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"Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Re: Suicide Bombers
Re: Sharon's best weapon
Re: Fisk at it again/ Passions Inflamed, Gaza Teenagers Die
Re: Suicide Bombers
ten days ago, but not outdated
Re: [syndicate] Re: Suicide Bombers
Re: Suicide Bombers
Suicide Bombers, UN policy and The Big Brother
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 16:32:29 -0400
Subject: Re: Suicide Bombers
It is very tricky to defend Milosevic's action in Kosovo, while trying
to expose Sharon's action in West Bank. Because, Sharon also
claims that he is just after the armed and 'uniformed' members of
well defined and named terrorist/paramilitary Palestinian formations
- Albanian paramilitaries (KLA) that Milosevic was after even have
the same letter "L" in the middle of their name just like PLO does,
hinting that they had the same objective: LIBERATION.
"The government force was appropriate to the nature of target,
terrain and the objective." - we hear that all the time from
aggressors around the world, don't we? It doesn't matter whether
their name is Milosevic or Sharon. And Milosevic, indeed, did not
use F16s and Apaches in Kosovo - but not out of his humane
restraint: he didn't use them because he didn't have them. He had
Drenica levelled to the ground just as Sharon had done it to
Ramallah, killing one terrorist in fifty dead civilians or so.
True, Albanians did not blow up themselves in Belgrade on
Orthodox Easter - now, in retrospect, maybe that would get some
attention of Belgrade intelligentsia to their decade-long suffering
under the martial-law - but that is because their local struggle
worked well. KLA was much better matched to the Yugoslav Army
than PLO is to the Israeli Army. KLA did not have to fight against
the latest military technology available to the Israeli Army, which
made their fight more fair - they did never have to resort to the most
desperate of weapons, the suicide bomber.
That's where US responsibility comes in: because it is the US that
armed the Israelis with this hi-tech weapons. It is also worth to
note that ALL US administrations insisted legally that Israelis can
use that weapons only in the defense from an external attack, as
former President Carter already publicly pointed out. The use of
those weapons against Palestinian refugee camps is a clear
violation of the US law that allowed Israelis to purchase those
weapons in the first place. I am appalled tha this breach of contract
issue did not already prompt US Congress to call for sanctions
against Israel, at least an arms embargo would be in order...
ivo
date sent: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 13:47:41 -0400
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from: Miroslav Visic <visic@PIPELINE.COM>
organization: New World Disorder
subject: Re: Suicide Bombers
to: JUSTWATCH-L@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU
The difference between (suspected) war criminal Milosevic and (suspected) war
criminal Sharon is that Milosevic sent military and police to chase well defined
terrorist paramilitary organization (KLA) whose members were armed and who wore
the uniforms. The Albanian terrorists were in rural, scarcely populated or
unpopulated areas. The government force was appropriate to the nature of target,
terrain and the objective. It doesn't matter, if they attacked pizza parlor or
not, the point is what appropriate response was.
Sharon sent heavy armor, tanks and artillery, Apache helicopters and F-16
fighter jets to attack civilian population with understanding that 1 out of 50
or 200 people might be terrorist. I am surprised that some people, including
Steve, support it. When did you see any civilized country do the same? When "Red
Brigades" operated in Italy, Italians didn't send tanks and helicopters, they
used their elite anti-terrorist police.
But I am really concerned with the following kind of thinking:
MV: "Are they (terrorists) targeting us because they are envious of our life
style? Suicide bombers - why do they hate life?"
Steve: "Well, Miroslav, I really don't know, nor quite frankly do I care."
I think Steve, like most apologists of Israel's occupation, fail to recognize
the fact that as a result of ethnic cleansing, the sizable amount of land was
stolen from Palestinians. The policy of our government is to support the country
that stole that land, the country that runs apartheid style society. At the same
time, our governments are denying Palestinians UN recognized universal right to
self defense.
As a result of such policy, myself and other people of dignity and decency, are
also potential targets because of stand of our government. I don't want to be
target just because Bush and some powerful lobbies support Israel. Israel does
nothing for me, except, as right now, making me a more likely target of people
who, in their desperate search for freedom, resort to all means they may have at
their disposal.
However, the latest crisis opened a crucial question - more and more people are
asking is it in our best interest to support Israel? Do we really have strategic
interest in it? Do we buy oil from Israel? When did we last time use their soil
to enhance our interests in the Middle east? Why they spy on us if we are
friends? Or this importance altogether a bogus concept, as a result of lobbying
of our corrupt politicians?
I think 9/11 and the position that all world (except couple of Australian
tabloids) are taken, should teach us a lesson. As for Israelis, if they want
peace, they know what they need to do: return the land that's not theirs.
Steve Albert wrote:
> I particularly like these lines from MIroslav's post :
>
> Who sends tanks and F-16s to "fight
> terrorism" in urban areas densely populated by civilians?
