http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/ Posts for alt.culture.azerbaijan Wed, 17 Sep 2008 13:02:47 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/ http://www.nnseek.com/img/64.png 64 64 NNSeek http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/_19_muslims_involved_in_9_11_never_proved_guilty_by_63528059t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/_19_muslims_involved_in_9_11_never_proved_guilty_by_63528059t.html

Nasir Mahmood

Karachi—“Unflinching, unswerving, fierce intellectual determination, as citizens, to define the
real truth of our lives and our societies is a crucial obligation which devolves upon us all.
It is in fact mandatory. If such a determination is not embodied in our political vision we
have no hope of restoring what is so nearly lost to us - the dignity of man.” Harold Pinter an
American intellectual said while expressing through a net debate with reference to the incident
of 9/11.

Pinter disclosed that Elias Davidsson, who is Icelandic, but also speaks perfect German and
English, along with several other languages, gave his eloquent and spontaneous speech in French
to the French reporter. Having researched the available forensic proof, M. Elias Davidsson is
now offering 10,000 Euros (+/- $15,000) to whomever who can step forward and deliver legal
proof that ONE Muslim was involved.

He said it reminds me of Elias Davidsson’s ALL IMPORTANT CALL TO EVERY CONCERNED CITIZEN: For
those with a notion of French, please watch this special Sept 11th 2008 report where several
intellectuals speak out during the Brussels Sept 7th United for Truth demonstration:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x6psbj_edition-speciale-11-septembre-20... Since their message
is highly important, we are working on an English subtitled version of this short video
including Jean-Claude Paye’s take on the design of the psychological warfare operation to
induce a mass psychosis and fear, and Elias Davidsson’s resounding call which I’ll translate here:

“Any person who dares to pronounce that Muslims participated in this crime is taking part in
defamation (libel) against innocent persons, since the 19 persons accused of carrying out this
operation have never been proven guilty by anybody.

This implies, in my opinion, that any honest citizen, who is against racism, should take action
and denounce each and every case where a journalist or politician has the gut to accuse Muslims
of this ignoble crime of Sept 11th.

This incitation towards racial hatred against the Muslims must be stopped, because it reminds
me of the incitation of hate towards the Jews. (I am a Jew, my parents had to flee Germany, and
so I was born in Palestine.) The racial-hate incitation towards the Jews done by the Nazis led
first to concentration camps, and later towards extermination camps.

Today, the racial hate incitation towards Muslims has already brought us two wars of
aggression, more than a million dead in Iraq, and a world preparing more wars. This is why I
ask everybody to protest, and denounce EVERY case where some-one tries to accuse Muslims for
the crime of September 11th 2001.”

It may be mentioned here that on Thursday 11th September 2008 the 4th Annual 9/11 Film Festival
held at the Grand Lake Theater was a Great Success. The 9/11 Film Festival was a great success
on many levels. The producer of 9/11 and Nationalist Faith (as well as most of the films
featuring David Ray Griffin), and so Ken Jenkins introduced the first film. During the eleven
hour festival, people continued to pour into the theater; they came from the Bay Area, from
Fresno, Sacramento, Santa Cruz, and from as far away as the East Coast. Mike Godbe, a history
major at Vassar College, working on his 9/11 thesis, flew out from the East Coast to interview
people.

There were great films, great speakers, the lobby was filled with activist organizations,
including World Can’t Wait, Richard Hayes Phillips with his book on the 2004 Stolen
Presidential Election, Peace Resource Project, Guns and Butter, Architects and Engineers for
9/11 Truth, and, of course, the Northern California 9/11 Truth Alliance, tabling information
and resources. They soon ran out of the featured films- Zero: An Investigation into 9/11 and
9/11 False Flag.

On the marquee, on the sidewalks, in the park across the street, American citizens proclaimed
their message: “The War on Terror is a Fraud” “Expose the 9/11 Cover-up” “The 9/11 Commission
Report is full of holes”… The mainstream press ignored them, although prior to the event there
was a cover story in the North Bay Bohemian with two good articles on Ken Jenkins and Richard
Gage, and another on Bonnie Faulkner which mentioned the film festival. The activist,
independent, media brought their video cameras, recorded the speeches and will no doubt post
and blast the messages online and on the radio.

By evening the auditorium and the lobby were packed with people. At least six hundred people
came during the course of the day. The volunteers, organizers, crew, speakers for keeping very
close to the scheduled program times. Craig Bartmer, a New York Police Department officer on
September 11th, witness, first responder, survivor, spoke after In Their Own Words: The Untold
Stories of the 9/11 Families (The sequel to 9/11 Press for Truth). He is currently working on
Cindy Sheehan’s campaign which he feels is critical towards getting a real investigation into
9/11. He read aloud Cindy’s Reflections on 9/11.

Richard Gage, Dan Hamburg, Peter Dale Scott, and Ken Jenkins, all gave great talks and informed
anyone who hasn’t been immersed in the subject of 9/11 night and day for seven years, insights
on the latest research, developments, world opinion and the movement.

The event was a group endeavor, and of course, much applause and credit should go to the film
makers who spent years and poured many resources into the creation of the excellent films, but
bringing folks into a theater on a Thursday afternoon took a bit of work, as well.


Watch 9/11 revisited
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4488542891415681105

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Wed, 17 Sep 2008 13:02:47 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/the_lies_and_crimes_of_911_63515003t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/the_lies_and_crimes_of_911_63515003t.html A Canadian View of the War on Terror's Origins.
By Professor Anthony J. Hall

Founding Coordinator of Globalization Studies: Lethbridge University (raprockprof@gmail.com)
Paper for Delivery at "Edmonton Questions 9/11: Convention and Film" Stanley A. Milner Public
Library Theatre 6 September 2008
SEE COMPLETE PAPER: http://www.edmonton911truth.com/edmontonquestioned.html

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9084186521228739020&hl=en

55 min - Video Published Sep 14, 2008, by : Edmonton 9/11 Civil Information Activism- Blog :
www.hawkeyi.blogspot.com
Produced by Richard D. Brinkman and Emily Vokes.

