The problem with the Geneva Communique from the first Geneva round on Syria is that the government of Syria never subscribed to it. It was jointly chaired by the League of Arab States for Syria, whatever that may mean. Another problem is that it is, as so many diplomatic documents are, highly ambiguous. It plainly advocates a power sharing executive formed by some of the current government plus the opposition to oversee a transition to democracy. But it does not state which elements of the current government, and it does not mention which elements of the opposition, nor does it make plain if President Assad himself is eligible to be part of, or to head, the power-sharing executive, and whether he is eligible to be a candidate in future democratic elections.
Doubtless the British, for example, would argue that the term transition implies that he will go. The Russians will argue there is no such implication and the text does not exclude anybody from the process. Doubtless also diplomats on all sides were fully aware of these differing interpretations and the ambiguity is quite deliberate to enable an agreed text. I would say that the text tends much more to the “western” side, and that this reflects the apparently weak military position of the Assad regime at that time and the then extant threat of western military intervention. There has been a radical shift in those factors against the western side in the interim. Expect Russian interpretations now to get more hardline.
Given the extreme ambiguity of the text, Iran has, as it frequently does, shot itself in the foot diplomatically by refusing to accept the communique as the basis of talks and thus getting excluded from Geneva. Iran should have accepted the communique, and then at Geneva issued its own interpretation of it.
But that is a minor point. The farcical thing about the Geneva conference is that it is attempting to promote into power-sharing in Syria “opposition” members who have no democratic credentials and represent a scarcely significant portion of those actually fighting the Assad regime in Syria. What the West are trying to achieve is what the CIA and Mossad have now achieved in Egypt; replacing the head of the Mubarak regime while keeping all its power structures in place. The West don’t really want democracy in Syria, they just want a less pro-Russian leader of the power structures.
The inability of the British left to understand the Middle East is pathetic. I recall arguing with commenters on this blog who supported the overthrow of the elected President of Egypt Morsi on the grounds that his overthrow was supporting secularism, judicial independence (missing the entirely obvious fact the Egyptian judiciary are almost all puppets of the military) and would lead to a left wing revolutionary outcome. Similarly the demonstrations against Erdogan in Istanbul, orchestrated by very similar pro-military forces to those now in charge in Egypt, were also hailed by commenters here. The word “secularist” seems to obviate all sins when it comes to the Middle East.
Qatar will be present at Geneva, and Qatar has just launched a pre-emptive media offensive by launching a dossier on torture and murder of detainees by the Assad regime, which is being given first headline treatment by the BBC all morning
There would be a good dossier to be issued on torture in detention in Qatar, and the lives of slave workers there, but that is another question.
I do not doubt at all that atrocities have been committed and are being committed by the Assad regime. It is a very unpleasant regime indeed. The fact that atrocities are also being committed by various rebel groups does not make Syrian government atrocities any better.
But whether 11,000 people really were murdered in a single detainee camp I am unsure. What I do know is that the BBC presentation of today’s report has been a disgrace. The report was commissioned by the government of Qatar who commissioned Carter Ruck to do it. Both those organisations are infamous suppressors of free speech. What is reprehensible is that the BBC are presenting the report as though it were produced by neutral experts, whereas the opposite is the case. It is produced not by anti torture campaigners or by human rights activists, but by lawyers who are doing it purely and simply because they are being paid to do it.
The BBC are showing enormous deference to Sir Desmond De Silva, who is introduced as a former UN war crimes prosecutor. He is indeed that, but it is not the capacity in which he is now acting. He is acting as a barrister in private practice. Before he was a UN prosecutor, he was for decades a criminal defence lawyer and has defended many murderers. He has since acted to suppress the truth being published about many celebrities, including John Terry.
