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miércoles, 28 de enero de 2015

PEÑA ATRAPADO

El señor Peña se siente atrapado en el caso Ayotzinapa, dice que México no debe quedar atrapado en este hecho lamentable.
Llama a seguir adelante, a "superarlo", insiste en que México no se puede quedar detenido en este asunto.
Habrá que decirles a los padres de los 43 estudiantes desaparecidos y hoy, oficialmente declarados asesinados y calcinados, que ya no busquen más, que regresen a sus vidas, que "superen su dolor". También habrá que decirles lo mismo a los padres, madres, hermanos, amigos de los 25 mil desaparecidos, que ya no busquen más, que seguro también están muertos, que lo "superen" y que sigan adelante. 
Habrá que decirle a los padres, hermanos, familiares, amigos de los decenas de miles de muertos por las organizaciones del crimen organizado y por las propias autoridades en "fuegos cruzados", en los últimos 8 años (los 6 nefastos años del fascista Calderón y los dos que van de Peña), que ya no exijan el esclarecimiento de esos crímenes, que "lo superen", que sigan "adelante", que entiendan que México no puede quedarse estancado en esos casos.
Y de una vez les dice el señor Peña a todos los padres, hermanos, familiares, amigos, etc. de los próximos desaparecidos y muertos por la violencia criminal que enluta al país todos los días, que no detengan la marcha triunfal de México hacia el progreso (perdón, hacia el crecimiento económico, que no es lo mismo) con sus próximas y ya sabidas exigencias de justicia, castigo a los culpables, reparación del daño, y ese tipo de cosas (que por cierto molestan mucho al señor Secretario de Marina y a los señores empresarios del Consejo Coordinador Empresarial).
Liberémonos de esas ataduras que nos tienen atrapados, liberemos a México de esas exigencias, dejemos que siga el curso majestuoso de este país maravilloso hacia el desarrollo (perdón, crecimiento, que no es lo mismo) económico y social, permitamos que los visionarios políticos (incorruptibles, creativos, trabajadores, responsables) y esos modelos de innovación, trabajo esforzado y compromiso con México que son los grandes empresarios, nos guíen por el camino de la felicidad para todos (bueno, para casi todos).
Pero no señor Peña, no se ha dado cuenta ("no entiende, que no entiende" The Economist dixit), que usted no está atrapado por las exigencias de justicia de la gran mayoría de la población mexicana; no está atrapado por el compromiso que juró ante todos los mexicanos de cumplir y hacer cumplir la Constitución y las leyes que de ella emanan (con todo y las mutilaciones impulsadas por usted mismo, tanto a la Constitución como a las leyes referidas); no está atrapado por las desgracias que sus políticas y su modelo económico provocan día tras día a los mexicanos.
Usted está atrapado en la corrupción que ha sido y es el principal objetivo de la gran mayoría de los políticos y funcionarios públicos de este país (la divisa del Grupo Atlacomulco, expresada por quien lo encabezara por décadas, Carlos Hank : "un político pobre, es un pobre político"); está atrapado por los intereses de los empresarios que le "venden" casas (Hinojosa Cantú, San Román) a usted, a su esposa, a sus colaboradores, y que sin sospecha alguna, ganan licitaciones y contratos multimillonarios de los gobiernos que usted encabeza; está atrapado por Televisa, que construyó su candidatura desde que estaba en el gobierno del Estado de México y ahora se da el gusto de exhibirlo (columnas críticas de Loret de Mola, de Dennise Maerker, etc.), pero no porque esté interesada en "limpiar" la corrupción, sino porque exige una mayor rebanada del reparto del "pastel" (críticas a concesión del tren rápido, a la del aeropuerto, etc.); está atrapado en los chantajes del empresariado (Lorenzo Servitje: hay que apoyar al presidente en su momento más obscuro, pero que nos apoye en nuestros negocios), que le exige seguridad (duro con los revoltosos que toman casetas y queman edificios públicos), quita de impuestos y más concesiones de obras públicas (sin pagar tanto "moche"), a cambio de hacerse de la vista gorda en materia de corrupción y apoyarlo "políticamente"; está atrapado por las élites de Estados Unidos, que un día sí y otro también lo exhiben como corrupto (una casa por aquí, otra por allá), a cambio de que no se le dé a China ninguna oportunidad de expandir sus inversiones en México (se da a conocer casa en Las Lomas, se quita la concesión del tren rápido a empresa china; se da a conocer casa en Ixtapan de la Sal, se cancela definitivamente el proyecto Dragon Mart en Cancún).
Usted está atrapado en sus propias redes de complicidad, negocios turbios, encubrimientos (Tlatlaya, ¿Iguala?), compromisos (familias Salinas, Hank, Del Mazo, etc.) y en su propia torpeza para darse cuenta en donde está ("no entiende, que no entiende"), qué se supone que debe hacer para proteger los intereses de sus socios (Atlacomulco, CCE, Televisa, Hinojosa, San Román, etc.), aparentando que sigue siendo el presidente de todos los mexicanos y no sólo de su grupo político y económico (como el fascista Calderón, que fue presidente sólo de sus cuates y su familia, y subordinado de Estados Unidos y de García Luna).
Ya no se le puede pedir que entienda que los reclamos de justicia, de seguridad, de paz, de empleo, de mejor salario, de una vida digna para los mexicanos, son lo que usted y su gobierno deberían atender, y no sólo las quejas y admoniciones de los encumbrados oligarcas que explotan a placer los recursos naturales y la mano de obra casi regalada de este país; no sólo la rapacidad de los políticos de toda laya y funcionarios públicos que se enriquecen obscenamente a costa del erario público; no sólo de las empresas transnacionales que sólo van a dejar desastre social, económico y ecológico a su paso por el país, una vez que agoten todos los recursos naturales que tan generosamente usted y ese Congreso de sanguijuelas les han regalado.
Pero no se preocupe, ya se encargará el aparto político-mediático de "convencer" a la población que México no puede quedar atrapado en Ayotzinapa y que debe enfocarse en la próxima telenovela, en las elecciones intermedias (que sirven para legitimar a todos esos partidos políticos vividores y corruptos) y en las próximas Copa de Oro y Copa América, en donde seguramente la selección mexicana tendrá una gran actuación.

