in February of 2006. Directly following the destruction of the Shiite mosque, 27 Sunni mosques were attacked and three Sunni imams were killed. Hundreds, if not thousands of people have died as a result of the attack. The strike seemed to be a clearcut case, but further examination raises questions as to who the actual perpetrators of the attack were. The suggestion is now being made that Western specialists were involved. Jassem Mohammed Jaafar, at that time Construction minister, said on Iraqi television: '"According to initial reports, the bombing was technically well conceived and could only have been carried out by specialists"', to which he added that the placement of the explosives had to have taken at least twelve hours. Jafaar: '[...] "holes were dug into the mausoleum's four main pillars and packed with explosives." "Then the charges were connected together and linked to another charge placed just under the dome. The wires were then linked to a detonator which was triggered at a distance'. These statements were borne out by the account of the caretaker of the mosque, as noted by The New York Times: 'The night before the explosion, he said, just before the 8 p.m. curfew on Feb. 21, 2006, on the Western calendar, men dressed in commando uniforms like those issued by the Interior Ministry entered the shrine. The caretaker said he had been beaten, tied up and locked in a room. Throughout the night, he said, he could hear the sound of drilling as the attackers positioned the explosives, apparently in such a way as to inflict maximum damage on the dome. [...] I can describe what was done as exactly like what happened to the World Trade Center," he said. "Bad people used this incident to divide Iraq on a detestable sectarian basis."' Journalist Mike Whitney writes: 'Eyewitness accounts verify that American troops and Iraqi National Guard were active in the area throughout the night and that their cars could be heard running "the whole night until next morning". People living around the mosque were told "to stay in your shop and don't leave the area". At 6:30 AM the American troops left, just 10 minutes before the bombs went off.' '"There are forces seeking to prevent democracy and obstruct the peaceful political and economic development of Iraq. They seek to achieve their goals in a number of ways. But, as I said before, promoting sectarian violence is one of them. There's nothing new here"', according to American spokesperson Adam Ereli. Pro-Sunni clandestine operations in and around IranAccording to Seymour Hersh, American foreign policy as it relates to Iran - based as it is on the mutual strife between Sunnis and Shiites - has been completely overturned. In his latest article The Redirection, he writes: 'The new strategy "is a major shift in American policy-it's a sea change," a U.S. government consultant with close ties to Israel said.' He makes the argument that the rise of the Shiites in Iraq, combined with a powerful Shiite Iran no longer held in check by the threat of Saddam's Sunni-controlled army, has sent chills through Sunni countries in the region, such as Saudi Arabia: 'The Sunni states "were petrified of a Shiite resurgence, and there was growing resentment with our gambling on the moderate Shiites in Iraq," he said. "We cannot reverse the Shiite gain in Iraq, but we can contain it."' According to Hersh this fear explains the readiness of the Saudis to contribute financially to the clandestine pro-Sunni support operations: 'The clandestine operations have been kept secret, in some cases, by leaving the execution or the funding to the Saudis, or by finding other ways to work around the normal congressional appropriations process, current and former officials close to the Administration said.' The money comes in part from the Saudis, and the execution of the operations takes place under the guidance of Vice-President Dick Cheney: '[...] former and current officials said that the clandestine side has been guided by Cheney. [...] American military and special-operations teams have escalated their activities in Iran to gather intelligence [...]'. Read more about clandestine operations in Iran in part 4 (October 2005) of this DeepJournal series.A new Cold War in the Middle EastThe divisions between Sunni and Shiite groups could be the beginning of a new Cold War in the Middle East. Following the Cold War against communism and during the subsequent War on Terror, a new war could now arise between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. 'Martin Indyk, a senior State Department official in the Clinton Administration who also served as Ambassador to Israel, said that "the Middle East is heading into a serious Sunni-Shiite Cold War." Indyk, who is the director of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, added that, in his opinion, it was not clear whether the White House was fully aware of the strategic implications of its new policy', writes Hersh. But just as with the Cold War, the War on Terror and the new religious divisions, the question is whether the U.S. is the victim or the perpetrator. Whichever the case may be, both Muslim groups are battling each other while Iran as a target is getting more and more in the picture, just as a relatively safe Israel, surrounded by a patchwork quilt of small and fragmented statelets in an oil-rich region. Influence of the Democratic majority on Bush AdministrationSome are pinning their hopes on the Democrats - who now hold a majority in Congress - to avert a military conflict with Iran. But their recent history doesn't offer much in the way of hope. In the years following the 9/11 attacks, they remained silent while the new media amassed fact upon fact, chipping away at the official conspiracy theory of what happened on and around September 11th. The Democratic party didn't exactly stand in the way of the radical legislation which came in the wake of 9/11 either, and what's more, they used the first hundred hours of their majority in Congress to adopt into law the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, whose findings were taken apart piece by piece by Professor David Ray Griffin in his book The New Pearl Harbor. And as to the question of what the most relevant Democrats are saying about Iran - the answer is disappointing. Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Barack Obama have all made clear that they are not opposed to military action against Iran. DNC Chairman Howard Dean was quite clear at the beginning of last year: '[...] under no circumstances will a Democratic Administration ever allow Iran to become a nuclear power.' One year later he called the Iran of now a greater danger than the Iraq of then. Meanwhile Clinton is making similar statements, but feels that if Bush wants to declare war on Iran he should definitely ask Congress for approval. According to Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, this isn't necessary; under pressure from the Israeli lobby she has introduced legislation ensuring that Bush doesn't have to do this. The Democrats are echoing the rhetoric of the Republican administration. Under the motto 'Don't Let the People Who Brought Us Iraq Define the Questions' Paul Pillar, 'a former national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia, [who] teaches security studies at Georgetown University' is advising first and foremost to ask the right questions, such as: 'If Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons, how would that change its behavior and affect U.S. interests? In particular, why would deterrence, which has kept nuclear peace with other adversaries, not work with Iran?'In spite of democracy, small group dictatesWith the appropriate questions not being posed, and with the Democrats having begged off and the build-up to the coming war with Iran only now in this late stage getting the full attention of the Western media, it remains as clear as ever that a small group of extremists - an elite of the elite - are once again prepared to take the world one step further on a path above which most people see only dark clouds gathering. Speaking of this small group of people who have no fear of the gathering storm and who see a shiny pot of gold at the end of it, former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski said to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: 'I am perplexed by the fact that major strategic decisions seem to be made within a very narrow circle of individuals - just a few, probably a handful, perhaps not more than the fingers on my hand. And these are the individuals, all of whom but one, who made the original decision to go to war [with Iraq], and used the original justifications to go to war.' One thing that comes to mind while listening to Brzezinski is a quote taken down by New York Times reporter Ron Suskind that came from the mouth of a White House aide: Suskind writes: 'The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people who ''believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.'' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ''That's not the way the world really works anymore,'' he continued. ''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''' Vanity Fair sums up this idea as it translates into the situation with Iran in a long article with a short headline: From the Wonderful Folks Who Brought You Iraq.Fundamentalist leadership in both U.S. and IranIn his testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Brzezinski underscores a view held on the role that the U.S. has played in the rise of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's star: 'Our policy has unintentionally - I hope unintentionally, maybe it was develishly clever, but I think unintentionally - helped Ahmadinejad consolidate himself in power and excercised a degree of influence which actually his position doesn't justify. Most Americans when they say president Ahmadinejad, they think he is the equivalent of president Bush, he is not, he is roughly a third level official, who doesn't even control the military resources of the country.' In comparing Bush and Ahmadinejad, investigative journalist Jim Lobe was compelled to make a side-by-side product comparison which brought him to the conclusion: Bush and Ahmadinejad: separated at birth?One of the similarities between the two leaders lies in their fundamental character. Bush's image, which along with that of the U.S. has taken a beating, is that of the democratic, Christian leader of the free world. That's why he is supported by the Moral Majority in the U.S. The same moral theme can also be seen in Dutch Prime Minister Balkenende. Upon further inspection there are a few things to take note of regarding the exacting image of both gentlemen. Balkenende preaches norms and values, but then does the opposite by refusing to publicly state the reason that The Netherlands sent soldiers to Iraq. Balkenende reconfirms the hypocritical image of fundamentalist Christians. This image is also shaped - alongside the sex abuse scandals in the Church - by George W. Bush, a man who while governor of Texas held the record for death sentences handed out, who now feels that torture is necessary, and who could be held responsible for thousands of American deaths and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi victims. And that's just to name a few. Bush is facilitated by the conservative Christian Erik Prince, director of Blackwater, the most important supplier of mercenaries for Iraq. These leaders of the Moral Majority would nevertheless be nowhere without the Silent Majority, the much more moderate sectors of the population of the U.S. and The Netherlands, for example. While the silence of the Silent Majority and the actions of the Moral Majority keep the wars coming, the conservative Christians, through their active support for Bush and Israel, seem to be eager to bring on exactly that which their guidebook - The Bible - warns against: a great battle in the Middle East which would usher in the End Times. President Ahmadinejad echoes this vision of the so-called 'End Times' held by the millions of Christians who support Bush; just like them, his view of the future is none too gloomy because he also foresees a final battle and above all redemption for mankind: 'French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy has quoted Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad as saying that one should really hope for "chaos" because "there will be God" afterward. [...] Ahmadinejad has also called for the return of al-Mahdi, a messiah-like figure in Shi'ite Islam, whose reappearance is supposed to restore justice before the end of the world', writes AFP. In this way he's on the same wavelength as the millions of readers of the Left Behind series, which foresees a miraculous catching up of all true Christian believers prior to the apocalypse. Influential Christians such as Joel Rosenberg, whose books are recommended on the Left Behind website, interpret what they read in the newspaper the same way they interpret the Bible, and see in the news the fulfillment of age-old prophecies: '[...] what is particularly curious about the emergence of an even stronger Iran-Sudan alliance this week is that it was foretold 2,500 years ago by the Hebrew Prophet Ezekiel in chapters 38 and 39'. To this statement he adds an article from Haaretz, in which it talks about how 'several Orthodox Jewish groups in Israel are currently making preparations to build and outfit the Third Temple', after which he refers to the title of chapter 13 from his book Epicenter: Future Headline: Jews build third temple in Jerusalem. In a recent contribution, Rosenberg writes: 'I've written before that 2007 is the Year of Decision. But is April about to become the "month of decision"?' How dangerous is Iran?The Iranian economy is weak, and as opposed to the U.S. and Israel, Iran has no history of initiating wars (the war with Iraq was the result of an attack by Saddam that was spurred on by the U.S.). Ahmadinejad says that he doesn't want war, and in part 14 of this series it was also shown how he was incorrectly quoted and doesn't want to wipe Israel off the map. While the U.S. is refusing offers of negotiations (1, 2) with Iran, Iran is allowing UN-inspectors to investigate their nuclear program, though they restricted their cooperation recently, and as opposed to the U.S. and Israel, Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. On the other hand Ahmadinejad did organize a conference to promote research into the Holocaust, and he might be lying about his belief that his faith forbids the production of a nuclear weapon. Depending on which cleric you ask, a nuclear weapon would actually be permitted, so long as it is not used offensively (in contrary to the U.S. view). And then there is Iran's support for Hezbollah. When it comes to the facts, there are different ways of looking at it: 'Iran's control over Hezbollah has been steadily declining since approximately 1996, during the reformist presidency of Mohammad Khatami. Money does continue to come "from Iran" to support Hezbollah, but not the Iranian government. Instead, it's private religious foundations that direct the bulk of support, primarily to Hezbollah's charitable activities. [...] the most important reason for not targeting Iran for the continued fighting in Lebanon is that this conflict is antithetical to Iran's interests. [...] If a state is needed to explain the continued existence of groups like Hezbollah, then Iran is an ideal candidate. Ergo, the connection must exist. Such claims serve to bolster the central, but fallacious, political doctrine for the Bush administration that the Global War on Terrorism really exists', writes Professor of Anthropology and Middle East Studies at Brown University, William O. Beeman, author of the book The "Great Satan" vs. the "Mad Mullahs": How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other.