If the Assad regime and not the government of Qatar had instructed him and paid him, he would now be on our screens arguing the opposite case to that he is putting. That is his job. He probably regards that as not reprehensible. What is reprehensible is that the BBC do not make it plain, but introduce him as a UN war crimes prosecutor as though he were acting in that capacity or out of concern for human rights. I can find no evidence of his having an especial love for human rights in the abstract, when he is not being paid for it. He produced an official UK government report into the murder of Pat Finucane, a murder organised by British authorities, which Pat Finucane’s widow described as a “sham”. He was also put in charge of quietly sweeping the Israeli murders on the Gaza flotilla under the carpet at the UN.
The question any decent journalist should be asking him is “Sir Desmond De Silva, how much did the government of Qatar pay you for your part in preparing this report? How much did it pay the other experts? Does your fee from the Government of Qatar include this TV interview, or are you charging separately for your time in giving this interview? In short how much are you being paid to say this?”
That is what any decent journalist would ask. Which is why you will never hear those questions on the BBC.
Very interesting piece Schamberg at 10.30 pm. Especially the link in the article to the Cuban-resistance anti-Syrian alliance. Quite clearly the Yanks are intent on going in if they get their way this time round. ~
http://www.directorio.org/pressreleases/note.php?note_id=3258
Not surprised to see Karl Rove, the man who got underachieving warmonger George W. Bush illegally elected, and who for the last few years has been, with the help of the son of the man who blew a big hole in the ozone layer over Australia, Billy McCormac Jr, is supporting the extreme Reinfeldt in his persecution of Julian Assange.
That silence was expected Rabbi Ovadia – The genesis of terror and confusion was written one time in words by indigenous tribes skilled in a doctrine by communication. They created Yahweh as a great warrior more powerful and supreme than those mere idols created by human craftsman.
“Let them all come together and take their stand;
they will be brought down to terror and shame [confusion].”
Likewise possessing the basal skills to release information from mass and having the means to hide from that annihilation is the present day equivalent.
‘My last post listed US bombs delivered by plane.’ (Sofia)
More accurately, US bombs delivered by US planes. Obviously, that doesn’t include US bombs delivered on the US’s behalf, by plane. Probably a quibble, but US military aid to the usual suspect rarely seems to pass its sell-by date in a warehouse. And that aid is brought to the suspect on US planes before use, sometimes via Shannon or Prestwick or Lakenheath – its precise status vis-a-vis US planes and delivery is ambiguous.
I think Buggalugs has been drinking, btw.
Dad.
Emabarrassing yet again!
“All the signs of a man cracking under pressure.”
WHF!
Is this really the best the Hasbara community has to offer on the UK’s third most visited political blog?
It’s like the IDF’s last outing to South Lebanon. Endless ineffective salvos of cluster-insults, ad hominens and accusations of “antisemitism”.
As for calling your own daughter a “lapdog”. I’m beginning to think you don’t love me anymore.
“Here is a crazy story no one is talking about that is evidence of the Israel lobby’s role in our politics.”
http://isteve.blogspot.de/2014/02/american-deep-state.html
“Sevres was never ratified by the Turks – thanks, Kemal – Lausanne was.”
_______________
Which should, more accurately, have read
“Sévres was never ratified by the Turks – thanks, Kemal – Lausanne was – thanks again, Kemal”
A small but significant (and I suspect deliberate) omission.
Dear friend Habbabkuk,
“smutty references to (?) masturbation”
Come, come.
I have no way of knowing what your personal sexual predilections are. So I must say that playing in the league that plays with itself has more to do with some of the comments you make than what you do in your spare time. It was intended to bring a little relief in the hard-slog of international law and, after all, you raised the competitive football analogy so I had to respond. Hope it did not cause you too much pain. Now will you answer why every United Nations country except Israel is opposed to the US embargo on Cuba, a country it claimed it was there to support.
Someone; Thanks for that. This list has been edited to avoid redundancy. I take no responsibility for the inbreeding.
