Sweden has ended a military deal with Saudi Arabia over human rights issues, Saudi Arabia pressured Arab League to cancel Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström's speech

Sweden has ended a military deal with Saudi Arabia over human rights issues, Saudi Arabia pressured Arab League to cancel Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström's speech

    Tuesday, March 10, 2015   No comments

Sweden has ended a military deal with Saudi Arabia over human rights issues. The break comes after the Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström was allegedly prevented from making a speech at an Arab League meeting.


Arms Exports
Sweden cancels Saudi arms deal after human rights row

Sweden has ended a military deal with Saudi Arabia over human rights issues. The break comes after the Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström was allegedly prevented from making a speech at an Arab League meeting.

Sweden announced that it would not be renewing its military cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia, effectively ending the 10-year-old defense ties due to mounting concerns over rights issues.

"It will be broken off," Prime Minister Stefan Löfven said on Swedish public radio. The Social Democrat premier's comments came a day after Sweden's Foreign Minister Margot Wallström accused Saudi Arabia of blocking her speech at an Arab League meeting in Cairo.

The government made the official announcement Tuesday evening about the termination of the trade agreement, which includes the export of military arms to Saudi Arabia.

Speech row

Relations between the two countries have grown frosty in the last 24 hours after Wallström said Riyadh had stopped her from making her opening address to the meeting on Monday because of her stance on human rights.

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Full Interview With Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif

Full Interview With Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif

    Thursday, March 05, 2015   No comments

Iran's Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, spoke with NBC News' Ann Curry Wednesday. Below is the complete interview:

ANN CURRY: Foreign minister, thank you so much for being here.

JAVAD ZARIF: Happy to be with you.

ANN CURRY: We've noticed a sudden flurry of meetings - is this a sign that things are getting-- bogged down or moving forward?

JAVAD ZARIF: Well-- it's a sign that we are very serious. And we want to reach a conclusion. We suggested that we needed to raise the level of technical discussions. And so we had our head of an atomic energy organization and United States for-- the secretary of energy, both-- very well known nuclear physicists-- in order to reach-- some sort of a technical understanding. And that proved to be a-- very important, useful-- step. And we have been able to move forward with a good number of-- issues dealing with the-- with the technicalities. Because we were-- said all along that our nuclear program is exclusively peaceful. And when we have experts sitting together they can ascertain that, rather easily. And I'm-- I'm very happy that that has gone well. Of course that doesn't mean that we have resolved all the issues. We have a number of issues, both technical as well as political, that still need to be resolved. But we-- we've made good progress. But long way to go.

ANN CURRY: Where's the area of the major stumbling block?

JAVAD ZARIF: Well-- as we have been saying for the past, I think, year and a half-- nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. This is a puzzle. And all pieces of this puzzle should come together in order for us to have a picture of what lies ahead. But I think the major stumbling block-- is a political decision that needs to be made. And-- and that is that we have to choose between-- either pressure or an agreement. And it seems that there is a lot of pressure-- particularly within the United States, from various courses, and we've seen some recently-- not to have an agreement. And-- there are those who simply see their-- hopes-- and-- their political future in conflict, tension and crisis. And as-- as long as that is the case, it's a very difficult environment to make political decisions.

ANN CURRY: Some of the pressure against the deal has come as recently as Tuesday from Ira-- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He caused quite a stir in Washington on Tuesday when he told Congress that this deal paves the way to war, not peace, as it would allow Iran to eventually procure nuclear weapons.

JAVAD ZARIF: Well-- Mr. Netanyahu has been-- proclaiming, predicting that Iran will have a nuclear weapon with-- within two, three, four years, since 1992. He has been on the record time and again that Iran will build a nuclear weapon within two years-- since, as I said, 1992. In 2012, he went before the General Assembly and said, "Iran will have a nuclear weapon within one year." It seems that he wants to stick to his one year-- forever. Iran is not about building nuclear weapon. We don't wanna build nuclear weapons. We don't believe that nuclear weapons bring security to anybody, certainly not to us. So-- it's important for everybody to come to the realization that-- this is about nuclear technology, this is about scientific advancement, this is about pride of the Iranian people. It's-- it has nothing to do with nuclear weapons. And once we reach that understanding, once this hysteria is out, one-- once this fear mongering is out, then we can have a deal, and a deal that is not gonna hurt anybody. This deal will help ensure that Iran's nuclear program will always remain peaceful. We have no doubt in Iran that our nuclear program is peaceful, will remain peaceful. There may be people who have concerns. There may be people who-- who may have been affected by the type of-- hysteria that is being fanned by people like Mr. Netanyahu. And it is useful for everybody to allow this deal to go through. As you know, Iran has been under more inspections over the last ten, 15 years than any other country on the face of the Earth, probably with the only exception of Japan. And we have less than a tenth of Japan's nuclear facilities. But we have gone almost through as many inspections. And over the past ten years, time and again, The IAEA, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the nuclear watchdog of the United Nations, has come out and said, "There is nothing that is going on behind-- public attention in Iran." And we are confident that, with an agreement, where we will have even more monitoring and more scrutiny-- it will be clear to the international community that our nuclear program is exclusively peaceful. I don't know why some people are afraid of that. I don't know why some people do not want to work to see that all of this hysteria that has been found over the past many years, as I said, since 1992, when we have been at-- one or two or three years away from the bomb and it hasn't materialized, I don't know why they the audacity to continue to-- to make the same statement and nobody questions them, under many times that they have been wrong.

ANN CURRY: You've mentioned the IAEA. As you know-- it says that Iran has been stalling on answering certain questions about past nuclear activities, specifically about whether or not Iran was involved in trying to develop a weapon. So why is Iran stalling on these questions?

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New documents suggest that NSA and the UK’s Spy Agency Launch a Joint Cyberattack on Iran

New documents suggest that NSA and the UK’s Spy Agency Launch a Joint Cyberattack on Iran

    Monday, February 23, 2015   No comments

New documents suggest that NSA and the UK’s Spy Agency Launch a Joint Cyberattack on Iran

An NSA document newly published today suggests two interesting facts that haven’t previously been reported.

The Intercept, which published the document, highlighted that in it the NSA expresses fear that it may be teaching Iran how to hack, but there are two other points in the document that merit attention.

One concerns the spy tool known as Flame; the other refers to concerns the NSA had about partnering with the British spy agency Government Communications Headquarters and Israeli intelligence in surveillance operations.

Full story: http://www.wired.com/2015/02/uks-spy-agency-partner-nsa-cyberattacks-iran/
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Report: Leaked intelligence document shows Mossad didn't think Iran sought nuclear weapon
Al Jazeera says one of hundreds of intelligence documents it has obtained shows that Mossad assessment of Iranian nuclear threat differed with Netanyahu's statements on the issue.

A new leak of secret intelligence documents obtained by Al Jazeera shows that the Mossad expressed the belief that Tehran was not pursuing a nuclear weapon just a month after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the Islamic Republic was a year away from becoming nuclear-armed.

The Qatari television network, in collaboration with Britain's Guardian will be publishing "The Spy Cables" in the coming days.

The documents, spanning the period of 2006-2014, were written by members of South Africa's State Security Agency (SSA). The documents, according to Al Jazeera, highlight the SSA's dealings with the intelligence services of its allies, including the Mossad and the CIA.

full story: http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Report-Leaked-intelligence-document-shows-Mossad-didnt-think-Iran-sought-nuclear-weapon-391902

U.S. officials, in blunt language, say Israel is distorting reality of Iran talks

U.S. officials, in blunt language, say Israel is distorting reality of Iran talks

    Thursday, February 19, 2015   No comments

The Obama administration on Wednesday accused the Israeli government of misleading the public over the Iran nuclear negotiations, using unusually blunt and terse language that once again highlighted the rift between the two sides.