>
> I wonder whether I should repost some of Mirolslav's remarks about how
> Serbian troops were fighting Kosovar terrorism.
>
> Maybe my memory is failing me but I don't seem to remember Kosovars blowing
> themselves up in pizza parlors in Belgrade, or during celebrations of the
> Orthodox Easter.
>
> How should we regard the activity of the suicide bombers?
>
> Miroslav answers this question by asking another question:
>
> Are they(terrorists) targeting us because they are envious of our life
> style? Suicide bombers - why do they hate life?
>
> Well, Miroslav, I realy don't know, nor quite frankly do I care.
>
> For two reasons:
>
> 1)Making the targeting of civilians one's principal (not to say only)
> method of warfare is wrong. Period. Sept 11 has shown us where the logic of
> this kind of actions will lead.
>
> 2) The first reason should suffice.
>
> However, leaving aside all consideration of morality,this tactic is sure
> fire way to guarentee that the Palestinians never have a homeland.
>
> Before this Intifada began, Israel had a government that favored leaving the
> occupied territories. Poll after poll showed that a majority of Israelis
> favored ending the settlements, if that was the price of peace.
>
> Even if this were not the case, Israel would eventually have had to do so.In
> our modern era, no nation can occupy the territory and control the lives of
> another people against their will for ever.
>
> That being said,the suicide bombings don't take place in the occupied
> territories.They take place in Israel proper.
>
> No matter how many times one hears that the goal of the Paletinians is to
> see resolution 242 enforced, who would believe them ? What guarantee is
> there that if Israel withdrew from all of the land it conquered in 1967 this
> stuff would stop? What would keep terrorists from using a newly free
> Palestine as a platform for further attacks? Without the assurance that
> withdrawal will bring peace,what incentive does Israel have to pull out of
> the territories?
>
> Secondly,as even the members of this list would have to admit,only the US
> can broker a settlement between the Israel and the Palestinians. Who can
> anyone believe that the US will really have any interest in doing so as
> long as the Palestinians don't clearly renounce the favored tactic of Osama
> Bin Laden?
>
> Given all that, I do not think that anybody does the Palestinians a good
> service by trying to "understand suicide bombers" In fact, it might even be
> a greater act of friendship for the allies of the Palestinians in Europe and
> elsewhere to try to explain to them that this kind of action makes it almost
> inevitable that they will never will be able to acheive their legitimate
> aspirations.
>
> One last thing about this:Here is a standard line one hears after a suicide
> bombing,whether it be from Saudi diplomats, or idiots like Robert Fisk:
>
> Look how desperate a 16 year old must be to blow themselves up in this way.
>
> Really.
>
> What about the Colombine killers? What about the child warrriors in Sierre
> Leone. What about Tamil Tiger suicide bombers?
>
> Why don't we have a little 'understanding' for their causes as well?
>
> Young people can do some pretty horrid things,and some of them don't even
> need to live under occupation to do so (witness yesterday's massacre in a
> school yard in Germany).
>
> In this particular case ,however,(and in the case of Sierre Leone and the
> actions of Tamil Tigers who,I believe invented this horrid tactic), the
> young people didn't carry out their action on their own. Somebody built the
> bomb.Somebody planned the action. And the adults who did so should know
> better than to believe that these actions will lead to anybody's liberation.
>
> The same should also be true for all those who tell us that these bombing
> help us understand how oppressed the Palestinians are. This is a hell of a
> price to pay for a sociology lesson,especially one that does nothing to
> bring the Palestinains closer to freedom.
>
> Steve
--
__________________________________________________________________________
"Of course I lie to people. But I lie altruistically -- for our mutual good."
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 16:29:36 -0400
Subject: Re: Sharon's best weapon
I know this sounds odd from an anti-globalist - but I believe that
Sharon's actions can harm the global stability. He is playing the
same fear game that Milosevic and his copy-cat Balkan strongmen
played. The Ustasha will come and slaughter you like they did in
the WW II. The more Serbs in Bosnia and Croatia feared the
separation from Yugoslavia, the stronger Milosevic's power was.
However, Milosevic is now in The Hague. All Western democracies
stood together and called his bluff. This is not a case with Sharon.
Because the Americans simply don't want to give him up,
regardless of how disgusting his actions are. Consequently,
Sharon's policies drove a wedge, a dangerous wedge, in the US -
Western Europe relationship. Something that Milosevic tried to do
for a couple of years but without much success.
And there is a global backlash against Jews, provoked by Sharon's
cunning malice. He, indeed, equalizes his political platform for
Israel with protecting the entire Jewish cause worldwide. More and
more this creates critique not only of Israel but also of Jews in
general. And in turn rises fears of anti-semitsm around Jewish
population outside Israel - the fears that Sharon can well exploit,
just as Milosevic did. "Everybody is against us" mentality serves
military dictator personalities like Sharon well.