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Wed, 17 Sep 2008 12:03:30 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/white_house_claims_bin_laden_was_not_the_mastermind_63285115t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/white_house_claims_bin_laden_was_not_the_mastermind_63285115t.html
Tomorrow marks the seventh anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. In a press conference today, a
reporter asked White House Press Secretary Dana Perino about the administration’s ongoing
efforts to find Osama bin Laden, calling him the “mastermind” of 9/11. Perino interrupted the
reporter, claiming bin Laden was not the true “mastermind” of the attacks:

Q But Osama bin Laden is the one that — you keep talking about his lieutenants, and, yes,
they are very important, but Osama bin Laden was the mastermind of 9/11 –

PERINO: No, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was the mastermind of 9/11, and he’s sitting in jail
right now.

Watch it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gwb2EuzGN4

Perino seems to be attempting to justify the White House’s failure to catch bin Laden by
suggesting he was not the “mastermind.” But in September 2006, former press secretary Tony Snow
stated:

Osama bin Laden, mastermind of September 11th, the person that many people talk about and
still have concerns about, calls this fight, the fight in Iraq, “the third world war.”

While Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has admitted to being the “architect” of 9/11, bin Laden was not
inconsequential; he approved and executed the attacks. KSM in fact, brought the idea to bin
Laden, who according to the 9/11 Commission, “wanted to hit the White House, Pentagon and U.S.
Capitol,” not just the World Trade Center.

Perino suggested that it would take “superpowers” to catch bin Laden. “So there are human
limitations to any — this is not the movies, we don’t have superpowers,” she said. It didn’t,
however, take “superpowers” to capture bin Laden at Tora Bora in late 2001, where he escaped in
part because of a lack of troops.


http://thinkprogress.org/2008/09/10/seventh-anniversary-white-house/

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

3 Comments

Reply

]]> Mon, 15 Sep 2008 11:47:22 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/fabled_enemies_spy_thriller_exposes_vast_intelligence_62057595t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/fabled_enemies_spy_thriller_exposes_vast_intelligence_62057595t.html
Paul Joseph Watson
[1] Prison Planet
Friday, August 29, 2008

Fabled Enemies is a departure from every other 9/11 truth film released so far. It comes off as
more of a spy thriller than a mere conspiracy romp. With tight editing, slick presentation, and
sublimely complimentary backing music, the documentary draws the viewer in for an eminently
watchable experience.

The film begins by revealing how in the very hours after 9/11, Osama bin Laden’s conviction of
guilt in the court of public opinion was assured simply by constant repetition in the news
media, and how the fairytale of 19 hijackers with box cutters began to unravel.

The film does not try to invent an alternative scenario behind what really happened on 9/11, it
expertly demolishes the official version by concentrating on how Bin Laden’s network was
protected every step of the way by higher-ups and the hijackers issued visas while good FBI
agents like Robert Wright attempted to penetrate the wider plot but were blocked from doing so.

The treatment of Anthony Shaffer, who attempted to inform the 9/11 Commission about Able
Danger, an intelligence program that identified the hijackers before 9/11, highlights precisely
why the Commission was a set-up from the very beginning. Shaffer and his team were gagged and
slandered and the vital information they had passed on was ignored and buried.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7hIQ8UM9Y0

The murky and mysterious connections of Israeli citizens, who were later connected to
gargantuan spy rings, detained on 9/11 and their links to the attacks are then explored in
detail, including the strange reports of truck bombs and bombs planted on the George Washington
Bridge, aspects of 9/11 that are key yet have been largely sidelined by previous 9/11 truth films.

The evidence presented in the movie painfully underscores the damage that the United States’
alliance with Israel is proliferating, highlighted nowhere more starkly than Likud leader [2]
Benjamin Netanyahu’s bold admission that the 9/11 attacks were good for Israel and continue to
benefit the Zionist state.

“9/11 was an international intelligence operation,” avers producer Jason Bermas, “that included
role players within our own government as well as the governments of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia,
and Israel. Each played a compartmentalized role in order to create a climate of fear and
confusion.” Fabled Enemies painstakingly delves into known and little known minutiae of this
international intelligence operation to provide an overview of what is certainly the largest
and most audacious false flag attack in American history.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUcC7R24r5Y

Other aspects of events on that day which even seasoned 9/11 truthers might be unaware of are
also explored, including the strange case of Flight 23, a transcontinental flight that raised
red flags because of Middle Eastern passengers who were behaving oddly and were asked to leave
the plane before take-off. When they refused and armed police were sent to deal with the
situation, the men simply vanished, strongly suggesting they had the support of people with
access to secure areas of the airport and runway, a pattern observed in the other hijackings.

The film also tackles in depth the numerous wargames that took place which coincided with the
9/11 attacks, along with the threat to Air Force One and questions how the terrorists could
have obtained secure codes and security procedures for a raft of sensitive U.S. government
agencies without help from the inside.

Finally, the film explores the collapse of World Trade Center Building 7 and the possible
motives for why this building had to be destroyed on 9/11, as well as the suspicious anthrax
attacks and their connections to the U.S. government and military institutions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTSvzZXEEVE

In summary, Jason Bermas has produced a 9/11 film to rank up there with the very best. The
strength of the evidence presented stands alone and conclusively debunks the official version
of 9/11 as nothing more than a paper-thin work of fiction. The depth of information presented
in Fabled Enemies is enough to sway even a hardened skeptic, and the movie should be held up as
a shining beacon and the very best that the 9/11 truth movement has to offer.

——————————————————–

Fabled Enemies will be available first to Prison Planet.tv members in high quality streaming
and multiple download formats on September 1st. [3] Click here to obtain your exclusive
membership today.

[4] Click here to pre-order Fabled Enemies on DVD.

[5] Click here to watch more high quality trailers and teaser clips.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/fabled-enemies-spy-thriller-exposes-vast-intelligence...

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Tue, 02 Sep 2008 00:42:57 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/make_easy_money_mem_61684091t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/make_easy_money_mem_61684091t.html > This is Realy Hot....!!!

> PLEASE READ THIS WHOLE MESSAGE!!!

> TURN 6 EURO IN 3000 OR MORE IN A FEW WEEKS !!!

> Complete legal !!! Its not a scam !!! Try it out !!!

> The only thing jou need is a Emailaccount,
> a Premier (Free) Paypal account, with 6 Euro's on it,
> and 30 minutes of jour time.
> After 30 minutes you will not need to do more
> all goes without saying.
> There is no limit on how much you can earn
> with this Business program.

> This is how it works......

> 1. You need a Emailaddress.
> 2. You need a Premier Paypal account.
(you can open a free account https://www.paypal.com)

> Paypal is a secure method of payment on the Internet.
> It is as easy as making a new MSN account.