martes, 27 de enero de 2015

La cuestión palestina
Pedro Salmerón Sanginés
La Jornada 27 de Enero 2015
Hace un par de meses empezó a circular La cuestión palestina, de Edward Said, un libro que, aunque data de hace 20 años (la redición aumentada), es de una actualidad devastadora y, hasta ahora, casi imposible de conseguir en México. Dos enormes méritos tiene el libro: la capacidad de síntesis, que permite hacerse una idea general y acabada sobre uno de los problemas más agudos de la actualidad, y su historicidad: explica la genealogía del problema, entendiéndolo y rechazando cualquier explicación conspiranoica o racista.
El libro cuenta la historia y la identidad del pueblo palestino, para revisar después sus aspiraciones políticas y las diferencias que hay entre los exiliados (grupo al que pertenece el propio Said), los que quedaron dentro de Israel desde 1948 (a quienes llama árabes israelíes) y los sometidos a ocupación militar desde 1967. El libro es también, y sobre todo, una historia de la resistencia popular y nacional contra la agresión israelí, contra los horrores de la ocupación, contra el intento de desaparecer a la nación palestina. Y es un posicionamiento:
La tarea del pueblo palestino sigue siendo la de asegurarse su presencia en la tierra y persuadir a los israelíes de que sólo un acuerdo político puede aliviar el asedio mutuo, la angustia y la inseguridad de ambos pueblos. No hay ninguna alternativa.
El otro factor del problema, el sionismo, es también analizado históricamente, como resultado y parte del colonialismo del siglo XIX. Sus constructores razonaban como los imperialistas: idénticos en el racismo y el desdén por una población autóctona inexistente, no porque no existiera, sino porque se les negaba sistemáticamente su estatus de habitantes o humanos. El sionismo apeló a la ideología imperialista, para la que la clasificación de los nativos de las colonias como inexistentes o inferiores, era natural. En muchos casos, se da una inequívoca coincidencia entre las experiencias de los árabes palestinos a manos del sionismo y las experiencias de aquellas gentes de piel negra, amarilla o morena descritas como inferiores e infrahumanos por los imperialismos.
La historia es imprescindible para entender hasta qué punto están arraigadas en amplios sectores de la población israelí las perspectivas imperialistas del sionismo, su visión del mundo y su percepción de otro nativo inferior, lo que para los palestinos resulta ser una práctica inflexiblemente exclusivista, discriminatoria y colonialista. Para el palestino, el sionismo es mero agente de una cultura esencialmente discriminatoria y poderosa.
Esta práctica colonialista –surgida de la ideología europea dominante– tiene sus particularidades: du­rante mucho tiempo los palestinos lucharon contra un ocupante que era visto por la mayoría del mundo como víctima de la persecución y el Holocausto. Demasiados liberales cerraban los ojos ante los crímenes del Estado de Israel por esa his­toria, a la vez que por el otro lado, demasiados críticos de Israel lo hacían desde el antisemitismo, y también ignoraban la resistencia palestina. Por eso, numerosos judíos no israelíes apoyaron acríticamente al Estado que se presentaba como el Estado de todo el pueblo judío.
A esta definición del sionismo como colonialismo sigue la historia particular del poblamiento israelí y el criminal despoblamiento palestino. Y, por tanto, es también la historia del apoyo de Estados Unidos –y otras potencias– al Estado de Israel. También, la del natural apoyo de muchos países del tercer mundo y de los movimientos de liberación, a la Organización para la Liberación de Palestina.
Querría al menos mencionar a los israelíes que se oponen al colonialismo: el Partido Comunista de Israel y otros. Dice Said: Es muy importante señalar la contribución de numerosos judíos, e incluso de grupos e individuos sionistas que mediante la erudición revisionista, la valentía y una activa campaña contra el militarismo, ayudaron a hacer posible el cambio.
El libro concluye con una amarga crítica a los acuerdos internacionales patrocinados por Estados Unidos, a los que ve como derrotas palestinas. Pero también con una certeza: el imperialismo y el sionismo no lograron diluir al pueblo palestino. Y otra: Nada que no sea la autodeterminación palestina funcionará. Y una apuesta: De hecho algunos judíos israelíes y no israelíes han entendido ya que si israelíes y palestinos pretenden tener un futuro decente, éste ha de ser un futuro común, no basado en la anulación de unos por parte de los otros.
Es un libro que nos llama a entender, que rechaza el odio basado en diferencias raciales o religiosas. Y que lamenta un hecho fundamental: Palestina seguía en 1992 (y sigue en 2015) sin ser un Estado soberano, y cientos de miles de palestinos viven bajo ocupación.


lunes, 26 de enero de 2015

Bringing the Battlefield to the Border
Todd Miller and Gabriel Schivone, January 26, 2015

Originally posted at TomDispatch.
Predator drones, tested out in this country’s distant war zones, have played an increasingly prominent role in the up-armoring of the U.S.-Mexican border. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) launched its first Predator in 2004, but only really ramped up drone use in March 2013. There have been approximately 10,000 Predator flights along that border since. The agency had plans to expand its ten-Predator fleet – nine after a $12 million maritime drone crashed off the California coast, as those robotic planes are wont to do – to 24. It was going to dispatch some of them to the Canadian border as well. (You never know, after all, what dark forces might descend on us from the chilly north.) The CBP even got into the chummy habit of encouraging interagency drone-addiction by loaning its Predators out to the FBI, the Texas Department of Public Safety, and the U.S. Forest Service, among other places. You might say that the CBP was distinctly high on drones.
Only one problem: the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general recently audited the use of drones on the border and issued a scathing report, calling them “dubious achievers” and essentially declaring them an enormous waste of money, time, and personnel. At $12,255 a flight hour (when not simply grounded), military-grade drones turned out to cost way more than the CBP estimated or reported, flew far less often, and helped find a mere 2% of the immigrants crossing the border without papers. As Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post reported, “Less than one-tenth of 1 percent of border-crossing apprehensions were attributed to drone detection.” The inspector general suggested that the CBP should, among other things, shelve its plans to expand its drone fleet (at the cost of a mere $443 million).
Based on such a report from the IG – the CBP is part of the Department of Homeland Security – you might assume that it would be curtains for the drone program. But if you’re a betting kind of guy in twenty-first-century Washington, you’re not going to put your money on any self-respecting part of the national security state giving up, or even cutting back, on its high-tech toys. Drones, after all, are sexy as hell and what self-respecting government official wouldn’t want a machine onto which you could attach even more seductively high-tech devices like Vader (think deep, breathy voice, though the acronym stands for “Vehicle and Dismount Exploitation Radar”), a set of sensors that can detect motion on the ground. So CBP has instead struck back, accusing the inspector general of cherry-picking his data and misconstruing more or less everything.
Meanwhile, the drones continue to fly and the CBP, as Todd Miller who covers the militarization of America’s borders for TomDispatch has long noted, remains gaga for high-tech border toys of just about any sort. Today, Miller and Gabriel Schivone suggest that, whatever waste and extravagance may be involved, our already heavily technologized borders and the increasingly robot-filled skies over them are just at the beginning of an era of border-closing high-tech extravaganzas. When it comes to visions of how to shut down the world, it’s evidently time to call in the real experts, the Israelis, who live in a country without fully demarcated borders, and yet have had a remarkable amount of experience building high-tech walls. ~ Tom Engelhardt
Gaza in Arizona
How Israeli High-Tech Firms Will Up-Armor the U.S.-Mexican Border
By Todd Miller and Gabriel M. Schivone

