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CounterPunch Print Edition Exclusive!

Obama's Green Light to BP

Jeffrey St Clair traces the corruption across three presidencies that led to disaster in the Gulf. It was bad under Clinton; worse under Bush. But it was Obama and his Interior Secretary Ken Salazar who set the stage for catastrophe. What’s the best way to create jobs? Eugene Coyle makes the case for the 4-day work week. Have the CIA and MI6 destroyed classical music in the western world? Britain’s best known composer, Howard Blake, says Yes. Get your new edition today by subscribing online or calling 1-800-840-3683 Contributions to CounterPunch are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! CounterPunch books and t-shirts make great presents.

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Today's Stories

July 1, 2010

Conn Hallinan
Guns of August in the Middle East?

William R. Polk
Afghanistan Sitrep

Bill Quigley /
Alex Tuscano
BP and Bhopal: Double Standards

Nadia Hijab
America's Credibility Gap

Arman Grigorian
Genocide Recognition, But at What Cost?

Russell Mokhiber
The Rape of Appalachia

Harry Browne
World Cup: What's in a Team?

Jayne Lyn Stahl
Banner Drop Crime

Website of the Day
One Nation, Under Surveillance

June 30, 2010

Julien Mercille
Why Afghanistan's Poppies Aren't the Problem

Ellen Brown
Who Will Pay: Wall Street or Main Street?

Alan Farago
BP's Temple of Doom

Dave Lindorff
The Politics of Death: Throwing Mumia Under the Bus

Ralph Nader
36 Questions for Elena Kagan

Joe Shansky
The Coup is Not Complete

Ron Jacobs
Video Gamers and the Future of Labor Rights

Winslow Myers
Fighting for the Freedom to Dissent

Billy Wharton
Going Horizontal at the US Social Forum

Shepherd Bliss
The No Blow Movement

Website of the Day
Last and Proud of It

June 29, 2010

Jules Boykoff
The World Cup and the Politics of Immigration

Dean Baker
Is Advice From the IMF Better Than Advice From a Drunk on the Street?

Sheldon Richman
Endless Occupation?

Nadia Hijab
A Better Blockade?

George Ciccariello-Maher
Chronicle of a Riot Foretold

David Macaray
Giving Laws the Finger

Jeanine Molloff
The Cops' War on Videos of Cops

Brian Horejsi
The Fate of Alberta's Grizzly Bears

Helen Redmond
Scare Tactics, Spin and Health Care

John Grant
Holding America's Soldiers Accountable

Website of the Day
Why McChrystral was Really Fired

June 28, 2010

Eamonn McCann
The Bloody Sunday Report: How the Higher-Ups Got Off the Hook

Frank Menetrez Elena Kagan's Harvard

David Ker Thomson
Toronto: Still Free, Barely Holding On

Mark Weisbrot
Can't Get No Stimulation

Bill Quigley
Honduras, After Democracy

Jonathan Cook
Plan Lieberman: Blueprint for a Purely Jewish State

Alan Farago
Environmental Catastrophe Fatigue

Damien Millet /
Eric Toussaint
Vain and Void in Toronto

Harry Browne
World Cup: For Love and Money

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Emergency War Supplemental Explained

Dr. Susan Block
Hillbilly Rebel Women v. Corporate Murderers

Website of the Day
Trying to Film BP HQ

June 25 - 27, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
Loose-Lip McChrystal Did Obama a Huge Favor

Winslow T. Wheeler
General Petraeus and His Senate Vassals

Michael Hudson
Europe's Fiscal Dystopia: the "New Austerity" Road

Noor Elashi
The Holy Land Foundation Case: Defending My Father ... and the Constitution

Patrick Cockburn
Putting Petraeus in Perspective

Jonathan Cook
Gaza Starves More Slowly

John Ross
An Uprising of Bones

Darwin Bond-Graham
Capital Speaks: How Big Foundations and Wall Street Elites are Legitimating Their Plans to Balance the Budget

Paul Fitzgerald /
Elizabeth Gould
Afghanistan, the Saudi Arabia of Lithium?