2. Andrew Rosenthal is the son of A.M. Rosenthal.
4. Arthur Sulzberger Jr. is the son of Arthur Sulzberger.
5. Barbara Amiel is the wife of Conrad Black.
6. Barbara Ledeen is the mother of Simone Ledeen who is the daughter of Michael Ledeen.
8. Benjamin Netanyahu is the son of Benzion Netanyahu.
11. Dalck Feith is the father of Douglas Feith.
14. Daniel Feith is the brother of David Feith.
15. Daniel Feith is the grandson of Dalck Feith.
17. Daniel Pipes is the son of Richard Pipes.
21. David Wurmser is the husband of Meyrav Wurmser.
22. Dick Cheney is the father of Liz Cheney who is the daughter of Lynne Cheney.
24. Donald Kagan is the father-in-law of Victoria Nuland and Kimberly Kagan
25. Donald Kagan is the father of Frederick and Robert Kagan.
26. Donald Kagan is the father of Robert Kagan.
31. Elliott Abrams is the son-in-law of Midge Decter and Norman Podhoretz, and brother-in-law of John Podhoretz.
38. Gertrude Himmelfarb is the wife of Irving Kristol and the mother of William Kristol.
45. Jonah Goldberg is the son of Lucianne Goldberg.
Neoconservatism: it’s a real family business.
—————
“I have no way of knowing ….” Nor do we want to, John. Projection requires a lot of lubrication, and is a messy business normally conducted without observers.
“BREAKING: Pipe Break At Coal Facility Contaminates West Virginia Waterway”
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/02/11/3277541/west-virginia-coal-slurry-spill/
Yes Someone, well spotted; connecting the dots reveals the incestuous proponents of terror, a cabal, a scheme, a ‘chosen few’ dedicated to the global temple.
“Scottish independence: George Osborne to ‘rule out currency union'”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-26147783
Has anyone noticed there are no late nights for Hab, various Anons, Beeziebug, and Resident anthromorph? Ten pm is the witching hour, and they head to the pub after working hours.
Thanks for the reminder of the petition Clark. I used the wretched FB to spread it, as well as in my own ways.
Anode, thanks for the dejavu on your mingling with socket, and a big fat mud pie for his anniverssarry here? it is very revealing to those who come here, hoping to find a reasonably well written piece to comment on, but find a cackle clearing his throat.
Enough of the dross picking on John Goss,
and what an superb chuckle, a mere mutter from ye green Irish butter, bliss….
the trolls are loosing it, what a Schmiss.
habbakukhalfcooked, with some Gladio on the side.
I agree beelzebub, he’s been on the Duvel/Teufel again, poor Sofia’s in charge of cleaning him up afterwards, again
@Sophia, the same gangster network is still in existence, in Italy Turkey and Israel, all have powerfull gangster syndicates that have decade long relations with each other, all play with fire and have had one over on each other, but their glue are the armies and politicians who keep it going, however shady it is.
https://thedaywefightback.org/international/?r=dp
“Scottish independence: George Osborne to ‘rule out currency union’”
So basically Osborne is in favour of Scottish independence and Salmond isn’t.
” a mere mutter from ye green Irish butter, bliss….”
I cannot resist. It’s me Ben. I’ve decided the tactics of the oppos transcends it’s state of effluence.
I hope I do not offend the faithful, but find parody more effective than rhetoric, at least in theory. We shall see.
As to the earlier missives based on recorded quotes from famous individuals, there is no copyright infringement, as the proper attribution has been made in the user name. That’s for the Corporatist/Authoritarian/Putative Libertarians in our midst, jftr.
I love Irish butter. Grass-fed and hormone free ( Nyah nyah, I can’t hear you. Let me have my butter without guilt for supporting good sense ranching and farming) You hear me?
Ben you’re a Scream Lol… good to see ya around.
A Node @ 11th feb 5;36 read every word Cheers
John some info you might find useful – re gitmo
part of an interview with a Susan M. Akram, a School of Law clinical professor of law and former executive director of Boston’s Political Asylum/Immigration Representation Project
Why are the detainees’ rights so different from those accorded by our constitution and international law?