It was October 2012. Roei Elkabetz, a brigadier general for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), was explaining his country’s border policing strategies. In his PowerPoint presentation, a photo of the enclosure wall that isolates the Gaza Strip from Israel clicked onscreen. “We have learned lots from Gaza,” he told the audience. “It’s a great laboratory.”
Elkabetz was speaking at a border technology conference and fair surrounded by a dazzling display of technology – the components of his boundary-building lab. There were surveillance balloons with high-powered cameras floating over a desert-camouflaged armored vehicle made by Lockheed Martin. There were seismic sensor systems used to detect the movement of people and other wonders of the modern border-policing world. Around Elkabetz, you could see vivid examples of where the future of such policing was heading, as imagined not by a dystopian science fiction writer but by some of the top corporate techno-innovators on the planet.
Swimming in a sea of border security, the brigadier general was, however, not surrounded by the Mediterranean but by a parched West Texas landscape. He was in El Paso, a 10-minute walk from the wall that separates the United States from Mexico.
Just a few more minutes on foot and Elkabetz could have watched green-striped U.S. Border Patrol vehicles inching along the trickling Rio Grande in front of Ciudad Juarez, one of Mexico’s largest cities filled with U.S. factories and the dead of that country’s drug wars. The Border Patrol agents whom the general might have spotted were then being up-armored with a lethal combination of surveillance technologies, military hardware, assault rifles, helicopters, and drones. This once-peaceful place was being transformed into what Timothy Dunn, in his book The Militarization of the U.S. Mexico Border, terms a state of “low-intensity warfare.”
The Border Surge
On November 20, 2014, President Obama announced a series of executive actions on immigration reform. Addressing the American people, he referred to bipartisan immigration legislation passed by the Senate in June 2013 that would, among other things, further up-armor the same landscape in what’s been termed – in language adopted from recent U.S. war zones – a “border surge.” The president bemoaned the fact that the bill had been stalled in the House of Representatives, hailing it as a “compromise” that “reflected common sense.” It would, he pointed out, “have doubled the number of Border Patrol agents, while giving undocumented immigrants a pathway to citizenship.”
In the wake of his announcement, including executive actions that would protect five to six million of those immigrants from future deportation, the national debate was quickly framed as a conflict between Republicans and Democrats. Missed in this partisan war of words was one thing: the initial executive action that Obama announced involved a further militarization of the border supported by both parties.
“First,” the president said, “we’ll build on our progress at the border with additional resources for our law enforcement personnel so that they can stem the flow of illegal crossings and speed the return of those who do cross over.” Without further elaboration, he then moved on to other matters.
If, however, the United States follows the “common sense” of the border-surge bill, the result could add more than $40 billion dollars worth of agents, advanced technologies, walls, and other barriers to an already unparalleled border enforcement apparatus. And a crucial signal would be sent to the private sector that, as the trade magazine Homeland Security Today puts it, another “treasure trove” of profit is on the way for a border control market already, according to the latest forecasts, in an “unprecedented boom period.”
Like the Gaza Strip for the Israelis, the U.S. borderlands, dubbed a “constitution-free zone” by the ACLU, are becoming a vast open-air laboratory for tech companies. There, almost any form of surveillance and “security” can be developed, tested, and showcased, as if in a militarized shopping mall, for other nations across the planet to consider. In this fashion, border security is becoming a global industry and few corporate complexes can be more pleased by this than the one that has developed in Elkabetz’s Israel.
The Palestine-Mexico Border
Consider the IDF brigadier general’s presence in El Paso two years ago an omen. After all, in February 2014, Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agency in charge of policing our borders, contracted with Israel’s giant private military manufacturer Elbit Systems to build a “virtual wall,” a technological barrier set back from the actual international divide in the Arizona desert. That company, whose U.S.-traded stock shot up by 6% during Israel’s massive military operation against Gaza in the summer of 2014, will bring the same databank of technology used in Israel’s borderlands – Gaza and the West Bank – to Southern Arizona through its subsidiary Elbit Systems of America.
With approximately 12,000 employees and, as it boasts, “10+ years securing the world’s most challenging borders,” Elbit produces an arsenal of “homeland security systems.” These include surveillance land vehicles, mini-unmanned aerial systems, and “smart fences,” highly fortified steel barriers that have the ability to sense a person’s touch or movement. In its role as lead system integrator for Israel’s border technology plan, the company has already installed smart fences in the West Bank and the Golan Heights.
In Arizona, with up to a billion dollars potentially at its disposal, CBP has tasked Elbit with creating a “wall” of “integrated fixed towers” containing the latest in cameras, radar, motion sensors, and control rooms. Construction will start in the rugged, desert canyons around Nogales. Once a DHS evaluation deems that part of the project effective, the rest will be built to monitor the full length of the state’s borderlands with Mexico. Keep in mind, however, that these towers are only one part of a broader operation, the Arizona Border Surveillance Technology Plan. At this stage, it’s essentially a blueprint for an unprecedented infrastructure of high-tech border fortifications that has attracted the attention of many companies.
This is not the first time Israeli companies have been involved in a U.S. border build-up. In fact, in 2004, Elbit’s Hermes drones were the first unmanned aerial vehicles to take to the skies to patrol the southern border. In 2007, according to Naomi Klein in The Shock Doctrine, the Golan Group, an Israeli consulting company made up of former IDF Special Forces officers, provided an intensive eight-day course for special DHS immigration agents covering “everything from hand-to-hand combat to target practice to ‘getting proactive with their SUV.’” The Israeli company NICE Systems even supplied Arizona’s Joe Arpaio,“America’s toughest sheriff,” with a surveillance system to watch one of his jails.
As such border cooperation intensified, journalist Jimmy Johnson coined the apt phrase “Palestine-Mexico border” to catch what was happening. In 2012, Arizona state legislators, sensing the potential economic benefit of this growing collaboration, declared their desert state and Israel to be natural “trade partners,” adding that it was “a relationship we seek to enhance.”
In this way, the doors were opened to a new world order in which the United States and Israel are to become partners in the “laboratory” that is the U.S.-Mexican borderlands. Its testing grounds are to be in Arizona. There, largely through a program known as Global Advantage, American academic and corporate knowhow and Mexican low-wage manufacturing are to fuse with Israel’s border and homeland security companies.
The Border: Open for Business
No one may frame the budding romance between Israel’s high-tech companies and Arizona better than Tucson Mayor Jonathan Rothschild. “If you go to Israel and you come to Southern Arizona and close your eyes and spin yourself a few times,” he says, “you might not be able to tell the difference.”
Global Advantage is a business project based on a partnership between the University of Arizona’s Tech Parks Arizona and the Offshore Group, a business advisory and housing firm which offers “nearshore solutions for manufacturers of any size” just across the border in Mexico. Tech Parks Arizona has the lawyers, accountants, and scholars, as well as the technical knowhow, to help any foreign company land softly and set up shop in the state. It will aid that company in addressing legal issues, achieving regulatory compliance, and even finding qualified employees – and through a program it’s called the Israel Business Initiative, Global Advantage has identified its target country.
Think of it as the perfect example of a post-NAFTA world in which companies dedicated to stopping border crossers are ever freer to cross the same borders themselves. In the spirit of free trade that created the NAFTA treaty, the latest border fortification programs are designed to eliminate borders when it comes to letting high-tech companies from across the seas set up in the United States and make use of Mexico’s manufacturing base to create their products. While Israel and Arizona may be separated by thousands of miles, Rothschild assured TomDispatch that in “economics, there are no borders.”
Of course, what the mayor appreciates, above all, is the way new border technology could bring money and jobs into an area with a nearly 23% poverty rate. How those jobs might be created matters far less to him. According to Molly Gilbert, the director of community engagement for the Tech Parks Arizona, “It’s really about development, and we want to create technology jobs in our borderlands.”
