Flotilla Update: Israel Attacks Convoy, Deaths Reported (2)

[compared2what?]

Well maybe I'm not qualified to speak to the subject authoritatively wrt either the present or the events that led to it, except for the fact that I'm old enough to have lived through a great deal of it unlike most of the toddlers around here. I also received my University degree in 1975 before education was poisoned by all this post-modern bullcrap. And it's good enough for me tho your mileage might vary.

I didn't actually say you weren't qualified to speak to the subject authoritatively wrt the present or the events that led to it. I said I had yet to see the slightest sign that you were. And fwiw, I lived through most of it myself, in the sense that I was alive, aware of events, and have had at least some independent comprehension of them since the '70s. Also, I read a lot.

But then again, I neither claim nor aspire to be authoritative. I'm just trying to contribute what I got to give. Also, I wouldn't (and don't) take it personally if others rated my contributions as too low-value and high-maintenance to make them gifts worth accepting. This is a serious political conversation about a very sensitive topic and not, like, the last round of competition for contestants who've made it all the way to the Queen of the Rigorous Intuition Junior High School Mean Girls Spring Fling and Semi-Formal Tea Dance finals. Or whatever. I feel compelled to add.

Plus, you may well have enhanced this discussion with remarks the significance and originality of which was richly informed by the breadth and depth of knowledge you bring to the topic. Although if you have, I regret to say that I must have overlooked them.

And I'm genuinely not going for snark in saying that, btw. Because I genuinely have neither any interest in nor any wish to add anything to the volume of personally abusive and contemptuous posts already addressed to you on this board. Furthermore, the vitriol in some of them strikes me as disproportionate to the provocation.

That notwithstanding, it wouldn't kill you to be a little less aggressively and personally confrontational yourself. Or -- if you're feeling really adventursome and bold -- you could even try differentiating between views expressed by others with which you don't concur on the basis of merit, tone and apparent good faith. And then -- are you sitting down? -- responding to the ones in connection with which you had something thoughtful to say.

Seriously. You might like it.

Although I myself wouldn't stick around if I were being as roundly scorned and insulted for my good-faith convictions and opinions as you are. So what do I know? Takes all kinds, I guess. It's not exactly like I don't have quirks of my own. For instance, to my eyes, this:

tho your mileage might vary.

reads as:

tho your mileage might vary.

And I'm not entirely sure that I could even say why, assuming that there's a reason for it at all.*** Which there might not be. But there you have it.

Anyway. Try courtesy, that's my advice.

***ON EDIT: There is. But there are no surprises anywhere in, around or near it that I can see. And it's probably only a meaningful reason to me. So carry on. As you were. Because frankly, I'm as bored by my quirks as anybody, you have my sympathy on that point. As well as in a general humanitarian sense, needless to say.

That doesn't mean that I don't still sincerely advise trying courtesy, though.

Just give it a little test drive, come on. Where's the harm?

[barracuda]

I told you you weren't gonna like it. But you need to answer that question before I answer yours. That's what happens in a real discussion. Ground rules get set so we are both clear about what's going to happen.

The following are ground rules for discussion to which I subscribe and that is why I will never have a discussion with you. When I sit down with another human to discuss an emotionally charged and divisive topic, I know I won't get anywhere if I approach the other person with disrespect, and especially if that disrespect is born out of blind rage. I can have empathy for people who are so stuck in their own pain, who can not muster the capacity to approach others with an open and initially non-judgmental heart, but it does me or the stuck person no good to tolerate their behavior and avoid setting boundaries. Boundaries teach the transgressor as much as they protect the transgressed.

You have not approached people here with respect. You have sought to find malice and hatred where none is expected, nor, I would assert, exists. You have sought to sow discord as means to mediate ... something. There is no charity in your voice. We have had on the board numerous instances when posters inferred guilt where none existed due solely to their understandable struggles with trust, but there was humility and vulnerability in their voices. There is only hardness and condemnation in your voice, no humble self-consciousness. I am offended by your treatment of people on this board, many of whom I've been reading for 5 years. I feel both angry and protective, whether that be my place or not.

There should most certainly be a venue where someone who identifies with the current policies and agendas of the Israeli Government can enter into discussion, but not in the form you have established, not without the ability to treat others with a basic level of respect, not without the ability to be open and nonreactive, at least on some level.