> Follow the next 4 steps.

> Step 1.
> Make sure you have 6 Euro on your Paypal account.

> Step 2.
> Send each Emailaddress below 1 Euro (6x1 Euro=6)
> using your Paypal account.
> Make sure your subject of payment is
> *** PLEASE PUT ME ON YOUR EMAILLIST ***.
> You must do this to make sure that we keep it 100%% legal !!! (Don't forget).

> 1.) hloop21@gmail.com
> 2.) magna10@live.nl
> 3.) financ@ymail.com
> 4.) zeppiexx@live.nl
> 5.) beleg08@gmail.com
> 6.) laafxx@live.nl

> Step 3.
> After sending each Emailaddress 1 Euro
> you have to put your own Emailaddress on the 6th place
> of the Emaillist and remove the 1st Emailaddress.
> So (2,3,4,5 and 6 will be 1,2,3,4 and 5)

> You can make changes in this dokument by
> saving it first as a text-file.(ASCII)

> ** Be sure that your Emailaddress is the same as the name of your Paypal account.

> Remember this is completely legal we create a service,an Emaillist service.

> Step 4.
> Upload or Copie this changed dokument and sent it to
> friends / Chat sites / Forums / discussion groups etc.
> It is important to reach as many people as possible.
> That is the key for success.


> Why this system works so well......

> Suppose you send 200 Emails and you are getting 6 responses (skeptical view)
> It means that you have jour 6 Euro investment back and your Emailaddress
> is on the 5th place on the list.
> When the 6 people also find 6 responses we get 6 x 6 = 36 Euro.
> Now your Emailaddress is on the 4th place.
> When the 36 people also find 6 responses we get 36 x 6 = 216 Euro.
> Now your Emailaddress is on the 3th place.
> When the 216 people also find 6 responses we get 216 x 6 = 1296 Euro.
> Now your Emailaddress is on the 2th place.
> When the 1296 people also find 6 responses we get 1296 x 6 = 7776 Euro.
> Now your Emailaddress is on the 1th place.
> When the 7776 people also find 6 responses we get 7776 x 6 = 46.656 Euro.

> This is an example of how it could be.
> Now Suppose you dont get 6 responses back but 15 our more.

> Every day Millions of people go online and read messages
> just like you do now.

> At first I was sceptical I read at least 100 of this kind of messages.
> I thought yeeeee sure

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Wed, 27 Aug 2008 06:23:41 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/september_11_2008_day_of_prayer_61346939t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/september_11_2008_day_of_prayer_61346939t.html ~ William Sloane Coffin, clergyman & international peace activist

Greetings to the 9/11 Truth Community and All Concerned Citizens

We invite activists and citizens from all countries to join us on September 11, 2008 for quiet
moments of meditation and reflection.

Join us in creative acts of inspiration and prayer! Add your prayers and send us your photos
from your remembrance.

Some activists are arranging local 9/11 Truth Memorials, and these words of inspiration are for
all who are moved to take a moment of thoughtful remembrance of that day seven years ago and
the unfolding of events since then.

We honor and remember not just those who lost their lives or a family member, but also the many
who have dedicated ourselves to the cause of exposing 9/11 truth and other governmental cover
ups as a road to profound societal change.

We remember for a living reason. We are moved by our desire to live in a kinder more peaceful
world and we are sustained by our vision of a better future.

Please take a moment and visit our website http://911dayofprayer.org/ and add your prayers and
inspirations.

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:25:57 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/the_gaza_concentration_camp_ancient_colonialism_through_61346683t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/the_gaza_concentration_camp_ancient_colonialism_through_61346683t.html
Aug. 17th, 2008 at 12:22 PM

Visiting the Gaza strip, July 2008

Translated by Toni Solo

When you approach the Erez frontier post to enter Gaza from the north, you notice a
concentration camp straightaway even if you may never have seen one like the ones turned into
museums or educational centres, or like the ones that appear in documentaries or photographs.

An observation balloon, innocently painted white, rocks gently to and fro in the air over the
wall surrounding Gaza. It makes sure no unhappy soul moves beyond arbitrary limits set by the
camp guards. The visitor is overwhelmed by the mammoth steel-reinforced wall. This imprisons a
million and a half inmates inside an area approximately 38 kilometres long and 12 wide at its
widest.

Apart from cases you can count on the fingers of one hand, Palestinians quite simply cannot
pass through Erez. Full stop. Besides, they are not allowed out via the South, crossing into
Egypt, nor via the West, since the Mediterranean Sea is barred to them, nor via the air, since
that too is likewise barred, despite there being no boats or planes to travel in. In any case,
the airport was destroyed by the bombs of Israel air power. Gazans are not allowed to exit by
digging underground either.

Patrolling closely about the ten or so people waiting under a scorching sun before a guard post
in the middle of open ground about a built-up area, various soldiers and plain clothes police,
with state of the art machine guns at the ready, make very clear the people had better keep
very still. At the end of a long wait, by loudspeaker, the soldier in the armed guard post lets
them through into the built-up precinct.

It is like a warehouse, unexpectedly high, air conditioned and with various control posts
inside, although only one is in use, since not enough people go through to warrant operating
the rest. One is subjected to more waiting despite the absence of movement.

For the Zionist mentality everyone who does not cooperate with the system must pay a price. It
is not even necessary to be one of their declared enemies. In this case, the visitors came from
a State with good relations of all kinds with Israel, namely the Kingdom of Spain. Their
documents were in order and they were unarmed. Matters had been prearranged with the Israeli
authorities via the Spanish Consulate in Jerusalem. They also had a return ticket to their
country, money for their stay and a stated humanitarian purpose for their visit, which would
last exactly three days.

The reason the Israeli frontier police at Erez waste the foreigners' time, is because the
Zionists are not enthusiastic about witnesses visiting the camp. Foreigners arriving at Erez
intending to pass through, are indeed that, nothing else. Israelis are forbidden to enter.

Israelis attempt to discourage visitors by many means. If the sight of the wall, the wandering
machinegun-totting soldiers, the wait in the sun do not work, then visitors are subjected to
hostile interrogation. From behind thick armoured glass, the seated interrogator addresses the
standing interrogated person.