But, there is a connection between driving Jewish tanks over Arab
teenagers and neo-nazi political victories in European
democracies. I wonder whether Sharon completely understands to
what kind of dangers he is opening his own state and people that
he wowed to protect.
ivo
date sent: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 19:23:41 -0400
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from: Daniel Tomasevich <danilo@MARTNET.COM>
subject: Sharon's best weapon
to: JUSTWATCH-L@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU
Fear is a powerful tool that A Sharon knows how to use well.
For Ariel Sharon, it is the fear of anti-semitism, both real and
imagined, that is the weapon. Mr Sharon likes to say that he stands up
to terrorists to show he is not afraid. In fact, his policies are
driven by fear. His great talent is that he fully understands the
depths of Jewish fear of another Holocaust. He knows how to draw
parallels between Jewish anxieties about anti-semitism and American
fears of terrorism, and he is an expert at harnessing all of it for
his political ends.
Daniel
(article not for cross posting)
-------------------------------------------------------------
The Guardian Thursday April 25, 2002
Comment
Sharon's best weapon
Anti-semitism sustains Israel's brutal leader - the fight against it
must be reclaimed
Naomi Klein
Something new happened in Washington DC last weekend. A demonstration
<...>
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<http://amsterdam.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-0204/msg00218.html>
for full article --nettime mod (tb)]
www.nologo.org
_________________________________________________________________
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 16:31:08 -0400
Subject: Re: Fisk at it again/ Passions Inflamed, Gaza Teenagers Die
in Suicidal AttacksBy DAVID ROHDE
I don't think that it is important in this particular case whether the
teenagers were also armed with the explosives, or were they 'only'
armed with knives or axes or whatever. The explosives are easy to
buy in the war areas, like Palestine. So, it is far more probable that
they obtained some makeshift bombs, than that David Rohde lied
about that in his article. And Hamas statement is probably more
concerned with the unsuccesfulness of their suicide in terms of not
taking any Israelis to death with them, than with the fact that the
idealization of a 'suicide bomber' as a role model now produced
some unintended effects.
What is important, I think, is that the situation for dispossesed and
impoverished Palestinian population in Israel is so desperately
dead-ended, that the only tool/weapon at the disposal of various
Palestinian armed factions to fight Israelis seems to be the
dreaded 'suicide bomber'. What is important, I think, is that
Palestinian society grows more and more fascinated with the
demented concept of suicide bombings, and that both the
Palestinian militants, and Israeli war-mongering government are
feeding of the fear that the 'suicide bomber' evokes in the Israeli
population. What is important, I think, is the brutality, cruelty and
impunity with which Israelis are threating Palestinian population -
the tank-mangled teenage bodies just being the top of that iceberg.
ivo
date sent: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 06:14:36 -0500
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from: Steve Albert <stevealbert@VIDEOTRON.CA>
subject: Fisk at it again/ Passions Inflamed,
Gaza Teenagers Die in Suicidal AttacksBy DAVID ROHDE
to: JUSTWATCH-L@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU
In an article posted on Jw yesterday,Robert Fisk wrote :
Knife-wielding suicide bombers approaching the Jewish settlement, according
to the Israeli army and, of course, The New York Times. But even Hamas,
creator of the vicious Palestinian campaign of suicide bombing, admits that
the three schoolchildren - all ninth-graders in the Salahadin School in Gaza
City - had naively planned to attack the settlement of their own accord and
with, at most, knives. It urged preachers and schoolteachers to tell
children that they should never embark on such wild schemes again.
Don't you love this objective reporting.
First there is that lovely phrase 'of course The News York Times' that
implies that the Times just takes the word of the IDF about what went on in
Jenin.
Just look at the kind of reporters they sent there. Why they even sent
David Rohde,the man who won the Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on
Srebrenica.
The story Fisk is reffering to here was written by David Rohde.
I kind of doubt that he would take the Israeli Army's version of a story on
faith.
OF course Fisk can't trust the likes of Rohde,whom he knows must be working
for the IDF, but when Hamas assures him that their version of a story is
accurate it must be God,s truth.After all, these people, 'the creators of
the vicious Palestinian campaign of suicide bombing', would never tell a
lie.
This is what Rohde wrote about Hamas's decision to stop the incitement of
this kind of suicide attack after this incident:
Palestinian parents called for an investigation into whether radical groups
had recruited the boys for a foolhardy mission and asked local religious
leaders and the radical Palestinian groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad to issue
statements urging children not to take part in suicidal attacks.
Both groups issued statements tonight denying responsibility for the boys'
attack and saying that children should not carry out such raids. They said
they would begin a campaign in local mosques urging children not to engage
in attacks like the one in which the three boys were killed.