I think that as long as your approach is defended, the overall integrity of this board is in jeopardy. I will call again here, publicly, on the moderators to take action and set guidelines for behavior that serves discourse rather than discord, that sets a base level of respect upon which we can all then build. There are guidelines against proclaiming another poster to be an agent, could there not be a guideline against assuming and approaching all posters as if they are closet racists?

Alright, that is the most rational and measured approach I have yet heard to this problem, and I take it seriously. To a certain extent, the constant calls of "troll" have begun to deaden for me. 17breezes very first post on the board was in answer to a post by a username who has been banned subsequently and quite recently, for posting virulent antisemitic material here. So I'll admit, I saw his instincts as having some validity early on, and that may have colored my opinion of him. And I'll add that his denunciation of chump's post was met with consternation by many posters here. But if you look closely at that thread, you'll come across at least one other poster here who was banned for the same thing. So let's face it - it's not an unheard of point of view here.

I am in agreement with you that if, for example, obscenity cannot be allowed here, then a modicum of decorum is required which in his tone and demeanor are absent. He is virulently anti-antisemitic. Overly so. But if we were to require a certain level of depth and respect to every post, I doubt sincerely if I'd still be allowed here.

This episode here may be demonstrating the limits of the capacity for this forum to handle a subject which has defeated every attempt to defuse it or solve it in the real world, or it may simply be a demonstration of the lack of abilities of the mod to be able to channel discussion into more fruitful directions, which I have to own. It's hard to do that without being on the board constantly, and reading every post diligently. And yet during the most intense periods of the conflicts here on the board, the regulars were the ones fully flaunting the rules as they currently stand. I'm not sure if the administration of the board can really be expected to function by reacting and capitulating to a series of ultimatums in order to cater to the requirements of posters we like. I know, though, that Jeff hates it when anyone leaves out of hand, or commits suicide by mod.

The line where hypervigilance against antisemitism turns into a type of racism of it's own is a tricky place to identify, and you may be right that it has to do with encountering every member with a distrust so severe that it feels like a series of blind accusations rather than a conversation. And I think there is a legitimate argument that defending the policies which drive the Israeli army equates to justifying the horror of the one-sided conflict in Palestine, which is an advocation of fascism for which I find no excuse. I sort of take it as a given, though, that anyone with 17breezes approach to his fellows has probably had his share of hard situations in life. But that doesn't mean I have to agree to assist in allowing him to destroy the forum, or enjoy being part of a series of events in which some of my favorite posters quit in disgust one after another, because we wouldn't agree to ban 17breezes when they demanded it.

The idea of a special case ruling to remove him from the discussions seems wrong. There's really no rule against being an unreconstructed asshole here, but I'm willing to entertain the notion, even if I'm sure it would put a further crimp in my ability to express myself at all. I guess we could simply declare that what he's doing is de facto trolling, ban him, and leave it at that. Maybe everyone would be happy about a result of that nature, but it won't bring back the dead from the dead around here, or anywhere. I sure feel as if his last post to me was a fucking troll move. I'd like to ban him just for that. Along with winsomecowboy2, who I just don't like that much.

[AlicetheKurious]

Naomi Klein: "Let our people go". These are my people.



How do you define "your people", Percival? What is the criterion?

[vanlose kid]

The method in Israel's madness
By Pepe Escobar

Why would Israel, in a deliberate and methodical operation planned over a week in advance - according to statements by senior Israeli military commanders made in Hebrew-language media days before the attack - target an unarmed ship on a humanitarian mission flying the flag of Comoros? (Unlike Turkey, Comoros is a party of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which has jurisdiction over war crimes committed on vessels of member states.)

Why would Israeli commandos shoot nine unarmed activists dead with nine millimeter bullets at close range, between the eyes, in the top of the head, in the back of the head, in the chest, in the back, and in the legs - including an American citizen? (The final death toll may be 15, as six activists are still missing; Israeli army radio reported 16 dead early last Monday when the attack took place on the Mavi Marmara, a part of the Free Gaza flotilla.)

How could Israel think it would get away with it by censoring video and photos - and then getting away with it all over again by refusing an international, independent commission to investigate the incident and subsequent cover-up?

Why, geopolitically, would Israel declare war on the de facto international community - from Muslim nations to North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) member-countries to global public opinion?

Is this merely a case of a "dysfunctional government", as Bradley Burston wrote in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz. And strategically speaking, is there any method behind the madness? Or is the method actually the madness?

Be afraid, be very afraid
There may be a very simple answer to all these questions: fear.

