Yasser Arafat and his cohorts got what they wanted - a get-out-of-Tunis free pass where they were in exile following the 1982 Lebanon war. They got to come home, take charge of their people and become Israel's enforcer. Interestingly, Cook points out a little known fact. Many high-level Israeli security figures opposed Oslo. They saw it giving Arafat an "internationalist platform" to encourage Palestinian nationalism that might undermine Israel. After Rabin's assassination, it wasn't surprising that the spirit of Oslo died, Arafat became isolated, spent much of the second intifada a prisoner in his Ramallah compound, and died in a Paris hospital in November 2004, the victim of Israeli poisoning with convincing evidence to prove it.
In the meanwhile, Israel scrapped Oslo and tried a new approach - cantonizing Gaza and the West Bank to crush organized resistance and dissolve Palestinian nationalism. It began with checkpoints and curfews. Then it was hardened into forced separation, displacement, willful harassment, land seizures, home demolitions, bypass roads, and state-sponsored violence matching lightly-armed people against the world's fourth most powerful military with every imaginable weapon at its disposal and no hesitancy using them against civilians.
At the same time, Israel chose a co-optable Mahmoud Abbas over the legitimate Hamas government. Its leaders will only recognize Israel if Palestinians are recognized in return and given an independent homeland inside pre-1967 borders or there's one state for all Israeli citizens. Israel, of course, refuses, and continues expanding settlements on expropriated land. In addition, with Abbas' Fatah in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza, Israel assures the two sides remain divided and continue fighting each other for control. That's the strategy to keep Palestinians marginalized and Israel confident that what's now working in the Territories can be applied advantageously across the region.
That became Bush administration strategy early on with extremist neocons in charge led by Dick Cheney. They knew all along that invading and occupying Iraq would unleash sectarian violence "on an unprecedented scale." Cook notes that the scheme came out of a 1996 policy paper called "A Clean Break" that was written by key neocons behind the war - David Wurmser, Richard Pearle and Douglas Feith. They predicted that after Saddam fell Iraq would "be ripped apart by the politics of warlords, tribes, clans, sects and key families" because Sunni leadership maintained unity through state repression.
Pre-war, Britain knew it as well, and, in May 2007, a US Senate Intelligence Committee reported that US intelligence documents warned of post-invasion chaos because Iraq is one of the least cohesive Middle East states with rival Sunni, Shia and Kurdish populations. This, however, fits perfectly with the type occupation Washington wants. It also justifies the "war on terror," and prepares things for the final solution Israel advocates - splitting the country into three mini-states: a Kurdish one in the North, Shias in the South, and Sunnis between them.
Making it work won't be easy, however, because Iraq's largest cities have mixed populations. It's the reason the Pentagon plans to cantonize them Israeli-style by enclosing neighborhoods with barricades and walls and require special IDs for entry. Israel plans the same thing for Lebanon where a large Shia population has been marginalized under the country's "confessional" system. It allocates public office along religious lines, gives disproportionate power to Christian and Sunni minorities, but Hezbollah is challenging the pro-western government with things so far unresolved.
After the 2006 war, Hezbollah got stronger, Washington supports the Siniora government, and is promoting a "Cedar Revolution" like the "Orange" and "Rose" ones it successfully engineered in Ukraine and Georgia. Assassinations and car bombings are part of the scheme, they're blamed on Syria without evidence, but a more likely culprit is Mossad that has a long history in the region engineering this type violence. Cook quotes former US counter-terrorism expert, Fred Burton, saying the technology used in Lebanon's recent assassinations is available only to a few countries - the US, Israel, Britain, France and Russia.
The Pentagon and CIA are also active in "black operations" in Iran, have been for many months, and it's no secret why. As in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine, it's to create ethnic tensions throughout the country, promote conflict, and hope it will destabilize the government and force it into a mistake Washington can jump on in response. A Pentagon source told Seymour Hersh that their operatives are working with Azeris in the north, Baluchis in the southeast, Kurds in the northeast, and their own special forces in-country as well. The pot is bubbling, and Iran knows it.
It's a new version of the older colonial "divide and rule" scheme that so far proved ineffective, and Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, thinks he knows what's going on. He says Israel and Washington want to partition Iraq, Iran, Lebanon and Syria. If he's right, as seems likely, it means the idea is to change the way colonial powers ruled post-WW I, and Cook challenges it. He believes making it work is "improbable (and) little more than a deluded fantasy." It worked in Yugoslavia, but the Arab world is different.
He concludes his book saying a generation of Washington policy makers have been "captivated" by thinking the Middle East can be remade by "spreading instability and inter-communal strife." Instead, Cook sees a different outcome - new political, religious and social alliances forming across the region. If Washington pursues its "war on terror," he sees continued "war without end" with no victory. After the chaotic Bush years, it's hard disagreeing with him.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
I am a 72 year old, retired, progressive small businessman concerned about all the major national and world issues, committed to speak out and write about them.
Jonathan Cook's analysis is a TEXT BOOK lesson which should be taught at schools and colleges all across the Middle East. Bits and pieces of his observations are obvious to those of all ages who see, think and analyse. Most, however, do not know what to do about it because of apathy or the extremely limited opportunities available to them in the police states they live in BUT South Lebanese, Gazans and Iranians are providing examples. Like it or not for the US and Israel what is emerging and will continue to grow will definitely not be palatable to both. Enough is enough!
by
syed mahdi (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 125 comments)
on Tuesday, February 5, 2008 at 2:11:32 AM
2 comments
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