I guess this decison by Hamas and Islamic JIhad is all to the good. However,
given the sequence of events as reported by David Rohde ,it is possible that
Hamas might have a reason other than concern for the lives of young people
for asking them not to carry out acts like this ON Their Own,in the future.
David Rohde,s account of this incident follows.
Steve
New York Tomes
April 25, 2002
GAZA STRIP
Passions Inflamed, Gaza Teenagers Die in Suicidal Attacks
By DAVID ROHDE
Ruth Fremson/The New York Times
Elham Zaqout is helped up by friends and relatives at her home in Gaza City,
as she grieves for her son Yusef Zaqout, 14, who was shot and killed Tuesday
night while trying to enter the Israeli Netsarim settlement in the Gaza
Strip. Armed with axes and home-made grenades he was with two other boys who
planned to attack the settlement.
The Prime Minister: Sharon Suggests Arafat Could Go to the Gaza Strip (April
25, 2002)
The Aftermath: Israel Eases Opposition to Inquiry Into Jenin Attack (April
25, 2002)
Passions Inflamed, Gaza Teenagers Die in Suicidal Attacks
By DAVID ROHDE
GAZA CITY, Gaza, April 24 ‹ The boy asked his family to pay the corner
grocer the 25 cents he owed him, give two of his favorite cassette tapes to
his friends Sami and Maher and return the two books he borrowed from his
teacher, Mr. Sabri. He then described how he would like to be buried.
"I want my grave to be like the grave of Muhammad, not so big," the boy,
Yusef Zaqout, 14, wrote, adding how he would like to be mourned: "Don't cry
for me. Bury me with my brothers the martyrs. And visit my grave if you have
time."
Not long after that, he set out on Tuesday night with two friends, each 15,
on a futile mission to attack the heavily fortified Israeli settlement near
here. Armed with knives and homemade bombs that can easily be purchased on
the street here, the three were shot dead by Israeli soldiers 15 yards from
the settlement's exterior wall.
The age of the three boys and their backgrounds ‹ all said by Yusef's
relatives to be excellent students from middle-class families ‹ shocked even
Palestinians here who have witnessed rising levels of violence in the
current conflict and have seen it draw in younger and younger victims and
participants.
Palestinians said the attack on Tuesday night was the second in a week by
boys 15 or younger, marking a pitiless new dynamic in 18 months of
retaliation and retribution between Israelis and Palestinians. Adults may be
secretly recruiting boys to carry out the attacks, some speculated. Or
teenagers may be mounting the raids themselves, after being reared in an
impoverished and isolated world where suicide attackers are praised as
"martyrs."
"It seems that he and his friends arranged the whole thing," Basim Zaqout,
Yusef's father, said as he sat looking stunned at his son's wake tonight.
"God help us if someone is behind this."
Palestinian parents called for an investigation into whether radical groups
had recruited the boys for a foolhardy mission and asked local religious
leaders and the radical Palestinian groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad to issue
statements urging children not to take part in suicidal attacks.
Both groups issued statements tonight denying responsibility for the boys'
attack and saying that children should not carry out such raids. They said
they would begin a campaign in local mosques urging children not to engage
in attacks like the one in which the three boys were killed.
Most Palestinians, including Mr. Zaqout, blamed the long Israeli occupation,
the recent Israeli incursion into the West Bank and the crushing poverty
here for driving young Palestinians to increasingly desperate acts.
But others suggested that a more fervent brand of nationalism and Islamic
militancy was making this intifada, or uprising, far deadlier to younger
Palestinians than the first one in the late 1980's.
Suicide attacks are incessantly hailed on posters, in mosques and at rallies
in the occupied territories. These days, unlike in the past, satellite
television images here routinely barrages frustrated Palestinians with
accounts of Israeli attacks and unconfirmed allegations of Israeli massacres
against Palestinian civilians.
Israeli officials have said their recent offensive in the West Bank was
intended to destroy an "infrastructure of terror" that included recruiters
and bomb factories. But something far more difficult to eradicate ‹ a
culture of martyrdom ‹ is thriving here. Palestinians parents expressed
bewilderment tonight at the number of young boys saying they were eager to
become martyrs in recent weeks.
Muhammad Bakar, 16, one of scores teenagers who attended the wake for Yusef
tonight, gave a candid assessment of the 14-year-old's death. "It's a heroic
act," he said. "Everybody wants to do it."
Thousands of people, most of them teenagers, clogged this decrepit city's
streets this afternoon during the funeral for the three ninth graders who
died in the attack Tuesday night on the Israeli settlement at Netzarim.
The two other youths ‹ whom residents identified as Anwar Hamdonah and
Ismael Abu Naji, both 15 ‹ were buried next to Yusef, as he requested, in
the "martyrs' cemetery."
