Here's to you, Condoleezza Rice

By Laila El-Haddad

"Firstly, a blessed and joyous Ramadan to everyone. I only wish it was so joyous an occasion for my friends and family in Gaza.

Today Israel officially announced Hamas a "hostile entity" (although that sort of had me confused-is this to say they were of "friendly entity" status before??). And made the decision to cut fuel and electricity, once again.

But fear not, country folk. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice confirmed reassuringly that the U.S. "would not abandon the innocent Palestinians". Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni also said that Israel will continue to supply Gaza's humanitarian needs, just not "all the needs that are more than the humanitarian".

... except for fuel. Oh, and electricity. So don't worry, people of Gaza, you won't starve (remember: you are on a diet). You will get to eat your (cold) Ramadan iftars,-only in the dark, and of course no water to wash down that meal (or your clothes, for that matter) since the pumps are driven by electricity. And no gas to heat your food or houses with come winter. And you'll have to consume what you get quickly, since the refrigerators (both yours and the supermarket's) won't work without power. And don't even THINK about getting sick-prevention is your best insurance policy now. Hospital ICUs will have to be powered by generators. Kidney dialysis? Start writing a will. Baby formula? Breastfeed. Vaccinations? Stay home from school.

"Civilian levers" is what the Israeli cabinet has mockingly decided to call these "measures" of collective punishment. No doubt this sick euphemism was the brain-child of the ever-reliable Dov Weisglass, of "the Gaza diet" fame.

And remember, you are the "innocent Palestinians" stuck in the middle of all of this.

Now how about some thank you notes to Condi? Its Ramadan, after all, the month of mercy, forgiveness and thanks."

While the Stooge Abbas Was Cheering for Israel: UN chief: Cutting off fuel to Gaza is violation of international law

"United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged Israel on Wednesday to
reconsider its decision to declare the Gaza Strip an enemy entity, warning that any cutoff of vital services would violate international law and punish the already suffering civilian population.

In one of his toughest statements aimed at Israel since taking the reins of the UN on January 1, Ban said he was very concerned at the Israeli government's declaration earlier Wednesday and its announced intent to interrupt essential services such as electricity and fuel to the civilian population.

"Such a step would be contrary to Israel's obligations towards the civilian population under international humanitarian and human rights law," he said.

"I call for Israel to reconsider this decision," the secretary-general said in a statement read by UN spokeswoman Michele Montas......"

Bush, Congress at record low ratings: Reuters poll

"WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush and the U.S. Congress registered record-low approval ratings in a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday, and a new monthly index measuring the mood of Americans dipped slightly on deepening worries about the economy.

Only 29 percent of Americans gave Bush a positive grade for his job performance, below his worst Zogby poll mark of 30 percent in March. A paltry 11 percent rated Congress positively, beating the previous low of 14 percent in July....."

Car bomb rips through Beirut suburb, MP killed

Al-Manar Special - Hanan Awarekeh

"19/09/2007 Lebanese MP Antoine Ghanem was killed in a car bomb in eastern suburb of Beirut on Wednesday, a senior official of his Phalange party told AFP.

"The blast targeted a deputy's car and several names were raised including that of MP Antoine Ghanem," the spokesman said.
The car bomb ripped through the Lebanese capital on Wednesday, an attack that killed a number of people and injured others.
"The blast was caused by a car bomb that claimed numerous victims," said a police official who did not want to be named.
Lebanese television footage showed several cars on fire on a street of the Sin el-Fil neighborhood as well as traces of blood on the street. It said at least four people had been killed and an unknown number of injured. "

Checkbook Imperialism: The Blackwater Fiasco

By Robert Scheer

"Please, please, I tell myself, leave Orwell out of it. Find some other, fresher way to explain why “Operation Iraqi Freedom” is dependent upon killer mercenaries. Or why the “democratically elected government” of “liberated” Iraq does not explicitly have the legal power to expel Blackwater USA from its land or hold any of the 50,000 private contractor troops that the U.S. government has brought to Iraq accountable for their deadly actions.