Let's survey Israel's possible motivations. A key Israeli motive to attack the humanitarian flotilla was to send a "signal" to Turkey about the Brazil and Turkey-mediated Iran nuclear fuel-swap deal - as its success pre-empted Israel's pleas for a military strike on Tehran's nuclear facilities. Israel wants conflict between Washington and Tehran - and that means using the Israel lobby in Washington to sabotage US President Barack Obama's half-hearted attempts at finding any sort of agreement with Tehran over its uranium-enrichment program.

Israel wants a weak Turkey - out of the loop both in the Middle East and the European Union (EU). Turkey is an emerging, key regional power now with good, stable relations with its neighbors. Turkey is key for the US: 70% of all supplies for US troops in Iraq go through the Incirlik base in Turkey. Turkey has troops fighting the US war in Afghanistan. Not to mention that Turkey - in Obama's own terms - represents the key bridge between the West and the Muslim world.

The White House gave a wimpy response, "The United States deeply regrets the loss of life and injuries sustained and is currently working to understand the circumstances surrounding this tragedy." This was also Washington's signal to Turkey that the Brazil-Turkey mediation on the Iran nuclear fuel swap deal was not exactly welcome.

Iran agreed last month with the leaders of Brazil and Turkey to send most of its low-enriched uranium to Turkey to be held in escrow pending delivery of fuel rods for the Tehran Research Reactor.

As much as Israel wants Turkey immersed in deep trouble with both Syria and Greece, and fighting a nasty internal Kurdish problem, Ankara is not exactly trembling because of Israel's "message". In terms of conventional military strength, Turkey is ahead of Israel itself; and moreover it is a very important US NATO ally.

Another key Israeli motive was to undermine and in fact abort any possibility of meaningful peaceful negotiations with the Palestinians and the Syrians - and to cut Turkey from the loop. Turkey is very much involved in the Palestinian tragedy. It is trying hard to breach the gap between Fatah and Hamas. A key Israeli aim appears to be to sabotage any Turkish-led peace initiative to solve the Palestinian problem that includes the essential provision of a fully denuclearized Middle East - anathema to (undeclared) nuclear power Israel.

To round it all up, there is the crucial element of fear itself. As the once-fabled Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have struggled in battles with Hezbollah in Lebanon in 2006 and Hamas in Gaza in 2008, they have had to come to grips with the fact that their tanks are now vulnerable to Russian-made rocket-propelled grenades; their ships are now vulnerable to Hezbollah's made in China missiles; and their planes will soon be vulnerable to Russian S-300 surface-to-air missiles.

The new axis in town
Iraqi Kurdistan is now virtually independent - according to Washington's designs. Israel is robustly active everywhere in Iraqi Kurdistan. At the same time, the US actively supports the Iraq-based Kurdish Workers' Party separatists in eastern Anatolia as well as Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK) separatists in Iran and Kurdish separatists in Syria. The Turkish military spent no time analyzing these crucial developments. Their conclusion: NATO is not exactly a panacea. We must focus on the Middle East.

And this has led to the ultimate Israeli nightmare. The new key axis in the Middle East is Turkey, Iran and Syria. It used to be only Iran and Syria. Its historical legitimacy simply cannot be questioned, as it unites Shi'ite Iran, secular Syria and post-Ottoman Sunni Turkey.

There are many fascinating side-effects of this cross-fertilization - such as more than a million Iraqis, many of them very well educated, finding a new life in Syria. But the most remarkable effect of this axis is that it has smashed the same old divide-and-rule logic Western colonialism has been imposing on the Middle East for more than a century. Turkey's destiny may not be firmly attached to a fearful Europe that really does not want to embrace it after all; Turkey is to become once again a leader of the Muslim world.

Life for the new axis won't be easy. United States covert operations have tried to destabilize Syrian President Bashar al-Assad - to no avail. The same for US Central Intelligence Agency black ops in Sistan-Balochistan province in southeast Iran, as a means to destabilize the regime in Tehran. And the same for shady covert ops meant to bring a new military dictatorship in Turkey. But while US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton perfects her vociferousness, Assad, Hezbollah's Hassan Nasrallah and Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad got together this February in Syria and advanced their partnership.

Crucially, Russia immediately stepped in to fill the US-provoked void. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has been to Ankara and Damascus and has positioned himself in favor of full reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas and a fully functional Palestinian state side-by-side with Israel.

Even US Central Command commander General David “I'm always positioning myself to 2012” Petraeus has been forced to publicly admit that US strategic ally Israel - because of the non-stop colonization of Palestine and the blockade it is enforcing in Gaza - has become an immense burden for US strategic designs.

