Why the surprise? Has anyone looked at the Saudi flag? The green flag of Saudi Arabia is actually the flag of the Wahabbi movement. I wonder who the sword is for?
The Limits of Bad Policy
The Bush administration relearns the fact that Saudi Arabia is not a 'moderate' state.
Sunday, April 1, 2007; Page B06
SEVERAL MONTHS ago the Bush administration abruptly embraced a new strategy in the Middle East based on aligning "mainstream" Sunni Arab states against Iran and its "extremist" allies, coupled with a renewal of the Arab-Israeli peace process. Last week it began to run up against the predictable limits of that poorly conceived policy. At an Arab summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia orchestrated the reissuance of a five-year-old initiative offering Israel normal relations if it retreated to its 1967 borders and settled with its neighbors, but the Saudis refused either to amend the plan or to embrace the idea of participating in direct negotiations with Israel. Meanwhile, Saudi King Abdullah delivered a speech that condemned the "illegitimate foreign occupation of Iraq" -- a direct rebuff of the Bush administration's attempt to obtain full Arab recognition and support for the Shiite-led government in Baghdad.
The Arab summit followed several days of shuttle diplomacy by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Israel and the West Bank, during which Israel resisted her attempt to start talks on a final settlement with Palestinians. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert won't conduct those negotiations because the newly formed Palestinian "unity" government -- brokered by Saudi Arabia -- does not recognize Israel's right to exist. Mr. Olmert did express eagerness to begin contacts with the Saudis -- but the Saudis say they won't engage with Israel until after it settles with both the Palestinians and Syria. Only one slim concession to U.S. appeals emerged from the Arab summit: the creation of a diplomatic mechanism under which states that already recognize Israel would meet with its diplomats to discuss the Arab initiative.
The Bush administration imagined that the United States and Saudi Arabia, along with fellow Sunni autocracies such as Egypt and Jordan, shared common interests in containing Iran, stabilizing Iraq, defending the Lebanese government and settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. What's becoming clear is that the Arab rulers see these issues very differently than Washington. The Saudi government's strategy has aimed at detaching the Palestinian Hamas movement from Iranian tutelage but not from its rejection of Israel. Last week King Abdullah graciously welcomed another Iranian ally, Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, to Riyadh, even though Syria has not ended its troublemaking in Iraq and Lebanon.
What the administration is discovering is something that it once loudly said it understood -- that attempting to achieve U.S. strategic ends through partnerships with Arab autocracies yields mixed results, at best, in the short term and is cancerous in the longer run. To facilitate its new policy, the administration has all but dropped efforts to press Egypt to liberalize its political system and abandoned even the pretense of seeking change in Saudi Arabia, which continues to export its extremist version of Islam. When she first unveiled the new strategy, Ms. Rice described the Arab alliance against Iran as one of "moderates." She shouldn't have been surprised to find last week that in terms of America's fundamental interests, Middle Eastern dictators are neither moderates nor good allies.
"The Arab summit followed several days of shuttle diplomacy by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Israel and the West Bank, during which Israel resisted her attempt to start talks on a final settlement with Palestinians.
ReplyDeletePrime Minister Ehud Olmert won't conduct those negotiations because the newly formed Palestinian "unity" government
-- brokered by Saudi Arabia
-- does not recognize Israel's right to exist. "
---
Picky, picky, picky.
GD Jooos
No wonder the Jooos weren't invited:
How can you get anything done for Allah, w/people who insist on their right to exist?
(even the liberals)
ReplyDelete...Much to Condi's dismay.
Condi liked the ring of
ReplyDelete"final settlement"
Reminded her of the glory days of Albright's dad, and the
"Final Solution"
Who woulda thot the WaPo would have higher moral standards than the GWB Administration.
ReplyDeleteTo put stock in a WaPo editorial, are we fools? Don't we know that the WaPo has its' own agenda that is not one of subservience to Wahhabists, as is the new Bush Doctrine.