Were there even the faintest trace of Iraqi independence rising from the ashes of this failed American imperialist venture, Blackwater would have to fold its tents and go, if only in the interest of keeping up appearances. After all, the Iraqi Interior Ministry claimed that the Blackwater thugs guarding a U.S. State Department convoy through the streets of Baghdad fired “randomly at citizens” in a crowded square on Sunday, killing 11 people and wounding 13 others. So the Iraqi government has ordered Blackwater to leave the country after what a government spokesman called a “flagrant assault ... on Iraqi citizens.”

But who told those Iraqi officials that they have the power to control anything regarding the 182,000 privately contracted personnel working for the U.S. in Iraq? Don’t they know about Order 17......"

Iran warns it could bomb Israel if attacked

Al-Manar

"19/09/2007 Iran has drawn up a plan that could see it bomb Israel if the Jewish state launched a military attack against the Islamic republic, the Fars news agency quoted a top air force commander as saying on Wednesday.
"We have come up with a plan that in the event of possible foolishness by this regime, Iranian bombers can carry out an attack in retaliation against Israeli soil," said deputy air force commander Mohammad Alavi.
"In addition to our missiles, whose range covers the whole soil of this regime, we can attack them with our fighter jets and respond to any attack - an unlikely event - with an air attack on their soil," he said.
"This plan is not an empty threat because everything we do is based on planning. So Israel should remove any foolishness from its head.""

انباء عن اصابة النائب انطوان غانم في انفجار سن الفيل

قناة المنار - محمد عبد الله /

"19/09/2007 سقط اربعة قتلى واصيب عدد اخر بجراح جراء الانفجار الكبير الذي وقع بعد ظهر اليوم الاربعاء في منطقة سن الفيل شرقي العاصمة اللبنانية بيروت. وتحدث الانباء الاولية عن اصابة النائب في البرلمان اللبناني انطوان غانم وذلك في الانفجار الذي وقع بين مستديرتي الصالومي والحايك التي يقع فيها حرش ثابت.
وبثت محطات التلفزة المحلية صور سيارات تحترق واضراراً كبيرة في الابنية السكنية في منطقة حرش ثابت حيث بدا حجم الانفجار كبيراً.
الوكالة الوطنية للاعلام ذكرت ان الانفجار استهدف سيارة النائب انطوان غانم وهي من نوع شفروليه سوداء اللون في داخل صندوقها لوحة زرقاء تحمل الرقم 133. ولم يعرف بعد ما اذا كان النائب غانم بداخلها. وافاد الصليب الاحمر اللبناني عن سقوط 4 شهداء وعدد من الجرحى.
يذكر ان اخر انفجار شهدته بيروت دوى في حزيران/يونيو الماضي واودى بحياة النائب وليد عيدو."

BREAKING NEWS

At least five people killed, 20 more injured in Beirut car bomb

A.P.

"At least five people were killed and another 20 wounded on Wednesday when a car bomb exploded in a Christian suburb east of the Lebanese capital of Beirut.

Anti-Syrian MP Antoine Ghanem was wounded in the attack. Security sources said earlier that the explosion had targeted a politician.

The explosion occurred in the Sin el-Fil district, but the cause was not immediately known. Television footage showed severe damage in nearby buildings and several cars on fire. The blast sent a cloud of gray smoke over the area.

The area houses the home of former Lebanese President Amin Gemayeh, whose son, Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel, was shot dead in November.