Russia on the other hand supports the new Turkey, Syria and Iran politico-economic axis. Visa-free travel between Ankara and Moscow is now on. Russia's Rosatom and Atomstroyexport are finishing Iran's Bushehr nuclear power station this August; are discussing the building of other plants; and have clinched a Turkish nuclear power station deal worth US$20 billion (Syria is also interested). Stroitransgaz and Gazprom will bring Syrian gas to Lebanon - as Israel prevents Lebanon from exploiting its considerable offshore reserves. Russia is on a roll. Tehran will soon receive its already paid-for S-300 missiles. And Syria will soon get a new naval base.

In Pipelineistan, Russia and Turkey are now brothers in arms. Russia will build a crucial Samsun-Ceyhan pipeline to bring Russian oil from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. Moreover, Turkey is about to join the Russian South Stream gas pipeline - and that means a direct blow to the troubled US/EU-supported Nabucco.

Russia - just like Turkey - also wants a fully denuclearized Middle East, which implies a non-nuclear Israel. This will be discussed at the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency.

Thus, essentially, Israel fears the new Turkey, Syria and Iran as much as it fears Russian support for it. A new Middle East is being born - and there seems to be only one place for Israel: isolation.

Israel's "mad dog" strategy - conceived by former military leader Moshe Dayan - is not exactly an exercise in fitting in. Even centrist Middle East analyst Anthony Cordesman, an establishment icon at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, wrote an essay under the title "Israel as a Strategic Liability?"

Big Brother Washington may be - forever - blind to it; but if you are a state and your strategy is to configure yourself as South Africa at the twilight of apartheid - by the way, at the time Israel was trying to sell nuclear weapons to South Africa - method is the last thing to be found in your madness.

[source]

[vanlose kid]

deleded: dupe

[compared2what?]

All due respect to both Pepe Escobar and you, vanlose kid. It's nice to see you posting.

But I'm not so sure that's where Turkey's at in any way that's new. For one thing, Turkey's always at two or more places. And I'm pretty sure that understanding where they are and why at any particular moment takes more work than anyone except for a dedicated team of round-the-clock professionals really has the resources to do.

Or that's my impression, anyway. But I don't really understand them. It's more like I see them around, meeting with neo-cons, collaborating with Israel and the US to ship weapons to Iran in exchange for the release of hostages in Lebanon and a hefty mark-up, having a Prime Minister who's best friends with hidden PTech owner and officially US-declared terrorist financier Yassin Al-Qadi, whom he harbored in his hour of eventually-unindicted-by-the-ICC trouble, trying to assassinate John Paul II (that's an overstatement, I know), funding Bosnian Jihadists, and being a longstanding well-known Friend to the Jews going back to when they still were the Ottoman Empire and continuing (in its capacity as Turkey, Israel's-Only-Predominantly-Islamic-Nation Friend) right up until, apparently, last week.

Per the thinktank policy wonks who are always wrong, the received wisdom is basically that the secular military powers who stopped officially being dictators in Turkey c. 1980 or so still have the true final say in political matters, and would rein in the very Islamist prime minister and equally Islamist president if they went too far, so no worries. I don't know about that. Because it looks like reality may be a little more complicated than that from my uncomprehending perspective.

But it's definitely true that for the last thirty or so years, Turkey has acted on the US's behalf as a conduit through which the CIA funnels money to whatever jihadis it's paying to fight in some U.S. proxy war today, simply so that they'll have more "global terrorists" to not stop, arrest or capture tomorrow, evidently. Plus they're still in the oil and gas business with one of America's favorite former Soviet friends, Azerbaijan.

It would be a total deep-political 180-degree turn on someone's part if they were now shunning Israel and the US and dating Iran and Venezuela for real. And one that would be kind of a puzzlement, given that there's a lot of U.S. corporate money invested in Turkey. To say nothing of the additional whole lot of U.S.-trade-generated revenues flowing into Turkey.

The U.S. might be breaking up with Israel and doing it through Turkey, I guess. But that doesn't seem quite right either.

In fact....Wasn't that lobby shop (or arms-trafficking operation, or whatever it was) over which Richard Perle had to resign his chairmanship of the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee connected to or working for Turkey in some way?

I can't remember. And I wouldn't understand it if I could. But that article, if accurate, would mean a very, very major geopolitical sea-change. Maybe we're due for one, though.

I really don't know how to make any sense of it.