ReplyDeleteThey do not promote turning over the Golan to the Syrians, the right of return for ALL Palistinians to their Homeland, and the funding of Hamas by US taxpayers. Dirty dogs at the WaPo, treasonous apes that they are.
They fail to see that we are at the edge of a new day, the dawning of the newest Age of aQuarius.
When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars
This is the dawning of the Age of aQuarius
The Age of aQuarius
aQuarius! aQuarius!
Harmony and understanding
Sympathy and trust abounding
No more falsehoods or derisions
Golden living dreams of visions
Mystic crystal revelation
And the mind's true liberation
aQuarius! aQuarius!
All hail the calls for Reconciliation:
Harmony and understanding
Sympathy and trust abounding
No more falsehoods or derisions
Golden living dreams of visions
Mystic crystal revelation
And the mind's true liberation
aQuarius! aQuarius!
The Associated Press
ReplyDeleteSunday, April 1, 2007; 10:21 AM
TEHRAN, Iran -- About 200 students threw rocks and firecrackers at the British Embassy on Sunday, calling for the expulsion of the country's ambassador because of the standoff over Iran's capture of 15 British sailors and marines.
Several dozen policemen prevented the protesters from entering the embassy compound, although a few briefly scaled a fence outside the compound's walls before being pushed back, according to an Associated Press reporter at the scene.
...
A British Foreign Office spokeswoman in London, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with government rules, said diplomats were working normally inside the embassy.
"There is a police presence outside and there is no risk to those inside," said the spokeswoman.
...
Transport Minister Douglas Alexander said Britain was engaged in "exploring the potential for dialogue with the Iranians."
"The responsible way forward is to continue the often unglamorous, but important and quiet diplomatic work to get our personnel home," Alexander told the British Broadcasting Corp.'s Sunday AM program.
British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett appeared to soften rhetoric against Iran Saturday _ though she stopped far short of the apology sought by many in Iran.
...
"I think everyone regrets that this position has arisen," Beckett said in Bremen, Germany, before returning to England. "What we want is a way out of it."
It's the Age of aQuarius
aQuarius! aQuarius!
Harmony and understanding
Sympathy and trust abounding
No more falsehoods or derisions
Golden living dreams of visions
Mystic crystal revelation
And the mind's true liberation
aQuarius! aQuarius!
Show US the path to Reconciliation!
RAMALLAH, West Bank: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday called on Israel "to take constructive steps" in response to a new Arab peace initiative.
ReplyDeleteThe Arab League last week relaunched a dormant 2002 Saudi plan offering peace with Israel in exchange for a full withdrawal from lands captured in the 1967 Mideast War. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has hailed the plan as a "revolutionary change" but expressed reservations as well.
"I call on the Israeli government to take constructive steps to answer the peace initiative put forward by Arab countries," Abbas said at a news conference with visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is the current EU president.
Standing next to Abbas, Merkel welcomed the Arab initiative, but said it was not a final plan.
"It's clear when you negotiate, that you have to talk to each other, and often the opening position is not the final position, but that you have to find a compromise. Many Arab countries now show a sense of responsibility. I feel there is good will on both sides. What is necessary is to build trust," she said, before calling for Palestinian militants to release an Israeli soldier captured last June.
Abbas also reiterated his calls for the soldier's release, but he has been unable to persuade Hamas-allied militants to free the young man.
Merkel called on both Israel and the Palestinians to seize the "window of opportunity" opened by the new international peace push to end their conflict.
"I believe time is of the essence. We have to try to reach results as quickly as possible," she said.
Time is of the Essence
When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars
Viva Basra!
Viva Success!
Viva Reconciliation!
There was, however, one other approach that would have a good chance of succeeding. The members of the EU aspire to having a common foreign policy. What better issue could there be on which our French, German and Italian allies and partners could show solidarity with the UK and demonstrate the benefits of joint action?
ReplyDeleteThe best means of pressure would have been the export credit guarantees that are given to assist trade between Iran and western Europe. These, together with banking and other financial facilities are the soft underbelly of the Iranians and their withdrawal could do significant damage to Iran's already weak economy.
