Deep Blade Journal

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.

Incredible shame for America

This is not self-defense: South Beirut after Israeli bombardment

New York Times headline July 22:

U.S. Speeds Up Bomb Delivery for the Israelis

The US-Israel axis just can’t kill fast enough. What is said in this article is just outrageous. More GBU-28 bunker busters are on their way ahead of schedule:

WASHINGTON, July 21 ­ The Bush administration is rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs to Israel, which requested the expedited shipment last week after beginning its air campaign against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, American officials said Friday….The munitions that the United States is sending to Israel are part of a multimillion-dollar arms sale package approved last year that Israel is able to draw on as needed, the officials said. But Israel’s request for expedited delivery of the satellite and laser-guided bombs was described as unusual by some military officers, and as an indication that Israel still had a long list of targets in Lebanon to strike….American officials said that once a weapons purchase is approved, it is up to the buyer nation to set up a timetable. But one American official said normal procedures usually do not include rushing deliveries within days of a request. That was done because Israel is a close ally in the midst of hostilities, the official said….Israel said its air force had dropped 23 tons of explosives Wednesday night alone in Beirut, in an effort to penetrate what was believed to be a bunker used by senior Hezbollah officials….

This amazing tidbit is also included in the story: The Saudis have been assuaged with a new $6 billion weapons deal of their own.

Lebanon not destroyed enough

According to US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, too many people are still alive and too many essential facilities are still standing. The humanitarian crisis in Lebanon is not yet dire enough.

Secretary Rice says there are no “quick fixes” that could “create conditions that can lead to a lasting and sustainable end to the violence”.

What Rice and the US administration and the Israelis evidently want to continue is described in a summary of remarks by Jan Egeland, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator at Friday’s special UN Security Council meeting on the Middle East crisis:

As a result of targeting of fuel facilities, Beirut had only days of fuel remaining, he said. It was believed that there were sufficient food supplies, including wheat stocks, to cover national consumption for one to three months. The primary concern was the destruction to food-supply chains. Hospitals were functioning, but were overwhelmed and suffering from power outages. Too many ill could not reach hospitals on time, as the roads were blocked. With the number of people in shelters increasing, access to safe drinking water was also a concern. The Lebanese Government had requested international humanitarian assistance and had appealed for medical supplies and other equipment. While the figures remained only indicative, the current planning figures suggested more than half a million conflict-affected people, of which more than one third were children. There might be some 115,000 third-country nationals in Lebanon. More than 100,000 Lebanese were believed to be in Syria, and required assistance.

Yes, “a rain of rockets” is terrorizing civilians in a band of northern Israel, doubtless a war crime. But the humanitarian crisis is caused by the vastly larger war crimes committed by Israel in “Southern Lebanon, Beirut and the Bekaa Valley.”

Please, Mr. Israeli, show restraint
That Rice is emitting a load of crap is belied by the clear fact, barely hidden, that the United States is directing the Israeli attack on Lebanon. The US is supplying the bombs, supporting the operation, and giving diplomatic cover–transparently bogus as it is. In a Wednesday NY Times story under the heading “Violence”, we learned that the “U.S. Appears to Be Waiting to Act on Israeli Airstrikes”. The fact of US control is hardly disguised:

an American-Israeli consensus began to emerge on Tuesday in which Israel would continue to bombard Lebanon for about another week to degrade the capabilities of the Hezbollah militia, officials of the two countries said.

Meanwhile, Rice seems to understand there is civilian death. But just like any terrorist, she explains how the ends justify the means. The Nazis certainly would have approved:

QUESTION: Madame Secretary, aren’t you concerned that the delay in halting the fighting and the loss of many civilian lives in Lebanon will hamper your efforts to win the heart and minds of the Arab world?

SECRETARY RICE: I’m concerned about civilian casualties because I’m concerned about civilian casualties. Nobody wants to see innocent civilians caught up in this kind of fighting. And it’s why we are very determined to do more about the humanitarian situation. It’s why we have talked so determinedly and so frequently with the Israelis about restraint in their operations. It’s why we’ve worked to get the humanitarian corridors opened. This is a terrible thing for the Lebanese people. The unfortunate fact is that if we don’t do this right, if we don’t create political conditions that allow an end to the violence to also deal with the root cause, deal with the circumstances that produced this violence, then we’re going to be back here in several months more.