Andrea Peacock
The Miron Brothers: From Vietnam to Libby

Ralph Nader
Losing It at the Airport Checkpoint

M. Shahid Alam
Getting Out of Palestine

Kathy Kelly /
Dan Pearson
Killing Civilians, Ducking Blame

Russell Mokhiber
Revoking BP's Charter

Ramzy Baroud
Righting a Perpetual Wrong

Rannie Amiri
Netanyahu Plays the Vuvuzela

David Rosen
The New Abortion Wars

Linn Washington
Racism in the Courts

Margaret Kimberley
The Death of Black Politics

Anthony DiMaggio
No Repeal of Whaling Ban: US Says It's a Major Loss--For Whales!

Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: High Times Puts on a White Coat

Mark Weisbrot
Distorting Chavez

Christopher Brauchli
Overthrowing Darwin: the Texas / Russia Axis

Adam Engel
The System and the Drug War

Ananya Mukherjee-Reed
Toronto: Fake Lakes vs. Real People

Julie Hilden
Can the Internet End Libel Laws?

David Ker Thomson
Shock and Awe From Ottawa

Saul Landau
Fidel Advises Obama?

Judith Bello
Can Iraq Form a Government?

Trond Andresen
What If the Greeks Did This?

Don North
El Salvador: a President Without a Party, a Party Without a President

Patrick Bond
What South Africa Really Lost at the World Cup

Missy Beattie
No Shelter From the Storm

Stuart Jeanne Bramhall
Targeting Women

Whitney Cole /
Alexander Brockweh
Revisiting Guazapa

Charles R. Larson
No Room With a View

David Yearsley
Three Cheers for Renée Fleming

Kim Nicolini
Heavy Metal in Baghdad: Iraqi Power Chords

Paul Krassner
Why Firing the General Was an Act of God

Poets' Basement
Henson, Mahagin and Valentine

Website of the Weekend
Why the Taliban is Winning

June 24, 2010

Gareth Porter
Why McChrystal Did Obama a Big Favor

Anne McClintock
Militarizing the Gulf Oil Crisis

Paul Craig Roberts
Is Petraeus McChrystal's Replacement or Obama's?

Mike Whitney
Time for a Second Stimulus

Alan Farago
The Forty Year War on the Environment

S. Eben Kirksey
Neglecting Indonesia: President Obama, What Would Your Mother Say?

John Halle
Economic War on the "Lesser People"

Harry Browne
World Cup: Workers and Players

John Grant
The Sociopathic General

Website of the Day
Leave BP Alone!

 

June 23, 2010

Kathy Kelly
Witnessing Against Torture

Deepak Tripathi
The Obama-McChyrstal Showdown

Dave Lindorff
The Oil Industry's Go-To Judge Comes Through

Sheldon Richman
Did the CIA Conduct Medical Experiments on Detainees?

Laura Carlsen
Lethal Force on the Border

Conn Hallinan
Turkey, the US and Empire's Twilight

Jayne Lyn Stahl
The McChrystal Shield

Susan Galleymore
Protesting Israel at the Oakland Docks

Björn Kumm
A Grand Day for Monarchism

John Holt
A Biologist With Courage and Vision

Website of the Day
Grayson Unleashed

June 22, 2010

Uri Avnery
When Force Doesn't Work

Lawrence S. Wittner
Iran, BP and the CIA

Dean Baker
The Social Security Fixation

Ludwig Watzal
An Israel Beyond Zionism?

Rick Kuhn
Why Money Doesn't Make the World Go Round

Martha Rosenberg
Why You Should Care About the University of Miami NIH Scandal

James Ridgeway / Jean Casella
The Ordeal of the Angola Three's Albert Woodfox

Russell Mokhiber
Capito, Cash and Capitulation

Yvonne Ridley
US Fear Factory Kills Free Speech

Shamus Cooke
Why the Oil Spill Will Change Nothing

Website of the Day
Kagan Wins; Constitution Looses

June 21, 2010

Joshua Brollier /
Kathy Kelly
Is Pakistan Unraveling?