So consider it anything but an irony that, in this developing global set of boundary-busting partnerships, the factories that will produce the border fortresses designed by Elbit and other Israeli and U.S. high-tech firms will mainly be located in Mexico. Ill-paid Mexican blue-collar workers will, then, manufacture the very components of a future surveillance regime, which may well help locate, detain, arrest, incarcerate, and expel some of them if they try to cross into the United States.
Think of Global Advantage as a multinational assembly line, a place where homeland security meets NAFTA. Right now there are reportedly 10 to 20 Israeli companies in active discussion about joining the program. Bruce Wright, the CEO of Tech Parks Arizona, tells TomDispatch that his organization has a “nondisclosure” agreement with any companies that sign on and so cannot reveal their names.
Though cautious about officially claiming success for Global Advantage’s Israel Business Initiative, Wright brims with optimism about his organization’s cross-national planning. As he talks in a conference room located on the 1,345-acre park on the southern outskirts of Tucson, it’s apparent that he’s buoyed by predictions that the Homeland Security market will grow from a $51 billion annual business in 2012 to $81 billion in the United States alone by 2020, and $544 billion worldwide by 2018.
Wright knows as well that submarkets for border-related products like video surveillance, non-lethal weaponry, and people-screening technologies are all advancing rapidly and that the U.S. market for drones is poised to create 70,000 new jobs by 2016. Partially fueling this growth is what the Associated Press calls an “unheralded shift” to drone surveillance on the U.S. southern divide. More than 10,000 drone flights have been launched into border air space since March 2013, with plans for many more, especially after the Border Patrol doubles its fleet.
When Wright speaks, it’s clear he knows that his park sits atop a twenty-first-century gold mine. As he sees it, Southern Arizona, aided by his tech park, will become the perfect laboratory for the first cluster of border security companies in North America. He’s not only thinking about the 57 southern Arizona companies already identified as working in border security and management, but similar companies nationwide and across the globe, especially in Israel.
In fact, Wright’s aim is to follow Israel’s lead, as it is now the number-one place for such groupings. In his case, the Mexican border would simply replace that country’s highly marketed Palestinian testing grounds. The 18,000 linear feet that surround the tech park’s solar panel farm would, for example, be a perfect spot to test out motion sensors. Companies could also deploy, evaluate, and test their products “in the field,” as he likes to say – that is, where real people are crossing real borders – just as Elbit Systems did before CBP gave it the contract.
“If we’re going to be in bed with the border on a day-to-day basis, with all of its problems and issues, and there’s a solution to it,” Wright said in a 2012 interview, “why shouldn’t we be the place where the issue is solved and we get the commercial benefit from it?”
From the Battlefield to the Border
When Naomi Weiner, project coordinator for the Israel Business Initiative, returned from a trip to that country with University of Arizona researchers in tow, she couldn’t have been more enthusiastic about the possibilities for collaboration. She arrived back in November, just a day before Obama announced his new executive actions – a promising declaration for those, like her, in the business of bolstering border defenses.
“We’ve chosen areas where Israel is very strong and Southern Arizona is very strong,” Weiner explained to TomDispatch, pointing to the surveillance industry “synergy” between the two places. For example, one firm her team met with in Israel was Brightway Vision, a subsidiary of Elbit Systems. If it decides to set up shop in Arizona, it could use tech park expertise to further develop and refine its thermal imaging cameras and goggles, while exploring ways to repurpose those military products for border surveillance applications. The Offshore Group would then manufacture the cameras and goggles in Mexico.
Arizona, as Weiner puts it, possesses the “complete package” for such Israeli companies. “We’re sitting right on the border, close to Fort Huachuca,” a nearby military base where, among other things, technicians control the drones surveilling the borderlands. “We have the relationship with Customs and Border Protection, so there’s a lot going on here. And we’re also the Center of Excellence on Homeland Security.”
Weiner is referring to the fact that, in 2008, DHS designated the University of Arizona the lead school for the Center of Excellence on Border Security and Immigration. Thanks to that, it has since received millions of dollars in federal grants. Focusing on research and development of border-policing technologies, the center is a place where, among other things, engineers are studying locust wings in order to create miniature drones equipped with cameras that can get into the tiniest of spaces near ground level, while large drones like the Predator B continue to buzz over the borderlands at 30,000 feet (despite the fact that a recent audit by the inspector general of homeland security found them a waste of money).
Although the Arizona-Israeli romance is still in the courtship stage, excitement about its possibilities is growing. Officials from Tech Parks Arizona see Global Advantage as the perfect way to strengthen the U.S.-Israel “special relationship.” There is no other place in the world with a higher concentration of homeland security tech companies than Israel. Six hundred tech start-ups are launched in Tel Aviv alone every year. During the Gaza offensive last summer, Bloomberg reported that investment in such companies had “actually accelerated.” However, despite the periodic military operations in Gaza and the incessant build-up of the Israeli homeland security regime, there are serious limitations to the local market.
The Israeli Ministry of Economy is painfully aware of this. Its officials know that the growth of the Israeli economy is “largely fueled by a steady increase in exports and foreign investment.” The government coddles, cultivates, and supports these start-up tech companies until their products are market-ready. Among them have been innovations like the “skunk,” a liquid with a putrid odor meant to stop unruly crowds in their tracks. The ministry has also been successful in taking such products to market across the globe. In the decade following 9/11, sales of Israeli “security exports” rose from $2 billion to $7 billion annually.
Israeli companies have sold surveillance drones to Latin American countries like Mexico, Chile, and Colombia, and massive security systems to India and Brazil, where an electro-optic surveillance system will be deployed along the country’s borders with Paraguay and Bolivia. They have also been involved in preparations for policing the 2016 Olympics in Brazil. The products of Elbit Systems and its subsidiaries are now in use from the Americas and Europe to Australia. Meanwhile, that mammoth security firm is ever more involved in finding “civilian applications” for its war technologies. It is also ever more dedicated to bringing the battlefield to the world’s borderlands, including southern Arizona.
As geographer Joseph Nevins notes, although there are many differences between the political situations of the U.S. and Israel, both Israel-Palestine and Arizona share a focus on keeping out “those deemed permanent outsiders,” whether Palestinians, undocumented Latin Americans, or indigenous people.
Mohyeddin Abdulaziz has seen this “special relationship” from both sides, as a Palestinian refugee whose home and village Israeli military forces destroyed in 1967 and as a long-time resident of the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. A founding member of the Southern Arizona BDS Network, whose goal is to pressure U.S. divestment from Israeli companies, Abdulaziz opposes any program like Global Advantage that will contribute to the further militarization of the border, especially when it also sanitizes Israel’s “violations of human rights and international law.”
Such violations matter little, of course, when there is money to be made, as Brigadier General Elkabetz indicated at that 2012 border technology conference. Given the direction that both the U.S. and Israel are taking when it comes to their borderlands, the deals being brokered at the University of Arizona look increasingly like matches made in heaven (or perhaps hell). As a result, there is truth packed into journalist Dan Cohen’s comment that “Arizona is the Israel of the United States.”
Todd Miller, a TomDispatch regular, is the author of Border Patrol Nation: Dispatches From the Front Lines of Homeland Security. He has written on border and immigration issues for the New York Times, Al Jazeera America, and NACLA Report on the Americas and its blog Border Wars, among other places. You can follow him on twitter @memomiller and view more of his work at toddwmiller.wordpress.com.
Gabriel M. Schivone, a writer from Tucson, has worked as a humanitarian volunteer in the Mexico-U.S. borderlands for more than six years. He blogs at Electronic Intifada and Huffington Post’s “Latino Voices.” His articles have appeared in the Arizona Daily Star, the Arizona Republic, StudentNation, the Guardian, and McClatchy Newspapers, among other publications. You can follow him on Twitter @GSchivone.
Follow TomDispatch on Twitter and join us on Facebook. Check out the newest Dispatch Book, Rebecca Solnit’s Men Explain Things to Me, and Tom Engelhardt’s just published book, Shadow Government: Surveillance, Secret Wars, and a Global Security State in a Single-Superpower World.
Copyright 2015 Todd Miller and Gabriel M. Schivone