Relatives of Yusef said he was friends with Haitham Abu Shokah, also 14, who
tried to carry out his own attack last Thursday on the Israeli settlement at
Dugit.
Armed with a knife and makeshift explosives, he too was shot dead before he
could even reach the settlement.
The three boys who carried out the Tuesday night attack went to the same
school, and all the boys, including Haitham, were said to be excellent
students.
As Yusef's mother lay in the living room tonight, the family showed off the
boy's report cards, with scores of 90 and 99 out of 100, and certificates
from his karate class.
Yusef shared a carpeted bedroom with his 16-year-old brother, Ahmad, who sat
alone and silent at the wake tonight, slowly twisting a ring on his left
hand. The teenagers shared a computer, a rare luxury, and a satellite
television was the centerpiece of their family's ornately furnished living
room. Yusef's father works for the Palestinian Authority's Ministry of
Social Affairs and earns $400 a month, a large sum in Gaza, where half of
the people live below a poverty line measured by far less.
Mr. Zaqout said his son was deeply religious, spending hours in a local
mosque and praying five times a day, as is custom among the devout. He
disabled the satellite television so it could not play music, something
considered blasphemous to fundamentalists.
Before a group of reporters was allowed to enter his room, family members
were seen taking down a poster listing the "great martyrs" of Hamas. In his
letter, the boy asked Hamas to pay for his funeral.
Abed Abu Askar, the boy's uncle, said he did not believe that the three boys
could have attempted the attack by themselves. But, he said, Hamas
representatives had told him that they had nothing to do with the boys'
attempt to attack the Israeli settlement.
The poster in the boy's room is commonly available in markets in Gaza City,
where Hamas enjoys genuine popularity. The uncle said signs and murals
hailing Hamas and promising an eternal paradise for "martyrs" were
everywhere in the refugee settlement and its mosques.
His nephew, he said, had once told him that he felt he had no future.
"If you promised me 72 virgins," the uncle said, referring to the number
fundamentalists say await martyrs in paradise, "I'd do it too."
He and other parents also criticized the attack by Israeli soldiers on the
Palestinians refugee camp in Jenin ‹ and the coverage of it on satellite
television ‹ for heightening tensions in Gaza, which has been largely
exempted from the latest Israeli offensive.
Since last fall, the United States and other Western governments have
appealed to Al Jazeera, a popular television network based in Qatar, and
other Arabic language satellite networks to show more balanced coverage of
the conflicts in Afghanistan and the Middle East.
An even younger boy, 13, came close to taking part in the attack last
Thursday. Um Ahmad Tafish, the the boy's mother, said her son was the last
to see Haitham before he set out on his own to attack the Dugit settlement.
She blamed the Israeli offensive in Jenin, which leveled wide tracks of the
refugee camp there, for inflaming passions.
She said that her son had told her no adults were involved in Haitham's
attack and that the older boy had announced to her son that he wanted to
become a martyr.
Her son, she said, decided not to join him.
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2002 20:48:35 -0400
Subject: Re: Suicide Bombers
Hmmm, I think Milosevic did not use MIG 29s and T 72s in Kosovo
because of the fear he might lose them, and then remain
defenseless. Sharon has no such fears. Palestinians are far more
isolated, exhausted and underarmed than Albanians in Kosovo
were. And Sharon not only has 3 times more tanks and 15 times
more aircraft than Milosevic at his disposal, but can always count
on the endless re-supply from the U.S. - something that Milosevic
couldn't count on.
ivo
date sent: Sun, 28 Apr 2002 20:21:12 -0400
from: Miroslav Visic <visic@pipeline.com>
organization: New World Disorder
to: drakula <drakula@nyc.rr.com>
copies to: ivo@reporters.net
subject: Re: Suicide Bombers
Good point. I agree.
To Ivo: Milosevic did have MiG 29s and 21s, and T55s to 72s but
they were inappropriate for the nature of target. He didn't go after
"infrastructure" (villages, hospitals, etc). I am trying to say that
Sharon is worse in that sense. Ivo reminded me that people believe
what they want to believe not necessarily what the facts were
telling them.
drakula wrote:
> E-hem, pardon me if I am wrong, gentlemen, but there seems to be another
very important differenc e which Ivo is forgetting. While the Israelis are
raiding the Palestinians who are fighting for the ir own land (they were
pushed away from their turf by the Israelis in 1948, weren't they?), the YU
army was fighting the confirmed terrorists (KLA), who had pushed away the
Serbs from their own land , and who were simply wiping out the rest of the
remaining Serb population in Kosovo. Of course, it is not as simple as
that, but worth taking into consideration...
>
> (And just for the record, I do not believe in violent actions, and I do
not symphatize with eithe r one of the "(suspected) war criminals", nor do
I approve of their actions.)
>
> Do what You will shall be the whole of the Law.
> Love is all. Love is the Law.