Such measures have already been canvassed by the Americans in respect of Iran's nuclear defiance.
The firm statement made by EU foreign ministers calling for the 'immediate and unconditional' release is welcome. But the apparent lack of any agreement over economic pressure has two serious consequences. First, it makes it very unlikely that Britain will be able to secure the release of the service personnel in the short term. Second, it is now almost inevitable that Iran will try to impose conditions from the international community and, in particular, the US, on their ultimate release.
This lack of agreement shows how hollow are the aspirations to a common European foreign policy. France and Germany should be ashamed at their refusal to assist their European partner in a humanitarian cause of this kind. If there had been a political will, there could already have been agreement.
The UN, in comparison, would take days or weeks and might face vetoes from predictable quarters. The Iranians might be reluctant to abandon their nuclear programme in the face of such limited economic sanctions from the EU, as they would consider a major national economic interest at stake. But the arrest of the British was a tactic and not a strategy. Once they had realised that their bluff had been called, it would have been quite likely that they would have conceded.
All this would have been even more probable if a European threat had been conveyed privately, thereby letting Iran back down without too much loss of face. It may be that a strategy of this kind is still under consideration. We should not expect the government to reveal all its thinking. Modern diplomacy needs confidentiality and private exchanges as much as it did in a previous age.
One thing, however, is sure. It will be pressure and not rhetoric that will impress the Iranian regime. If the EU is not prepared to help, there will now be a pause. The ball will now be in the Iranian court.
· Sir Malcolm Rifkind was Foreign Secretary and Secretary of State for Defence in the last Conservative government.
"...
ReplyDeleteSo we live today in a world of one-way sovereignty: American, British and Iraqi forces in Iraq respect the Syrian and Iranian borders; the Syrians and Iranians do not respect the Iraqi border. Patrolling the Shatt al-Arab at a time of war, the Royal Navy operates under rules of engagement designed by distant fainthearts with an eye to the polite fictions of "international law": If you're in a ''warship,'' you can't wage war. If you're in a ''destroyer,'' don't destroy anything. If you're in a "frigate," you're frigging done for.
On Sept. 11, a New York skyscraper was brought down by the Egyptian leader of a German cell of an Afghan terror group led by a Saudi. Islamism is only the first of many globalized ideological viruses that will seep undetected across national frontiers in the years ahead. Meanwhile, we put our faith in meetings of foreign ministers.
"It is better to be making the news than taking it," wrote Winston Churchill in 1898. But his successors have gotten used to taking it, and the men who make the news well understand that.
Mark Steyn
NWFP/FATA map. Red agencies are openly controlled by the Taliban; yellow are under threat.
ReplyDeleteClick map to view.
Bill Roggio reporting
Succession seems to be the talk of the day.
ReplyDeleteprinted in the WaPo.
The Once and Future Republic of Vermont
By Ian Baldwin and Frank Bryan
Sunday, April 1, 2007; Page B01
BURLINGTON, Vt.
The winds of secession are blowing in the Green Mountain State.
Vermont was once an independent republic, and it can be one again. We think the time to make that happen is now. Over the past 50 years, the U.S. government has grown too big, too corrupt and too aggressive toward the world, toward its own citizens and toward local democratic institutions. It has abandoned the democratic vision of its founders and eroded Americans' fundamental freedoms.
Vermont did not join the Union to become part of an empire.
Some of us therefore seek permission to leave.
...
It's quite simple. The United States has destroyed the 10th Amendment, which says that "powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
The present movement for secession has been gathering steam for a decade and a half. In preparation for Vermont's bicentennial in 1991, public debates -- moderated by then-Lt. Gov. Howard Dean -- were held in seven towns before crowds that averaged 230 citizens. At the end of each, Dean asked all those in favor of Vermont's seceding from the Union to stand and be counted. In town after town, solid majorities stood. The final count: 999 (62 percent) for secession and 608 opposed.