jueves, 22 de enero de 2015

EL VERDADERO JEFE

Después del triunfalista discurso de Barack Obama ante el Congreso de Estados Unidos y sus propuestas en materia económica, era de esperar que en los medios de comunicación de ese país se estuvieran discutiendo a fondo estos tópicos, que tienen mucho que ver con la vida cotidiana del estadounidense común (más impuestos a los ricos para financiar cuidado de hijos en los lugares de trabajo; aumento del salario mínimo; aprobación de los tratados comerciales y de inversión con Europa y países de la Cuenca del Pacífico; más inversión en infraestructura, etc.).

Sin embargo, ¿cuál es el tema que acapara la atención de los medios estadounidenses y en especial de la mayoría republicana en el Congreso? El tema es ¡IRAN! Sí, Irán, porque Obama ha insistido en que aprobar más sanciones económicas contra este país sería contraproducente, en momentos en que las negociaciones para limitar su capacidad nuclear y evitar así que pueda fabricar armas atómicas, están muy avanzadas.

El todo poderoso lobby pro Israel de Estados Unidos (que controla gran parte de los medios de comunicación de ese país), bajo las directrices del Primer Ministro de Israel, Benjamín Netanyahu, ha iniciado una campaña histérica contra Irán, afirmando que no se le debe hacer ninguna concesión en las negociaciones, que son unos "radicales", que no desean realmente ningún acuerdo; que están "engañando" a Obama; y, por lo tanto lo mejor sería ni siquiera negociar con los iraníes, sino aumentar la presión económica, política y militar. En suma, toda la narrativa que Netanyahu y su partido el Likud ( y buena parte del establecimiento político israelí) ha mantenido durante 30 años.

Según esto, los "ayatollahs" iraníes están dispuestos a fabricar armas nucleares con el sólo objetivo de lanzarlas sobre Israel, y eso lo harían porque odian a los judíos, al Estado de Israel y porque son anti-semitas.

Ahora resulta que esos "ayatollahs" que se tardaron 25 años en derrocar al títere que Estados Unidos y Gran Bretaña tenían al frente de Irán, el sha Rezha Pahlevi; y que los últimos 35 años han resistido un bloqueo económico de parte de Occidente y hasta una guerra instigada contra ellos, que duró 8 largos y desgastantes años (iniciada por Saddam Hussein, entonces aliado de Estados Unidos y a quien se le encomendó desangrar a Irán), estarían dispuestos a lanzar todo por la borda, con tal de arrojar una o dos bombas atómicas sobre Israel. La respuesta de Occidente y de Tel Aviv sería la destrucción completa de Irán por parte de Estados Unidos y del mismo Israel (país que es la verdadera amenaza en Medio Oriente, pues es el único que cuenta con armas nucleares, y no está monitoreado o supervisado por ninguna instancia internacional, como la Agencia Internacional de la Energía Atómica, que en cambio mantiene una vigilancia permanente sobre las instalaciones iraníes, que están enfocadas a uso civil), que es la tercera potencia en materia de armamento nuclear, sólo detrás de Rusia y Estados Unidos, e incluso por encima de China.

El verdadero temor de Netanyahu y los "halcones" israelíes es que Irán, al romper el bloqueo económico que ha limitado sus capacidades de desarrollo, se convierta en una potencia aún más relevante en el Medio Oriente, considerando que es un país con recursos naturales abundantes (especialmente el petróleo), población con mejor nivel educativo que otros países de la región, un ejército que se ha modernizado y un liderazgo político con objetivos claros y que no está subordinado a Occidente ni a Tel Aviv. Todo ello, por supuesto que pondría en riesgo la hegemonía israelí sobre la región y mantendría un contrapeso al que sería muy difícil eliminar, a no ser que se iniciara una nueva guerra en la que Israel, como lo hizo en el caso de Irak, utilice a Occidente para eliminar a uno de sus competidores en esta atribulada región del mundo.

Irán ha podido aguantar las sanciones económicas, la guerra contra Irak, los ataques cibernéticos contra sus instalaciones nucleares, los asesinatos de científicos y de miembros relevantes de sus servicios de inteligencia, por parte del Mossad israelí, y ahora el ataque concertado entre Estados Unidos y Arabia Saudita, para mantener deprimidos los precios del petróleo, y así afectar las finanzas de Irán y Rusia, vistos ahora por Washington y Tel Aviv como sus enemigos mortales.

Así también, Irán y Rusia, con su apoyo a Bashar el Assad en Siria, han obstaculizado la estrategia de estadounidenses e israelíes destinada a mantener en el caos al Medio Oriente, con el claro objetivo de debilitar a todos los países que Israel considere que ponen en peligro su hegemonía, para lo cual es preferible instigar guerras civiles, "jihadismo radical", disputas entre sunnitas y chiítas, etc. que tener a países fuertes, unificados y desarrollados, que seguramente se opondrían al objetivo israelí de crear el "Gran Israel", apropiándose de todas las tierras  palestinas, y expulsando a esa población hacia Jordania. 

Si bien Obama ha sido el títere de Wall Street estos años; está llevando a cabo una campaña de hostigamiento contra Rusia y ha mantenido buena parte de los elementos de la estrategia elaborada por los neoconservadores en el tema del terrorismo; aún no ha podido ser convencido, ni obligado a iniciar una nueva guerra contra Siria e Irán, que es un punto primordial de la agenda de los "halcones" neconservadores estadounidenses, y especialmente de Benjamín Netanyahu y su gobierno.

De ahí que el lobby pro Israel y los neconservadores que ahora dominan nuevamente el Congreso, han decidido humillar a Obama y hacerle ver claramente que el VERDADERO JEFE DE ESTADOS UNIDOS EN MATERIA DE SEGURIDAD NACIONAL ES BENJAMIN NETANYAHU. Y por eso, saltándose todo protocolo y los usos normales entre los países, en donde son los poderes ejecutivos los que invitan a sus pares a visitar el país, ha sido ahora el líder de la Cámara de Diputados, el republicano John Boehner el que ha invitado a Netanyahu a hablar ante el Congreso (la última vez que estuvo ahí lo ovacionaron 29 veces, más que a cualquier presidente estadounidense) sobre IRAN.

Queda claro así que el lobby pro Israel no sólo domina los medios de comunicación de Estados Unidos (así como la Reserva Federal y buena parte de Wall Street), sino que también ha decidido demostrarle a los estadounidenses ( y al mundo), que el Congreso de ese país sólo es un instrumento del poder de Tel Aviv y no representa a los estadounidenses, sino a Israel.

Cada año el Congreso aprueba una partida de 3000 millones de dólares para Israel, que no tiene que ser reembolsada; adicionalmente se han aprobado cientos de millones de dólares extra para reaprovisionar los arsenales israelíes (incluso en plena agresión contra los palestinos de Gaza, el año pasado) y para fabricar y mantener en operación el llamado Iron Dome, que es la defensa israelí contra los cohetes artesanales que lanza Hamas a su territorio.

Israel es el único país por el que el Congreso de Estados Unidos aprobó una ley que lo designa aliado estratégico (ni siquiera Gran Bretaña o Canadá tienen ese status), y todo ello lo han logrado comprando a diputados y senadores estadounidenses, que reciben generosas contribuciones para sus campañas de parte de los "Political action comittees" (PACs), creados por el lobby pro Israel, y con el apoyo que reciben de los grandes medios de comunicación manejados por miembros de dicho lobby, que premian a quienes apoyan a Israel, y castigan con todo a quienes lo critican (incluidos periodistas que se atreven a ello, como Rick Sánchez y Tom Clancy de CNN, que fueron corridos por expresar criticas a los "amos" israelíes).

Veremos si Obama puede aguantar la presión y continua con las negociaciones con Irán, y sobre todo mantiene su promesa de vetar nuevas sanciones que apruebe el Congreso, en tanto no terminen la negociaciones.