Monday, 02 April 2007
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by Daan de Wit
The Dutch in this article was translated into English by Ben Kearney.
The march towards war with Iran continues unabated. As time goes by, the possibility that Iran will be attacked is not lessening, but growing. It will increase the level of chaos in the Middle East, but the question is whether this is an unfortunate consequence or a means to an end.While expansive war games are being conducted off the Iranian coast and new sanctions are being imposed on Iran, the heat is being turned up in other ways as well. Under the headline US funds terror groups to sow chaos in Iran, The Sunday Telegraph writes: 'In the past year there has been a wave of unrest in ethnic minority border areas of Iran, with bombing and assassination campaigns against soldiers and government officials. [...] Fred Burton, a former US state department counter-terrorism agent, [...] said: "The latest attacks inside Iran fall in line with US efforts to supply and train Iran's ethnic minorities to destabilise the Iranian regime." [...] Funding for their separatist causes comes directly from the CIA's classified budget but is now "no great secret", according to one former high-ranking CIA official in Washington who spoke anonymously to The Sunday Telegraph.' The current situation involving Iran and the 15 British Marines is reminiscent of the situation prior to the Vietnam War, when the U.S. was provoking Vietnam by way of Operation 34A. It was then that the American government seized upon an alleged incident in the Gulf of Tonkin in order to demonstrate Vietnamese agression, after which Congress gave President Johnson its approval to attack the country. For more details see this article by DeepJournal. Also see: Fake Maritime Boundaries, written by Craig Murray, former Head of the Maritime Section of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
U.S. troop build-up in Persian GulfOn Tuesday of last week 'a high-ranking security source' told the Russian RIA Novosti that 'U.S. Naval presence in the Persian Gulf has for the first time in the past four years reached the level that existed shortly before the invasion of Iraq in March 2003. Col.-Gen. Leonid Ivashov, vice president of the Academy of Geopolitical Sciences, said last week that the Pentagon is planning to deliver a massive air strike on Iran's military infrastructure in the near future.' Professor A. Richard Norton, advisor to the Iraq Study Group, made a good point back in mid-February in reference to the American show of power in the Persian Gulf: 'Remember that in 1990-91 and then again in 2003 the very fact that the United States assembled a formidable array of forces in the Gulf region became an argument for using those forces and launching wars. The United States will soon have two carrier task forces on station, and perhaps a third carrier task force will soon be deployed. It will be difficult for the United States to step down from its combative perch without Iran accepting some fairly significant concessions. While many leading Iranian officials fully understand the gravity of the situation, it is nonetheless possible to imagine a series of real or contrived clashes that lead, perhaps unintentionally, to a serious aerial and naval campaign against Iran. Or - to put it simply - to yet another U.S. war of choice.' Tony Blair in a speech to the U.S. Congress: 'September 11th was not an isolated event, but a tragic prologue. Iraq; another Act; and many further struggles will be set upon this stage before it's over.'Religious strife Middle East: unintended fire to the flames or means to an end?From the moment he first gained any significance, right up until his death, the life of Saddam Hussein was intertwined with the West, as I wrote previously. Saddam provided his country with the order that the West desired, and together they saw how the country descended into chaos following the overthrow of the Baath regime. There are different viewpoints circulating as to how the Bush administration might be able to create order in Iraq. Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh sees what he calls 'the redirection' of the Bush Administration: Out of fear for Shiite Iran, the U.S. would actively support the Sunnis in the region. Previously it were the Iraqi Shiites who received their support, to the detriment of the Sunni minority, which in general is seen as the core of the Iraqi resistance. The question though is whether or not there is any discussion of an adjustment to American plans. On the one hand, the fact that American plans have been frustrated by the resistance could indeed be an explanation for a reevaluation, but it could also be an explanation for the fact that, contrary to all predictions, Iran hasn't been attacked yet (the newest predictions are talking about this month). On the other hand, there are indications that the discord that exists between the two Muslim groups is the result of a preconceived plan: divide and conquer, culminating in an evenly divided future Middle East. And while two dogs are fighting for a bone... If there really is a 'Redirection', then the U.S. will end up profiting from the divisions that it itself brought about which resulted from the decision, often described as a blunder, to dismiss the constituent Sunni elements of the police and army en masse. In response to the Sunni insurgency, the Shiites were supported by the U.S. from the beginning. They received military support via Task Force 121, a team of specialists from Special Operations and the CIA. Additional American support came in the form of the coordination and cultivation of a large Iraqi militia. It may be this group that called itself 'Black Flag' in 2004 and took the fight to the insurgents. The resulting internecine conflict between the two Muslim groups not only divided Iraq, but it also put pressure on the situation in the region. Questions surrounding attack on Golden MosqueA relatively important moment in the fighting between the Sunnis and the Shiites was the attack on the Golden Mosque in February of 2006. Directly following the destruction of the Shiite mosque, 27 Sunni mosques were attacked and three Sunni imams were killed. Hundreds, if not thousands of people have died as a result of the attack. The strike seemed to be a clearcut case, but further examination raises questions as to who the actual perpetrators of the attack were. The suggestion is now being made that Western specialists were involved. Jassem Mohammed Jaafar, at that time Construction minister, said on Iraqi television: '"According to initial reports, the bombing was technically well conceived and could only have been carried out by specialists"', to which he added that the placement of the explosives had to have taken at least twelve hours. Jafaar: '[...] "holes were dug into the mausoleum's four main pillars and packed with explosives." "Then the charges were connected together and linked to another charge placed just under the dome. The wires were then linked to a detonator which was triggered at a distance'. These statements were borne out by the account of the caretaker of the mosque, as noted by The New York Times: 'The night before the explosion, he said, just before the 8 p.m. curfew on Feb. 21, 2006, on the Western calendar, men dressed in commando uniforms like those issued by the Interior Ministry entered the shrine. The caretaker said he had been beaten, tied up and locked in a room. Throughout the night, he said, he could hear the sound of drilling as the attackers positioned the explosives, apparently in such a way as to inflict maximum damage on the dome. [...] I can