Vijay Praahad
Global Bonapartism

Ralph Nader
Festering Corruption

Ronnie Cummins
Generation Monsanto

Mark Weisbrot
The Brazilian Presidential Elections

Jayne Lyn Stahl
The Real Shakedown

Harry Browne
World Cup: Anti-Imperialism 101

Tom Turnipseed
Peculiar Politics in South Carolina

Thomas H. Naylor
Vermont and Israel: Silence of the Liberals

Website of the Day
If Army Ads Had Health Warnings

June 18 - 20, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
He Should Have Kept His Mouth Shut

Dean Baker
Bad Parallels: US and Greece

Rannie Amiri
Better Never Than Late

Richard Ward
Louisiana Story: the Sequel

Saul Landau
The Flotilla Fiasco

Ramzy Baroud
What Ankara Knows

Martine Bulard
Sayonara, America?

Ellen Brown
Deficit Terrorists Strike England: Is the US Next?

David Macaray
Honey, I Shrank the Labor Lobby

Stanley Heller
Grand Theft Flotilla

Paul Craig Roberts
Progressives Want "Direct Action" But a Disarmed Public

Russell Mokhiber
Spilling It on BP

M. Shahid Alam
Roger Cohen and the Motley Crew

Robert Bryce
Addicted to Prosperity

Mark Weisbrot
Economic Timidity in the Eurozone

David Michael Green
Empty Presidential Platitudes

George Wuerthner
The Perils of Collaboration

John Grant
Truth Through a Soda Straw

John Stanton
A Visit to Turkey

Christopher Brauchli
Poor Britain: BP and the English Psyche

Missy Beattie
Under the Covers With Rush and Larry

Robert Jensen
Pornography and the Military

Tanya Golash-Boza
The Carachuri-Rosendo Case

Robert Roth
Haiti Five Months After the Quake

Farzana Versey
Dangerous Liaisons

David Ker Thomson
Against Sport

Charles R. Larson
Tech Transfer: More Academic Fun

David Yearsley
Summer Nights in Emden and Uttum

Mitu Sengupta
Sex, the City and American Patriotism

Kim Nicolini
An Exercise in Vigilantism

Poets' Basement
Gibbons, Orloski and Beatty

Website of the Day
Civil Civic

 

June 17, 2010

John Ross
Mexico's Gaza

Gareth Porter
McChrystal's War Plan Fails

Robert Weissman
Five Questions for Tony Hayward

Farrah Hassen
AEI Does Syria: Demonization with Coffee and Croissants

Ron Jacobs
Washington's False Promise in Afghanistan

Harry Browne
World Cup: Fútbol Arte v. Anti-Fútbol

Kevin Zeese
The Holes in the Finance Bill

Harvey Wasserman
The Gusher and the Sun

Website of the Day
The Nightmare Scenario in the Gulf

June 16, 2010

Paul Craig Roberts
Helen Thomas: an Appreciation

Anthony DiMaggio
Deconstructing Obama's BP Speech

Ralph Nader
The Scourging of Helen Thomas

Robert Weissman
Closing BP's Escape Routes

Dean Baker
The Retail Sales Slump

Greg Moses
Gulf Crisis Implodes Obama Presidency

M. Kamiar
A Short History of BP

Dave Lindorff
What Kevin Neish Saw: Eyewitness to the Israeli Assault on the Mavi Marmara

Alison Weir
The NYT and the Flotilla Inquiry

Laura Flanders
The Iron Lady Meets the Pitbull in Lipstick

Misty MacDuffee / Chris Genovali
BC's Killer Whales Get Their Day in Court

Website of the Day
The Pro-Corporate Sierra Club

June 15, 2010

P. Sainath
What Bhopal Started

Jordan Flaherty
Fears of Cultural Extinction on Louisiana's Gulf Coast

Mike Whitney
The Next Housing Crisis

Patrick Cockburn / Terri Judd
The Most Dangerous Country in the World for Journalists

Fred Gardner
Helen Thomas' Watergate Scoop

Linn Washington
Israeli Raid Coverage: American Media Failure Again

Roberto Rodriguez
The Arizona Spasm

Tolu Olorunda
The Africans are Coming!