The questions vary from the reasonable to the comical, "What are you doing in Gaza? Have you
been to Israel before? Do you speak Russian? Do you have a driving license? How many passports
do you have? What's your boss called?" >From the higher level floor above, cameras and guards
record and observe the visitors without being seen. Afterwards people have to go individually
through a narrow series of metal barriers which the service personnel can shut off at will,
then another couple of armoured doors operated by remote control and - all the while under
closed circuit TV cameras - one leaves the precinct to enter a metal corridor and finally cross
through the concrete wall into the Palestinian side.

When returning from Gaza to Israel, the process is the same except that one is forced to enter
a coffin-like cubicle that is adjusted to one's body and in which you have to place yourself,
legs apart, arms apart above your head. A kind of vertical electronic belt or ribbon goes
around one's body. It is a procedure as stupid as it is impressive since the soldiers know
beforehand who the visitors are and why they are visiting Gaza.

Entering a devastated Gaza

Entering Gaza, the devastation is stark. In the suffocating heat one traverses the remains of
bulldozed or partially damaged buildings, mass of tangled rusting steel rods, piles of debris,
sand, dust everywhere. Buildings have been torn down at an arbitrary distance from the border.
One sees leveled ruins of houses and buildings in an area stretching to the horizon, broken
only by that imposing wall.

One is not talking about a couple of houses that might have been in the way. Thousands of
Palestinian houses and buildings have been razed in order to leave a way clear for military
operations, in order to clear them for the so called security reasons. (1)

A taxi takes visitors to the refugee camp at Yabalia, seat of the first Intifada that began in
December 7th 1987. After winding through the streets of various parts of the camp, covered in
improvised houses, lacking infrastructure and sewage, transport, school or other facilities,
one arrives at Al Awda hospital, whose name, perhaps ironically, means Return. There the
hospital management meet you and tell about the health situation in the Strip generally and
around the hospital in particular.

Perhaps it is best not to visit the room with photographs of the wounded, mutilated and dead at
the hands of the Israeli Occupation, it graphically documents the barbarism inflicted by what,
according to Israeli hagiography, is "the most moral army in the world". (2)

Living conditions in the Gaza concentration camp

Bassam Naim, Minister of Health for the Hamas government, receives visitors in his office.
There he tells them of the problems caused by the international siege of the health system.
Even so, the most interesting information for the non-healthcare specialist foreign visitors,
is the political aspect. The Minister clarifies for visitors the confusion that exists in the
West about the situation in the Gaza Strip.

It is not correct to consider that Gaza is a prison, as some argue in Europe. Rather it is
indeed a concentration camp, because the inmates of European prisons get enough food and
adequate medical care. They are free from military attack and they are not denied other rights,
like education. None of that happens in Israeli occupied Gaza.

The Minister offers a further important reflection: the international community, not just
Israel, is responsible for this situation. Both rejected the results of the 2006 elections,
regarded as free and fair by international observers, and furthermore the "international
community" looked the other way when Israel committed serious violations of international law.
And of course, the Minister is right in his accusation because according to the law the
international community has adopted, every country has the obligation to obey it and make sure
that other member countries obey it too.

On April 4th this year, the Israeli daily paper Ha'aretz published the following announcement
from the World Health Organization, "Israel has refused transit to more sick Palestinians
seeking treatment since Hamas took control of the Strip and several of them die unnecessarily
every month."

According to World Health Organization statistics, in 2007, 1627 patients from Gaza had
requests for treatment denied, an increase of 470 compared to requests rejected in 2006. As of
August 4th this year, 225 sick Palestinians have died in Gaza since the siege began, either
because they could not get the necessary medical supplies, since their importation is more
controlled than ever, or because they were not allowed to travel to hospitals in the West Bank,
Israel or Egypt for treatment unavailable in Gaza.

On August 1st this year, Ahmed Abu Amra, a three-month-old child, died of heart failure because
her parents were denied permission to transfer him to a specialist hospital in Israel. Within
24 hours another four adults died, again because Israel denied permission to obtain treatment
abroad.

Since 21 June 2008 a tenuous ceasefire has been in place between Israel and Gaza, but despite
the calmer situation access to medical treatment has not improved. The Israeli organization
Physicians for Human Rights recently stated: "Despite the agreement between Hamas and
Israel\205 there has been no improvement towards patients in Gaza in Israeli policy, which
seems even to have become worse. To the obstacles imposed by the general security service on
people who want to leave Gaza for medical treatment, patients face more bureaucratic
difficulties imposed by the army, which prevent them enjoying their right to health." The
entire Palestinian medical system is undermined by the siege; it ranges form the basic access
to medical supplies to the impossibility of referring patients to specialized treatment.

Although health is not the only social sector seriously debilitated by the siege, it
illustrates very well that in fact Israel is not defending itself against the Palestinians; in
fact, what is in evidence is a clear policy intent on harming the overall population.

Health is a fundamental right. If the Palestinians don't get enough to eat; if their health
needs are not adequately met; if the water purification plants do not work because there are no
fuels or spare parts; if waste waters are not treated; if sanitary conditions deteriorate to
such an extent, then life turns into mere survival.

The shortages caused by the siege go beyond medical supplies. They cover food, water, building
materials, spare parts for basic products, energy, educational materials, in fact everything.

John Ging, director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in
the Near East, UNRWA, explains the situation as follows: "UNRWA receives barely 56%% of the
resources it needs to look after the refugees. It supplies 60%% of their daily diet, which does
not meet Western recommendations on personal nutrition."

School classes are so crowded they have to offer two classroom shifts a day, so as not to leave
any child without basic schooling. Some children start at 8.00 and finish at midday. Others
then enter and finish at 16.00. No space or facilities exist for extra-curricular activities,
either sports or any other kind. Since the facilities are unavailable, there is an educational
collapse; young people will not be minimally prepared. Not only are basic skills affected, but
what they learn in the moral and political spheres is impinging upon future peaceful relations,
democracy, human rights.

I asked Ging about his opinion of the role of the international community and he remarked: "I
have invited Solana and Blair to visit Gaza and get to know personally the situation of the
refugees, but they have declined the invitation."

The awful condition of 1.5 million Palestinians corralled in 360 sq.km, where they are deprived
of basic human rights, is insufficient to prick the consciences of leading Western politicians.
In the very least, the likes of Javier Solana or Tony Blair should demand respect for the
freedom of movement of people.

John Ging's blood seems almost to boil when relates that UNRWA has 10,000 employees and a
budget of US$200 million for clinics, schools and housing. However, Israel will not even permit
the agency to carry out its humanitarian mission, and they are not exempt from the effects of
siege. He is a diplomat and can only present these facts while observing that Solana and Blair
do not even answer his calls.