In briefings with reporters, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki and White House spokesman Josh Earnest suggested Israeli officials were not being truthful about how the United States is handling the secretive talks.

“I think it is safe to say not everything you are hearing from the Israeli government is an accurate reflection of the details of the talks,” said Psaki, who acknowledged that the State Department is withholding some details from the Israelis out of concern they will share them more broadly.

Earnest said U.S. officials routinely speak with their Israeli counterparts. But, he added, the administration “is not going to be in a position of negotiating this agreement in public, particularly when we see that there is a continued practice of cherry-picking specific pieces of information and using them out of context to distort the negotiating position of the United States.”

A spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington declined to comment.

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Letter: UK artists announce a cultural boycott of Israel

Letter: UK artists announce a cultural boycott of Israel

    Sunday, February 15, 2015   No comments

Along with more than 600 other fellow artists, we are announcing today that we will not engage in business-as-usual cultural relations with Israel. We will accept neither professional invitations to Israel, nor funding, from any institutions linked to its government. Since the summer war on Gaza, Palestinians have enjoyed no respite from Israel’s unrelenting attack on their land, their livelihood, their right to political existence. “2014,” says the Israeli human rights organisation B’Tselem, was “one of the cruellest and deadliest in the history of the occupation.” The Palestinian catastrophe goes on.

Israel’s wars are fought on the cultural front too. Its army targets Palestinian cultural institutions for attack, and prevents the free movement of cultural workers. Its own theatre companies perform to settler audiences on the West Bank – and those same companies tour the globe as cultural diplomats, in support of “Brand Israel”. During South African apartheid, musicians announced they weren’t going to “play Sun City”. Now we are saying, in Tel Aviv, Netanya, Ashkelon or Ariel, we won’t play music, accept awards, attend exhibitions, festivals or conferences, run masterclasses or workshops, until Israel respects international law and ends its colonial oppression of the Palestinians. To see the full list of supporters, go to artistsforpalestine.org.uk.

Peter Kosminsky, Mike Leigh, Jimmy McGovern, Phyllida Lloyd, Max Stafford-Clark, Will Alsop OBE, John Berger, Miriam Margolyes, Maggie Steed, Riz Ahmed, Anna Carteret, Jeremy Hardy, Brian Eno, Richard Ashcroft, Gillian Slovo, China Miéville, Aminatta Forna, Hari Kunzru, Liz Lochhead, Hanan Al-Shaykh, Peter Ahrends, David Calder, Caryl Churchill, Sacha Craddock, Selma Dabbagh, Ken Loach, Roger Michell, April De Angelis, Andy de la Tour, Mike Hodges, Rachel Holmes, Ann Jungman, Kika Markham, Simon McBurney, Andrew O’Hagan, Courttia Newland, Michael Radford, Lynne Reid Banks, Kamila Shamsie, Alexei Sayle, Roger Waters, Mark Thomas, Susan Wooldridge, Laura Mulvey, Pauline Melville, Khalid Abdalla, Bidisha, Nicholas Blincoe, Leah Borrromeo, Haim Bresheeth, Victoria Brittain, Niall Buggy, Tam Dean Burn, Jonathan Burrows, Taghrid Choucair-Vizoso, Ian Christie, Liam Cunningham, Ivor Dembina, Shane Dempsey, Patrick Driver, Okin Earl, Leon Rosselson, Sally El Hosaini, Paul Laverty, Eyal Sivan, John Smith, Mitra Tabrizian, Siobhan Redmond, Ian Rickson, Tom Leonard, Sonja Linden, David Mabb, Rose Issa, Gareth Evans, Alisa Lebow, Annie Firbank, James Floyd, Jane Frere, Kadija George, Bob Giles, Mel Gooding, Tony Graham, Penny Woolcock, Omar Robert Hamilton, James Holcombe, Adrian Hornsby, John Keane, Brigid Keenan, Hannah Khalil, Shahid Khan, Sabrina Mahfouz, Sarah McDade, Jonathan Munby, Lizzie Nunnery, Rebecca O’Brien, Timothy Pottier, Maha Rahwanji, Ravinder Randhawa, Leila Sansour, Seni Seneviratne, Anna Sherbany, Eyal Sivan, Kareem Samara, Cat Villiers, Esther Wilson, Emily Young, Andrea Luka Zimmerman, Jeremy Page, Sarah Streatfeild, Colin Darke, Russell Mills, Elaine Di Campo, Treasa O’Brien

read artists' statements

Syrian rebels call on Israel to bomb Hezbollah, Iran, Syria positions in southern Syria

Syrian rebels call on Israel to bomb Hezbollah, Iran, Syria positions in southern Syria

    Friday, February 13, 2015   No comments

Israeli officials meeting Syrian opposition figures

Mendi Safadi, who served as former Likud deputy minister Ayoub Kara’s chief of staff, has independently met with members of the liberal and democratic Syrian opposition who oppose the Islamists and want friendly relations with Israel.

Safadi met a week and a half ago with Syrian rebel leaders in Bulgaria and has traveled in the region, met with activists, and relayed messages from them to the Prime Minister’s Office.

He was responsible for relaying the congratulatory letters from the Syrian opposition to then President-elect Reuven Rivlin.

Over the past few days there has been a heavy battle going on between the forces aided by Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah against the Syrian opposition, Safadi told The Jerusalem Post in an interview on Thursday.

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Around 2,000 Syrians have been treated in Israel, according to Safadi.

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After receiving this hard hit, “Hezbollah and Iran want to show that they can withstand it and still have motivation to fight,” argued Safadi.

“The Syrian opposition contacted me yesterday [Wednesday] in a Whatsapp message and asked for me to relay a message to the [Israeli] prime minister that Israel should give Hezbollah and Iran another hard hit to stop their progress,” reported Safadi.

The Free Syrian Army commander of a large unit in southern Syria, who did not want to be identified, claimed to Safadi that the Syrian allied forces intend to reach the Israeli border and use it to carry out terrorist attacks against the Jewish state.

“The commander relayed to me coordinates where Syrian and Hezbollah forces are located,” said Safadi, adding that he cannot reveal this information.

Read more >>  http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Syrian-rebels-call-on-Israel-to-bomb-Hezbollah-Iran-Syria-positions-390896

How Americans really feel about Netanyahu and why it matters

How Americans really feel about Netanyahu and why it matters

    Sunday, February 01, 2015   No comments

 By Shibley Telhami January 30

 The controversy over an invitation to Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to address Congress shortly before Israeli elections has polarized the U.S. political scene. Netanyahu has been here before, of course. His transparent support for the Republican candidate for president in 2012, Mitt Romney, generated much resentment in the Democratic Party hierarchy, and certainly in the Obama administration. But this time – together with House Speaker John Boehner – he is a central player in a highly charged national political environment pitting a Republican-controlled Congress against a Democratic president; public and media attention is much greater, and the consequences potentially higher.

How this will play out in terms of U.S. politics and the impact on relations with Israel depends in part upon a more basic question: How do Americans see Bibi Netanyahu in the first place? And how do these attitudes play into a broader, and growing national divide about policy toward Israel? Some of the questions in a November 2014 poll I conducted – fielded by the research company GfK – among a nationally representative panel of 1008 Americans offer some intriguing evidence.