> May the Force be with you.
>
> @~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~
> Drak
> http://home.nyc.rr.com/drakula/
> @~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~@~
--
__________________________________________________________________________
"Of course I lie to people. But I lie altruistically -- for our mutual good."
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2002 20:47:48 -0400
Subject: ten days ago, but not outdated
I remember watching TV news when I was a little kid. There were
<...>
[see
<http://amsterdam.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-0204/msg00173.html>
for the rest --nettime mod (tb)]
Ivo
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2002 20:48:50 -0400
Subject: Re: [syndicate] Re: Suicide Bombers
But Sharon also claims that he conducts legitimate operations to
protect Israel, and Albanians in Kosovo also claimed that Milosevic
is commanding an occupying force?! Is it all in our perception? Can
Jews be occupiers on the land they left 2000 years ago? Can not
Serbs be occupiers on the land they never really left, just because
they became a minority? I think this is irrelevant from the
humanitarian law aspect. It is WHAT they do, and HOW they do it,
not WHY they do it, that matters. Of course, what must enrage
you is the fantastically opposite stance that the U.S. government is
taking (pro-KLA, anti-Milosevic, yet pro-Sharon and anti-KLA)...I
mean they were ready to go in bed with Osama himself just to
topple Milosevic, and here they behave as Sharon's poodles.
ivo
from: "Andrej Tisma" <aart@EUnet.yu>
to: <ivo@reporters.net>, "Miroslav Visic" <visic@PIPELINE.COM>
subject: Re: [syndicate] Re: Suicide Bombers
date sent: Mon, 29 Apr 2002 02:23:42 +0200
organization: Happiness
There are some more differences between Milosevic and Sharon:
1. Milosevic, as opposed to Sharon, was conducting legitimate anti-terrorist
operations ON THE SOVEREIGN AND CONSTITUENT TERRITORY OF JUGOSLAVIA
(Kosovo). Sharon, on the other hand, has been carrying out his bloody deeds
ON OCCUPIED LANDS.
2. True, Albanian civilians were occasionally 'caught in the crossfire'
during these anti-terrorist operations. However, Milosevic's anti-terrorist
operations could hardly be said to have been aimed at THE COMPLETE
DESTRUCTION OF THE KOSOVAR ALBANIAN CIVILIANS AND INFRASTRUCTURE. Sharon's
bloody operations, on the other hand, are self-evidently DESIGNED TO
COMPLETELY DESTROY THE CIVILIAN INFRASTRUCTURE OF THE PALESTINIANS MAKING
THE ALREADY MARGINAL EXISTENCE OF THE PALESTINIANS IMPOSSIBLE.
3. When Milosevic made an agreement with the Holbrooke to withdraw
Jugoslavian National Army and Serbian anti-terrorist forces from Kosovo, he
held to that agreement and with dispatch withdrew those forces. Sharon, on
the other hand, HAS HEMMED, HAWED, DAWDLED AND DELAYED AT EVERY JUNCTURE.
In spite of the Shrub's 'insistence' that Sharon withdraw his forces from
the West Bank every such 'withdrawal' hailed by the mainline media is
nothing more than a strategic pullback to just outside the Palestinian towns
and cities accompanied by numerous and repeated 'sweeps' through yet more
Palestinian towns and cities.
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2002 20:48:20 -0400
Subject: Re: Suicide Bombers
I did suppose this would be coming from somebody. It is true that
historically KLA and PLO do have a different background, but in
their respective fighting situations, they were pretty much in the
same boat.
Serbs were once the masters of Kosovo, just as Jews were
controlling Israel/Palestine. That was history. Than Albanians
moved in Kosovo, and Arabs moved in Israel. In 1948 Israel was
"given" back to Israeli Jews and they started pushing Arabs away.
Serbs were also trying to push/contain Albanians in Kosovo.
The difference of course exists: Serbs never really left Kosovo and
than returned after a couple of thousands years as occupiers. But
everything else is eerily similar, isn't it?
ivo
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From: "Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>
Date: Thu, 2 May 2002 15:53:50 -0400
Subject: Suicide Bombers, UN policy and The Big Brother
So, Kosovo is a part of Serbia 'de iure' - while West Bank is not a
part of Israel in the same manner; yet, 'de facto' Serbia does not
excersise any control over Kosovo, while Israel does excersise a
little too much control over West Bank. What this tells us is that
UN resolutions are not worth the paper they were printed on. The
world is not ruled by justice, but by power. This is nothing new,
though.
This article brilliantly describes how it is done:
The U.S. Hit List at the United Nations
------------------------------------------------------------------------
by Ian Williams
April 30, 2002
Quietly, and without the fanfare that accompanies the campaign in
the mountains of Afghanistan, the administration has begun a long
march through multilateral institutions. At the UN and elsewhere,
the U.S. has mounted a campaign to purge international civil
servants judged to be out of step with Washington in the war on
terrorism and its insistence that the U.S. have the last word in all
global governance issues.