In early 2003, transplanted Southerner and retired Duke University economics professor Thomas Naylor gave a speech at Johnson State College opposing the Iraq war. When he pitched the idea of secession to the crowd, he saw many eyes "light up," he said. Later that year, he and several others started a loosely organized movement (now a think tank) called the Second Vermont Republic, which has an independent quarterly journal, Vermont Commons, and a Web site.
In October 2005, about 300 Vermonters attended a statewide convention on the question of secession. Six months later, the annual Vermont Poll of the University of Vermont's Center for Rural Studies found that about 8 percent of respondents replied "yes" to peaceful secession, arguably making Vermont foremost among the many states with secessionist movements (including Alaska, California, Hawaii, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Texas).
The Washingon Post article contains one enormous mistake -
ReplyDelete..."The Saudi government's strategy has aimed at detaching the Palestinian Hamas...MOVEMENT"
Sorry, it is no longer a movement but the freely elected government of the Palestinian people.
Several months ago i asked allen why Sharon allowed free elections in Gaza?
Sharon's strategy (IMO) was to ensure that a movement became the government (and the people are the government now aren't they).
This distinction is tremendously important?
With movements (as previously with Hamas or Hezbollah) actions can be conducted that would be acts of war if they were committed by another state. But how do you declare war on an enemy that has all the destructive potential of a state, but is not itself a state? There’s no capital city you can capture, no industrial infrastructure you can degrade. All there is are people, scattered through the general population.
Now, the general population is Hamas and Hezbollah, the movement is the government and the government is the people (and as bin laden states, the people are responsible for the actions of their government.
Analogous to Hamas, Hezbollah has over 20 seats in the Lebanese government from ...democratic elections (cedar revolution). It is a state within a state that has created social, political, and military institutions within Lebanon.
Lebanon was dragged into last summer's war because they did not have either the might or the political will to disarm Hezbollah, as they had a duty to do.
.................................
- Michael Béhé in Beirut(July 2006)
...In fact, our country had become an extension of Iran, and our so-called political power also served as a political and military cover for the Islamists of Teheran. We suddenly discovered that Teheran had stocked more than 12,000 missiles, of all types and calibers, on our territory and that they had patiently, systematically, organized a suppletive force, with the help of the Syrians, that took over, day after day, all the rooms in the House of Lebanon. Just imagine it : we stock ground-to-ground missiles, Zilzals, on our territory and that the firing of such devices without our knowledge, has the power to spark a regional strategic conflict and, potentially, bring about the annihilation of Lebanon.
It is easy now to whine and gripe, and to play the hypocritical role of victims. We know full well how to get others to pity us and to claim that we are never responsible for the horrors that regularly occur on our soil. Of course, that is nothing but rubbish! The Security Council’s Resolution 1559 – that demanded that OUR government deploy OUR army on OUR sovereign territory, along OUR international border with Israel and that it disarm all the militia on OUR land – was voted on 2 September 2004.
Lebanon a victim? What a joke!
Before the Israeli attack, Lebanon no longer existed, it was no more than a hologram. At Beirut innocent citizens like myself were forbidden access to certain areas of their own capital. But our police, our army and our judges were also excluded. That was the case, for example, of Hezbollah’s and the Syrians’ command zone in the Haret Hreik quarter (in red on the satellite map). A square measuring a kilometer wide, a capital within the capital, permanently guarded by a Horla army [1], possessing its own institutions, its schools, its crèches, its tribunals, its radio, its television and, above all… its government. A “government” that, alone decided, in the place of the figureheads of the Lebanese government – in which Hezbollah also had its ministers! – to attack a neighboring state, with which we had no substantial or grounded quarrel, and to plunge US into a bloody conflict. And if attacking a sovereign nation on its territory, assassinating eight of its soldiers, kidnapping two others and, simultaneously, launching missiles on nine of its towns does not constitute a casus belli, the latter juridical principle will seriously need revising.
..........................
In any future conflict, the Lebanese will not be able play the part of poor victims and well... too bad that the U.N. was again unable to live up to its mandate and prevent Hezbollah from rearming.
So the peoples of Arab autocracies in the ME should think carefully about free elections.