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CIA and Mossad killed senior Hezbollah figure in car bombing

CIA and Mossad killed senior Hezbollah figure in car bombing

    Saturday, January 31, 2015   No comments

On Feb. 12, 2008, Imad Mughniyah, Hezbollah’s international operations chief, walked on a quiet nighttime street in Damascus after dinner at a nearby restaurant. Not far away, a team of CIA spotters in the Syrian capital was tracking his movements.

As Mughniyah approached a parked SUV, a bomb planted in a spare tire on the back of the vehicle exploded, sending a burst of shrapnel across a tight radius. He was killed instantly.

The device was triggered remotely from Tel Aviv by agents with Mossad, the Israeli foreign intelligence service, who were in communication with the operatives on the ground in Damascus. “The way it was set up, the U.S. could object and call it off, but it could not execute,” said a former U.S. intelligence official.

The United States helped build the bomb, the former official said, and tested it repeatedly at a CIA facility in North Carolina to ensure the potential blast area was contained and would not result in collateral damage.

“We probably blew up 25 bombs to make sure we got it right,” the former official said.

The extraordinarily close cooperation between the U.S. and Israeli intelligence services suggested the importance of the target — a man who over the years had been implicated in some of Hezbollah’s most spectacular terrorist attacks, including those against the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and the Israeli Embassy in Argentina.

The United States has never acknowledged participation in the killing of Mughniyah, which Hezbollah blamed on Israel. Until now, there has been little detail about the joint operation by the CIA and Mossad to kill him, how the car bombing was planned or the exact U.S. role. With the exception of the 2011 killing of Osama bin Laden, the mission marked one of the most high-risk covert actions by the United States in recent years.

U.S. involvement in the killing, which was confirmed by five former U.S. intelligence officials, also pushed American legal boundaries.

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U.S. officials calling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a "chickenshit"

U.S. officials calling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a "chickenshit"

    Thursday, October 30, 2014   No comments

The Crisis in U.S.-Israel Relations Is Officially Here

The Obama administration's anger is "red-hot" over Israel's settlement policies, and the Netanyahu government openly expresses contempt for Obama's understanding of the Middle East. Profound changes in the relationship may be coming.

The other day I was talking to a senior Obama administration official about the foreign leader who seems to frustrate the White House and the State Department the most. “The thing about Bibi is, he’s a chickenshit,” this official said, referring to the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, by his nickname.

This comment is representative of the gloves-off manner in which American and Israeli officials now talk about each other behind closed doors, and is yet another sign that relations between the Obama and Netanyahu governments have moved toward a full-blown crisis. The relationship between these two administrations— dual guarantors of the putatively “unbreakable” bond between the U.S. and Israel—is now the worst it's ever been, and it stands to get significantly worse after the November midterm elections. By next year, the Obama administration may actually withdraw diplomatic cover for Israel at the United Nations, but even before that, both sides are expecting a showdown over Iran, should an agreement be reached about the future of its nuclear program.


The fault for this breakdown in relations can be assigned in good part to the junior partner in the relationship, Netanyahu, and in particular, to the behavior of his cabinet. Netanyahu has told several people I’ve spoken to in recent days that he has “written off” the Obama administration, and plans to speak directly to Congress and to the American people should an Iran nuclear deal be reached. For their part, Obama administration officials express, in the words of one official, a “red-hot anger” at Netanyahu for pursuing settlement policies on the West Bank, and building policies in Jerusalem, that they believe have fatally undermined Secretary of State John Kerry’s peace process.

Over the years, Obama administration officials have described Netanyahu to me as recalcitrant, myopic, reactionary, obtuse, blustering, pompous, and “Aspergery.” (These are verbatim descriptions; I keep a running list.)  But I had not previously heard Netanyahu described as a “chickenshit.” I thought I appreciated the implication of this description, but it turns out I didn’t have a full understanding. From time to time, current and former administration officials have described Netanyahu as a national leader who acts as though he is mayor of Jerusalem, which is to say, a no-vision small-timer who worries mainly about pleasing the hardest core of his political constituency. (President Obama, in interviews with me, has alluded to Netanyahu’s lack of political courage.)

“The good thing about Netanyahu is that he’s scared to launch wars,” the official said, expanding the definition of what a chickenshit Israeli prime minister looks like. “The bad thing about him is that he won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or with the Sunni Arab states. The only thing he’s interested in is protecting himself from political defeat. He’s not [Yitzhak] Rabin, he’s not [Ariel] Sharon, he’s certainly no [Menachem] Begin. He’s got no guts.”

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U.S. VP Joe Biden: Our biggest problem is our allies. Our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria

U.S. VP Joe Biden: Our biggest problem is our allies. Our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria

    Friday, October 03, 2014   No comments

U.S. VP Joe Biden has said that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan admitted mistakes that paved the way for the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

"President Erdoğan told me, he is an old friend, said you were right, we let too many people through, now we are trying to seal the border," Biden said during a speech on foreign policy at Harvard Kennedy School on Oct. 2.


While speaking to the students for nearly an hour and a half, Biden defended the U.S. foreign policy, stressing that the White House was not late to move against the rise of the ISIL. He said that the regional allies of the U.S, determined to take down Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, "poured hundreds of millions dollars, and tens thousands of tones of weapons into anyone who would fight against al-Assad, accepted the people who would be in supply for Al Nusra and Al Qaeda and extremist elements of jihadists coming from other parts of the world."

"Our biggest problem is our allies. Our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria. The Turks, we’re great friends and I have a great relationship with Erdoğan that I spent  a lot of time with. The Saudis, The Emiratis etc... What were they doing?" Biden asked.

"So now what is happening, all of sudden everybody is awakened," Biden added, claiming that like Turkey admitted its mistakes, Saudi Arabia and Qatar stopped the funding of jihadists.

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See also these reports: Liveleaks and  RT report 

Qatar has pumped tens of millions of dollars through obscure funding networks to hard-line Syrian rebels and extremist Salafists

Qatar has pumped tens of millions of dollars through obscure funding networks to hard-line Syrian rebels and extremist Salafists

    Thursday, October 02, 2014   No comments

The Case Against Qatar

The tiny, gas-rich emirate has pumped tens of millions of dollars through obscure funding networks to hard-line Syrian rebels and extremist Salafists, building a foreign policy that punches above its weight. After years of acquiescing -- even taking advantage of its ally's meddling -- Washington may finally be punching back. 

Behind a glittering mall near Doha's city center sits the quiet restaurant where Hossam used to run his Syrian rebel brigade. At the battalion's peak in 2012 and 2013, he had 13,000 men under his control near the eastern city of Deir Ezzor. "Part of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), they are loyal to me," he said over sweet tea and sugary pastries this spring. "I had a good team to fight."

Hossam, a middle-aged Syrian expat, owns several restaurants throughout Doha, Qatar, catering mostly to the country's upper crust. The food is excellent, and at night the tables are packed with well-dressed Qataris, Westerners, and Arabs. Some of his revenue still goes toward supporting brigades and civilians with humanitarian goods -- blankets, food, even cigarettes.

He insists that he has stopped sending money to the battle, for now. His brigade's funds came, at least in part, from Qatar, he says, under the discretion of then Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Khalid bin Mohammed Al Attiyah. But the injection of cash was ad hoc: Dozens of other brigades like his received initial start-up funding, and only some continued to receive Qatari support as the months wore on. When the funds ran out in mid-2013, his fighters sought support elsewhere. "Money plays a big role in the FSA, and on that front, we didn't have," he explained.