Pero por lo pronto, ya se vio quien es el Verdadero Jefe de los congresistas estadounidenses: es Benjamín Netanyahu.


miércoles, 21 de enero de 2015

Trolling Russia
by ISRAEL SHAMIR
Moscow.
The edifice of world post-1991 order is collapsing right now before our eyes. President Putin’s decision to give a miss to the Auschwitz pilgrimage, right after his absence in Paris at the Charlie festival, gave it the last shove. It was good clean fun to troll Russia, as long as it stayed the course. Not anymore. Russia broke the rules.
Until now, Russia, like a country bumpkin in Eton, tried to belong. It attended the gathering of the grandees where it was shunned, paid its dues to European bodies that condemned it, patiently suffered ceaseless hectoring of the great powers and irritating baiting of East European small-timers alike. But something broke down. The lad does not want to belong anymore; he picked up his stuff and went home – just when they needed him to knee in Auschwitz.
Auschwitz gathering is an annual Canossa of Western leaders where they bewail their historic failure to protect the Jews and swear their perennial obedience to them. This is a more important religious rite of our times, the One Ring to rule them all, established in 2001, when the Judeo-American empire had reached the pinnacle of its power. The Russian leader had duly attended the events. This year, they will have to do without him. Israeli ministers already have expressed their deep dissatisfaction for this was Russia’s Red Army that saved the Jews in Auschwitz, after all. Russia’s absence will turn the Holocaust memorial day into a parochial, West-only, event. Worse, Russia’s place will be taken by Ukraine, ruled by unrepentant heirs to Hitler’s Bandera.
This comes after the French ‘Charlie’ demo, also spurned by Russia. The West hinted that Russia’s sins would be forgiven, up to a point, if she joined, first the demo, and later, the planned anti-terrorist coalition, but Russia did not take the bait. This was a visible change, for previously, Russian leaders eagerly participated in joint events and voted for West-sponsored resolutions. In 2001, Putin fully supported George Bush’s War on Terrorism in the UN and on the ground. As recently as 2011, Russia agreed with sanctions against North Korea and Iran. As for coming for a demonstration, the Russians could always be relied upon. This time, the Russians did not come, except for the token presence of the foreign minister Mr. Lavrov. This indomitable successor of Mr. Nyet left the event almost immediately and went – to pray in the Russian church, in a counter-demonstration, of sorts, against Charlie. By going to the church, he declared that he is not Charlie.
For the Charlie Hebdo magazine was (and probably is) explicitly anti-Christian as well as anti-Muslim. One finds on its pages some very obnoxious cartoons offending the Virgin and Christ, as well as the pope and the Church. (They never offend Jews, somehow).
A Russian blogger who’s been exposed to this magazine for the first time, wrote on his page: I am ashamed that the bastards were dealt with by Muslims, not by Christians. This was quite a common feeling in Moscow these days. The Russians could not believe that such smut could be published and defended as a right of free speech. People planned a demo against the Charlie, but City Hall forbade it.
Remember, a few years ago, the Pussy Riot have profaned the St Saviour of Moscow like Femen did in some great European cathedrals, from Notre Dame de Paris to Strasbourg. The Russian government did not wait for vigilante justice to be meted upon the viragos, but sent them for up to two years of prison. At the same time, the Russian criminal law has been changed to include ‘sacrilege’ among ordinary crimes, by general consent. The Russians do feel about their faith more strongly than the EC rulers prescribe.
In Charlie’s France, Hollande’s regime frogmarched the unwilling people into a quite unnecessary gay marriage law, notwithstanding one-million-strong protest demonstrations by Catholics. Femen despoiling the churches were never punished; but a church warden who tried to prevent that, was heavily fined. France has a long anti-Christian tradition, usually described as “laic”, and its grand anti-Church coalition of Atheists, Huguenots and Jews coalesced in Dreyfus Affair days. Thus Lavrov’s escape to the church was a counter-demonstration, saying: Russia is for Christ, and Russia is not against Muslims.
While the present western regime is anti-Christian and anti-Muslim, it is pro-Jewish to an extent that defies a rational explanation. France had sent thousands of soldiers and policemen to defend Jewish institutions, though this defence antagonises their neighbours. While Charlie are glorified for insulting Christians and Muslims, Dieudonné has been sent to jail (just for a day, but with great fanfare) for annoying Jews. Actually, Charlie Hebdo dismissed a journalist for one sentence allegedly disrespectful for Jews. This unfairness is a source of aggravation: Muslims were laughed out of court when they complained against particularly vile Charlie’s cartoons, but Jews almost always win when they go to the court against their denigrators. (Full disclosure: I was also sued by LICRA, the French Jewish body, while my French publisher was devastated by their legal attacks).
The Russians don’t comprehend the Western infatuation with Jews, for Russian Jews have been well assimilated and integrated in general society. The narrative of Holocaust is not popular in Russia for one simple reason: so many Russians from every ethnic background lost their lives in the war, that there is no reason to single out Jews as supreme victims. Millions died at the siege of Leningrad; Belarus lost a quarter of its population. More importantly, Russians feel no guilt regarding Jews: they treated them fairly and saved them from the Nazis. For them, the Holocaust is a Western narrative, as foreign as JeSuisCharlie. With drifting of Russia out of Western consensus, there is no reason to maintain it.
This does not mean the Jews are discriminated against. The Jews of Russia are doing very well, thank you, without Holocaust worship: they occupy the highest positions in the Forbes list of Russia’s rich, with a combined capital of $122 billion, while all rich ethnic Russians own only $165 billion, according to the Jewish-owned source. Jews run the most celebrated media shows in prime time on the state TV; they publish newspapers; they have full and unlimited access to Putin and his ministers; they usually have their way when they want to get a plot of land for their communal purposes. And anti-Semitic propaganda is punishable by law – like anti-Christian or anti-Muslim abuse, but even more severely. Still, it is impossible to imagine a Russian journalist getting sack like CNN anchor Jim Clancy or BBC’s Tim Willcox for upsetting a Jew or speaking against Israel.
Russia preserves its plurality, diversity and freedom of opinion. The pro-Western Russian media – Novaya Gazeta of oligarch Lebedev, the owner of the British newspaper Independent – carries the JeSuis slogan and speaks of the Holocaust, as well as demands to restore Crimea to the Ukraine. But the vast majority of Russians do support their President, and his civilizational choice. He expressed it when he went to midnight Christmas mass in a small village church in far-away province, together with orphans and refugees from the Ukraine. And he expressed it by refusing to go to Auschwitz.
2.
Neither willingly nor easily did Russia break ranks. Putin tried to take Western baiting in his stride: be it Olympic games, Syria confrontation, gender politics, Georgian border, even Crimea-related sanctions. The open economic warfare was a game-changer. Russia felt attacked by falling oil prices, by rouble trouble, by credit downgrading. These developments are considered an act of hostility, rather than the result of “the hidden hand of the market”.
Russians love conspiracia, as James Bond used to say. They do not believe in chance, coincidence nor natural occurrences, and are likely to consider a falling meteorite or an earthquake – a result of hostile American action, let alone a fall in the rouble/dollar exchange rate. They could be right, too, though it is hard to prove.
Regarding oil price fall, the jury is out. Some say this action by Saudis is aimed at American fracking companies, or alternatively it’s a Saudi-American plot against Russia. However, the price of oil is not formed by supply-demand, but by financial instruments, futures and derivatives. This virtual demand-and-supply is much bigger than the real one. When hedge funds stopped to buy oil futures, price downturn became unavoidable, but were the funds directed by politicians, or did they act so as Quantitative Easing ended?
The steep fall of the rouble could be connected to oil price downturn, but not necessarily so. The rouble is not involved in oil price forming. It could be an action by a very big financial institution. Soros broke the back of British pound in 1991; Korean won, Thai bath and Malaysian ringgit suffered similar fate in 1998. In each case, the attacked country lost about 40% of its GDP. It is possible that Russia was attacked by financial weapons directed from New York.
The European punitive sanctions forbade long-term cheap credit to Russian companies. The Russian state does not need loans, but Russian companies do. Combination of these factors put a squeeze on Russian pockets. The rating agencies kept downgrading Russian rating to almost junk level, for political reasons, I was told. As they were deprived of credit, state companies began to hoard dollars to pay later their debts, and they refrained from converting their huge profits to roubles, as they did until now. The rouble fell drastically, probably much lower than it had to.
This is not pinpoint sanctions aimed at Putin’s friends. This is a full-blown war. If the initiators expected Russians to be mad at Putin, they miscalculated. The Russian public is angry with the American organisers of the economical warfare, not with its own government. The pro-Western opposition tried to demonstrate against Putin, but very few people joined them.
Ordinary Russians kept a stiff upper lip. They did not notice the sanctions until the rouble staggered, and even then they shopped like mad rather than protested. In the face of shrinking money, they did not buy salt and sugar, as their grandparents would have. Their battle cry against hogging was “Do not take more than two Lexus cars per family, leave something for others!”
Perhaps, the invisible financiers went too far. Instead of being cowed, the Russians are preparing for a real long war, as they and their ancestors have historically fought – and won. It is not like they have a choice: though Americans insist Russia should join their War-on-Terrorism-II, they do not intend to relinquish sanctions.
The Russians do not know how to deal with a financial attack. Without capital restrictions, Russia will be cleaned out. Russian Central bank and Treasury people are strict monetarists, capital restrictions are anathema for them. Putin, being a liberal himself, apparently trusts them. Capital flight has taken huge proportions. Unless Russia uses the measures successfully tried by Mohammad Mahathir of Malaysia, it will continue. At present, however, we do not see sign of change.
This could be the incentive for Putin to advance in Ukraine. If the Russians do not know how to shuffle futures and derivatives, they are expert in armour movements and tank battles. Kiev regime is also spoiling for a fight, apparently pushed by the American neocons. It is possible that the US will get more than what it bargained for in the Ukraine.
One can be certain that Russians will not support the Middle Eastern crusade of NATO, as this military action was prepared at the Charlie demo in Paris. It is far from clear who killed the cartoonists, but Paris and Washington intend to use it for reigniting war in the Middle East. This time, Russia will be in opposition, and probably will use it as an opportunity to change the uncomfortable standoff in the Ukraine. Thus supporters of peace in the Middle East have a good reason to back Russia.
Israel Shamir works in Moscow and Jaffa