describe what was done as exactly like what happened to the World Trade Center," he said. "Bad people used this incident to divide Iraq on a detestable sectarian basis."' Journalist Mike Whitney writes: 'Eyewitness accounts verify that American troops and Iraqi National Guard were active in the area throughout the night and that their cars could be heard running "the whole night until next morning". People living around the mosque were told "to stay in your shop and don't leave the area". At 6:30 AM the American troops left, just 10 minutes before the bombs went off.' '"There are forces seeking to prevent democracy and obstruct the peaceful political and economic development of Iraq. They seek to achieve their goals in a number of ways. But, as I said before, promoting sectarian violence is one of them. There's nothing new here"', according to American spokesperson Adam Ereli. Pro-Sunni clandestine operations in and around IranAccording to Seymour Hersh, American foreign policy as it relates to Iran - based as it is on the mutual strife between Sunnis and Shiites - has been completely overturned. In his latest article The Redirection, he writes: 'The new strategy "is a major shift in American policy-it's a sea change," a U.S. government consultant with close ties to Israel said.' He makes the argument that the rise of the Shiites in Iraq, combined with a powerful Shiite Iran no longer held in check by the threat of Saddam's Sunni-controlled army, has sent chills through Sunni countries in the region, such as Saudi Arabia: 'The Sunni states "were petrified of a Shiite resurgence, and there was growing resentment with our gambling on the moderate Shiites in Iraq," he said. "We cannot reverse the Shiite gain in Iraq, but we can contain it."' According to Hersh this fear explains the readiness of the Saudis to contribute financially to the clandestine pro-Sunni support operations: 'The clandestine operations have been kept secret, in some cases, by leaving the execution or the funding to the Saudis, or by finding other ways to work around the normal congressional appropriations process, current and former officials close to the Administration said.' The money comes in part from the Saudis, and the execution of the operations takes place under the guidance of Vice-President Dick Cheney: '[...] former and current officials said that the clandestine side has been guided by Cheney. [...] American military and special-operations teams have escalated their activities in Iran to gather intelligence [...]'. Read more about clandestine operations in Iran in part 4 (October 2005) of this DeepJournal series.A new Cold War in the Middle EastThe divisions between Sunni and Shiite groups could be the beginning of a new Cold War in the Middle East. Following the Cold War against communism and during the subsequent War on Terror, a new war could now arise between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. 'Martin Indyk, a senior State Department official in the Clinton Administration who also served as Ambassador to Israel, said that "the Middle East is heading into a serious Sunni-Shiite Cold War." Indyk, who is the director of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, added that, in his opinion, it was not clear whether the White House was fully aware of the strategic implications of its new policy', writes Hersh. But just as with the Cold War, the War on Terror and the new religious divisions, the question is whether the U.S. is the victim or the perpetrator. Whichever the case may be, both Muslim groups are battling each other while Iran as a target is getting more and more in the picture, just as a relatively safe Israel, surrounded by a patchwork quilt of small and fragmented statelets in an oil-rich region. Influence of the Democratic majority on Bush AdministrationSome are pinning their hopes on the Democrats - who now hold a majority in Congress - to avert a military conflict with Iran. But their recent history doesn't offer much in the way of hope. In the years following the 9/11 attacks, they remained silent while the new media amassed fact upon fact, chipping away at the official conspiracy theory of what happened on and around September 11th. The Democratic party didn't exactly stand in the way of the radical legislation which came in the wake of 9/11 either, and what's more, they used the first hundred hours of their majority in Congress to adopt into law the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, whose findings were taken apart piece by piece by Professor David Ray Griffin in his book The New Pearl Harbor. And as to the question of what the most relevant Democrats are saying about Iran - the answer is disappointing. Hillary Clinton, John Edwards and Barack Obama have all made clear that they are not opposed to military action against Iran. DNC Chairman Howard Dean was quite clear at the beginning of last year: '[...] under no circumstances will a Democratic Administration ever allow Iran to become a nuclear power.' One year later he called the Iran of now a greater danger than the Iraq of then. Meanwhile Clinton is making similar statements, but feels that if Bush wants to declare war on Iran he should definitely ask Congress for approval. According to Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, this isn't necessary; under pressure from the Israeli lobby she has introduced legislation ensuring that Bush doesn't have to do this. The Democrats are echoing the rhetoric of the Republican administration. Under the motto 'Don't Let the People Who Brought Us Iraq Define the Questions' Paul Pillar, 'a former national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia, [who] teaches security studies at Georgetown University' is advising first and foremost to ask the right questions, such as: 'If Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons, how would that change its behavior and affect U.S. interests? In particular, why would deterrence, which has kept nuclear peace with other adversaries, not work with Iran?'In spite of democracy, small group dictatesWith the appropriate questions not being posed, and with the Democrats having begged off and the build-up to the coming war with Iran only now in this late stage getting the full attention of the Western media, it remains as clear as ever that a small group of extremists - an elite of the elite - are once again prepared to take the world one step further on a path above which most people see only dark clouds gathering. Speaking of this small group of people who have no fear of the gathering storm and who see a shiny pot of gold at the end of it, former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski said to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: 'I am perplexed by the fact that major strategic decisions seem to be made within a very narrow circle of individuals - just a few, probably a handful, perhaps not more than the fingers on my hand. And these are the individuals, all of whom but one, who made the original decision to go to war [with Iraq], and used the original justifications to go to war.' One thing that comes to mind while listening to Brzezinski is a quote taken down by New York Times reporter Ron Suskind that came from the mouth of a White House aide: Suskind writes: 'The aide said that guys like me were ''in what we call the reality-based community,'' which he defined as people who ''believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.'' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ''That's not the way the world really works anymore,'' he continued. ''We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.''' Vanity Fair sums up this idea as it translates into the situation with Iran in a long article with a short headline: From the Wonderful Folks Who Brought You Iraq.Fundamentalist leadership in both U.S. and IranIn his testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Brzezinski underscores a view held on the role that the U.S. has played in the rise of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's star: 'Our policy has unintentionally - I hope unintentionally, maybe it was develishly clever, but I think unintentionally - helped Ahmadinejad consolidate himself in power and excercised a degree of influence which actually his position doesn't justify. Most Americans when they say president Ahmadinejad, they think he is the equivalent of president Bush, he is not, he is roughly a third level official, who doesn't even control the military resources of the country.' In comparing Bush and Ahmadinejad, investigative journalist Jim Lobe was compelled to make a side-by-side product comparison which brought him to the conclusion: Bush and Ahmadinejad: separated at birth?One of the similarities between the two leaders lies in their fundamental character. Bush's image, which along with that of the U.S. has taken a beating, is that of the democratic, Christian leader of the free world. That's why he is supported by the Moral Majority in the U.S. The same moral theme can also be seen in Dutch Prime Minister Balkenende. Upon further inspection there are a few things to take note of regarding the exacting image of both gentlemen. Balkenende preaches norms and values, but then does the opposite by refusing to publicly state the reason that The Netherlands sent soldiers to Iraq. Balkenende reconfirms the hypocritical image of fundamentalist Christians. This image is also shaped - alongside the sex abuse scandals in the Church - by George W. Bush, a man who while governor of Texas held the record for death sentences handed out, who now feels that torture is necessary, and who could be held responsible for thousands of American deaths and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi victims. And that's just to name a few. Bush is facilitated by the conservative Christian Erik Prince, director of Blackwater, the most important supplier of mercenaries for Iraq. These leaders of the Moral Majority would nevertheless be nowhere without the Silent Majority, the much more moderate sectors of the population of the U.S. and The Netherlands, for example. While the silence of the Silent Majority and the actions of the Moral Majority keep the wars coming, the conservative Christians, through their active support for Bush and Israel, seem to be eager to bring on exactly that which their guidebook - The Bible - warns against: a great battle in the Middle East which would usher in the End Times. President Ahmadinejad echoes this vision of the so-called 'End Times' held by the millions of Christians who support Bush; just like them, his view of the future is none too gloomy because he also foresees a final battle and above all redemption for mankind: 'French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy has quoted Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad as saying that one should really hope for "chaos" because "there will be God" afterward. [...] Ahmadinejad has also called for the return of al-Mahdi, a messiah-like figure in Shi'ite Islam, whose reappearance is supposed to restore justice before the end of the world', writes AFP. In this way he's on the same wavelength as the millions of readers of the Left Behind series, which foresees a miraculous catching up of all true Christian believers prior to the apocalypse. Influential Christians such as Joel Rosenberg, whose books are recommended on the Left Behind website, interpret what they read in the newspaper the same way they interpret the Bible, and see in the news the fulfillment of age-old prophecies: '[...] what is particularly curious about the emergence of an even stronger Iran-Sudan alliance this week is that it was foretold 2,500 years ago by the Hebrew Prophet Ezekiel in chapters 38 and 39'. To this statement he adds an article from Haaretz, in which it talks about how 'several Orthodox Jewish groups in Israel are currently making preparations to build and outfit the Third Temple', after which he refers to the title of chapter 13 from his book Epicenter: Future Headline: Jews build third temple in Jerusalem. In a recent contribution, Rosenberg writes: 'I've written before that 2007 is the Year of Decision. But is April about to become the "month of decision"?' How dangerous is Iran?The Iranian economy is weak, and as opposed to the U.S. and Israel, Iran has no history of initiating wars (the war with Iraq was the result of an attack by Saddam that was spurred on by the U.S.). Ahmadinejad says that he doesn't want war, and in part 14 of this series it was also shown how he was incorrectly quoted and doesn't want to wipe Israel off the map. While the U.S. is refusing offers of negotiations (1, 2) with Iran, Iran is allowing UN-inspectors to investigate their nuclear program, though they restricted their cooperation recently, and as opposed to the U.S. and Israel, Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. On the other hand Ahmadinejad did organize a conference to promote research into the Holocaust, and he might be lying about his belief that his faith forbids the production of a nuclear weapon. Depending on which cleric you ask, a nuclear weapon would actually be permitted, so long as it is not used offensively (in contrary to the U.S. view). And then there is Iran's support for Hezbollah. When it comes to the facts, there are different ways of looking at it: 'Iran's control over Hezbollah has been steadily declining since approximately 1996, during the reformist presidency of Mohammad Khatami. Money does continue to come "from Iran" to support Hezbollah, but not the Iranian government. Instead, it's private religious foundations that direct the bulk of support, primarily to Hezbollah's charitable activities. [...] the most important reason for not targeting Iran for the continued fighting in Lebanon is that this conflict is antithetical to Iran's interests. [...] If a state is needed to explain the continued existence of groups like Hezbollah, then Iran is an ideal candidate. Ergo, the connection must exist. Such claims serve to bolster the central, but fallacious, political doctrine for the Bush administration that the Global War on Terrorism really exists', writes Professor of Anthropology and Middle East Studies at Brown University, William O. Beeman, author of the book The "Great Satan" vs. the "Mad Mullahs": How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Nicholas Burns on Charlie Rose 2-23-07 (William O. Beeman)
Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs, Nicholas Burns, appeared on the Charlie Rose show on PBS on February 23, 2007. His appearance was a very revealing insight into what anthropologists call “magical thinking” on his part, and perhaps that of the State Department. The view Burns presented was that U.S. pressure on Iran was creating “cracks” in the Iranian political establishment. The “magical thinking” part of his formulation is to attribute causality to a series of irrelevant actions that have no causal force at all.
The story going around Washington, promulgated by the Bush administration, is that the December U.N. sanctions were more effective than anyone believed they would be, that they have created dissention among the leadership ranks in Iran, and that U.S. efforts to bring financial pressure on Iran has caused the power establishment in Iran to estrange itself from President Ahmadinejad.