John Ging is an Irishman straightforward and clear in his arguments. He does not let any
visitor leave without obtaining an accurate idea of what is going on in the Gaza Strip and
above all why it is happening. "The issue is one of justice, not of distributing food parcels
and medicines to people in need. Without a system by which Israel is held to account for its
actions, justice does not exist."

Conclusion: Gaza is not just a prison and Israel is not its only guard

Listening to John Ging, one determines that the responsibility for the Palestinian humanitarian
disaster does not just reside with Israel, but the international community certainly bears much
responsibility.

What makes this situation more galling is that the Palestinians had sought to obtain a
negotiated solution and democratic elections of its leadership - hoops Israel and the United
States demanded that the Palestinians should jump through. The consequence of this unending
situation is obviously a growing sense of despair and violence among its victims.

The terrible history of the Nazi concentration camps does not seem to deter Israel in creating
a concentration camp of its own in Gaza. Now, with the blessing and the money of the
"international community", the Erez crossing point has turned into the entrance to a
concentration camp right now in the 21st Century. If blame, even if only moral blame, was cast
on those who did nothing and looked the other way in times gone by, what judgment do the people
deserve now who not only keep quiet about Israel's actions in Gaza, but actually aid and abet them?

It is a disgrace that in Europe and the United States, stalwart defenders of women's rights
find space in the most influential newspapers and most watched television programmes to clamour
against the use of the veil by Muslim women, but there is no clamour against the Israeli State
for denying medical care in the Gaza strip, which means that hundreds of Gazans die due to
medical neglect. Some women even have given birth right there in the control post, in the most
shameful conditions, because they are not authorized to leave Gaza.
(1) The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD) announced on October 11th 2007 that
the Israeli government had demolished 18,000 Palestinian houses since the Occupation of the
West Bank and Gaza began in 1967. It concludes, "Israeli policies are designed to limit the
number of Palestinians living in areas earmarked for settlements or in their vicinity".

Amnesty International recalled on its web page of March 11th this year, "The Israeli
authorities have for many years applied a discriminatory policy of house demolitions,
permitting, on the one hand, many tens of Israeli settlements to be built on Occupied
Palestinian territory in flagrant violation of international law at the same time as they
confiscate Palestinian lands, forbidding the Palestinian population to build and destroying
their houses. The cleared land is often used to build illegal Israeli settlements.
International law prohibits occupying powers from building settlements for their own citizens
on the territories they occupy."

(2) Thousands of Palestinians with horrible mutilations, unimaginable wounds, bodies burned and
disabled for life give the lie to the Israeli government version. They wait to be called as
witnesses by an eventual court briefed to try crimes against humanity committed in Palestine,
Lebanon and other countries.

That day, given the statistics of victims of Israeli attacks, there was no shortage of
witnesses: 12,261 Palestinians have been wounded by the Israeli Occupation army just from the
start of the Al Aqsa Intifada of September 29th 2000 up until May 2008. To get a total of the
victims of Zionism, a figure very much higher, one would have to add the victims of the first
Intifada and those from previous aggression in the form of actual attacks and wars.

The Palestine Centre for Human Rights, based in Gaza, offers abundant information about the
long list of human rights violations by Israel in the Occupied Territories, including torture,
arbitrary detention, destruction of Palestinian property, attacks on medical teams,
extra-judicial executions, attacks on civilians not involved in hostilities and so on. See also
data by B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights, Defence for Children
International - Israel Section, Machsom Watch - Women for Human Rights, Physicians for Human
Rights - Israel, Rabbis for Human Rights, etc.

Any action by Israel has to be sold to the world as action to preserve the peace, defend the
security of Israel, fight against terrorism, strengthen the peace process: Mass marketing
know-how applied once again to selling another, different genocide.

"In his 1965 autobiography, Edward Bernays recalls a dinner at his home in 1933, 'where Karl
von Weigand, foreign correspondent of the Hearst newspapers, an old hand at interpreting Europe
and just returned from Germany, was telling us about Goebbels and his propaganda plans to
consolidate Nazi power. Goebbels had shown Weigand his propaganda library, the best Weigand had
ever seen. Goebbels, said Weigand, was using my book Crystallizing Public Opinion as a basis
for his destructive campaign against the Jews of Germany. This shocked me. ... Obviously the
attack on the Jews of Germany was no emotional outburst of the Nazis, but a deliberate, planned
campaign.'"

Ending note: Agustin Velloso answers a doubt of the translator, TS.

Simone Weil wrote that the Nazis applied in Europe what the Europeans routinely did in their
colonies - genocide, torture, outright theft of land. After all this time, clearly, Zionist
crimes against the Palestinians, against the Lebanese, knowingly and deliberately carry the
weight not just of Nazi crimes but also those of the French in Algeria, of the Belgians in the
Congo of the Dutch in Indonesia, of Portugal in Africa, of the British around the world, of the
United States against its native peoples. It seems to me, the Israelis and their allies, the
United States and the European Union, are deliberately applying the accumulated weight of that
evil so as to destroy, if they have not done so already, the legitimacy of the United Nations
system and related international law, and thus facilitate more easily criminal rich-country
domination in the name of globalization. So I had a conceptual difficulty translating this
article, related to the references to Nazism since, t aken altogether in the current context,
Israeli government policies, especially the defiance of the International Court of Justice and
the threats of nuclear genocide against the people of Iran, amount to something worse than Nazism.

Translation copyleft, Toni Solo 2008

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:23:32 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/major_neo_con_role_in_russo_georgian_war_61339771t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/major_neo_con_role_in_russo_georgian_war_61339771t.html
Caspian Sea oil pipeline, sovereignty at heart of Russia’s blowup with U.S. ally

By Howard Carson

George W. Bush and his neo-con cohorts are behind the Russo-Georgia war, inside sources on the
ground in South Ossetia and in Washington have revealed. Israel is also involved on behalf of
Georgia because of oil. The sources remain anonymous.

Russia’s attack was in response to U.S. plans to install missile sites near its borders and to
bring Georgia into NATO. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin called for Russia to regain its
influential position in former Cold War ally Cuba, giving his country a military presence
reminiscent of the 1963 Cuban missile crisis, which brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.

This threat emerged earlier (AFP, Aug. 4, 2008) but was blacked out by the mainstream media.