The Bush administration took the position that laws of war and humanitarian law under the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 did not apply to the armed conflict the United States was engaged in with al-Qaeda in the US invasion of Afghanistan. The Bush policy was that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to “unlawful enemy combatants,” such as al-Qaeda and the Taliban. In Hamdan v. Rumsfeld (2006), the US Supreme Court disagreed, finding that Article 3, common to all the Geneva Conventions, did apply to all individuals in the conflict, providing minimum guarantees of fair and humane treatment. The court found that Article 3 requires fair trials for all detainees, prohibits torture and indefinite detention, and binds both the United States and Afghanistan. This is the overwhelming consensus under international law of the applicability of the Geneva Conventions.
UN and international bodies, including the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, have consistently stated that the four Geneva Conventions apply to the Guantanamo prisoners as well as international human rights treaties. These prohibit torture, cruel and inhuman treatment, and indefinite detention without trial, and require prompt and fair trials for all prisoners before impartial tribunals. The problem is not the law; it is that both the Bush and Obama administrations have failed to apply the substantial body of law that does apply to the Guantanamo prisoners.
Isn’t force-feeding of hunger-striking detainees a clear violation of the Geneva Conventions?
The ICRC has taken the position that force-feeding hunger-striking detainees is a violation of Common Article 3 of the four Geneva Conventions, which, as noted, prohibit cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment. The Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 also prohibits cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment. The UN Human Rights Council previously found that force-feeding used in earlier hunger strikes was torture under the Convention Against Torture, a treaty to which the United States is a party.
In fact, the World Medical Association (WMA) has condemned force-feeding of prisoners who are competent to decide to hunger strike. The WMA has said that “feeding accompanied by threats, coercion, or physical restraint is a form of inhuman and degrading treatment.” Debilitating risks of force-feeding include major infections, pneumonia, collapsed lungs, heart failure, and post-traumatic stress disorder.
More on this @
http://www.bu.edu/today/2013/gitmo-the-legal-mess-behind-the-ethical-mess/
The US is also the only state ever to have used nuclear weapons.
Does anyone have a list of democracies destroyed, overthrown, subverted or otherwise degraded by the US?
One position I’ve considered is that relative freedom and democracy within a country is a trade-off by the Elite which buys longevity for the state. A state can go for all-out totalitarianism, but it’s likely to last a couple of decades at most; there are many examples. The freer a state is internally the longer it’s likely to last, but that doesn’t imply that the said state will pursue an ethical foreign policy.
The irony inherent in this is that we should perhaps welcome the current ongoing degradation of freedom within the US and the UK.
BrianJ; Entertainment is an important part of my ‘schtick’. Without E, it’s a sticky wicket.
Oh. My 9:25 was a fiction, since I couldn’t find anything Batista said; at all. Seriously.