The first and most prominent to go was Mary Robinson, the former
Irish president whose work as UN High Commissioner for Human
Rights has been acclaimed by human rights groups across the
world. Officially, she retired after a one-year renewal of her
contract. In fact, the U.S. ferociously lobbied against here
reappointment. UN officials and Western diplomats
also said she was "difficult to work with"-the usual euphemism for
not taking dictation. Most human rights activists see this as
precisely her strength in an organization where not rocking the boat
seems to be genetically engineered into many officials. The U.S.
could not forgive her for her stands on the Middle East issues or for
her endorsement last year of the results of the UN's Durban
Conference on Racism, which both the U.S. and Israel walked out
of. The rest of the world stayed and adopted a toned-down
document, and subsequently Washington began its campaign to
force Robinson out.
Another recent victim of the U.S. campaign was Robert Watson, the
much-respected chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change.
On April 19, the U.S. administration succeeded in replacing him
with Rajendra Pachauri, an Indian economist. The panel is (or
perhaps was is the correct tense) an independent scientific body
established to assess the degree of climate change and the
contribution made by human activities such as burning fossil fuels.
The panel's work had come to a consensus, not shared by the
Bush administration, that human activity is a factor in climate
change. A leaked memo from ExxonMobil had previously asked
the White House, "Can Watson be replaced now at the request of
the U.S.?" The memo goes on to recommend that the
administration "restructure the U.S. attendance at upcoming IPCC
meetings to assure none of the Clinton/Gore proponents are
involved in any decisional activities." Apparently, the administration
heeded ExxonMobil's recommendation. Pachauri himself attributes
his selection to being the developing world candidate, but
environmental NGOs ascribe it to U.S. lobbying.
A few days later, on April 22, the U.S. right achieved a new level of
success with the deposition of Jose Mauricio Bustani, the head of
the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW),
a mere year after he had been unanimously elected for a second
five-year term. The voting was 48 votes to 7 with 43 abstentions.
The OPCW was created by the Chemical Weapons Convention,
which outlaws the production of chemical weapons. It arranges
regular inspections of member countries' facilities to ensure that no
one is cheating. Bustani, a Brazilian, has headed it from
its creation five years ago, and his inspectors have overseen the
destruction of two million chemical weapons and two-thirds of the
world's chemical weapon facilities in the past several years. They
have carried out 1,100 inspections in more than 50 nations.
>From the beginning of 2002, however, the U.S. has treated Bustani
almost as if he were some form of bureaucratic Bin Laden. Bush
administration officials accused him of "ongoing financial
mismanagement, demoralization of the Technical Secretariat staff,
and ill-considered initiatives." Only last year he had been reelected
unanimously, with plaudits from all, including Colin Powell.
Moreover, his staff pointed out that the organization's
finances and management were controlled not by Bustani but by a
U.S. government appointee.
So what had changed? Not Bustani, but Washington. His main
persecutor was John Bolton, Under Secretary of State for Arms
Control and International Security. Bolton earned his right-wing
credentials when he served as the house UN-basher for the
Heritage Foundation. But his anti-UN convictions have never
stopped him taking money from the organization himself. Most
recently he served as assistant to James Baker on the failed
Western Sahara mission. For years, Bolton had argued that the
U.S. should get out of the United Nations. At the same time,
however, Bolton served as a consultant to Taiwan advising the
government how it could get into the UN, according to The Nation.
Although Bolton may have flexible principles, like many of Bush's
hard right entourage he has a rigid line in grudges and he soon
developed a major one against Bustani.
Having Bolton in charge of disarmament is like letting a pyromaniac
have the run of a fireworks factory--as his recent hardnose attitude
to nuclear limitation talks with Russia, and staunch advocacy of
the "Star Wars," Strategic Defense Initiative suggests. Bustani first
started running into problems when he resisted American efforts to
dictate the nationality of the OPCW inspectors assigned to
investigate American facilities. What's more, he had opposed a
U.S. law allowing the president to block unannounced inspections
in the United States and banning OPCW inspectors from removing
samples of its chemicals. Diplomats suggest that Bustani's
biggest "crime" was trying to persuade Iraq to sign the convention,
which could mean that OPCW inspectors would inspect Iraqi
facilities. The hawks in the administration resented these "ill-
considered initiatives." If Iraq would sign the convention and allow
UN inspectors, it would deprive Washington of a quasi-legal
justification for military action against Baghdad.