“We should restore our position in Cuba and other countries,” Putin said, while hearing a
report on a recent Russian delegation’s trip to Cuba.

“It is not a secret that the West is creating a ‘buffer zone’ around Russia, involving
countries in Central Europe, the Caucasus, the Baltic states and Ukraine,” said Leonid Ivashov,
head of the Academy of Geopolitical Problems.

“In response, we may have to expand our military presence abroad, including Cuba.”

Earlier, Russia threatened a “military technical” response to U.S. plans to put missiles in
Eastern Europe near its borders. Russia strongly opposes plans of Western oil companies,
including Israeli firms, to route oil and gas that transit Georgia through Turkey instead of
linking them to Russian pipelines. Tel Aviv owns a heavy interest in Caspian oil and gas pipelines.

The Swiss-based Israeli investigative journalist and author Shraga Elam reports that Israel,
with U.S. connivance, was behind the attack against South Ossetia by the tiny former Soviet
state of Georgia.

“There is an obvious Israeli involvement in the present conflict between Georgia and Russia,”
he says.

“There are hundreds of Israeli military advisers in Georgia. . . .” He quotes sources like
military expert Yossi Melman in the Israeli daily Ha’aretz:

“Melman wrote that Georgia became a real El Dorado for Israeli arms dealers and numerous
representatives of the army and intelligence services. Some former generals like Israel Ziv and
Gal Hersh (with his company Defensive Shield) are very active there.

“Hersh and Ziv are mainly training and consulting Georgian army units. They are using the
‘chain’ method common among Israeli arms dealers: a main contractor wins a tender and employs
sub-contractors—in this case Israeli officers and former Shin Bet employees,” wrote Melman.

According to him there was a project to sell Merkava tanks to Georgia, The Ma’ariv newspaper
points out that the Georgian defense minister, David Kezerashvili, lived for a while in Israel
and speaks Hebrew. In a lengthy article the military exports to Georgia are described. Ma’ariv
estimates them to be of a value of at least $300 million. An Israeli marketing expert told Ma’ariv:

“To every Israeli agent representing an Israeli defense company is attached a cousin of the
defense minister, who opens the doors for him.”

Also, Israeli news web site (News First Class) confirms the massive presence of Israeli
advisers in Georgia and writes:

“The Israeli military industries upgraded the Georgian air force, sold unmanned aerial
vehicles, advanced artillery systems and trained infantry units.”

U.S. “consultants” are helping the Georgian army. According to Pentagon spokesman Bryan
Whitman, there are 127 U.S. military trainers there, of whom about 35 are civilian contractors.

In addition to the trainers, 1,000 soldiers from the Vicenza, Italy-based Southern European
Task Force (Airborne) and the Kaiserslautern-based 21st Theater Sustainment Command, along with
Marine reservists with the 3rd Battalion, 25th Marines out of Ohio, and the U.S. state of
Georgia’s Army National Guard’s 1st Battalion, 121st Infantry participated in “Immediate
Response 2008.”

Operation Immediate Response 2008 was held from July 15-July 30, with U.S. personnel training
about 600 troops at a former Soviet base near Tbilisi, the largest city and capital of Georgia.
The goal of this operation was allegedly teaching combat skills for missions in Iraq. The
Marines left, but not the airmen.

Georgia had sent 2,000 soldiers to Iraq, who were recalled to face the Russian invasion.
Washington has provided Georgia with materiel and advisers, and so did Israel—at least until
Russia pressed it to stop, reportedly in return for promises to withhold advanced weapons from
Syria.

The South Ossetia separatists claim U.S. intervention, saying there are black people among the
Georgian casualties. But even if some American personnel went discreetly into action, that
would not suffice to deter Russia from bringing Georgia to heel, if not physically occupying
the country. And then the Western loss will not be limited to the independence of a small,
remote, struggling democracy.

Among items Israel has been selling to Tbilisi are pilotless drone aircraft. Russian fighters
shot one down in May, according to UN observers.

Russia sent Israel a letter of protest after the shooting incident asking it to stop supplying
military hardware to Georgia “as Russia from time to time complies with Israel’s requests not
to supply weapons systems” to states seen as threatening Israel, according to the Israeli daily
Ma’ariv. Israel is one of the world’s leading arms exporters but does not detail the contents
or value of its trade with individual countries.

In addition to the spy drones, Israel has also been supplying Georgia with infantry weapons and
electronics for artillery systems, and has helped upgrade Soviet-designed Su-25 ground attack
jets assembled in Georgia, according to Koba Liklikadze, an independent military expert based
in Tbilisi. Former Israeli generals also serve as advisers to the Georgian military.

Howard Carson, AFP Southwest Bureau chief, travels widely and has influential contacts in
Russia and other countries.

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

2 Comments

Reply

]]> Mon, 18 Aug 2008 08:07:39 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/standing_up_for_justice_in_the_middle_east_61327227t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/standing_up_for_justice_in_the_middle_east_61327227t.html Standing Up for Justice in the Middle East
by Ramzi Kysia

“Come, my friends
‘Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset…”
—from Tennyson’s “Ulysses”

Limassol, Cyprus - In a few, short days, the Free Gaza Movement, a diverse group of
international human rights activists from seventeen different countries, will set sail from
Cyprus to Gaza in order to shatter the Israeli blockade of the Gaza Strip. I’m proud to stand
with them. Over 170 prominent individuals and organizations have endorsed our efforts,
including the Carter Center, former British Cabinet member Clare Short, and Nobel Peace Prize
laureates Mairead Maguire and Desmond Tutu.

Adam Qvist, a 22 year old student and filmmaker from Copenhagen, Denmark, is one of the human
rights workers sailing to Gaza. He explains his participation in the project in this way:

“I’m interested in telling narratives and advocating people’s existent feelings. The idea of
sailing to Gaza is kind of crazy, but it’s also very straight-forward. The whole idea of having
just one Palestinian who’s been forced off their land and who is able to return to Palestine -
this is something that could demolish the whole Zionist venture. And it just has to be one
person. If one person can do it, then others can do it. This project, this boat, is about
giving people the freedom to take responsibility. You shouldn’t expect something from others if
you can’t do it yourself, and this is true both on a very personal but also on a political level.

“This mission is an amazing opportunity to have a huge impact on this hard-locked,
heart-locked, crisis. I’ve never been to Gaza, myself, but I know that Gaza is the forgotten
little brother of the Middle East, or at least of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. Everything
about this crisis is clearer in Gaza. The Israeli occupation strategy is much clearer in Gaza,
because it’s not specifically about taking more land. It’s mostly about completely destroying a
people.”