[seemslikeadream]

A Friendly Note to Many of Israel's Defenders
From the sickeningly rancid, foully infected underbelly of the Outraged Furor! over Helen Thomas's violation of The Sacred Rules Concerning What Is Permissible to Say About Israel, there is one "argument" offered by Israel's defenders that might be among my favorite debating tactics of recent years.

In their efforts to prove beyond all dispute that Thomas is a vicious anti-Semite who loathes every Jew who has ever lived and longs for the day when every single one of them is dead, these defenders of notably horrifying and murderous State terrorism gleefully spit out: "It's just like saying, 'Hey, all you Black Americans! Go back to Africa!' And we all know what it would mean if someone said that!"

I've heard and read this a huge number of times in the last several days. I am forced to admit that the comparison is staggering in its power. It makes the point with concision, and the historic parallels are overwhelming. To review briefly, and despite the very painful familiarity of these facts: significant numbers of Africans voluntarily, indeed enthusiastically, migrated westward and took over large parts of the eastern seaboard of what was then the United States beginning in the mid-1800s. They were able to do this because they had the unending support in a multitude of forms of the most powerful Nation-States of the time. The Africans claimed that a special dispensation from ... well, something or other ... ordained that the land mass designated by the name "United States" was uniquely theirs. The Nation-States that made possible the Africans' conquest and domination agreed.

In the ensuing century and a half, the Africans slaughtered most of those they found living in the United States, beginning in the eastern states and then steadily continuing their campaign of murder and destruction across the continent. The few survivors fled further and further west. The Africans inexorably pursued them, all still with the backing of certain immensely powerful Nation-States. Eventually, the Africans drove the remaining previous inhabitants of the United States into just three or four very small areas in (what were then called) Arizona and New Mexico. From that point on and continuing to the present, the Africans forbade virtually anyone and anything from moving into or out of these impossibly restricted areas. Although it is rarely talked about or admitted, people will eventually acknowledge, when pressed, that the Americans forced to remain in these concentration camps must endure conditions that are among the most nightmarish on earth.

Given this history, well-known to every young school child in the world, it is indeed exactly the same to say that the Israelis should "get out of Palestine" and to demand that the Africans should "get out of the United States." The argument is unanswerable to a degree that causes me profound embarrassment and distress. I greatly resent having the pathetic shabbiness of my views revealed in this manner.

But perhaps I might offer an exceedingly minor piece of unsolicited and doubtless unwanted advice to many of those who regularly defend Israel's systematic State terrorism, extended entirely free of charge and only because I'm a hell of a sweet guy:

You don't need to work at making yourselves stupid. Seriously.

On a related note: it is not "brave" or "courageous" of you in the slightest degree to side with unanswerable power, or to act as enforcers of permissible speech. To the contrary, that decision is one of the least courageous choices imaginable. It is also remarkably, astonishingly ... well, stupid. But I've told you that you don't need to work at that.

I have a number of other, considerably more complex points I want to make about this Helen Thomas episode. I'll get to all that in the next day or so. But I came across this particular "argument" several times again this morning. So I wanted to get this out of the way.

For me, one of the more gut-wrenching aspects of today's monstrous culture, a culture that kills each and every manifestation of empathy, understanding and compassion with relentlessly systematic determination, is the combination of unending destruction, cruelty, violence and murder with the most abysmally wretched depths of stupidity.

In certain respects, that is my own personal nightmare. And so, so many people work with such diligence to make it real every single day. They needn't work at that, either, and I desperately wish they would stop.

Assuredly, they will not.

[JackRiddler]

The method in Israel's madness
By Pepe Escobar

Why would Israel, in a deliberate and methodical operation planned over a week in advance - according to statements by senior Israeli military commanders made in Hebrew-language media days before the attack - target an unarmed ship on a humanitarian mission flying the flag of Comoros?

SNIP

Is this merely a case of a "dysfunctional government", as Bradley Burston wrote in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz. And strategically speaking, is there any method behind the madness? Or is the method actually the madness? SNIP

All due respect to both Pepe Escobar and you, vanlose kid. It's nice to see you posting.