Hossam is a peripheral figure in a vast Qatari network of Islamist-leaning proxies that spans former Syrian generals, Taliban insurgents, Somali Islamists, and Sudanese rebels. He left home in 1996 after more than a decade under pressure from the Syrian regime for his sympathy with the Muslim Brotherhood. Many of his friends were killed in a massacre of the group in Hama province in 1982 by then President Hafez al-Assad. He finally found refuge here in Qatar and built his business and contacts slowly. Mostly, he laid low; Doha used to be quite welcoming to the young President Bashar al-Assad and his elegant wife, who were often spotted in the high-end fashion boutiques before the revolt broke out in 2011.
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Hezbollah Drones Target Al-Nusra Front's Positions at Syrian Border

Hezbollah Drones Target Al-Nusra Front's Positions at Syrian Border

    Sunday, September 21, 2014   No comments

During the operations Hezbollah pounded positions of the radical Syrian rebels on the outskirts of the Northeastern town of Arsal using drones, heavy fire and cannons.

At least 23 terrorists were killed and tens of others were injured, while ground troops arrested several terrorists in another part of the operations.

Also the Hezbollah forces repelled an attack by the terrorists in Ra's al-Ma'rah region and Nahlah heights.

This was the first time ever that the Hezbollah resistance group used drone to bomb the terrorists. The resistance group formerly used drones for reconnaissance missions.

The attacks also killed Abu Laith al-Shami, a Lebanese national and ringleader of one of the terrorist groups.

The operations were conducted after the al-Nusra Front claimed responsibility late Saturday for an attack that targeted a Hezbollah checkpoint in Northeast Lebanon. The terrorist group said the attack destroyed a 57 millimeter cannon but did not elaborate. 

At least three were killed in a suicide bombing which targeted a Hezbollah checkpoint in East Lebanon Saturday evening, security sources said.

But Hezbollah's al-Manar TV said the blast left no casualties.

The bombing, which occurred in the village of Khreibeh near the border with Syria, came one day after the killing of three Army soldiers in the Bekaa Valley.

Transcript: Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif's Full NPR Interview: the net income of the United States from these sanctions

Transcript: Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif's Full NPR Interview: the net income of the United States from these sanctions

    Friday, September 19, 2014   No comments

NPR's Steve Inskeep interviewed Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Wednesday about negotiations over Iran's nuclear weapons program, the U.S. approach to combating extremist groups in Iraq and Syria, and Jason Rezaian, a Washington Post reporter currently in custody in Iran. A full transcript of the interview follows:

STEVE INSKEEP: Let me begin with the nuclear negotiations. Obviously there are many tactical details to work out, but I'd like to get your sense of the attitude. Do you believe, after all the years that you've worked on this issue, that you've arrived in a moment when both countries — the United States and Iran — are ready to make a deal?

MOHAMMED JAVAD ZARIF: Well, I thought everybody was ready to make a deal. And the primary reason that I thought that was the case was that we had all tried all the wrong options. And as Churchill said after having trying all the wrong options, I'd hoped that we would use the right option. And I still believe that's a possibility. The only problem is how this could be presented to some domestic constituencies — primarily in the United States, but even in places in Europe — that could please them, or some may say could appease them because some of them are not interested in any deal.

You're talking about people in the United States who feel that a deal with Iran is a bad idea.

Yeah. So if they think any deal with Iran is a bad idea, there's no amount of — I don't want to call it concession — no amount of assurance that is inherent in any deal that could satisfy them, because they're not interested in a deal, period. And they'll try to use excuses to kill a deal. But I think if you compare any deal with a no deal, it's clear that a deal is much preferable. We have had almost 10 years of trying to help one another in the nuclear area, and the net result has been nothing to be proud of. If the United States believes that sanctions have been so effective, then it should answer the question, those who are pushing for continued sanctions and more sanctions, to see what these sanctions have achieved. Have they achieved any of the policy goals that they intended to achieve? That is — the two policy goals that they wanted to achieve were, the obvious one, the stated one, was to push Iran into abandoning its nuclear program. It was never a nuclear weapons program. It was a peaceful program and Iran did not abandon it. If at the time of the imposition of sanctions, we had less than a couple of hundred centrifuges, now we have about 20,000. So that's the net outcome. If the hidden intention of these sanctions was to create a wedge between the government and the populous, than that proved to be erroneous, too, because last year in the presidential elections 73 percent of the population participated in the presidential election, putting their trust in the government.

And voted for a man who said he wanted better relations with the West.

And voted for a man who said he wanted better relations with the West because he believed the previous president mismanaged this thing. He never said he that "I'm going to abandon the nuclear program." He said that the approach that the previous government had to this was not an approach that was commensurate with the problem and that is why it had to be changed.

Foreign Minister, you mention that there are people in both countries who are reluctant to make a deal — you said primarily in the United States. But many people have noted that Iran's supreme leader, Khamenei, has made a number of statements voicing skepticism about these negotiations. Shortly before this conversation began, there was a message on his Twitter feed saying that negotiations have been damaging. What are we in the United States to make of that?

Well, the fact is that the United States government has shown such an, for the lack of a better word, infatuation with sanctions that it has continued imposing sanctions even though it had promised in the Geneva Plan of Action, which we adopted last November, not to impose new sanctions. Now of course Americans are very good in finding technicalities and fine print so that they could justify that these are not new sanctions, but the fact of the matter is that the Iranian people believe that the United States has been less than honest in dealing with this issue, has imposed new sanctions, however they frame it. And that is why the supreme leader has said — the Iranian public in general is skeptical about the United States, and let me give you one example. Last week, an Iranian patient who must have been an admirer of the United States sent a blood sample to the United States for a second opinion. Of course, we have our laboratories.

This was — he had a medical issue, you're saying.

Yeah, he had a medical issue. He took a blood test, tested it in Iranian laboratories, which are quite good, but he wanted a second opinion, and he sent the sample to the United States. And the laboratory refused to test that blood sample because Iran was under sanctions. This is the message that the United —- this is the net income of the United States from these sanctions. That somebody and his family who must have been admirers of the United States, otherwise they wouldn't have sent their blood sample to the United States, are now resentful, if not hateful, of the United States because of what has been done. So if you see people and their leaders skeptical of the way the United States deals with issues, it's because the United States is so wedded to its coercion. Whether it's military coercion, or whether it's economic coercion, that it even blinds the United States to finding a solution that addresses U.S. interests.

Should we believe that Iran's governing structure is ready to make an agreement?

If Iran's governing structure was not ready to make an agreement, we would not have had several reports of the [International Atomic Energy Agency) IAEA, one after another, saying that Iran has lived up to all its commitment. There is no international mechanism to measure how the United States has lived up to its commitment, if there were, I'm sure the United States would have gotten a failing score.

So are you ready?

We are ready. We are ready to stick to the negations. We are ready to stay with the negotiations until the very last minute. We are ready for a good deal, and we believe a good deal is in hand. We only need two sides to be able to have a deal — two willing sides.

Without getting into too many complexities, one issue is how long Iran might suspend its nuclear enrichment program. You have been quoted saying that you might be willing to put on the table a suspension of three to seven years. U.S. officials have talked about a longer period, something like a decade or more, which is a difference, but to an outsider does not seem like an insurmountable difference. Do you believe the two sides are close?

We are not talking about suspension. We're talking about limiting Iran's nuclear program. Now, again, it's a problem of perception. Iran has the capability to produce centrifuges. It's not like a country that imports its technology. We have developed—thanks to the United States sanctions and pressures — we have developed our own indigenous technology. So we are capable of producing — talking about numbers and years is, in my view, an extraneous issue. What we need to do is to put in place mechanisms to ensure that Iran would never produce nuclear weapons. We are prepared to put those mechanisms in place. If you say that Iran should abandon its enrichment program, you cannot abandon science. You cannot abandon technology. We have learned this. So the best way is to make sure that this technology is used in a transparent fashion for a peaceful program.