Over two years ago, in an election process advocated by the United States, the party of Hamas
was elected to power in Occupied Palestine. In response, Israel and the United States imposed a
near total blockade on the people of Gaza in an illegal act of collective punishment.

For more than two years, Israel has blocked Gaza’s access to tax revenues, humanitarian aid,
and even family remittances from Palestinians living abroad. Predictably, Gaza’s economy has
completely collapsed, and malnutrition rates have skyrocketed. Today, because of the blockade,
eighty percent of the people of Gaza are dependent on United Nations’ food aid just to be able
to eat.

This is intolerable.

U.S. Presidential candidate Barack Obama often speaks about the “audacity of hope.” But hope
can never be a passive emotion. Centuries ago, St. Augustine wrote that Hope has two, beautiful
daughters: Anger and Courage. To hope for a better world is to be angry at the injustices that
prevent that world from emerging, and it requires the courage to stand up and create newer
worlds for ourselves.

Tom Nelson, a lawyer from Welches, Oregon, is sailing to Gaza to seek that newer world.
According to Tom:

“Americans are terribly ignorant of the human effects of what they support. I think this boat
is one of the most effective means of raising consciousness - particularly American
consciousness - about the problems caused by American foreign policy. Americans have to know
the consequences of these policies … I’m sixty-four years old, my children are grown, and my
affairs are in order. I think about Rachel Corrie, and about what Israel may do to us. I know
it’s risky, but I take a risk when I ride a motorcycle, and I think that if we’re really going
to change things then somebody has to begin putting something on the line for that change to
happen.”

Eliza Ernshire is a thirty-two year old schoolteacher from London. Her reasons for sailing to
Gaza are much the same:

“For years and years - seeing place in the world that were being totally destroyed, and people
that were being totally destroyed by other people and governments - I thought there’s nothing
that I could do. But I realized that we can change things in small ways, and we have a
responsibility to do this.

“No one is paying attention to what’s happening in Gaza. No one is listening to Palestinians.
They are slowly being strangulated by Israel, and no one is even listening. I can’t sit outside
of this and just let it happen … We as human beings have an obligation to stand up, and I can’t
be passive about it. You can’t stand up in London and just say that you don’t agree. We need to
find ways to connect people in the Middle East, particularly young people, to people and groups
in wealthier countries. Together we can inspire each other, and together we can be much more
than we are alone.”

Eliza speaks a powerful truth. Politicians and pundits often complain that the conflicts in the
Middle East are complex and intractable, but two things are absolutely clear: One is that the
use of violence - and, in Israel’s case, overwhelming violence - has not helped any side to
achieve peace or security. And the other is that our governments, across our entire world, have
completely failed to do anything productive to address this crisis.

It’s time we the people stand up for ourselves against unjust laws, wanton violence, criminal
blockades, and the hardness of heart that makes these thing possible. It’s time we stand
against fear-mongering and war-mongering, and build connections, for ourselves, with our
sisters and brothers in the Middle East. Our politicians have long since failed us. Now it’s
our turn to stand up and seek a newer world for ourselves.

Ramzi Kysia is an Arab-American writer and activist, and a member of the Free Gaza Movement.
You can receive regular updates on their efforts to break the siege of Gaza by signing up for
their newsletter. If you’d like more information, or if you’d like to donate to their efforts,
please visit their website at FreeGaza.org.

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Sun, 17 Aug 2008 22:57:45 PDT http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/how_real_is_the_evangelical_hold_on_u_s_foreign_po_61326971t.html http://www.nnseek.com/e/alt.culture.azerbaijan/how_real_is_the_evangelical_hold_on_u_s_foreign_po_61326971t.html by Sadegh Kabeer (source: Eteraz Online)
Sunday, August 17, 2008

http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/index.php?q=node/6071

That religion plays a prominent role in American politics is undeniable. The pollsters at the
Pew Research Center have found that 85%% of Americans regard religion as an important part of
their lives. Moreover, the separation of religion from the political sphere doesn’t feature
highly on their list of priorities. In the same set of polls, 70%% of Americans stated they
desire their President to be a person of faith.

Several presidents have been unabashed in their use of religious nomenclature, symbolism and
allusion. Edifying homilies, packed with open professions of faith by Jimmy Carter, Ronald
Reagan and more recently George W. Bush were inveterate features of their respective
presidencies. Though the separation of church and state remains the writ of the land, recent
decades have seen a resurgence in religiosity and, to use a somewhat oxymoronic phrase,
“postmodern-revival” of the role of religion in public life, whereby ancient symbols are
refashioned and packaged to suit contemporary needs and agendas. An unrepresentative, but
powerful coalition of groups have since the eighties been aggressively pursuing their
politico-theological program with a hitherto unparalleled vigor. Though the situation is hardly
as alarming as some commentators would have us believe, there is little doubt that the
Christian Evangelical movement has emerged as a powerful and highly influential group with a
wish-list they expect their political representatives to translate into policy.

Leaders of this movement include the late Jerry Falwell, Gary Bauer, Pat Robertson and John
Hagee, and politicians such as former House Majority Leaders Tom DeLay (R-TX) and Richard Armey
(R-TX), and Senator James Inhofe (R-K). The growing pervasiveness and political tenor of
televangelism, e-vangelism (internet-vangelism) and religious activism have been part and
parcel of the aforementioned trend and its recent buoyancy. The pervasive influence of the
Christian Right is by no means a figment of “liberal America’s” imagination. In fact it’s very
real, with some experts contending the provenance of American exceptionalism and unilateralism
is to be found in Evangelism and its political cognates. For example, Professor Duane Oldfield
of Knox College has argued that:

“Although the Christian right's unilateralism is not new, its proximity to power is. Three
developments have helped make the Christian right a significant player in U.S. foreign policy:
the election of a president with close ties to the movement, the growth of the Christian
right's grassroots organizational strength, and the development of an alliance with
neoconservatives, who have come to play a crucial role in the present administration.”

An important subset of the politically-minded Christian Right are the so-called Christian
Zionists. The origins of Christian Zionism reside in the theology of dispensationalism which
emerged in nineteenth century England, largely through the efforts of Anglican ministers Louis
Way and John Nelson Darby. Dispensationalism constitutes a form of premillenarianism which
asserts that the world will experience an era of turmoil, hardship and catastrophe before
Christ returns.