But I'm not so sure that's where Turkey's at in any way that's new. For one thing, Turkey's always at two or more places. SNIP SNIP

Without doing the full work right now, or even going into all of what little I know, my rough estimate is that you're both reconcilably right about the situation. Escobar's looking at a grand geostrategic logic from a quasi-historical perspective. The shift he describes is happening because it must - because of the decline of US power and of Israeli legitimacy (and Israeli rationality, clearly), and because Turkey is looking to its East given its lack of progress with the EU. But not all things that must happen, happen in the ways and on the timetables of those who venture to predict. And c2w? is looking at an underbelly of conflicts and cross currents in which elements of the whole known as Turkey engage in activities that would seem to be at cross-purposes with the grand historical "must." But the geopolitical reality trend is more represented by the Turkish-brokered deal with Iran and the Israeli mad rage over it than by the long history of Turkish deep politics and the stygian involvements of the Perles and Qadis. Also, Erdogan's break with Israel is a bit older than last week. Remember the Davos speech, that was at the time of Cast Lead, a year and a half ago.

[Belligerent Savant]

.


This is interesting [or repulsive, whichever you prefer]..

"...this isn't the first time Reuters has been caught in some blatantly anti-Israel photo retouching.... [snip] ...armed thugs masquerading as humanitarian workers"

This is becoming increasingly farcical by the minute..

As one of the comments below this fine piece of journalism points out:

"Yes, the knife was cropped out of the photo. Initially it was in it's scabbard then brandished.
Whose knife was it? I suspect it was removed from one of the Israeli commandos... it looks military issue.
How was the knife used... at this point, no one knows. It wasn't used to slice open a commando's throat... no commando was killed.
With the availability of rope on a ship, no commando was lynched.
Of the fatalities associated with this incident, perhaps the uproar should be about the multiple close range gunshot wounds to the front and back of the 'activists' heads."



Of course, this is a NY Post piece, so no one should be surprised by the content.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/ed ... ZrjLCo6rGP

The camera never lies, they say -- but what if the photos are sent out by the Reuters news agency?

And especially what if they make Israel look bad?

Which is precisely what happened after IHH, the Turkish "humanitarian" group with longstanding terrorist ties, released photos of the bloody clash between its activists and Israeli commandos who boarded a ship trying to break the Gaza blockade.

One photo shows an Israeli surrounded by IHH "peace" activists, one of whom is holding a knife.

The second shows another Israeli lying under a bloodstained railing as a second IHH activist also holds a knife.

At least that's what appears in the images distributed by The Associated Press.

In the photos distributed by Reuters, there were no knives. And no blood.

The impact being to make it look more like an Israeli massacre of innocent civilians and less like an act of self-defense against armed thugs masquerading as humanitarian workers.

All this might have gone undetected -- had blogger Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs not blown the whistle.

The folks at Reuters insist it's all an innocent, harmless mistake.

The IHH photos were subjected to "normal editorial practice" that included "cropping around the edges," a spokesman said. "When we realized that the dagger was inadvertently cropped from the images, Reuters immediately moved the original set, as well."

Except that this isn't the first time Reuters has been caught in some blatantly anti-Israel photo retouching.

Back in 2006, during the Israel-Lebanon war, at least two images sent by Reuters over its wire from Beirut were deliberately doctored so as to suggest great damage inflicted by Israel.

Indeed, it was the very same blogger, Charles Johnson, who uncovered the outrageous exercise in what he called "fauxtography."

At first, the agency also claimed an innocent mistake, saying the photographer had been trying to remove "dust marks."

But eventually, Reuters was forced to 'fess up.

It admitted the photos had been deliberately faked, severed its ties to the photographer, Lebanese freelancer Adnan Hajj, and removed all 920 pictures he'd taken from its server. A senior photo editor also was fired.

Reuters insists that it's "committed to accurate and impartial reporting."

You be the judge.

--THE EDITORS

[compared2what?]

The method in Israel's madness
By Pepe Escobar

Why would Israel, in a deliberate and methodical operation planned over a week in advance - according to statements by senior Israeli military commanders made in Hebrew-language media days before the attack - target an unarmed ship on a humanitarian mission flying the flag of Comoros?

SNIP

Is this merely a case of a "dysfunctional government", as Bradley Burston wrote in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz. And strategically speaking, is there any method behind the madness? Or is the method actually the madness? SNIP

All due respect to both Pepe Escobar and you, vanlose kid. It's nice to see you posting.