You have eloquently stated Iran's basic position throughout these negotiations that it needs to be about transparency, but that Iran insists upon its rights. Nevertheless, you are in a situation of working out an agreement detail by detail about exactly what Iran will do. Do you believe that in those technical details the two sides are close?

I don't think we're close, but I think we can be. The fact that we're not close means that the United States and some of its Western allies are pushing for arbitrary limitations which have no bearing whatsoever on whether Iran can produce a nuclear weapon or not. What we are prepared to offer and what we have offered are actual scientific methods of ensuring that Iran will never produce a nuclear bomb. We've said that we don't want a nuclear bomb. We've made it clear that in our nuclear doctrine — in our defense doctrine — nuclear weapons not only do not augment our security, but in fact are detrimental to our security. We make that very clear. And there is a very sound, strategic argument. And let me tell you something, and tell your listeners who are sophisticated, that it is not conducive to tell governments in the developing world that by having nuclear weapons you increase your power. It's theoretically wrong, and even if it was theoretically not wrong, for powers who are interested in non-proliferation, you should continue to say that nuclear weapons do not augment anybody's security. They create a panacea sort of — that with nuclear weapons you resolve all your problems. You gain domestic security. You gain external security. And this is just a panacea. Is Israel secure — in a secure situation because of its nuclear weapons? Did nuclear weapons secure the United States from 9/11? So let's be realistic. We are in a region that nuclear weapons would only reduce and diminish our security. And that's a very calculated, strategic doctrine which some people fail to understand here.

Foreign minister, let me ask about the fight against ISIS. As you know very well, the threat posed by that group was considered so grave that the government changed in Iraq.

No. No. No, let me correct you there. The government did not change. You had an election in Iraq. The people of Iraq had elected members of the Parliament.

And they changed the prime minister.

They changed the prime minister. They might have changed the prime minister even without this threat because that's the procedure. The previous prime minister was in office for two consecutive terms. Now somebody from his own party is now prime minister. It's not someone else from an opposition party. Somebody from his own party through the Iraqi political process was chosen as prime minster. So I do not want anybody, particularly not the terrorists, to believe that the Iraqi government or the international community rewarded the terrorists by changing the Iraqi prime minister.

Nevertheless it was concluded that it was time for new leadership in order to more effectively unify Iraq and face this threat from ISIS. Why would it not be a good idea also to change leadership in Syria to more effectively unify Syria against that threat?

Well, I believe it is important for people to look at the realities on the ground. Let the Iraqi people decide about their government, and let the Syrian people decide about their government. If people from outside... We are the country with the greatest influence in Iraq, and we said from the very beginning that we will not intervene in the Iraqi people's decision on electing their government. And we insisted on this, and we remained with this until the last day. We helped the Iraqis. We engaged in consultations with the Iraqis. We helped coordinate with various Iraqi groups. I went to Iraq myself. I went to Sunni quarters. I went to Shia quarters. I even went to Kurdistan. We spoke to everybody. But we did not impose anything on the Iraqi people. I believe the same should be the case with the Syrians. The Syrian people should determine who will govern them. I believe people have entrenched themselves, particularly in the West, in arbitrary positions that have made Syrian people pay with their blood. Why didn't they allow the Syrians to decide for themselves. It's because the United States is not confident that if there were a free and fair election even monitored by the United Nations and the international community, anybody other than the current president would have won the votes of the Syrian people. That's why they want to be judged the outcome of the democratic process. I believe what they should insist — and that is why Iran six months ago proposed a four-point plan which would call for cease-fire, would call for a national unity government, it called for revising the constitution so that you would disperse power rather than centralize it in one person, and then to have an election monitored, supervised by the international community. Why didn't they accept that? Why did they even dis-invite Iran from Geneva too because of the fact that we did not accept a precondition for the Syrian government to leave.

Let's avoid that word: impose. You said you don't want to impose a solution on other countries. Nevertheless you acknowledge that you have influence. Would you not use your influence to encourage Syria to push forward new leadership that might unify the country?

Eh, I do not believe that's our job to do. It's the job of the Syrian people to do. We were prepared and we continued to be —

But you use your influence a lot.

No. No, we do use our influence, and we did use our influence. Otherwise, the four-point plan that we proposed about six months ago required us to spend a lot of political capital in Syria, had the west and particularly the neighbors accepted that proposal. Unfortunately they insisted on a precondition, a precondition that at the end of the day has caused the death of so many people in Syria. Because without that precondition, without the precondition that one of the sides...

That Assad must go.

That Assad must go. Without that precondition we could have had a deal long time ago. But people entrench themselves in a situation that precluded even the possibility of listening to alternates.

You've met with Bashar al-Assad. You're very familiar with the situation. Has he been a good leader of Syria?

Well, it's for the Syrian people to decide.

But what do you think?

... people outside Syria. If you want to put yourself in his position, he would tell you that, "I knew these people all along. I knew who I was being, who I was facing. I knew ISIL."

ISIS.

"I knew their true colors. It's you who are now repenting."

Didn't he let some of these people out of Syrian jails?

I use, I use the Paris conference as the coalition of repenters. These are the people who armed ISIL, who financed ISIL, now they want, all of a sudden, to fight ISIL. They're the ones who have to explain why they chose the wrong policy for the last three years. Actually for some of them for the last 11 years, because, as you know, ISIL was created not by Bashar al-Assad, but by the U.S. invasion of Iraq. If you remember Zarqawi, who is the founder of this very heinous movement, he was the product of American invasion, not of Bashar al-Assad.

I would like Americans to better understand how you view the world and Iran's situation in it. Americans commonly see Iran as expansive, as aggressive, as reaching out into countries like Iraq and Syria and Lebanon. But help us understand how you see it. Do you see Iran at this moment as a country that is surrounded by threats?

Well, we live in a dangerous neighborhood. But we have been a very responsible regional power. We have helped countries in the region. We have not used coercion. We have never expanded for the last 300 years, almost three centuries. Iran has not waged a war against anybody. We have defended ourselves, but we have never waged a war against no country. We are the largest, most powerful country in our immediate neighborhood. We go out of our way to convince our neighbors that we want to have good neighborly relations. Now, unfortunately there has been an environment of suspicion, partially fed by the conception that you can buy security from outside. That's a perception, and that's an illusion. You cannot buy security.

Who has that perception?

Some people with a lot of money.

Saudi Arabia for example?

Usually, usually when you have a lot or money you have the illusion that that money can buy everything. So when you have a lot of power — the United States has a lot of military power and believes its coercive power can win it a lot of things, and it has failed time and again to achieve that. So we see this and we see the possibility that Iran can play a positive role in Iraq, in Syria, in Lebanon as a force, as an influence that works with the people of these regions. That's why I'm saying that we cannot impose a government on Iraq, we cannot impose a government on Syria, we cannot impose a government on Lebanon. It's the work of the Lebanese, Syrian and Iraqi people as it is the work of the people of Afghanistan to elect their government. We have influence in all these countries, but we've never tried to tell them that this man should be your prime minister or your president or your leader.

But if you look at, say, Saudi Arabia, do you see — and this, I'm hearing this in some of the remarks that you've made — do you see the Saudis supporting ISIS in some way on one side of you, supporting certain groups in Pakistan on another side of you, effectively trying to surround you?

Well, there are certainly indications, if not evidence, that they have. But I'm looking to the future, not to the past. And I'm hoping that now that everybody sees this as a common threat, as a common challenge, that Iran and Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region can work together in order to deal with this challenge. And dealing with this challenge does not mean aerial bombardment. Dealing with this challenge means to stop creating the type of atmosphere of hatred and resentment that creates this type of monstrosity in our region.