martes, 20 de enero de 2015

US hegemonic quest in Mideast creates chaos
Source:Global Times Published: 2015-1-20 0:13:01
Editor's Note:

With the rise of the Islamic State (IS), the conflicts in Syria and Iraq, and the struggle between Iran and the West over nuclear issues, the Middle East remained chaotic in 2014. What about 2015? What kind of role will the US play in the regional political landscape? At a seminar held by the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies, Renmin University of China, Global Times (GT) reporter Liu Zhun talked to Flynt Leverett (Flynt), former senior director of Middle East Affairs at the National Security Council (NSC), and Hillary Mann Leverett (Hillary), former director of Iran, Afghanistan and Persian Gulf Affairs at the NSC, about these issues.
GT: What is your forecast of the situation of the Middle East this year?

Flynt: More and more negative consequences of the failed US drive for the hegemony in the Middle East will become increasingly evident. The US is struggling to come to terms with that.

Washington should reconsider its basic strategy for this region, but President Barack Obama has a great belief in US' hegemonic agenda.

Many analysts in the US argue that Washington should "double-down" on its strategy. But this is the wrong direction.

Hillary: There will be more violence throughout the region - violence encouraged by the US. A potential difference rests on the possibility that an alternative mindset will be brought in by China as it rises. Whether Russia, with the support of China and Iran, can put Syria's conflicts on a different trajectory toward resolution is important - whether they can bring in a different paradigm for conflict resolution. I am not sure they can yet, but I am encouraged by China's rise and its focus on sovereignty and conflict resolution.
GT: If the US changes its course, will the region be a better place?

Flynt: Yes, it will be a better place. The historical record has proven that. For 20 years after China's revolution, the US was doing everything it could to isolate and hurt the People's Republic of China.

After it gave up its hostile policies toward China, China, as well as other East Asian countries, embarked on a long and productive period of economic expansion with rising prosperity for hundreds of millions of people. The Middle East will not be perfect after the US changes its policy, but it will be better.
GT: But the chaos in the Middle East, much of which is driven by religious issues, is more complicated than the conflicts China encountered with the US, which were basically ideological. What do you think of the role of Islam in the chaos of the Middle East?

Hillary: There has been a perception that there is something wrong with Islam and that it is the major contributor to the complications of the problems in the Middle East. But if you look historically, that is not really true. There is no evidence that Muslims are historically terrorists. The head of the IS was in an American prison, where he became more extreme in his own views and forged a network with other extremists.

The perennial chaos of the Middle East, to a large extent, is caused by a long history of military penetration by Western countries such as France, the UK and now the US.
GT: You suggest the US should shift its Middle East policy and pull back from trying to be a hegemon - for example, by restoring ties with Iran. What do you think of Obama's current strategy to the Middle East?

Flynt: People are talking about the Obama doctrine and his being less interventionist. I don't really think that is right. I think the Obama administration is no less committed to so-called global leadership, which is actually hegemony, over strategically important areas like the Middle East. The Obama administration thinks it has a smarter way of promoting that leadership than its immediate predecessor. But that is more a tactical than strategic difference.
GT: Many countries criticize the US for its "double standards" on many international issues. But some US analysts said the US is a victim of "double standards," because many countries hate the US when it leads, but they hate even more when the US doesn't lead. What do you think?

Hillary: This is a deliberate confusion fostered by the US. When we look at the Middle East, we find that governments need the US to provide military and financial support to protect their vested interests, so they hate us even more when we don't lead. But the people of these countries hate when the US leads, because many US-backed governments cannot represent the interests of the people.
GT: China's "One Belt and One Road" project is believed to have a major influence on the Middle East. Will it be a counterbalance of the US' influence in the region?

Flynt: US power in the Persian Gulf is in relative decline. But because it is desperate to cling to its hegemonic ambitions in the region, Washington is trying to put China's interests at risk.

China will decide what its interests are in the Middle East. As an analytic point, though, if China really wants to have an independent and balanced foreign policy, China will need to decide how accommodating it wants to be of US preferences and to what extent it wants to pursue its own interests, even when the US is not necessarily happy about that.

I think the Middle East's engagement in the
Silk Road, especially Iran, is going to be a testing ground for China.

Hillary: I think the US will definitely disagree with the project. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US has really focused on trying to expand its influence, military or otherwise, on Central Asian states in a bid to put pressure on Russia. This has been a consistent theme through both Democratic and Republican administrations.

China's project will unavoidably reach Central Asia, which could lessen interest in those states in aligning with various American projects and make it harder for the US to pressure Russia.

Besides, as Iran is central for both Silk Roads, China's good relationship with Iran will be very problematic for the US interests, and also for its hegemonic ambitions across the entire Middle East.

If Iran benefits from this project and rises to be a more powerful force to challenge the influence of Saudi Arabia, Israel and eventually the US, Washington will try to stop this from happening.


lunes, 19 de enero de 2015

Netanyahu and Europe’s far right find common ground
The National
January 18, 2015
Israel has been having its own internal debate about the significance of the Paris killings this month, with concerns quite separate from those being expressed in Europe.