But I'm not so sure that's where Turkey's at in any way that's new. For one thing, Turkey's always at two or more places. SNIP SNIP

Without doing the full work right now, or even going into all of what little I know, my rough estimate is that you're both reconcilably right about the situation. Escobar's looking at a grand geostrategic logic from a quasi-historical perspective. The shift he describes is happening because it must - because of the decline of US power and of Israeli legitimacy (and Israeli rationality, clearly), and because Turkey is looking to its East given its lack of progress with the EU. But not all things that must happen, happen in the ways and on the timetables of those who venture to predict. And c2w? is looking at an underbelly of conflicts and cross currents in which elements of the whole known as Turkey engage in activities that would seem to be at cross-purposes with the grand historical "must." But the geopolitical reality trend is more represented by the Turkish-brokered deal with Iran and the Israeli mad rage over it than by the long history of Turkish deep politics and the stygian involvements of the Perles and Qadis. Also, Erdogan's break with Israel is a bit older than last week. Remember the Davos speech, that was at the time of Cast Lead, a year and a half ago.

Yeah....Maybe.

Like I said, as I've always not-understood it, Erdogan doesn't have that kind of policy-making power. Especially foreign policy. And the US has also been looking to the East in the exact same way, albeit under-the-radar in diplomatic terms, since....Well. At least the 1980s, to the best of my knowledge. That being when the one person I know who I'm absolutely positive is a covert CIA operative started inexplicably initially entered the workforce as a young adult by doing all kinds of business there and very successfully, too, despite having absolutely no apparent qualifications for doing it. Although there are less anecdotal attestations to a keen interest on the part of U.S. businesses in expanding the scope of their activities into the lucrative and burgeoning central and far Asian marketplace, too.

I could easily believe that Turkey was breaking with Israel, is my point. But not that they were breaking with the U.S.

Or anyway, not so easily. Too many business partnerships and/or common economic interests. But I've always thought the U.S. would ditch Israel the very second that it had enough purchase elsewhere in the region to get by without it. In fact, I would have (and did) say that goal pretty much had to be a big part of what we were after in Iraq during the build-up and early stages of the war, there being no other fully persuasive reason that I could think of.

And also because the neocons were so incredibly and prominently out front loudly saying stuff about being greeted as liberators that they can and do actually believe because they're fools, but that any person with two brain cells to rub together couldn't help observing was manifestly little more than a ludicrous and childish fantasy. So I figured they were being set up for future use as patsies. I mean, nobody actually really likes those guys. For the obvious reason: What's to like?

It's been quite a while since it began looking like I hadn't been wildly, delusionally wrong about that, however, I freely admit.

Hmm. Do you think that being functionally insolvent just might be having an effect on U.S. popularity abroad?

Rhetorical question, btw. Since I did actually read and comprehend the words "declining U.S. power" in the post by you quoted a mere hop, skip and jump upscreen in this one.

I don't know, though. It just foggily looks to me like quelque chose is happening here, mais qu'est-ce que c'est ain't exactly clear. FWIW.

I have no clue what I'm talking about, in other words.

[JackRiddler]

That's okay. When I'm honest, I must admit the same.

U.N. Security Council Passes New Sanctions Against Iran

UNITED NATIONS — The United States, moving firmly away from the Obama administration’s previous emphasis on wooing Iran, pushed through a new round of United Nations sanctions against the nation on Wednesday, taking aim at its military in yet another attempt to pressure Tehran over its nuclear program.

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U.N. Draft Resolution on Sanctions for Iran

Related
Turkey Goes From Pliable Ally to Thorn for U.S. (June 9, 2010)
Israel Makes Case to China for Iran Sanctions (June 9, 2010)
Web of Shell Companies Veils Trade by Iran’s Ships (June 8, 2010)
Times Topic: Iran's Nuclear Program
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The new sanctions, a modest increase from previous rounds, took months to negotiate but still did not carry the symbolic weight of a unanimous Security Council decision. Twelve of the 15 nations voted for the measure, while Turkey and Brazil voted against and Lebanon abstained.

SNIP!

"There's something happening here. What it is, ain't exactly clear. There's a man with a gun over there, telling me I've got to beware..."

[vanlose kid]

All due respect to both Pepe Escobar and you, vanlose kid. It's nice to see you posting.

But I'm not so sure that's where Turkey's at in any way that's new. For one thing, Turkey's always at two or more places. And I'm pretty sure that understanding where they are and why at any particular moment takes more work than anyone except for a dedicated team of round-the-clock professionals really has the resources to do.

Or that's my impression, anyway. But I don't really understand them. It's more like I see them around, meeting with neo-cons, collaborating with Israel and the US to ship weapons to Iran in exchange for the release of hostages in Lebanon and a hefty mark-up, having a Prime Minister who's best friends with hidden PTech owner and officially US-declared terrorist financier Yassin Al-Qadi, whom he harbored in his hour of eventually-unindicted-by-the-ICC trouble, trying to assassinate John Paul II (that's an overstatement, I know), funding Bosnian Jihadists, and being a longstanding well-known Friend to the Jews going back to when they still were the Ottoman Empire and continuing (in its capacity as Turkey, Israel's-Only-Predominantly-Islamic-Nation Friend) right up until, apparently, last week.