Because what is different now than when Robin was there in 1982 is that you have a circumstance in which a young, democratic government, free now of Syrian forces, is trying to assert its authority over Lebanese territory and trying to be there for a good neighbor and a good contributor to international peace and stability. And those extremists want to strangle it in its crib. They are frightened by the prospect of a Lebanon that is no longer a source of instability, no longer so weak that people use its territory in this way, much as these extremists want to strangle other new governments, new democratic governments in the region.

So this is a different Middle East and it’s a new Middle East and it’s hard and we’re going through a very violent time. I want the violence against civilians to stop because the violence against civilians needs to stop, but I know that unless the circumstances are dealt with, it’s not going to last, any end to the violence isn’t going to last. [emphasis added]

Surely the US-Israeli destruction of Lebanon would have been justified by Hitler in a manner parallel to the reasons Ms. Rice offered. Was not the same logic at work in the June 22, 1941 Proclamation justifying the invasion of the Soviet Union? Judge for yourself:

Only the victory of the Axis powers in the Balkans frustrated the plan of involving Germany in battle in the southeast for months, allowing the Soviet Russian armies to complete their march and increase their readiness for action. Together with England, and with the hoped for American supplies, they would have been ready to strangle and defeat the German Reich and Italy. [emphasis added]

“Israel’s strategy was to drive the Palestinians to largely-Muslim West Beirut (apart from those who were killed, dispersed or imprisoned), then to besiege the city, cutting off water, food, medical supplies and electricity, and to subject it to increasingly heavy bombardment. Naturally, the native Lebanese population was also severely battered. These measures had little impact on the PLO guerrilla fighters in Beirut, but civilians suffered increasingly brutal punishment. The correct calculation was that by this device, the PLO would be compelled to leave West Beirut to save it from total annihilation. It was assumed, also correctly, that American intellectuals could be found to carry out the task of showing that this too was a remarkable exercise in humanity and a historically unique display of `purity of arms,’ even having the audacity to claim that it was the PLO, not the Israeli attackers, who were `holding the city and its population hostage”’.

Noam Chomsky, 1983
from a passage in The Fateful Triangle on “Peace for Galilee”, Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon that killed over 17,000 innocent civilians

“Hezbollah’s provocative attack on 12 July was the trigger of this crisis. It is clear that the Lebanese government had no advance knowledge of this attack. Whatever other agendas they may serve, Hezbollah’s actions, which it portrays as defending Palestinian and Lebanese interests, in fact do neither. On the contrary, they hold an entire nation hostage, set back prospects for negotiation of a comprehensive Middle East peace.”

UN Secretary General Kofi Annan
July 20, 2006

Fruit filling out early

Bet there’s 50 like this underway

The brandywine tomatoes are in full production mode with ideal conditions. It’s hot, it’s humid, and it doesn’t stay dry for long. This week, a couple of dry days were followed by the passage of Tropical Storm Beryl off the coast this morning, leaving us about 10 mm of rain.

Al-Qaeda-like logic

“Sometimes it requires tragic situations to help bring clarity in the international community.”

President Bush
July 18, 2006

Smashing of Lebanon green-lighted by President Bush at G-8 meeting

Friends of war say Israel does nothing but defend itself. Boxer, friend of war where Israel is concerned, is disappointed that the US military is too “bogged down” due to its “obsession with Iraq”.

See full story on the Israeli blockade, widespread killing, and destruction of essential infrastructure all around Lebanon here.

Israel and a coaltion of Western countries–with essential and fundamental diplomatic support from the United States–has mercilessly punished the Palestinian people since January for freely and fairly electing a Hamas-led government. Sure, Hamas is the Palestinian war party. But then, no such international pressure ever befalls America for electing Democrats and Republicans who form the most savage war party the world has ever known. Maybe Hamas, as well as the Lebonese Hezbollah have learned from us and because of us the lesson that force is the only answer when state interests are at stake.

Let’s also recognize that Palestine, and now Lebanon too, are fighting for their very survival against vastly superior military powers (America and its Israeli client) who would much rather see the region’s Arabs subdued to the status of Bantustans or POW camps surrounded by networks of walls and Israeli-only expressways.

Months ago, the attack on the Palestinians was already reaching a critical stage with Israel intentionally halting Gaza’s economy, about which I posted here. Last month, Alexander Cockburn ran through the state of shambles and carnage that Gaza and all of Palestine had become under the brutal violence and de facto sanctions enforced by Israel, the US, and Europe:

Here’s an example of how to look back farther than just a minute ago to see how these events have precipitated. On May 25, a clandestine group thought to be run by the Israeli Mossad assassinated an Islamic Jihad leader and his brother on Lebanese soil.