While Europeans are mired in debates about free speech and the role of Islam in secular societies, Israelis generally – and their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, in particular – view the attacks as confirming Israel’s place as the only safe haven for Jews around the world.

The 17 deaths in Paris have reinforced Israeli suspicions that Europe, with its rapidly growing Muslim population, is being dragged into a clash of civilisations that it is ill-equipped to combat. More specifically, the targeting of a kosher supermarket that killed four Jews has heightened a belief that Jews outside Israel are in mortal danger.

If surveys are to be believed, such anxieties are shared in Europe’s Jewish communities. One published last week found that 56 per cent of British Jews think anti-semitism in Britain now is comparable to the 1930s.

As one calmer Israeli analyst pointed out, the findings suggested “a disconnect from reality which borders on hysteria”.

Such fears have been stoked by images like the one posted on Facebook last week by the Israeli embassy in Dublin, showing the Mona Lisa wearing a hijab and carrying a large rocket. The line underneath read: “Israel is the last frontier of the free world.”

In similar vein, the Arab affairs correspondent on Israel’s Channel 10 broadcast a fear-mongering “investigation” from London supposedly proving that the city was overrun with jihadis.

The hysteria is echoed by Israeli politicians, not least Mr Netanyahu. Since the Paris attacks, he has repeated warnings of a “poisonous” Islam conquering the West – ignoring the reality that Europe, including France, is far safer for Jews than Israel has proved.

Politicians on both the left and right have parroted his message that European Jews know “in their hearts that they have only one country”. Israel apparently persuaded the families of the four Jewish victims of that: they were flown to Israel to be buried in Jerusalem.

In contrast, the burial in Paris of Ahmed Merabet, the Muslim policeman also killed by the gunmen, sent a message of French unity, noted a French Jewish leader. This was the moment, he added, for his community to say: “We will be buried here, just like everyone else. We are French and we have not given up.”

Mr Netanyahu has other ideas. At a time when the number of Jewish migrants from France is already rocketing, he has established a ministerial committee to find ways to induce yet more to come to Israel.

It was widely reported in Israel that the French president, Francois Hollande, had appealed to Mr Netanyahu not to participate in the solidarity rally in Paris a week ago, fearful that he would use the occasion to exacerbate tensions in France. Mr Netanyahu ignored the request.

He had good reason to want to be there, not least to grandstand with world leaders during Israel’s election campaign. In addition, proselytising for his claim that the so-called Judeo-Christian West is on a collision course with Islam usefully places him on the side of the angels as he tries to build a Greater Israel, crushing Palestinian ambitions for statehood.

But it would be wrong to view Mr Netanyahu’s argument as solely opportunistic. It is underpinned by an authentic worldview, even if one with paradoxical antecedents.

His approach is embodied in recent efforts – delayed because of the election – to pass a basic law defining Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. That would crown Mr Netanyahu leader of Jews worldwide rather than of Israeli citizens, a fifth of whom are Palestinian.
Such a conception of citizenship and nationhood is based on ethnicity, not territory. It opposes multiculturalism, believing instead that loyalty to the state derives from a tribal attachment rather than a civic one. It stands in stark opposition to most European countries’ notions of citizenship.

As a result, the Israeli leadership assumes that all Palestinians, including those who are Israeli citizens, cannot be trusted and that there can never be real peace in the region. That is why Israel has been building iron walls everywhere to create a fortress Jewish state.

But the logical corollary is that Jews too cannot be loyal to the other states they live in, such as France. In Mr Netanyahu’s conception, a Jew’s primary bond should be to their “true home”: the Jewish state of Israel.

Paradoxically, that view is shared by Europe’s far-right, including groups like France’s National Front, whose popularity has been growing on the back of attacks like the one in Paris. They argue that minorities are inherently suspect and that Europe is better off without them.

In this regard, Mr Netanyahu and the far-right share much common ground. He wants a Europe free of Jews – as well as Muslims who undermine Europe’s support for Israel – because he thinks that is in Jewish interests. The far-right wants the same because it believes it will be in the interests of a supposed “native” white majority.

One Israeli commentator noted pointedly that Israeli politicians like Mr Netanyahu were helping to “finish the job started by the Nazis and their Vichy collaborators: making France Judenrein”.

In calling for Jews to flee after the Paris attacks, Mr Netanyahu is bolstering the dangerous arguments of Europe’s far-right.

Jonathan Cook is an independent journalist based in NazarethIsrael has been having its own internal debate about the significance of the Paris killings this month, with concerns quite separate from those being expressed in Europe.
While Europeans are mired in debates about free speech and the role of Islam in secular societies, Israelis generally – and their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, in particular – view the attacks as confirming Israel’s place as the only safe haven for Jews around the world.
The 17 deaths in Paris have reinforced Israeli suspicions that Europe, with its rapidly growing Muslim population, is being dragged into a clash of civilisations that it is ill-equipped to combat. More specifically, the targeting of a kosher supermarket that killed four Jews has heightened a belief that Jews outside Israel are in mortal danger.
If surveys are to be believed, such anxieties are shared in Europe’s Jewish communities. One published last week found that 56 per cent of British Jews think anti-semitism in Britain now is comparable to the 1930s.
As one calmer Israeli analyst pointed out, the findings suggested “a disconnect from reality which borders on hysteria”.
Such fears have been stoked by images like the one posted on Facebook last week by the Israeli embassy in Dublin, showing the Mona Lisa wearing a hijab and carrying a large rocket. The line underneath read: “Israel is the last frontier of the free world.”
In similar vein, the Arab affairs correspondent on Israel’s Channel 10 broadcast a fear-mongering “investigation” from London supposedly proving that the city was overrun with jihadis.
The hysteria is echoed by Israeli politicians, not least Mr Netanyahu. Since the Paris attacks, he has repeated warnings of a “poisonous” Islam conquering the West – ignoring the reality that Europe, including France, is far safer for Jews than Israel has proved.
Politicians on both the left and right have parroted his message that European Jews know “in their hearts that they have only one country”. Israel apparently persuaded the families of the four Jewish victims of that: they were flown to Israel to be buried in Jerusalem.
In contrast, the burial in Paris of Ahmed Merabet, the Muslim policeman also killed by the gunmen, sent a message of French unity, noted a French Jewish leader. This was the moment, he added, for his community to say: “We will be buried here, just like everyone else. We are French and we have not given up.”
Mr Netanyahu has other ideas. At a time when the number of Jewish migrants from France is already rocketing, he has established a ministerial committee to find ways to induce yet more to come to Israel.
It was widely reported in Israel that the French president, Francois Hollande, had appealed to Mr Netanyahu not to participate in the solidarity rally in Paris a week ago, fearful that he would use the occasion to exacerbate tensions in France. Mr Netanyahu ignored the request.
He had good reason to want to be there, not least to grandstand with world leaders during Israel’s election campaign. In addition, proselytising for his claim that the so-called Judeo-Christian West is on a collision course with Islam usefully places him on the side of the angels as he tries to build a Greater Israel, crushing Palestinian ambitions for statehood.
But it would be wrong to view Mr Netanyahu’s argument as solely opportunistic. It is underpinned by an authentic worldview, even if one with paradoxical antecedents.
His approach is embodied in recent efforts – delayed because of the election – to pass a basic law defining Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people. That would crown Mr Netanyahu leader of Jews worldwide rather than of Israeli citizens, a fifth of whom are Palestinian.