In fact, the factional disagreement that Burns wants to take credit for far pre-dates the U.S. actions in December, or even the Presidential elections of 2005. It is as if Burns and company never heard of the reform movement, or listened to original Revolutionary Ibrahim Yazdi. Moreover, the estrangement of the Iranian leadership from President Ahmadinejad began almost instantaneously after his election.
These splits in the Iranian political scene have been growing continually. The real cause for their growth is the change in the Iranian electorate as the voting population gets younger and is more estranged from the original revolution. Certainly U.S. gunboats in the Gulf and the annoyances of silly and ineffective sanctions are going to be a topic of discussion in Iran, but there has been absolutely no sea change in Iranian political life, only a steady growth in divergence of opinion over a much longer period.
These long-term divisions in Iranian political life may seem to have appeared suddenly, but not because they didn’t exist before, but rather because the United States has so long presented Iran as a monolithic dictatorship where no political dissent is possible, and where elections are not “real.” When the truth about the growing diversity of Iranian political thought becomes undeniable, the impression is created that something the U.S. did brought it about.
Mr. Burns and his boss, Condoleezza Rice can delude themselves, and perhaps the American public into thinking that they are creating some kind of cataclysm in Iran through their ineffective diplomacy, but their posturing is simply laughable to anyone who follows Iranian politics with any care.
The real breakthrough will come when the United States decides to pursue mature diplomatic efforts with Iran, and stop demanding preconditions for talking to Tehran that they know Iran will always refuse. The canard that it is the Iranians are refusing to talk to the U.S, which Mr. Burns put forward once again in his appearance, is an absurdity given the numerous overtures made by Iran over the years that have been systematically ignored by the Bush administration.
The story going around Washington, promulgated by the Bush administration, is that the December U.N. sanctions were more effective than anyone believed they would be, that they have created dissention among the leadership ranks in Iran, and that U.S. efforts to bring financial pressure on Iran has caused the power establishment in Iran to estrange itself from President Ahmadinejad.
In fact, the factional disagreement that Burns wants to take credit for far pre-dates the U.S. actions in December, or even the Presidential elections of 2005. It is as if Burns and company never heard of the reform movement, or listened to original Revolutionary Ibrahim Yazdi. Moreover, the estrangement of the Iranian leadership from President Ahmadinejad began almost instantaneously after his election.
These splits in the Iranian political scene have been growing continually. The real cause for their growth is the change in the Iranian electorate as the voting population gets younger and is more estranged from the original revolution. Certainly U.S. gunboats in the Gulf and the annoyances of silly and ineffective sanctions are going to be a topic of discussion in Iran, but there has been absolutely no sea change in Iranian political life, only a steady growth in divergence of opinion over a much longer period.
These long-term divisions in Iranian political life may seem to have appeared suddenly, but not because they didn’t exist before, but rather because the United States has so long presented Iran as a monolithic dictatorship where no political dissent is possible, and where elections are not “real.” When the truth about the growing diversity of Iranian political thought becomes undeniable, the impression is created that something the U.S. did brought it about.
Mr. Burns and his boss, Condoleezza Rice can delude themselves, and perhaps the American public into thinking that they are creating some kind of cataclysm in Iran through their ineffective diplomacy, but their posturing is simply laughable to anyone who follows Iranian politics with any care.
The real breakthrough will come when the United States decides to pursue mature diplomatic efforts with Iran, and stop demanding preconditions for talking to Tehran that they know Iran will always refuse. The canard that it is the Iranians are refusing to talk to the U.S, which Mr. Burns put forward once again in his appearance, is an absurdity given the numerous overtures made by Iran over the years that have been systematically ignored by the Bush administration.
Monday, January 15, 2007
The Forward--Iranian Jews Reject Outside Calls To Leave Push From Israel, U.S. Groups Falls Flat Despite Ahmadinejad--Marc Perelman
Iranian Jews Reject Outside Calls To Leave Push From Israel, U.S. Groups Falls Flat Despite Ahmadinejad
Marc Perelman Fri. Jan 12, 2007
A campaign to convince Iran’s 25,000 Jews to flee the country has stalled, with most opting to stay in their native homeland despite President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust denial and anti-Israeli speeches.
In recent months, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, Israeli officials and some American Jewish communal leaders have urged Iranian Jews to leave. But so far, despite generally being allowed to travel to Israel and emigrate abroad, Iranian Jews have stayed put.
According to the statistics compiled by HIAS, 152 out of 25,000 Jews left Iran between October 2005 and September 2006 — down from 297 during the same period the previous year, and 183 the year before. Sources said that the majority of those who have left in recent years cited economic and family reasons as their main incentive for leaving, rather than political concerns.
At the same time, HIAS workers in Vienna have detected a substantial increase in the number of Iranian refugees from other minority faiths, including Bahais.
Since the August 2005 election of Ahmadinejad, a conservative firebrand, the fate of Iranian Jewry has become part of a broader diplomatic game between Teheran, Washington and Jerusalem.
Ahmadinejad has repeatedly used rabid anti-Israeli rhetoric, threatening to wipe Israel off the map, and has questioned over and over again the number of Jews killed in the Holocaust. Tehran recently hosted a conference to “assess” the Holocaust, and last year a leading daily newspaper held a contest soliciting Holocaust cartoons as a response to the uproar caused by a Danish caricature contest of Prophet Muhammad.
At times, as international tensions mounted over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, staunch opponents of the mullah regime have launched accusations of religious and ethnic discrimination against Iran in an effort to depict the country as a pariah state.
HIAS declined to comment on its efforts to promote emigration, but some observers claim that the main reason Iranian Jews have chosen to stay is that they are, for the most part, free to practice their faith. “Iranian Jews have a comfortable Jewish life,” said Meir Javedanfar, an Iranian-born Middle East analyst now living in Israel.