Antoine Ghanem is a member of parliament belonging to the Christian Phalange party, the same party which assassinated Gemayel belonged to. "

America's Sampson option

Another Good Piece
From Missing Links

"......I call attention to this not just as an illustration of how irrelevant and contemptible American discussions can be in the Arab and Islamic worlds. There is also an analytical interest. Naaman discusses in an op-ed this morning in Al-Quds al-Arabi a novel interpretation of the recent saber-rattling, namely that in addition to the obvious targets of attempted intimidation, namely Iran and Syria and their allies, it is quite likely the creation of an atmosphere of menace is also designed to keep the supposedly pro-American cohorts from deviating from the American line, as they clearly show signs of doing, by intimating that their failure to help America rack up political gains could result in nothing less than war.....

Similarly, Washington is exasperated by the backsliding not only of Abbas, but of the Saudi King and also Mubarak, who are insisting on some tangible concession from Israel in exchange for going along with the charade of a November "peace conference" with Bush and Olmert in Washington. Here too, says Naaman:

we can say that the American campaign of intimidation and fear is designed to convince Abbas and Abdulaziz and Mubarak that there are more serious challenges that require being faced up to, and this requires putting first things first [meaning the Iran-Syria threat is more important than this question of concessions from Olmert on Palestine]......

It is an interesting argument, suggesting that the Bush administration is adopting a modification of what the Al-Quds editorialist sometimes refers to as the "Sampson option", namely pulling down the pillars of the temple over the heads of everyone, as a last resort. One problem for the Americans being that this isn't really a modification of the Sampson option, it is the real thing. Because it isn't only the Arab region that will be devastated if this strategy goes forward."

Diplomacy With Teeth! Rice swipes at IAEA, urges bold action on Iran

"SHANNON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice scolded the U.N.'s atomic watchdog agency on Wednesday over its Iran strategy and called for diplomacy with "teeth" to end Tehran's nuclear plans.

While repeating the U.S. stand that "all options" remained on the table -- a reference to military action against Tehran -- Rice sought to ease fresh concerns over talk of war.

"The diplomatic track can work but it has to work both with a set of incentives and a set of teeth," she said.

The United States has criticized a deal International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei has made with Iran to answer long-standing questions about its nuclear activities......"

Current Al-Jazeera (Arabic) Online Poll

The question is:

Do you believe that the upcoming peace conference will be a serious step towards a settlement?

With about 1,000 responding so far (it is early), 96% said no.

Crude Spills Into Tigris After Iraq Pipeline Bombing
(Courtesy of Antiwar.com)

The Mirage of 'Victory'

America's real war aims in Iraq

By Justin Raimondo

"......As I have been saying for months – or is that years? – our real war aims have nothing to do with stability, democracy, or finding "weapons of mass destruction" that never existed in any case. Our goal has always been to plunge the Arab and Muslim nations of the Middle East into chaos, the better to move in, take control, and ensure the two main objectives of our foreign policy: access to oil, and security for a Greater Israel. A stable Iraq makes achieving these two goals more unlikely, while the U.S. occupation of Iraq – extended into the indefinite future – gives us many more options, including the option to extend the war beyond Iraq's borders – which has been our real goal all along."

It depends who is doing the torturing

By Amira Hass

".......In reality, however, the legitimacy of the PA leadership stems from its compliance with the U.S. standard for an acceptable Arab regime. Ignoring the PA's campaigns of repression is a repetition of past mistakes. It means a denial of the fact that Hamas has won its popularity not because of its religious-political vision, and that the dual reason for its victory at the polls has not disappeared: The PLO failed in the negotiations to achieve political independence; at the same time, its internal administration is tainted by a lack of caring for its people and by seeing mainly to the interests of a limited stratum of society. This stratum owes its comfortable status to the adherence to a tactic of failed negotiations with Israel, over a non-solution. "

By Tom Toles

A real success story in the US's Iraq: Iran

By Peter Galbraith
Asia Times

(This essay appears in the October 11 issue of the New York Review of Books and is posted with the permission of the editors of that magazine.)