Steven Higgs
America's Worst Generation

Tom Woodbury
Montana's Frontline Against Big Oil

Prairie Miller
South of the Border

Website of the Day
The Pentagon's Afghan Mineral Hype

June 14, 2010

Diana Johnstone
Why the French Hate Noam Chomsky

Uri Avnery
Who is Afraid of a Real Inquiry?

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
Iran's Presidential Election One Year Later: Why the Greens Failed

Dean Baker
In the Service of the Rich

Dave Lindorff
Going After the Wrong People: From Julian Assange to Helen Thomas

Harry Browne
World Cup: Who Should We Root For?

Patrick Bond
World Cup, Inc.: Red Cards for Fifa, Coke and the South African Elites

Eve Spangler
Attacking Humanitarian Aid: PR Blunder or Strategic Necessity?

David Michael Green
The Do-Nothing President

Christopher Ketcham
The Re-Education of Helen Thomas

Phyllis Pollack
Stones in Exile

Website of the Day
Video of IDF Raid: Kicks and Shots in the Head

June 11 - 13, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
The Crude Truth

Winslow T. Wheeler
Budget Nightmare at the Pentagon

Vijay Prashad
Three Wars Uncompleted, the Price Unpaid

Franklin C. Spinney
Will Erdogan Blink?

Jeffrey Blankfort
Joe Biden: In Israel's Service

Mike Whitney
Another Bank Bailout

Rannie Amiri
Their Lives for Gaza

Karl Grossman
Obama and the Nuclear Rocket

T. P. Wilkinson
The State as Protection Racket

William Blum
Hypocrisy Reigns

Alan Farago
Taking Over BP

Larry Tuttle
Agency Breakdown: From the Gulf to the Umpqua River

Joseph Nevins
From Jim Crow to Juan Crow

Russell Mokhiber
The Battle for Coal Mine Safety

Linh Dinh
Head Fakes: Hard Times for American Racists

George Wuerthner
The West Needs Wolves

John Grant
Milo Mindbender in Afghanistan

Eric Walberg
Funding Both Sides in Afghanistan

Christopher Brauchli
How to Buy a Judge

Missy Beattie
Suffocating the Planet

David Ker Thomson
Educator: Day in the Life

Binoy Kampmark
War on Google

Julie Hilden
The MySpace Cases: Can Public Schools Censor Off-Campus Speech?

Joshua Frank
How NYC May be Revolutionizing the Way Kids Eat

Alvaro Huerta
Fear and Loathing of Mexicans

Farzana Versey
Another Blockade

Harry Browne
World Cup: the Games Begin, at Last

Saul Landau
The New Right History

David Macaray
Obama to Chinese Workers: Don't Make Waves

Patrick Bond
World Cup Profiteers

Charles R. Larson
Toy Story: "I am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced"

David Yearsley
Blue and Blind

Poets' Basement
Hyde, Taylor and Anderson

Website of the Weekend
Postulates of the Pitch

June 10, 2010

Bill Quigley
The Ordeal of Curtis Flowers

Patrick Cockburn
Erdogan Rising?

Sasan Fayazmanesh
The End of "Tough Diplomacy"?