Does the put Wednesday’s capture of two Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah near Lebanon following the capture of one near Gaza some days earlier in any sort of context? All I can say is that the US president has declared such right of killing, capture, and detention worldwide when at his whim he specifies “enemy combatants”, perhaps pointed to for bounty. Israel uses cross-border assasins with impunity. Why should not other entities engaged in armed struggle for survival claim the same rights, as long as the captives are treated with the rights afforded by the Geneva Conventions? The Arab dictatorships clearly are uncomfortable with such a formulation, witnessed by a Saudi statment disavowing the captures as having any legitimacy as acts of resistance. I have rejected repeatedly in this blog warfare through detention, so I reject this tactic here as well. But the Israeli response is beyond any possible measure of self defense and should be condemed under Article 33 of the 4th Geneva Convention.

Of course, as long as the American light for Israeli dealing of death and destruction is glowing brightly green, no appeal to international law means a damn thing. In yesterday’s State Department briefing, spokesman Sean McCormack laid out in full detail the precepts re-stated today by President Bush at the G-8 meeting. McCormack banged the drum, “This is, in our view, an act of self-defense on the Israeli part…” and then responded,

QUESTION: As the operations continue, it seems as if there are few ways as — you know, not only for Americans but for humanitarian supplies, oil, and other supplies to get into the country. Are you talking to the Israelis about, I don’t know, a ceasefire or something like to get more supplies into the country? Are you worried about a humanitarian crisis or an economic crisis? When you talk about supporting the Lebanon Government, is there anything you’re doing in that respect?

MR. MCCORMACK: Well, certainly I think the — I think all the countries in the region, including Israel, are attuned to the fact that they do not want to cause any harm to innocent civilians. This is a very difficult situation right now for the Lebanese people, I think. We understand that. And that’s why we’re doing everything we can, why the UN is doing everything it can, to deescalate the situation. The way out of this, as I said, is for the rocket attacks to stop, for these two captives to be returned. Then, if you have that situation and you have a situation where the Government of Lebanon actually controls all of its territory, you can start to get back to a more normal situation….

Now, at the moment, I don’t have a good read on the situation of the Lebanese people. I know it certainly must be very difficult for them right now. But this underscores the reason why you have to implement 1559. And the effect is that Hezbollah has dragged the Lebanese people into this situation. Hezbollah and its benefactors are attempting to drag the Lebanese people, drag the — and with regard to Hamas and its benefactors, drag the Palestinian people into an abyss of violence. [emphasis added]

Israel does nothing. America does nothing. Only Arabs do the “dragging”. Cast your eyes away from Lebanese civilians. No list of outrages upon the Palestinian people following their democratic election (that came out wrong) need be reviewed. The Cedar Revolution is over, smashed-up Lebanon is set back 20 years, and the Palestinians are on a “diet” near starvation.

Rumor

Here’s a totally unverified and unverifiable rumor seen on the comment boards at The Oil Drum:

What I am about to say is complete speculation, so take it with a huge grain of salt. I have heard that Valerie Plame was not working on WMD issues in the Middle East when her cover was blown by the infamous White House leak. Rather, what I have heard is that she was actually involved with a front company getting hard data on whether Matthew Simmons charges against Saudi Arabia’s reserves were true or not…

I have absolutely no idea if this is true, but I am certain that Simmons must have stirred up quite a reaction deep in Cheney’s “secure, undisclosed location.”

Meanwhile, look at the calming reassurances against breakdown of the global energy supply system that have to be given to keep markets from exploding in the face of rapidly-increasing Middle East violence:

Adam Plowright, Agence France Press in The Daily Star: PARIS: World demand for oil will rise at about 2 percent a year for the next five years, but OPEC countries are leading an expansion of production that will replenish a supply safety cushion, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said Wednesday. Investment by OPEC will increase the crude production capacity of the 11 countries belonging to the cartel by 10 percent from 2006 to 2011, with production of natural gas liquids set to increase by 44 percent. These increases, coupled with rising output from non-OPEC countries, will mean that growth in oil supplies outstrip growth in demand every year until 2010, adding vital spare production capacity to the global oil system.

Take this with about the same grain of salt as the Plame-Saudi story.