A Long, Good Essay

"......Muqtada has made Iraqi nationalism his political platform. He has attacked the SIIC for its pro-Iranian leanings and challenged Iraq's most important religious figure, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, himself an Iranian citizen. Asked about charges that Iran was organizing Iraqi insurgents, Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told The Financial Times on May 10, "The whole idea is unreasonable. Why should we do that? Why should we undermine a government in Iraq that we support more than anybody else?"

The US cannot now undo Bush's strategic gift to Iran. But importantly, the most pro-Iranian Shi'ite political party is the one least hostile to the US. In the battle now under way between the SIIC and Muqtada for control of southern Iraq and of the central government in Baghdad, the US and Iran are on the same side. The US has good reason to worry about Iran's activities in Iraq. But contrary to the Bush administration's allegations - supported by both General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker in their recent congressional testimony - Iran does not oppose Iraq's new political order. In fact, Iran is the major beneficiary of the US-induced changes in Iraq since 2003."

Saudis quietly go about 'business' in Iraq

By Dahr Jamail
Asia Times

".....The great irony is that while these accusations toward Tehran are supported by thin evidence, plenty of evidence does exist that another of Iraq's neighbors, US ally Saudi Arabia, is supporting resistance groups in Iraq, and intends to continue to do so.

A neighborly mess: Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia

"Saudi Arabia has both the means and the religious responsibility to intervene" in Iraq, wrote Nawaf Obaid, neo-conservative ally and a former security adviser to the Saudi government, in a shockingly frank editorial for the Washington Post last November.

He warned the Bush administration, sinking ever deeper into the quagmire of Iraq: "America must not ignore the counsel of Prince Turki al-Faisal, Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States. If it does, one of the first consequences will be massive Saudi intervention to stop Iranian-backed Shi'ite militias from butchering Iraqi Sunnis."

Obaid's warning, in response to talk of a possible US withdrawal from Iraq, noted the current Saudi political stance of "I am my brother's keeper" toward fellow Sunni Arabs in Iraq. Clearly, the Saudis do not consider all Iraqis their brothers, particularly the Shi'ites......."

Neo-cons have Syria in their sights

By Khody Akhavi
Asia Times

".....For neo-conservatives in the United Sates, though, this is an opportunity to re-ignite political debate that fits neatly with the infamous cast of the "axis of evil": Syria has long been designated as a junior partner in the "reign of terror" of Iran, North Korea and the erstwhile Iraq......

"Once again, this appears to be the work of a small group of officials leaking cherry-picked, unvetted 'intelligence' to key reporters in order to promote a pre-existing political agenda. If this sounds like the run-up to the war in Iraq, it should. This time it appears aimed at derailing the US-North Korean agreement that administration hardliners think is appeasement. Some Israelis want to thwart any dialogue between the US and Syria," said Cirincione, who previously served as director for non-proliferation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace......

Experts are still unsure of what that intelligence entails, and whether is it "nuclear", "non-conventional", "chemical" or nothing of the sort. Regardless, in most of the narratives, the North Korea connection remains a salient point......"

By Steve Bell, The Guardian

Israel's Agenda For Ethnic Cleansing and Transfer

By VICTORIA BUCH
CounterPunch

"......I believe that the final objective of our rulers is to set the stage for the second Naqba. Otherwise what is the point of the endless goading of Palestinians into violence? Any minimally thoughtful person understands that the Israeli policies in the Occupied Territories will lead to an eventual paroxysm of violence. Do not tell me that our leaders never thought about it. Granted, amongst them there are total opportunists who do not care about anything except staying in power. But somebody is pushing the ethnic cleansing forward. Sharon was the foremost among them, but judging from the well organized continuation, his associates are fully operational and in business. These people are actually looking forward to the violence. They have their eyes on the real-estate prize - the West Bank. A paroxysm of violence would enable the State of Israel to annex the West Bank - the entire West Bank, that is, while getting rid of most of Palestinian inhabitants. Just like in 1948. This is, in my view, the envisaged end-game. Where do they propose to expel the Palestinians? Jordan? The Gaza Strip? Syria? I do not know......."