Jonathan Cook
Blacklisting Helen Thomas

Jennifer Loewenstein
Obama, the ADC and the Gaza Flotilla

John Ross
The World Cup as Maximum Weapon of Social Control

Robert Bryce
Winners and Losers in the Gulf

Yves Engler
Canada's Gaza Flotilla

Laura Flanders
Bubba Goes Home

Charles M. Young
A Hell of Their Own Creation

Website of the Day
Scuba Diving the Gulf: What BP Doesn't Want You to See

June 9, 2010

Esam Al-Amin
Obama's Doublespeak on Iran

Mike Whitney
Strangulation Economics

Jonathan Cook
Barefoot Soldiers on the High Seas?

George Bisharat
Israel's Impunity From International Law

Shamus Cooke
Is Obama BP's Poodle?

Anthony DiMaggio
A Retrospective Look at Arizona's Immigration Law

Alison Weir
The Outrage at Helen Thomas

Linda Brayer /
Andrew Wimmer
It's Not Piracy!

Jayne Lyn Stahl
Casino Politics in California

Yasmin Qureshi
The Fate of Kashmir

Website of the Day
Jews for Helen Thomas

June 8, 2010

David Macaray
Labor Under Democrats: an Interview with Robert Reich

Jonathan Cook
Witchhunt for an Israeli MP

Dean Baker
How the Deficit Hawks are Robbing Jobs

Gary Leupp
The Ambush of Helen Thomas

Ramzy Baroud
The Old Gaza Boy and the Sea

Nicola Nasser
Israel is Fueling Anti-Americanism

Harvey Wasserman
Apocalypse in the Gulf

Mike Whitney
Paranoid, Resentful, Isolated

David Michael Green
What Lethal Arrogance Looks Like

Roberto Rodriguez
Arizona Rushes Toward the Wrong Side of History

Michael Winship
A Walk Through Israel's No-Man's Land

Johnny Barber
An Eye for an Eye

Website of the Day
Ready to Rumble

June 7, 2010

Ken O'Keefe
On Cowardice and Violence

Uri Avnery
Kill a Turk and Rest

Stephen Soldz
CIA Experiments in Torture

Dean Baker
Fixing the Housing Mess

Dave Lindorff
Shot in the Back

Yvonne Ridley
Why You Won't See Me on the BBC

Linh Dinh
Eyes With Legs: Shooting Witnesses

Ellen Brown
How Banks Make Money on Low-Interest Loans

Belén Fernández
Erdogan's Hebrew Phrasebook Requires Upgrade

Lisa Barr
The Peace Movement Needs New, Immature Friends

Website of the Day
Over to You, God

June 4 - 6, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
Pariah Nation

Esam Al-Amin
One Year After Cairo: Promises Made; Promises Unkept

Phillip Doe
Deepwater Ken: Scapegoating Birnbaum, Saving Salazar

John Ross
Savaging Turtle Island: Mexico Awaits BP's Oil Blowout

James Bovard
Blind Trust: How Democracy Breeds Political Idiocy

Mike Whitney
Europe is Heading for a Mini-Depression

Rannie Amiri
The Real Motive Behind the Gaza Flotilla Attack

Anthony DiMaggio
Rogue State Politics: International Law and Israel's Raid on the Gaza Flotilla

Neve Gordon
Israel's Two Spaces

John Grant
In the Israeli Minefield

Jeffrey St. Clair
Shaky Foundations: Toxic Sources, Tainted Money

Linn Washington, Jr. Cuban Five: the Federal Government Paid Journalists to Sabotage Trial

Peter Lee
The Cheonan Incident

Ahmad Shokr
Clamping the Lifeline: Egypt's Gaza Blockade

Soha Al-Jurf
The Semantics of Terrorism

Tolu Olorunda
Prisons and the Myth of Color-blindness: a Conversation with Michelle Alexander

Sheldon Richman
Serving the Empire, Killing for Lies

Diana Buttu
The Lessons of Gaza

Saul Landau
Fouling the Human Nest

P. Sainath
An Indian Saga: "Caste is Everything"

Ramzy Baroud
Facebook and Muslim Outrage

Christopher Brauchli
Newt Speak: Gingrich and the N-Word

Ron Jacobs
Korea Staredown

Laura Flanders
Being Poor in a Sinking America

Eric Walberg
Nuclear Juggling

Russell Mokhiber
Coal Intimidation

Martha Rosenberg
Meeting the Drug Industry

Missy Beattie
The Air is Humming

Alvaro Huerta
Toxic Twins: Arizona Meet BP

Harry Browne
World Cup: the Squads are Selected

Charles R. Larson
Darwinian Shenanigans?