My decision to go to bed early last night was correct. 😉
….Meanwhile in the only democracy in the ME
Zionism in practice – Israel’s Daily Toll on Palestinian Life, Limb, Liberty and Property
24 hours to 8am 11 February 2014
2 air strikes – 4 attacks – 33 raids including home invasions – 1 beaten – 4 injured – 6 acts of agricultural/economic sabotage – 15 taken prisoner – 5 detained – 118 restrictions of movement
Israeli air strikes cause extensive damage in southern Gaza
Night home invasions: Israeli troops open fire and assault residents – 3 injured
Al-Khadr residents under Israeli fire for over an hour
Al-Nabi Saleh villagers under Israeli fire
Israeli Navy hijacks Palestinian fishermen
Israeli war-planes strike refugee camp power generator
Zionist fanatics damage grapevines and 150 olive trees
Zionist militants slash tyres and spray-paint racist graffiti
Armed settler militants invade Palestinian church
Israeli soldiers abduct 17-year-old youth
Occupation destruction order: Jerusalem family given 48 hours to get out of their home
Night peace disruption and/or home invasions in refugee camp and 11 towns and villages
details: http://www.sapienspromise.org/modules/news/article.php?storyid=3054
Amerika is going down
/
down
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down
Obama Killed It
The American Dream is Dead
by MIKE WHITNEY
“The U.S. worked hard to create the American dream of opportunity. But today, that dream is a myth.” Economist Joseph Stiglitz, Financial Times
If you follow the financial news, you already know that the American people are on an epic downer. Just check out some of these headlines I pulled up in a five minute Internet search and you’ll see what I mean:
“Gloom and doom? Americans more pessimistic about future” Las Vegas Review
“U.S. Standard of Living Index Sinks to 10-Month Low; Expectations for future standard of living drops more than current satisfaction” Gallup
“Americans Still Pessimistic About Economy–Almost 70 per cent think the economy is in bad shape” Time Magazine
‘Slipping behind’: Are we becoming a nation of pessimists?” NBC News
Income Inequality in the United States Fuels Pessimism and Threatens Social Cohesion” Center for American Progress.
And here’s my personal favorite:
“NBC/WSJ poll: 60 percent say fire every member of Congress” NBC News
Pessimism, pessimism, and more pessimism. It’s like the whole country is on the brink of despair. Maybe Phil Graham was right, after all. Maybe we are just a nation of whiners. But I kind of doubt it. What’s really going on can be summed up in one word: Frustration. People are frustrated with the government, frustrated with their jobs, frustrated with their shitty, stagnant wages, frustrated with their droopy incomes, frustrated with their ripoff health care, frustrated with living paycheck to paycheck, frustrated with their measly cat-food retirement plan, frustrated with their dissembling, flannel-mouth president, frustrated with the fact that their kids can’t find jobs, and frustrated with the prevaricating US media that keeps palavering about that delusional chimera called the American Dream.
/
/
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/02/07/the-american-dream-is-dead/
Tomgram: Chase Madar, The Folly of Arming Israel
February 9, 2014.
Last year, Secretary of State John Kerry condemned Russia’s pledge to sell advanced antiaircraft weapons to Syria, noting that it would have “a profoundly negative impact on the balance of interests and the stability of the region.” And really, who could argue that pouring more weapons into a heavily-armed corner of the globe, roiled by conflict, convulsed by civil strife and civil war, could do anything but inflame tensions and cost lives?
Yet Kerry’s State Department, in coordination with the Pentagon, has been content to oversee a U.S.-sanctioned flood of arms and military matériel heading into the region at a breakneck pace. In December, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA), which coordinates sales and transfers of military equipment, announced that it had approved the sale of more than 15,000 Raytheon-produced anti-tank missiles to Saudi Arabia under two separate agreements worth a combined $1 billion. Last month, potential deals to sell and lease Apache attack helicopters to the embattled government of Iraq were also made public, in addition to an agreement that would send the country $82 million worth of Hellfire missiles. At about the same time, the DSCA notified Congress of a possible $270 million sale of F-16 fighters to the United Arab Emirates (UAE). All of this was on top of a potential $600 million deal to train 6,000-8,000 Libyan military personnel and a prospective $150 million agreement for Marines to mentor members of the UAE’s Presidential Guard Command, both of which were announced in January. And let’s not forget that, last month, Congress also turned on the spigot to allow automatic weapons and anti-tank rockets to flow to rebel fighters in — wait for it — Syria.
Of course, Muslim nations around the region aren’t alone in receiving U.S. support. The U.S. also plies Israel, the only nuclear power in the Middle East, with copious amounts of aid. Since World War II, the Jewish state has, in fact, been the largest beneficiary of U.S. foreign assistance, almost all of it military, according to the Congressional Research Service. Yet the topic is barely covered in the U.S. Today, TomDispatch regular Chase Madar provides a remedy for that collective silence, taking us on a deep dive into what that aid means in Israel, Palestine, and Washington. In the process, he explains why you’re unlikely ever to hear John Kerry suggest that sending weapons to Israel might have “a profoundly negative impact on the balance of interests and the stability of the region.” Nick Turse
Then follows the main article.