Earlier this year the U.S. asked Brazil to recall him, but the
Brazilian government pointed out that Bustani was not a Brazilian
appointee but rather was elected unanimously by the entire
OPCW. Then Bolton, personally, asked Bustani to resign. After he
refused, the U.S. then attempted to have the OPCW Executive
Council sack him. Failing that, Washington called for a special
session of member states to fire him, threatening that the U.S.
would not pay its dues if he were reappointed. Faced with losing an
effective and popular disarmament agency, a majority of states
succumbed to this blackmail. This acquiescence to Washington
was is in stark contrast to the willingness of so many countries to
defy the U.S. by ratifying the Rome Treaty establishing the
International Criminal Court only two weeks before.
In the end, it seems most members of the OPCW, with varying
degrees of pragmatism and reluctance, decided that the survival of
one of the most successful disarmament organizations was more
important than the fate of its director. However, they set an
ominous example--and possibly gave the hawks in Washington a
strong scent of blood to follow. As Bustani presciently told the
kangaroo court, "By dismissing me . an international precedent will
have been established whereby any duly elected head of any
international organization would at any point during his or her
tenure remain vulnerable to the whims of one or a few major
contributors. They would be in a position to remove any Director-
General, or Secretary-General, from office at any point in time."
To Play, U.S. Must Get Its Way The right wing has long had a
reflex hostility to international and multilateral organizations. But
during the Reagan administration, which was the first time that the
right wing exercised such control over U.S. policy, there was the
fear that the U.S. could not pull out of the UN and leave it in the
hands of its cold war enemy. Today, however, the U.S. has no
counterweight at the UN, and the Bush administration officials are
unabashedly insisting on exercising the influence that comes from
being the world's only superpower. Playing upon its indispensability
in this unipolar world, the Bush team is playing hard ball at the UN-
in effect, threatening to render the multilateral organization
impotent unless it gets its way.
It bodes ill for global affairs the way the administration has
managed to achieve these recent coups with little or no public
awareness, let alone discussion. In the case of Mary Robinson, the
U.S. did fear that any open campaign to unseat her would upset
Irish American voters. Instead of tapping its public diplomacy, the
administration used stealth tactics against Robinson. Human rights
organizations complained, but this administration has successfully
sidelined these organizations from foreign policy decisionmaking
and now routinely dismisses the concerns of these organizations.
Who is the next target? It may be Hans Blix, who heads
UNMOVIC, which is the UN organization established at the end of
the Persian Gulf War to inspect Iraqi arms facilities. It's been
reported that Paul Wolfowitz, Under Secretary of Defense, ordered
a CIA investigation of Blix. One reason that the administration is
concerned is that under the framework supported by Powell, if
Blix's team goes into Iraq and gives the regime a clean bill of
health, then the sanctions regime against Iraq will be largely
terminated. For Wolfowitz and other hardliners, this eventuality
would remove another main causus belli against Baghdad.
Deposing the highly respected Blix, who formerly headed the
International Atomic Energy Authority, would facilitate the
administration's case for launching a war on Baghdad.
It's also likely that included on the administration's hit list are the
individuals on the proposed fact-finding mission to Jenin that have
found disfavor with the Sharon government. One was Mary
Robinson, who has already been ousted. The others were Terje
Roed Larsen, one of the main agents in establishing the Oslo
channel that led to what was once the peace process, and
currently the UN's special coordinator for the peace process.
Although half-heartedly defended by Shimon Peres, it will be
difficult to keep him in position when he has "lost the trust" of
Sharon, and presumably his allies in the U.S. administration. The
third person the Israelis regarded as biased is Peter Hansen, the
recently reappointed Commissioner General of UNRWA, the U.S.-
funded agency that helps Palestinian refugees. Hansen was
appointed by the Secretary General Kofi Annan, who angrily sprang
to the defense of all three individuals criticized by Israel. But Annan
may find it hard to stand behind monitors criticized by the U.S. and
Israel, especially if the U.S. would threaten to cut off its funding of
UNRWA, which would likely result in starvation in the Palestinian
refugee camps.
Kofi Annan, himself, may also be targeted soon. Even though he
has only just started his second term, and even though he is
immensely popular, Kofi Annan has recently become stronger in
his public exasperation with Sharon's behavior. Given the recent
pattern of arrogant American diplomacy, one cannot help but
suspect that, but for Colin Powell and Shimon Peres--who have a
strong rapport with the secretary-general--the anti-Iraq and pro-
Sharon hardliners in the Bush administration will soon begin a
campaign to invite Annan to retire. It's likely that they will first
suggest that he could retire with honor and that this decision would
be for his own good. If that strategy doesn't work, they will likely
accuse him of managerial incompetence and inability to work well
with member states combined with yet another threat to withhold
dues.
If the U.S. purges continue and rise to higher levels, other UN
member nations may regret their pandering to Washington as they
see the entire post-World War II framework of multilateralism start
to disintegrate.
(Ian Williams <<uswarreport@igc.org> writes for Foreign Policy In
Focus and is the author of The UN for Beginners.)
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