I want to ask a question about what's happening on the ground in Iraq, foreign minister, because, as you know, the United States has sent advisers and is sending more. Iran also has troops or forces —-

We don't have troops. We also have military advisers in Iraq ...

Military advisers.

... and we provide military assistance to Iraq ...

Including the head of the Iran revolutionary guard.

As advisers. We also provide military assistance. This is on the request of the Iraqi government. We were the first as Barzani said in his joint press conference with me...

The Kurdish leader.

The Kurdish leader. When the Iraqi Kurdistan came under the threat of ISIL, Iran was the first to send advisers and equipment. Everybody else came long, long after.

So we have Iran and the United States both advising Iraqi forces. Have you worked out some way to work together or at least make sure that you communicate — don't trip over each other, have some accidental confrontation?

We are there to help the Iraqis. The Iraqis coordinate with whoever they want. They are a sovereign government, and we trust their choice. We help the Iraqi government, we help the Iraqi people, in whatever way we can. Whatever the Iraqis want to do with other countries is their choice.

Could there be a situation where in some military headquarters in Iraq there's an American advisor standing there and an Iranian advisor standing five feet away?

I don't think so because I do not believe that the type of activity that the United States is interested in engaging in is similar to helping Iraqis defend their territory.

What is the difference between Iran's approach and the U.S.?

We work with the people. We work with the government. We don't tell them what to do. We don't instruct them what to do. We help. We help in whatever way we can. And that makes us quite different from the United States.

The United States is a major military power, probably the greatest military power on the face of the earth. That has created an illusion in the United States that it can coerce, that it can order people around, that it can instruct people on how to deal with their problems. That's not how we see ourselves. We see ourselves as a friend of the Iraqis, a friend of Iraqi Shias, a friend of Iraqi Sunnis and a friend of Iraqi Kurds. And we have helped all various groups in Iraq in defending their territory against these terrorists.

Do you see the United States and Iran, whatever the policy differences, having the same basic interests when it comes to ISIS or ISIL?

Well, I know the Iranian interest. It's for the United States to articulate its own interests. Our interest is to have a region free from extremism and terrorism. If that is how the United States defines its interests, then there may be a commonality. We have not seen that unfortunately, because we continue to see United States hesitation in dealing with this terrorist group when it comes to Syria. If this is a dangerous terrorist group which engages in these types of heinous crimes against people of their own country, of the west, of the United States, of everywhere, then they should not have double standards about them. We have not witnessed that. We see that the United States hesitates in dealing with this group when it comes to Syria. So, whether there is commonality of interest, or whether there is, on our side, we are in the region, we don't have a choice. We need to live with this threat, or deal with this threat. For the United States, it may see this, in my view, erroneously, as an option. The United States is dealing with this as an option. The option in Iraq. The option in Syria. There are no options here. This is a challenge that you need to deal with it squarely and seriously and not based on double standards.

Are you saying the United States is not being forceful enough in this situation?

The United States is not being serious, because you cannot deal with a terrorist group whose bases are in Syria based on this illusion that you can have, as you say, your cake and eat it, too. That you can have this pressure on the Syrian government which has been the only force that has resisted. Had it been for the United States policy, had the United States been able to conduct its policy, today we would have had [ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi] Mr. Baghdadi not sitting in Mosul but sitting in Damascus. But thanks to people who recognized this threat from early on, now we do not have him sitting in Damascus. If the United States can determine for itself how it wants to deal with terrorists, then we have a very different situation.

So you think President Obama ought to reach an accommodation with President Assad of Syria?

No, I think President Obama needs to reach an accommodation with reality. That's what we need. We don't want to impose people on anybody. We need to deal with realities, and we believe that the interest of the United States, the interest of peace and security in the world is not served by a double-edged policy where you deal with ISIL in one way in Syria and a different way in Iraq.

A couple of other matters, foreign minister, and I'll let you go. Jason Rezaian, an American correspondent for the Washington Post, was taken into custody in some form in Iran over the summer, hasn't been heard from in a couple of months, what information if any can you give us about him?

Well, Jason Rezaian is also an Iranian citizen.

Dual citizenship

Dual citizenship. And if you look at your own passport, it says in your passport that if you have dual citizenship and you go to the country of your origin, then you are subjected to the laws of that country. Whatever he has done, and I'm not in a position, nor do I have information to share with you about what his charges are, but whatever he has done, he has done as an Iranian citizen, not as an American citizen. And he is facing interrogation in Iran for what he has done as an Iranian citizen.

Now, I hope that all detainees will be released. I believe that it is in the interest of everybody to work for a more positive atmosphere. And that's what I've done in the past several months. But I believe that people have to face justice, if they committed crimes. Of course if he didn't commit any crimes as an Iranian citizen, then it is our obligation as the government of Iran to seek his release.

I understood you to say that he is being interrogated on suspicion of some crime and you say you don't know what the crime is?

I don't know, because if he is arrested — which he is — and the Tehran Judiciary has — which is an independent branch of government from the executive — has said that he is under arrest, under interrogation, then he must be charged at a certain point with a crime.

Just to be clear, with all of its flaws, the United States justice system in most instances requires that if someone is to be held, there must be a charge before very many days have passed. You must find out why it is that the authorities are holding a person. We have a situation here where the government of Iran, using its own rules, has held a man without any explanation for months.

No, we have no obligation — the judiciary has no obligation to explain to the United States why it is detaining one of its citizens. His lawyers know. He knows his charge. I'm not supposed to know, but he knows his charge. Now let me tell you that there are Iranian citizens who have committed no crime, and they are being held in countries in East Asia on pressure from the United States. One of them died in prison a couple of month ago, for a crime that he didn't commit. It's not a crime to violate U.S. sanctions in Malaysia or in Philippines or in Thailand. It's not a crime. U.S. sanctions are only applicable on U.S. territory. If somebody tries to buy night vision goggles, for instance, in Malaysia, they have not violated... they've not committed any crimes. One of them died in a jail in Philippines under pressure from the United States for extradition. Now, do I have a better case than people who are asking us why we held an Iranian prison, an Iranian citizen in an Iranian court? These are two different issues. So let's, let's deal with realities. I, for one, I know Jason personally. As a reporter, he has worked with me, and I know him. And I know him to be a fair reporter. So I had hoped all along that his detention would be short, and I continued to try to make it shorter, than longer. But the point that needs to be made is that an Iranian citizen is being held by Iranian authorities on suspicions dealing with Iranian law.

Should other...

And nobody's water boarding him.

Should other Iranian Americans who are accustomed to the U.S. justice system be concerned about traveling back to Iran, as many do, and disappearing?

If they've not committed any crimes, no. If, if they've not committed any crimes that are punishable in Iranian judicial system, no they shouldn't.

But here we have a man who hasn't even been accused of a crime that we know of.

Well, you don't know of him being accused of a crime. It doesn't mean that he wasn't accused of a crime in the proper procedures of the Iranian judicial system.

One other thing, foreign minister, you, personally, have made quite effective use of Twitter, sending messages about Jews, sending messages about a variety of things. You've gotten quite a lot of attention for that. When do you think the moment will arrive when the people of Iran, more broadly, will be able to make freer use of that platform or other social media than they're allowed to do now?