At a time when Tehran and Jerusalem trade barbs and threats, the 25,000 Jews of Tehran, Shiraz and Yazd attend packed synagogues, send their children to Jewish schools, buy their meat in kosher butchers and are even exempt from prohibitions on alcohol. This modus vivendi is the result of a compact between the leadership of the Jewish community and the Iranian authorities, whereby Jews are permitted to practice their faith as a community on the condition that they remain out of politics and do not speak out in favor of Israel.
Some Iranian expatriates dispute the assertion that Jews are staying because conditions are good. Sam Kermanian, secretary general of the Los Angeles-based Iranian American Jewish Federation, asserted that the majority of Jews remaining in Iran are elderly and only speak Persian, and are naturally less inclined to emigrate.
In the early days after the Islamic revolution in 1979, several Jews were executed on charges of Zionism and relations with Israel. About 80% of the community left the country in which Jews had lived for nearly 3,000 years as descendants of slaves from Babylon saved by Cyrus the Great and enjoyed a “golden age” during the 1960s and ’70s under the Shah.
The situation for Jews improved in the years after the revolution, and Judaism is one of the recognized minority religions in Iran. Jews, Zoroastrians and Christians have rights enshrined in the Islamic constitution, and they each elect their own member of parliament and are entitled to worship freely but not to proselytize.
The State Department’s religious freedom reports have noted that the Jewish community in Iran is closely monitored by the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance and by the Ministry of Intelligence and Security. In other words, Jews, like other minorities, face discrimination because of the inherently Islamic nature of the regime, which prevents them, for instance, from securing government jobs or becoming army officers.
Seven years ago, a group of 13 Orthodox Jews in the southern city of Shiraz were accused of spying for Israel. The case prompted an international outcry that led to the eventual release of the Jewish prisoners after years of quiet diplomacy.
Some criticism of the regime has proved to be unfounded. A few months ago, several conservative media outlets in Canada and the United States published reports claiming that the Iranian government had approved legislation requiring religious minorities to wear a distinctive sign, invoking charged memories from World War II. The reports turned out to be wrong.
“Some people are trying to use the climate created by Ahmadinejad and the nuke issue,” said William Beeman, an Iran expert and professor of anthropology at the University of Minnesota. “But Iranian Jews have a fairly vibrant communal life, and they can even criticize the regime within the constraints of the Islamic regime.”
Both Maurice Motamed, the Jewish member of the Iranian parliament, and Haroun Yeshaya, longtime chairman of the Jewish Central Committee of Tehran, who have regularly criticized Israel, nevertheless publicly condemned the president’s views, the latter in an unusual letter to Ahmadinejad, sent in February 2006.
Kermanian, of the L.A.-based Iranian Jewish federation, said that “given the situation and the current climate, some Jews there will say things are not too bad, but the totality of the picture is negative.” He said that the recent uptick in antisemitic propaganda in books and the media had stoked fears within the Jewish community in Iran.
The regime’s anti-Zionist propaganda has at times provoked antisemitic incidents. Last summer, a hard-line weekly newspaper, Yalesarat, published photographs of people waving Israeli flags in synagogues to celebrate Israeli Independence Day. The paper falsely asserted that the synagogues were in Iran, prompting an assault on two synagogues. Motamed, the Jewish parliamentarian, described the vandals as “opportunists” in comments to the BBC, and said that the incident was defused by the Iranian security forces.
Several times in recent years, Jewish burial areas were overtaken by local authorities for urban development purposes. A Western diplomat said that while antisemitic intentions played a part in the incidents, another factor was that, in general, burial places are less sacred for Shia Muslims than they are for Jews.
For all his inflammatory rhetoric, Ahmadinejad has been careful not to single out Iran’s Jews, and his office even donated money to Tehran’s Jewish hospital.
“The government goes to extra lengths to differentiate between the government of Israel, with whom they have fundamental issues, and the Jewish people, especially Iranian Jews,” said Amir Cyrus Razzaghi, a Tehran-based commentator who is not Jewish. “There is a genuine interest to keep the Jewish community in Iran to demonstrate to the world that the government is anti-Israel and not anti-Jewish. This is especially important to a government that strives to be not only the leader in the Islamic world, but also a key regional and global player.”
The result is the only Jewish community living under an avowedly Islamic regime. In Tehran, where the majority of the community lives, there are six kosher butchers and about 30 synagogues. In addition, there is the Jewish hospital, which has a Jewish director and is funded by donations from the Diaspora, though the vast majority of its staff and patients are Muslim.
Children attend Jewish schools where they are taught Hebrew and receive religious training. All principals are Muslim, the schools do not close on the Sabbath and the curriculum is supervised by the government.
While Jews are allowed to obtain passports and visas to leave Iran, they have to submit their requests to a special section of the passport office and there are restrictions on families leaving en masse. Iranian Jews travel to and from Israel via a third country with the full knowledge of the authorities. Both sides had kept quiet about such journeys, but recently acknowledged them.
“It might seem strange,” said Javedanfar, the Israel-based expert, “but they can travel to Israel and other places, come back [to Iran] and have a comfortable Jewish life, as long as they keep quiet about Israel.”
Fri. Jan 12, 2007
Marc Perelman Fri. Jan 12, 2007
A campaign to convince Iran’s 25,000 Jews to flee the country has stalled, with most opting to stay in their native homeland despite President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust denial and anti-Israeli speeches.
In recent months, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, Israeli officials and some American Jewish communal leaders have urged Iranian Jews to leave. But so far, despite generally being allowed to travel to Israel and emigrate abroad, Iranian Jews have stayed put.
According to the statistics compiled by HIAS, 152 out of 25,000 Jews left Iran between October 2005 and September 2006 — down from 297 during the same period the previous year, and 183 the year before. Sources said that the majority of those who have left in recent years cited economic and family reasons as their main incentive for leaving, rather than political concerns.
At the same time, HIAS workers in Vienna have detected a substantial increase in the number of Iranian refugees from other minority faiths, including Bahais.
Since the August 2005 election of Ahmadinejad, a conservative firebrand, the fate of Iranian Jewry has become part of a broader diplomatic game between Teheran, Washington and Jerusalem.