The Evangelist community’s theological predilections have precipitated foreign policy
preferences consisting in unerring support for Israel and a tendency to view the Bush
administration’s “war on terror” as a war against Islam. Pastor John Hagee, for instance has
unapologetically proclaimed that, “We support Israel because all other nations were created by
an act of men, but Israel was created by an act of God!”

The Iraq War is seen as integral to a Manichean struggle of “good versus evil” and despite the
precipitous decline in support for the war amongst the American public, Christian Zionists
remain stalwart supporters of the Bush administration’s Babylonian adventure, viewing it
through the prism of a cosmic and eschatological struggle. Attitudes toward other religions and
Islam in particular have been characterized by prejudice, falsehood and misconception. Surveys
taken by the Pew Forum (PDF), furthermore, show that of all Americans, Evangelicals have the
most negative and derogatory views of Islam and Muslims. Reverend Franklin Graham, a leading
Evangelist created a stir when after the 9/11 attacks he infamously claimed that Islam was a
"very evil and a very wicked religion."

The Christian Zionists support for Israel is a curious and uneasy one. Evangelist support for
Israel first really gathered pace after the Six Day War (1967), in which Israel single-handedly
defeated the armies of Jordan, Egypt and Syria and occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank and
Gaza. These events were interpreted as a sign that the realization of Old and New Testament
prophecy was in the offing.

Ever since, a slew of Christian Zionist groups have been extremely vocal in their support of
the Jewish state and the settlement enterprise, even raising funds to expedite settlement
expansion. Their belief that God has promised Israel to the Jews, and the Jews alone has meant
that they are fundamentally at odds with the international consensus which advocates a
two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The reason why such an alliance might be deemed uneasy and fraught with contradictions is
because dispensationalist theology doesn’t envisage a pleasant fate for the Jews.
Dispensationalist theology assures us that when the end-of-times are upon us that the Jews, who
are crudely typecast in the Evangelicals’ literalist Biblical narrative, will either convert to
Christianity or die! Hence, despite their staunch and unreserved support for Israel, critics
suggest that such support only thinly veils a deep-seated brand of anti-Semitism.

This rather strange marriage of convenience is perhaps best exemplified in the person of Pastor
John Hagee, whose endorsement was wholeheartedly embraced by Republican presidential nominee,
John McCain, earlier this year. Despite being founder of lobbying organization Christians
United for Israel (CUFI), he has been widely accused of anti-Semitism. In his 2006 book
Jerusalem Countdown Hagee argues that:

"It was the disobedience and rebellion of the Jews, God's chosen people, to their covenantal
responsibility to serve only the one true God, Jehovah, that gave rise to the opposition and
persecution that they experienced beginning in Canaan and continuing to this very day..."

Hagee effectively puts down thousands of years of persecution, which culminated in the
Judaeocide and near-destruction of European Jewry, to what he perceives as the Jews
disobedience and deviance from the anointed path of Hagee’s infinitely vengeful God. Despite
such utterances, prominent figures in the American-Jewish community such as Abraham Foxman,
chairman of the Anti-Demfamation League (ADL), have been quick to jump to Hagee and the equally
offensive pronouncements of other Evangelical leaders’ defense. In the words of Foxman, “There
is a role for him…because of his support for Israel.”

The Evangelicals have also been jockeying for broadening the present conflicts in Iraq and
Afghanistan to Iran. Hagee’s CUFI has been zealously pushing the message of
“support-Israel-bomb-Iran”, urging Congress to follow suit and has told his followers that a US
strike on Tehran may initiate the sequence of apocalyptic events related in Ezekiel 38 and 39.
In Jerusalem Countdown he goes so far as to argue that “The coming nuclear showdown with Iran
is a certainty”.

Such dogma obviously leaves no room for negotiation or painstaking diplomacy. It’s not merely
the belief that the end-of-days is upon us which must been seen off, but that dangerous fantasy
that Armageddon must be instigated and provoked via a series of explosive and catastrophic
events. Apart from being dangerous in and of themselves, such ideas, even in infinitesimal
quantities can act as an damning impediments in the pursuit of peaceful solutions to what are
after all mundane geopolitical issues.

There is however consensus amongst experts that the Christian Evangelical movement cannot be
viewed as a monolith. Though there are of course ideological and philosophical commonalities
which bind them together, there are also issues which divide them such as global warming and
HIV/AIDS.

There is also the trenchant counterargument that despite appearances, the American policy
elite’s support for Israel and the neocon agenda in pursuit of American hegemony exist
independently of Evangelical lobbying efforts, and on the contrary remain entirely contingent
on geo-strategic considerations. Well-known advocates of a position somewhat analogous to this
are Noam Chomsky of MIT and Norman G. Finkelstein, both of whom take issue with the thesis
proposed in John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt’s, The Israel Lobby i.e. that it is the lobby and
its activities on Capitol Hill which are the key factor capable of explaining American policy
toward Israel and the broader Middle East. To oversimplify somewhat, they argue that when all
is said and done, it is America’s geo-strategic interests which take precedence over all else
and thereby go on to determine policy, with ideology, theology and the lobby in the final
instance falling by the wayside, playing only the most negligible of roles. Evangelicals rather
have been cast in the role of “useful idiots” mobilizing their followers on the basis of hollow
campaign promises, dutifully shepherding their flocks to the ballot box.

There is little doubt however that those politically-active Evangelicals whose world-view and
activities we have here briefly attempted to explicate, will be a force to be reckoned with for
the foreseeable future; further confirmed by the fact that the first general-election meeting
between Obama and McCain will not be taking place in a university auditorium, with news anchors
as moderators, but in the unorthodox locale of an Evangelical mega-church, overseen by a
southern Baptist pastor. The presidential hopefuls may well find themselves compelled to
indulge in catechism as opposed to the usual interrogatory welter of questions. Thus despite
various mitigating factors worthy of greater exploration, there is little doubt that analysts
and observers of American foreign policy will be struggling to assess the role of Christian
Evangelicals for some time to come.

© Sadegh Kabeer



If possible try and check out the short documentary, Pastor John Hagee: A Preoccupation with
the Jews, by jewsonfirst.org...

Posted In: alt.culture.azerbaijan

no comments

Reply

]]> Sun, 17 Aug 2008 22:52:40 PDT