Washington’s Military Aid to Israel
Fake Peace Process, Real War Process
By Chase Madar
http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175804/
February 11, 2014
Munich Olympics, Revisited
Do Only Some Massacres Matter?
by ALISON WEIR
The Washington Post has published a moving article, “Russian Jews remember Israeli athletes murdered at 1972 Munich Olympic Games.” Unfortunately, it gets a few things wrong and provides a one-sided context for the tragedy.
Allow me to correct the report and fill in a few of the missing facts.
Just 23 years before the Olympic incident, Israel had been created through ethnically cleansing much of the indigenous Palestinian population.
This had been accomplished through at least 33 massacres and was maintained in the years following by still more acts of ethnic cleansing and additional massacres. (These included areas from which the Munich kidnappers came).
Five years before the Munich incident, Israel violently conquered even more Palestinian land (illegal under international law), pushing out another 325,000+ Palestinian men, women, and children, and killing at least 13,000 Arabs in all. About 800 Israelis died.
The violence continued, and beginning in 1968 Israeli forces repeatedly savaged 150 or more towns and villages in south Lebanon alone. By the time of the Munich Olympics, Israel held hundreds of prisoners in its notorious prison system.
It is widely known, but rarely stated, that the goal of the Munich hostage-taking was not to kill them; it was to return the athletes to Israel in return for Israel returning its Palestinian prisoners.
Many of these prisoners were also young people, and, if we could have seen them, they might have looked very much like the Israeli athletes, minus the physical health. Israel is not known for its merciful treatment of those it dislikes.
When the Israeli government refused to consider an exchange, the German police, with the Mossad at hand, were pushed into an ill-planned rescue attempt in which some of the hostages (no one knows how many) were killed accidentally by the police, and a German policeman was also killed.
The day after the botched and unnecessary “rescue,” Israel launched heavy air attacks against Lebanon and Syria, killing between 200 and 500 Lebanese, Syrians and Palestinians, mostly civilians.
While Washington Post reporter Kathy Lally gives a great deal of information about the position of Russian Jews, going back over 100 years, it would have been valuable for her to tell a little about what the Munich incident was about – and about all the tragic victims of violence connected to the event, not just the 11 preferred ones.
Alison Weir is the executive director of If Americans Knew, president of the Council for the National Interest, and author of the upcoming history of US-Israel relations, Against Our Better Judgment, to be released next month.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/02/11/do-only-some-massacres-matter/
Mary, 12 Feb, 2014 – 7:51 am
The American economy is much worse than those headlines. One day there will be a run on the banks from the those people that have black bank accounts. It will cripple a once proud nation and bring down all the others that believed the dollar was strong. That includes China who bought lots of US government bonds. They are going to have to write it off as bad debt, but at least China has investment in other countries that are deserving of an economic uplift. China will just have to suck it and see. Times will be hard. Remember who caused it. Those who make false predictions about economic growth, like the IMF. Nobody buys US government bonds any more. So who will pay off the massive debts. You put your faith in a false god and what you get is USAtan.
“Sévres was never ratified by the Turks – thanks, Kemal – Lausanne was – thanks again, Kemal”
Christ. Nitpicking hits a new low. That’s all you’ve got, eh?
And thanks, Kemal, for winning the War of Independence against overwhelming odds, and retaining Turkish sovereignty, but Inönü led the delegation at Lausanne. Which confirmed, if nothing else, that Turkish law would continue to be law in Turkey.
None of which alters my conclusion that ESLO is talking bollocks -see tedious to-and-fro above – or that you have been hitting the Buckfast.