David Yearsley
Bach and the Oil Spill

Poets' Basement
Three Poems by Satnrose

Website of the Weekend
Amb. Peck: "We Call That Piracy"

June 3, 2010

James Abourezk
Dershowitz to the Rescue?

Nadia Hijab
Israel's Dilemma

Jonathan Cook
A Cornered Israel is Baring Its Teeth

Daniel C. Maguire
Chutzpah Galore

Gareth Porter
Revolt of the Drone Operators

Samuel Leff
Torturous Guilt?

Patrick Cockburn
Baghdad's Dud Bomb Detectors

Dennis Bernstein / Jesse Strauss
UN Human Rights Rapporteur Blasts Israel: an Interview with Richard Falk

Nikolas Kozloff
Whither the Mangroves?

Jayne Lyn Stahl
Miranda Who?

Website of the Day
Gulf Tribunal

June 2, 2010

Patrick Cockburn
Notch Up Another Disaster for Israel's Well-Oiled Propaganda Machine

Neve Gordon
Piracy on the Blood-Red Sea

Jonathan Cook
Israeli MP's Night of Terror on Aid Ship

Kathy Kelly /
Josh Brollier

Aid Poor and War Weary in Pakistan

Dean Baker
TARP and the Deficit Hawks

Walden Bello
The Battle for Thailand

Fran Shor
Gimme Shelter: Obama, Oil and War

Paul Fitzgerald /
Elizabeth Gould

The Battle for Kandahar and Perceptions of American Victory

Dave Lindorff
Worse Than North Korea

Yvonne Ridley
From Klinghoffer to the Gaza Flotilla

Charles M. Young
Lone Star Cheeseheads vs. the Lesser of Two Medievals

Shamus Cooke
The Widening Rift Between Teachers and Democrats

Website of the Day
Elvis and Nixon: the Official White House Memo

June 1, 2010

Paul Craig Roberts
America's Complicity in Evil

Patrick Cockburn
Turkey Condemns Israel

Vijay Prashad
The Madmen of Our Times

Anthony DiMaggio
War Takes No Holiday

Ray McGovern
Obama's Timidity and Deaths at Sea

Greg Moses
Of Booms and Skimmers

Marjorie Cohn
Murdering Human Rights Workers

Kathleen Barry
Pirates of the Mediterranean

Joseph Nevins
Memorial Day: a Time to Commemorate Mother Nature

Belén Fernández
"Worse Than Pirates"

Website of the Day
Finkelstein: "Israel is a Real Lunatic State"

May 31, 2010

Jonathan Cook
Israel's Attack on Us All

Uri Avnery
Rahm and Israel

Nikolas Kozloff
Carville, Colombia and BP

Dave Lindorff
The Glorification of War

Linh Dinh
Top Killing: Make Way for the Contractors

Michael Neumann
The WASP Penchant for Zionism

John Weisheit
Nukes in Canyon Country?

Stephen Lendman
Slaughter at Sea: Israel Attacks the Gaza Flotilla

Ralph Nader
What's Pelosi Afraid Of?

Tom Turnipseed
Immigrants R Us

Bouthaina Shaaban
As Dangerous as It Gets

Website of the Day
Messing with Miranda

May 28 - 30, 2010

Alexander Cockburn
Vietnam MIAs: Ghosts Return to Haunt McCain and the US Press

John Ross
The Big Snatch

Mike Whitney
Credit Storm in Europe

Patrick Cockburn
Iraq: Paralyzed, Dejected, Corrupt

Sharon Smith
Arizona's Rancid History

Jonathan Cook
The Torture of Ameer Makhoul

Greg Moses
Worse or Worser in the Gulf?