Well, that's an issue — you, you know where I come from. So I can try to explain for you, and for your listeners, the social atmosphere within which that decision-making should take place. In Iran, a large segment of Iranian population who are very traditional believe that it is the job of the government, the responsibility of the government to create social conditions that are safe. That the children, when they go on the Internet, do not face profanity, do not face prostitution, do not face pornography, so that it is the job of the government to create a barrier for them, to create that social security net for them. And the debate in Iran on how this can be done is an ongoing debate. It's far from being settled. It's clear where I stand on that debate, but I do not, nor does the government, determine the outcome of a domestic, social debate. It's a social debate that needs to be addressed. Even when we introduced high-speed mobile internet, there were a lot of objections from more traditional center in Iran. So that's an ongoing process and I hope at the end of the day, from my perspective as an Iranian citizen, not necessarily as an Iranian official, that one day these platforms will be free. It doesn't mean the Iranian people don't have access to platforms such as these. But I hope that as we go along we can reach that social consensus.

You mentioned concern for children, there's that same concern in the United States, foreign minister. In Iran, isn't this really about the concern that the government has — that there will be criticism of the government on these platforms?

Not really, because if you look at criticism of the government, just open any newspaper in Iran and it's filled with criticism of the government. So of one group in the government of another tendency in the government, so it depends on which newspaper you pick. You pick a newspaper close to the government, you will see criticism of our opposition. You pick up a newspaper from the opposition, you'll see very, the harshest possible... even allegations, even, eh.....

They're sometimes jailed, though. People from opposition papers.

Eh, well, not in this government. Certainly this government does not believe in jailing anybody for expressing their views. If people commit a crime, and there should be a proper procedure for investigating a crime for reaching a conclusion, based on the rule of law, then they should face punishment. Not saying that our legal system is perfect. I mean, you've gone through, after 200 years, or over 200 years of established legal procedures here in the United States. You went through water boarding. You went through situations that were less than adequate protection under the law. Now we have the same situation. We're only 35 years into this new system where we respect the rights of the people. Now we have deficiencies, a whole range of deficiencies. We can improve, and we should improve, and hopefully we will improve. But it doesn't mean that anybody for expressing their views is jailed in Iran. That's far from reality. That's a caricature that people ... If somebody wants to say Abu Ghraib or Guantanamo are reflections of the American justice system, nobody in the United States would buy that. So what people are saying here is not a reflection, maybe an aberration. But the fact is that the same people, 73 percent of them, went to the vote and voted for a president. That means that they trust their government, and people should come to live with that, should accept that as a reality. That's something, that's a phenomenon that is unprecedented in our region. For the past 35 years, every president in Iran has presided over the election of his opposition to office. For the past 35 years. In four consecutive presidential elections after two terms, every president has elected his opposition to office. So that tells you that there are accepted rules and norms in Iran and we need to come to terms with that.

I've kept you far too long. I want to ask one final, brief question if I may. Forgive me. I want people to know that you've lived in the United States, that you lived in San Francisco, that you lived in Colorado, that you have children in the United States.

I don't have children in the United States. I have children who were born in the United States. My children live in Iran.

You're children born in the United States. We could talk all day about the differences between the two countries. Is there one similarity between the two countries that you've noticed that people might not realize?

I think there are a lot of similarities. We are both proud people, interested in the future of our children, interested in having peace, security, interested in being respected. I think there are a lot of similarities. I think in the entire world, what joins us together is far greater than what divides us. Of course there are differences between governments. That doesn't mean the Iranian people are different from the American people. More similar than people want to believe.

Foreign Minister Zarif, thank you very much.

Thank you.

David Cameron: [War on ISIL] is a battle against a poisonous ideology that is condemned by all faiths and by all faith leaders, whether Christian, Jewish or Muslim

David Cameron: [War on ISIL] is a battle against a poisonous ideology that is condemned by all faiths and by all faith leaders, whether Christian, Jewish or Muslim

    Sunday, August 17, 2014   No comments

 Stability. Security. The peace of mind that comes from being able to get a decent job and provide for your family, in a country that you feel has a good future ahead of it and that treats people fairly. In a nutshell, that is what people in Britain want – and what the Government I lead is dedicated to building.

Britain – our economy, our security, our future – must come first. After a deep and damaging recession, and our involvement in long and difficult conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is hardly surprising that so many people say to me when seeing the tragedies unfolding on their television screens: “Yes, let’s help with aid, but let’s not get any more involved.”

I agree that we should avoid sending armies to fight or occupy. But we need to recognise that the brighter future we long for requires a long-term plan for our security as well as for our economy. True security will only be achieved if we use all our resources – aid, diplomacy, our military prowess – to help bring about a more stable world. Today, when every nation is so immediately interconnected, we cannot turn a blind eye and assume that there will not be a cost for us if we do.

The creation of an extremist caliphate in the heart of Iraq and extending into Syria is not a problem miles away from home. Nor is it a problem that should be defined by a war 10 years ago. It is our concern here and now. Because if we do not act to stem the onslaught of this exceptionally dangerous terrorist movement, it will only grow stronger until it can target us on the streets of Britain. We already know that it has the murderous intent. Indeed, the first Isil-inspired terrorist acts on the continent of Europe have already taken place.

Our first priority has of course been to deal with the acute humanitarian crisis in Iraq. We should be proud of the role that our brave armed services and aid workers have played in the international effort. British citizens have risked their lives to get 80 tons of vital supplies to the Yazidis trapped on Mount Sinjar. It is right that we use our aid programme to respond rapidly to a situation like this: Britain has given £13 million to support the aid effort. We also helped to plan a detailed international rescue operation and we remain ready and flexible to respond to the ongoing challenges in or around Dahuk, where more than 450,000 people have increased the population by 50 per cent.

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Hard choices for a gun-shy President: How Obama Evolved on the Issue of ‘Genocide’ in Iraq

Hard choices for a gun-shy President: How Obama Evolved on the Issue of ‘Genocide’ in Iraq

    Friday, August 08, 2014   No comments

As a first-time presidential candidate in 2007, Barack Obama built his campaign around a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. Nothing could shake him from his plan to end what he called a “dumb” war. At a New Hampshire campaign stop that July, Obama was asked whether he might delay a pullout if it meant preventing outright genocide in Iraq.

No, Obama said. “[If] that’s the criteria by which we are making decisions on the deployment of U.S. forces, then by that argument you would have 300,000 troops in the Congo right now — where millions have been slaughtered as a consequence of ethnic strife — which we haven’t done.”

Almost exactly five years later, Obama has ordered military action in Iraq “to prevent a potential act of genocide,” as he put it in his public remarks Thursday night.

For now, that action will consist of airlifting supplies to thousands of members of Iraq’s Yazidi religious sect, trapped atop a mountain and surrounded by the fanatical Sunni militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and greater Syria (ISIS). But it could also include air strikes against those ISIS fighters.

Did Obama flip-flop on a matter as serious as genocide? 

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How to Fix It: Ending this war in Gaza begins with recognizing Hamas as a legitimate political actor.

How to Fix It: Ending this war in Gaza begins with recognizing Hamas as a legitimate political actor.

    Wednesday, August 06, 2014   No comments

by Jimmy Carter , Mary Robinson
Israelis and Palestinians are still burying their loved ones as Gaza's third war in six years continues. Since July 8, when this war began, more than 1,600 Palestinian and 65 Israeli lives have been sacrificed. Many in the world are heartbroken in the powerless certainty that more will die, that more are being killed every hour.

This tragedy results from the deliberate obstruction of a promising move toward peace in the region, when a reconciliation agreement among the Palestinian factions was announced in April. This was a major concession by Hamas, in opening Gaza to joint control under a technocratic government that did not include any Hamas members. The new government also pledged to adopt the three basic principles demanded by the Middle East Quartet comprised of the United Nations, the United States, the European Union, and Russia: nonviolence, recognition of Israel, and adherence to past agreements. Tragically, Israel rejected this opportunity for peace and has succeeded in preventing the new government's deployment in Gaza.