Ahmadinejad has repeatedly used rabid anti-Israeli rhetoric, threatening to wipe Israel off the map, and has questioned over and over again the number of Jews killed in the Holocaust. Tehran recently hosted a conference to “assess” the Holocaust, and last year a leading daily newspaper held a contest soliciting Holocaust cartoons as a response to the uproar caused by a Danish caricature contest of Prophet Muhammad.
At times, as international tensions mounted over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions, staunch opponents of the mullah regime have launched accusations of religious and ethnic discrimination against Iran in an effort to depict the country as a pariah state.
HIAS declined to comment on its efforts to promote emigration, but some observers claim that the main reason Iranian Jews have chosen to stay is that they are, for the most part, free to practice their faith. “Iranian Jews have a comfortable Jewish life,” said Meir Javedanfar, an Iranian-born Middle East analyst now living in Israel.
At a time when Tehran and Jerusalem trade barbs and threats, the 25,000 Jews of Tehran, Shiraz and Yazd attend packed synagogues, send their children to Jewish schools, buy their meat in kosher butchers and are even exempt from prohibitions on alcohol. This modus vivendi is the result of a compact between the leadership of the Jewish community and the Iranian authorities, whereby Jews are permitted to practice their faith as a community on the condition that they remain out of politics and do not speak out in favor of Israel.
Some Iranian expatriates dispute the assertion that Jews are staying because conditions are good. Sam Kermanian, secretary general of the Los Angeles-based Iranian American Jewish Federation, asserted that the majority of Jews remaining in Iran are elderly and only speak Persian, and are naturally less inclined to emigrate.
In the early days after the Islamic revolution in 1979, several Jews were executed on charges of Zionism and relations with Israel. About 80% of the community left the country in which Jews had lived for nearly 3,000 years as descendants of slaves from Babylon saved by Cyrus the Great and enjoyed a “golden age” during the 1960s and ’70s under the Shah.
The situation for Jews improved in the years after the revolution, and Judaism is one of the recognized minority religions in Iran. Jews, Zoroastrians and Christians have rights enshrined in the Islamic constitution, and they each elect their own member of parliament and are entitled to worship freely but not to proselytize.
The State Department’s religious freedom reports have noted that the Jewish community in Iran is closely monitored by the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance and by the Ministry of Intelligence and Security. In other words, Jews, like other minorities, face discrimination because of the inherently Islamic nature of the regime, which prevents them, for instance, from securing government jobs or becoming army officers.
Seven years ago, a group of 13 Orthodox Jews in the southern city of Shiraz were accused of spying for Israel. The case prompted an international outcry that led to the eventual release of the Jewish prisoners after years of quiet diplomacy.
Some criticism of the regime has proved to be unfounded. A few months ago, several conservative media outlets in Canada and the United States published reports claiming that the Iranian government had approved legislation requiring religious minorities to wear a distinctive sign, invoking charged memories from World War II. The reports turned out to be wrong.
“Some people are trying to use the climate created by Ahmadinejad and the nuke issue,” said William Beeman, an Iran expert and professor of anthropology at the University of Minnesota. “But Iranian Jews have a fairly vibrant communal life, and they can even criticize the regime within the constraints of the Islamic regime.”
Both Maurice Motamed, the Jewish member of the Iranian parliament, and Haroun Yeshaya, longtime chairman of the Jewish Central Committee of Tehran, who have regularly criticized Israel, nevertheless publicly condemned the president’s views, the latter in an unusual letter to Ahmadinejad, sent in February 2006.
Kermanian, of the L.A.-based Iranian Jewish federation, said that “given the situation and the current climate, some Jews there will say things are not too bad, but the totality of the picture is negative.” He said that the recent uptick in antisemitic propaganda in books and the media had stoked fears within the Jewish community in Iran.
The regime’s anti-Zionist propaganda has at times provoked antisemitic incidents. Last summer, a hard-line weekly newspaper, Yalesarat, published photographs of people waving Israeli flags in synagogues to celebrate Israeli Independence Day. The paper falsely asserted that the synagogues were in Iran, prompting an assault on two synagogues. Motamed, the Jewish parliamentarian, described the vandals as “opportunists” in comments to the BBC, and said that the incident was defused by the Iranian security forces.
Several times in recent years, Jewish burial areas were overtaken by local authorities for urban development purposes. A Western diplomat said that while antisemitic intentions played a part in the incidents, another factor was that, in general, burial places are less sacred for Shia Muslims than they are for Jews.
For all his inflammatory rhetoric, Ahmadinejad has been careful not to single out Iran’s Jews, and his office even donated money to Tehran’s Jewish hospital.
“The government goes to extra lengths to differentiate between the government of Israel, with whom they have fundamental issues, and the Jewish people, especially Iranian Jews,” said Amir Cyrus Razzaghi, a Tehran-based commentator who is not Jewish. “There is a genuine interest to keep the Jewish community in Iran to demonstrate to the world that the government is anti-Israel and not anti-Jewish. This is especially important to a government that strives to be not only the leader in the Islamic world, but also a key regional and global player.”
The result is the only Jewish community living under an avowedly Islamic regime. In Tehran, where the majority of the community lives, there are six kosher butchers and about 30 synagogues. In addition, there is the Jewish hospital, which has a Jewish director and is funded by donations from the Diaspora, though the vast majority of its staff and patients are Muslim.
Children attend Jewish schools where they are taught Hebrew and receive religious training. All principals are Muslim, the schools do not close on the Sabbath and the curriculum is supervised by the government.
While Jews are allowed to obtain passports and visas to leave Iran, they have to submit their requests to a special section of the passport office and there are restrictions on families leaving en masse. Iranian Jews travel to and from Israel via a third country with the full knowledge of the authorities. Both sides had kept quiet about such journeys, but recently acknowledged them.
“It might seem strange,” said Javedanfar, the Israel-based expert, “but they can travel to Israel and other places, come back [to Iran] and have a comfortable Jewish life, as long as they keep quiet about Israel.”
Fri. Jan 12, 2007
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