Saul Landau
The Reverend and the Rentboy

Susan Galleymore
Agent Orange and the Third Generation

Ray McGovern
Ducking the Challenge

James Marc Leas
Targeting the Free Gaza Flotilla

Tanya Golash-Boza
Deportation as Punishment

Linn Washington, Jr.
Don't Know Much About (Race) History

David Rosen /
Bruce Kushnick

The Great Telecom Rip-Off

David Ker Thomson
Against Farmers

Rannie Amiri
Lebanon Marks Liberation Day

Ramzy Baroud
Paperless World

Harry Browne
World Cup: Brazil and the US

Missy Beattie
Dancing with the Scarred

Sheldon Richman
Is the Peace Movement Finally Awakening?

John V. Walsh
Compulsory Armageddon

David Macaray
Hopelessness in the Workplace

Laura Flanders
DeBush, Debar, and Debunk

Charles R. Larson
Not the Great Philippine Novel?

Clancy Sigal
Oh, What an Unlovely War: Hanks and Spielberg Do the Pacific

David Yearsley
Shoes: the Outside Story, From Beckham to Clinton to Bach

Poets' Basement
Three by S.C. Hahn

Website of the Weekend
A Buffalo's Trail of Tears

May 27, 2010

Richard Ward
Among the Teabaggers

Dean Baker
A Crew of Incompetents

Winslow T. Wheeler
A Mutually Assured Debacle

Franklin C. Spinney
Dropping COIN: McChrystal Returns to His Roots

John Grant
Down the Road to Conflagration

Bernard Marszalek
BP to Hell: the Oil Geyser and the Performance Principle

Linh Dinh
More Jive Than Jazz

Laura Flanders
On the Backs of Women

Deb Katz
Sneaking New Nukes Into the War Spending Bill

Evelyn Pringle
The Problems with Reglan

Website of the Day
Making Money on the Oil Spill

May 26, 2010

Jonathan Cook
Israel's Nukes Out of the Shadows

Forrest Hylton
Change Colombians Can Believe In?

Peter Lee
China's Cool Hand Game

Ron Jacobs
Killing Children: From Ghazi to Detroit

Greg Moses
Oil Wars Come Home to Roost

James Rothenberg
Why Afghanistan?

Mark Weisbrot
The Eurozone's Self-Inflicted Crisis

Neve Gordon
Even Picnics in Israel are Political

Lee Sustar
Winds of Change in Chicago

Firmin DeBrabander
Containing the Meat Spill

Website of the Day
BP, Dead Fish and the Tate Gallery

 

May 25, 2010

Uri Avnery
Chomsky at the Gate

Gareth Porter
Reaffirming Afghanistan's Al Capone

Mike Whitney
Slash-and-Burn Economics: Merkel's Savage Blitz Through Euroland

Roberto Rodriguez
Arizona and the Big Picture

Charles M. Young
Watching the Pentagon Channel

Randall Amster
Take a Hike: Misconceptions and Machinations in Iran

Ramzy Baroud
Overcoming the Bush Legacy: New Language is Not Enough

Linh Dinh
Washington and the Small Time Commies

Julie Hilden
The Fair Report Privilege

Laura Flanders
Something's Gotta Give

Website of the Day
When Members of Congress Play the Market

 

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July 1, 2010

Dispatches From the Edge

Guns of August in the Middle East?

By CONN HALLINAN

Crazy talk about the Middle East seems to be escalating, backed up by some pretty ominous military deployments. First, the department of scary statements:

First up, Shabtai Shavit, former chief of the Israeli spy agency Mossad, speaking June 21 at Bar Ilan University, Tel Aviv on why Israel should launch a pre-emptive strike at Iran: “I am of the opinion that, since there is an ongoing war, since the threat is permanent, since the intention of the enemy in this case is to annihilate you, the right doctrine is one of presumption and not retaliation.”

