Deep Blade Journal

Letter to Hastert condemns Iraqi PM for wanting Israeli killing in Lebanon to stop

As far as stopping war is concerned, perhaps the worst thing that could happen is a Democrat take-over of Congress. Get this:

Senate Democrats press Iraqi PM on Israel remarksIn a letter to [Iraqi Prime Minister] al-Maliki, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, Democratic Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois and Sen. Charles Schumer of New York called the Iraqi leader’s comments troubling.

“Your failure to condemn Hezbollah’s aggression and recognize Israel’s right to defend itself raise serious questions about whether Iraq under your leadership can play a constructive role in resolving the current crisis and bringing stability to the Middle East,” the letter said.

The key phrase there is “recognize Israel’s right to defend itself.” The Iraqis–all of them, it’s one of the few things that unites them–don’t see pummeling of Lebonese civilians and infrastructure as part of “Israel’s right to defend itself.”

However, the Iraqis do seem to recognize Hezbollah’s “right to defend” Lebanon. I personally do not condone rocket attacks. But then, I am not in a position where I must survive against a vastly more powerful military force that wants to kill me. But I do believe that al-Maliki has it exactly right on Lebanon:

What is happening is an operation of mass destruction and mass punishment and an operation using great force that Israel has — and Lebanon does not.

Last month’s glowing Republican reports revealed again and stronger than ever as complete BS

This is from a USA today story on war critics from military towns that mentions a pro-war, conservative Republican Congressman from my home state of Minnesota:

Rep. Gil Gutknecht, R-Minn. In a debate last month in the House of Representatives, Gutknecht defended the U.S. presence in Iraq. “Now is not the time to go wobbly,” he said. He visited Iraq last week hoping to meet some of the 2,900 Minnesota Guard and Reserve members stationed there, and returned shaken. “It’s a much more dangerous place than I thought,” says Gutknecht.

Now he’s calling for a phased U.S. troop withdrawal and more Iraqi involvement in enforcing security.

“I don’t think ’stay the course’ sells,” Gutknecht says.

I had expressed fears that the Rovian panic-button line where the Republicans last month bet the farm “that the American people will see their war in Iraq in just this way–stay in it for victory or withdraw for `defeat”’–therby creating a big November disappointment for Democrats playing on out-of-Iraq sentiments. We still have to wait and see.

Suddenly, however, we do have a situation where just a few weeks past those Congressional debates and Bush’s War Council & surprise Iraq visit, Iraq is rapidly deteriorating and spiraling out of control. Today, with Iraqi Prime Minister Malaki in Washington, there is a report out saying more US troops are on the way just to shore up an utterly failed attempt to clamp down on mayhem in the Iraqi capital.

Back on June 14, the White House promised to launch operation “Forward Together”, a giant sweep of Baghdad, along with Iraqi forces.

The President will provide, through the Commander, MNF-I, 12 battalions (approximately 7,200 troops) of Coalition forces in Baghdad to support 36 battalions of Iraqi Army forces (approximately 26,000) and nearly 23,000 Iraqi police who will work together to secure the city. Their goal will be to deny terrorists safe haven in areas around Baghdad and to deny terrorists freedom of movement in the city.

Result? Skyrocketing uncontrolled violence with over 3,000 dead in one month.

In this report, Patrick Cockburn says,

While the eyes of the world are elsewhere, Baghdad is still dying and the daily toll is hitting record levels. While the plumes of fire and smoke over Lebanon have dominated headlines for 11 days, with Britain and the US opposing a UN call for an immediate ceasefire, another Bush-Blair foreign policy disaster is unfolding in Iraq.

In a desperate effort to stem the butchery, the government yesterday imposed an all-day curfew on Baghdad, but tens of thousands of its people have already run for their lives. In some parts of the city, dead bodies are left to rot in the baking summer heat because nobody dares to remove them. I drove through empty streets in the heart of the city yesterday, taking a zigzag course to avoid police checkpoints that we thought might be doubling as death squads. Few shops were open. Those still doing business are frantically trying to sell their stock. A sign above one shop read: “Italian furniture: 75 per cent reductions.”

Iraqis are terrified in a way that I have never seen before….

Cockburn goes on to say that, “Baghdad is now breaking up into a dozen different hostile cities,” and “The Iraqi government is a prisoner of the Green Zone”.

Cockburn also has significant quotes from Iraqi government ministers, “Iraq as a political project is finished,” and, “The parties have moved to plan B”.

With all this in the background, the Malaki-Bush meeting today had an air of continuing unreality, “And, God willing, there will be no civil war in Iraq,” said Malaki.

I mentioned the lock-step resolution supporting Israel in its destruction of Lebanon in the last post. Here are the paltry 22 who did not cast a vote in favor of it:

NAYS—8
Abercrombie, Conyers, Dingell, Kilpatrick (MI), McDermott, Paul, Rahall, Stark

ANSWERED ‘‘PRESENT’’—4
Kaptur, Kucinich, Lee, Waters

NOT VOTING—10
Davis (FL); Davis, Jo Ann; Duncan; Evans; Fortenberry; McKinney; Northup; Nussle; Sanchez, Loretta; Westmoreland

I suppose some of them, like Dennis Kucinich, wanted to vote “present” because they did not want to come off like rocket attacks on Israel were okay. The Michigan reps.–Conyers, Dingell, Kilpatrick (MI) — represent many voters of Arab and Middle Eastern descent. McDermott and Paul are solidly anti-war. It takes some courage in Washington to step out of the Israel lock step.

This seems reasonable

U.S. Representative Dennis Kucinich from Ohio has submitted a resolution calling for “immediate cessation” of the devastating bombing in the Middle East. Of course, this rightly includes the far-less destructive rocket attacks on Israel.

I think this is dead-in-the-water, given the locked-in nature of US support for Israel in both parties in the Congress. But at least let them know you care that a berserk Middle East superpower firing US-made bombs and killing hundreds of innocents hardly can be, as Condoleezza Rice would have you believe, the “birth pangs” of democracy and advancement of a long-term “peace process”.

Here is the letter I just wrote about the Kucinich resolution to my own Rep.

To: The Honorable Mike Michaud, U.S. House of Representatives
RE: H. CON. RES. 450; the situation in the Middle East

Dear Mike:

I urge you to support H. CON. RES. 450, calling upon the President to appeal to all sides in the current crisis in the Middle East for an immediate cessation of violence and to commit United States diplomats to multi-party negotiations with no preconditions.

I would also like to mention that I was disappointed to see your name in the “yeas” on H. Res. 921 supporting Israel’s wanton destruction of Lebanon with US-made bombs. I’ll reserve discussion here, but if you have interest in learning about the flaws in this license for Israel to break international law, please read this article: “Congress and the Israeli Attack on Lebanon: A Critical Reading” by Stephen Zunes [http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/3381].

Major new Pakistan nulear facility

These guys get “a large plutonium-production reactor” and there is only a mild tut-tut discouraging “military use of the facility”. Maybe A. Q. Khan could be asked to distribute the stuff to nuclear wannabes around the world.