Two factors are necessary to make Palestinian unity possible. First, there must be at least a partial lifting of the 7-year-old sanctions and blockade that isolate the 1.8 million people in Gaza. There must also be an opportunity for the teachers, police, and welfare and health workers on the Hamas payroll to be paid. These necessary requirements for a human standard of living continue to be denied. Instead, Israel blocked Qatar's offer to provide funds to pay civil servants' salaries, and access to and from Gaza has been further tightened by Egypt and Israel.

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Out of a Job: Gaza war and academic freedom

Out of a Job: Gaza war and academic freedom

    Wednesday, August 06, 2014   No comments

By Scott Jaschik
Many faculty job offers (which are well-vetted by college officials before they go out) contain language stating that the offer is pending approval by the institution's board of trustees. It's just a formality, since many college bylaws require such approval.

Not so with a job offer made to Steven G. Salaita, who was to have joined the American Indian studies program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign this month. The appointment was made public, and Salaita resigned from his position as associate professor of English at Virginia Tech. But he was recently informed by Chancellor Phyllis Wise that the appointment would not go to the university's board, and that he did not have a job to come to in Illinois, according to two sources with knowledge of the situation.

The university declined to confirm the blocked appointment, but would not respond to questions about whether Salaita was going to be teaching there. (And as recently as two weeks ago, the university confirmed to reporters that he was coming.) The university also declined to answer questions about how rare it is for such appointments to fall through at this stage.

Salaita did not respond to numerous calls and emails.

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Brian Eno on the Israel-Gaza crisis: How can you justify images such as this? and Peter Schwartz responds to Brian Eno's open letter on Israel-Gaza crisis

Brian Eno on the Israel-Gaza crisis: How can you justify images such as this? and Peter Schwartz responds to Brian Eno's open letter on Israel-Gaza crisis

    Sunday, August 03, 2014   No comments

Dear All of You,

I sense I’m breaking an unspoken rule with this letter, but I can’t keep quiet any more.

Today I saw a picture of a weeping Palestinian man holding a plastic carrier bag of meat. It was his son. He’d been shredded (the hospital’s word) by an Israeli missile attack – apparently using their fab new weapon, fléchette bombs. You probably know what those are – hundreds of small steel darts packed around explosive which tear the flesh off humans. The boy was Mohammed Khalaf al-Nawasra. He was four years old.

I suddenly found myself thinking that it could have been one of my kids in that bag, and that thought upset me more than anything has for a long time.

Then I read that the UN had said that Israel might be guilty of war crimes in Gaza, and they wanted to launch a commission into that. America won’t sign up to it.

What is going on in America? I know from my own experience how slanted your news is, and how little you get to hear about the other side of this story. But – for Christ’s sake! – it’s not that hard to find out. Why does America continue its blind support of this one-sided exercise in ethnic cleansing? WHY? I just don’t get it. I really hate to think it’s just the power of Aipac [the American Israel Public Affairs Committee]… for if that’s the case, then your government really is fundamentally corrupt. No, I don’t think that’s the reason… but I have no idea what it could be. The America I know and like is compassionate, broad-minded, creative, eclectic, tolerant and generous. You, my close American friends, symbolise those things for me. But which America is backing this horrible one-sided colonialist war? I can’t work it out: I know you’re not the only people like you, so how come all those voices aren’t heard or registered? How come it isn’t your spirit that most of the world now thinks of when it hears the word “America”? How bad does it look when the one country which more than any other grounds its identity in notions of Liberty and Democracy then goes and puts its money exactly where its mouth isn’t and supports a ragingly racist theocracy?

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Dear Brian and friends,

I am writing to respond to your note about Gaza and how America is responding. It deserves a response.

My feelings and the actual realities are complex on several levels; the realities of the Arab-Israeli history and conflicts, global politics and modern American history/demographics. All three levels interact to create the current situation. And to understand the US posture you have to consider the history. Let me say, that, as you know, I am an immigrant and child of Holocaust survivors. I am culturally Jewish, but with no religious or spiritual inclinations, an atheist. And I believe that creating the Jewish state of Israel was a historic mistake that is likely to destroy the religion behind it. The actions nation states take to assure their survival are usually in contradiction to any moral values that a religion might espouse. And that contradiction is now very evident in Israel’s behaviour. Israel will destroy Judaism.

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SPIEGEL has learned from reliable sources that Israeli intelligence eavesdropped on US Secretary of State John Kerry during Middle East peace negotiations

SPIEGEL has learned from reliable sources that Israeli intelligence eavesdropped on US Secretary of State John Kerry during Middle East peace negotiations

    Sunday, August 03, 2014   No comments

SPIEGEL has learned from reliable sources that Israeli intelligence eavesdropped on US Secretary of State John Kerry during Middle East peace negotiations. In addition to the Israelis, at least one other intelligence service also listened in as Kerry mediated last year between Israel, the Palestinians and the Arab states, several intelligence service sources told SPIEGEL. Revelations of the eavesdropping could further damage already tense relations between the US government and Israel.
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Still, there are no doubts about fundamental support for Israel on the part of the United States. On Friday, the US Congress voted to help fund Israel's "Iron Dome" missile defense system to the tune of $225 million (around €168 million).

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American media's new pro-Israel bias: the same party line at the wrong time Evolving conversations on the ground demand probing questions on-air; So why does TV news look like a Netanyahu ad?

American media's new pro-Israel bias: the same party line at the wrong time Evolving conversations on the ground demand probing questions on-air; So why does TV news look like a Netanyahu ad?

    Friday, August 01, 2014   No comments

Here are a few questions you won’t hear asked of the parade of Israeli officials crossing US television screens during the current crisis in Gaza:

• What would you do if a foreign country was occupying your land?
• What does it mean that Israeli cabinet ministers deny Palestine’s right to exist?
• What should we make of a prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, who as opposition leader in the 1990s addressed a rally under a banner reading “Death to Arafat” a year after the Palestinian leader signed a peace accord with Israel?

These are contentious questions, to be sure, and with complicated answers. But they are relevant to understanding of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict today. They also parallel the issues routinely raised by American journalists with Palestinian officials, pressing to consider how the US would react if it were under rocket fire from Mexico, to explain why Hamas won’t recognise Israel and to repudiate Palestinian anti-Semitism.

But it’s a feature of much mainstream journalism in the US, not just an issue of coverage during the last three weeks of the Gaza crisis, that while one set of questions gets asked all the time, the other is heard hardly at all.

In years of reporting from and about Israel, I’ve followed the frequently robust debate in its press about whether Netanyahu really wants a peace deal, about the growing power of right-wing members inside the Israeli cabinet opposed to a Palestinian state, about the creeping air of permanence to the occupation.

So it has been all the more striking to discover a far narrower discourse in Washington and the notoriously pro-Israel mainstream media in the US at a time when difficult questions are more important than ever. John Kerry, the US secretary of state, and a crop of foreign leaders have ratcheted up warnings that the door for the two-state solution is closing, in no small part because of Israel’s actions. But still the difficult questions go unasked.

Take Netanyahu’s appearance on CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday. The host, Bob Schieffer, permitted the Israeli leader to make a lengthy case for the his military’s ground attack, guiding him along with one sympathetic question after another. Finally, after describing Netanyahu’s position as “very understandable”, Schieffer asked about dead Palestinian civilians – but only to wonder if they presented a public relations problem in “the battle for world opinion”.

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