Second up, Uzi Arad, Israeli prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s national security advisor, speaking before the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem June 22 on his belief that the “international community” would support an Israeli strike at Iran” “I don’t see anyone who questions the legality of this or the legitimacy.”

Third up, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi speaking to reporters at the G-8 meeting in Toronto June 26: “Iran is not guaranteeing a peaceful production of nuclear power [so] the members of the G-8 are worried and believe absolutely that Israel will probably react preemptively.”

Fourth up, Central Intelligence Director Leon Panetta predicting on ABC’s “This Week” program June 27 that Iran could have two nuclear weapons by 2012: “We think they [Iran] have enough low-enriched uranium for two weapons…and while there is continuing debate [within Iran] right now about whether or not they ought to proceed with a bomb…they clearly are developing their nuclear capacity.” He went on to say that the U.S. is sharing intelligence with Israelis and that Tel Aviv is “willing to give us the room to be able to try to change Iran diplomatically and culturally and politically.”

A few points:

1) Iran and Israel are not at war, a fact Shavit seems confused about.

2) Since the recent rounds of sanctions aimed at Iran would have lost in the United Nations General Assembly, it unclear who Arad thinks is the “international community.”

3) Berlusconi is a bit of a loose cannon, but he is tight with the Israelis.

4) An Iran that is different “diplomatically and culturally and politically” sounds an awful lot like “regime change.” Is that the “room” Panetta is talking about?

And it isn’t all talk.

Following up the London Times report that Saudi Arabia had given Israel permission to fly through Saudi airspace to attack Iran, the Jerusalem Post, the Islam Times and the Iranian news agency Fars report that the Israeli air force has stockpiled equipment in the Saudi desert near Jordan.

According to the Post supplies were unloaded June 18 and 19 outside the Saudi city of Tabuk, and all civilian flights into the area were canceled during the two day period. The Post said that an “anonymous American defense official” claimed that Mossad chief Meir Dagan was the contact man with Saudi Arabia and had briefed Netanyahu on the plans.

The Gulf Daily News reported June 26 that Israel has moved warplanes to Georgia and Azerbaijan, which would greatly shorten the distance Israeli planes would have to fly to attack targets in northern Iran.

The U.S currently has two aircraft carriers—the Truman and the Eisenhower—plus more than a dozen support vessels in the Gulf of Hormuz, the strategic choke point leading into the Gulf of Iran.

The Saudis have vigorously denied the reports they are aiding the Israelis, and Shafeeq Ghabra, president of the American University of Kuwait, says “It would be impossible for the Saudis to allow an Israeli attack on Iran.”

But Ephraim Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies in Ramat Gan, Israel, argues that Saudi Arabia and Israel both fear a nuclear-armed Iran. “This bring us together on a strategic level in that we have common interests. Since the Arab world and Saudi Arabia understand that President Obama is a weak person, maybe they decided to facilitate this happening.” He also said the story might not be true because “I don’t think the Saudis want to burden themselves with this kind of cooperation with Israel.”

According to military historian Martin van Creveld, a professor at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, “The real fear is that someone will get carried away by his own rhetoric and fear mongering” and start a war. He also thinks, however, that Israel should not take a preemptive strike “off the table.”

Trita Parsi of the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington argues that the escalation of rhetoric is dangerous. “When you have that kind of political environment, you are leaving yourself no space to find another solution,” she told the Christian Science Monitor. “You may very well end up in a situation where you are propelled to act, even though you understand it is an unwise action, but [do so] for political reasons.”

The rhetoric is getting steamy, the weapons are moving into position, and it is beginning to feel like “The Guns of August” in the Middle East.

Conn Hallinan can be reached at: ringoanne@sbcglobal.net
 

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