Per the thinktank policy wonks who are always wrong, the received wisdom is basically that the secular military powers who stopped officially being dictators in Turkey c. 1980 or so still have the true final say in political matters, and would rein in the very Islamist prime minister and equally Islamist president if they went too far, so no worries. I don't know about that. Because it looks like reality may be a little more complicated than that from my uncomprehending perspective.

But it's definitely true that for the last thirty or so years, Turkey has acted on the US's behalf as a conduit through which the CIA funnels money to whatever jihadis it's paying to fight in some U.S. proxy war today, simply so that they'll have more "global terrorists" to not stop, arrest or capture tomorrow, evidently. Plus they're still in the oil and gas business with one of America's favorite former Soviet friends, Azerbaijan.

It would be a total deep-political 180-degree turn on someone's part if they were now shunning Israel and the US and dating Iran and Venezuela for real. And one that would be kind of a puzzlement, given that there's a lot of U.S. corporate money invested in Turkey. To say nothing of the additional whole lot of U.S.-trade-generated revenues flowing into Turkey.

The U.S. might be breaking up with Israel and doing it through Turkey, I guess. But that doesn't seem quite right either.

In fact....Wasn't that lobby shop (or arms-trafficking operation, or whatever it was) over which Richard Perle had to resign his chairmanship of the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee connected to or working for Turkey in some way?

I can't remember. And I wouldn't understand it if I could. But that article, if accurate, would mean a very, very major geopolitical sea-change. Maybe we're due for one, though.

I really don't know how to make any sense of it.

Hi c2w, thanks for the welcome.

Anyway, I was going to make cuts in the quote but couldn't find a place to cut, so, there it is in full.

1) I agree with you that PE's piece only provides, let's say, "half" of the picture. And that what the picture is isn't entirely clear. But things are being shook up. The only reason I posted it was because of the fact that PE was looking into Turkeys part of this and drawing some wider background happenings.

2) You again. (I made cuts this time):

... Like I said, as I've always not-understood it, Erdogan doesn't have that kind of policy-making power. Especially foreign policy. And the US has also been looking to the East in the exact same way, albeit under-the-radar in diplomatic terms, since....Well. At least the 1980s, to the best of my knowledge. That being when the one person I know who I'm absolutely positive is a covert CIA operative started inexplicably initially entered the workforce as a young adult by doing all kinds of business there and very successfully, too, despite having absolutely no apparent qualifications for doing it. Although there are less anecdotal attestations to a keen interest on the part of U.S. businesses in expanding the scope of their activities into the lucrative and burgeoning central and far Asian marketplace, too.

I could easily believe that Turkey was breaking with Israel, is my point. But not that they were breaking with the U.S.

Or anyway, not so easily. Too many business partnerships and/or common economic interests. But I've always thought the U.S. would ditch Israel the very second that it had enough purchase elsewhere in the region to get by without it. In fact, I would have (and did) say that goal pretty much had to be a big part of what we were after in Iraq during the build-up and early stages of the war, there being no other fully persuasive reason that I could think of.

And also because the neocons were so incredibly and prominently out front loudly saying stuff about being greeted as liberators that they can and do actually believe because they're fools, but that any person with two brain cells to rub together couldn't help observing was manifestly little more than a ludicrous and childish fantasy. So I figured they were being set up for future use as patsies. I mean, nobody actually really likes those guys. For the obvious reason: What's to like?

And again, I agree. If I hadn't in a fit of complete depression deleted all my posts some while ago, I made even have been able to point back at something and say, yeah, I was trying to say something along those lines yonks ago. But, since you say it way better than I do, i have the luxury of just having to quote you. Which is nice, lazy as I am.

Which bring me to this, you again (with cuts, sorry):

3)

… Furthermore, it's also politically and historically substantively/constructively/informatively true. If and only if it can be taken for granted that everyone understands that:

(a) the secular agenda that led to the earliest beginnings of the zionist enterprise originated in the 1830s as an adjunct to British and/or American and/or German imperialist aspirations. Both mutual and competitive;

(b) the religious agenda that led to the earliest beginnings of the zionist enterprise also originated in the 1830s -- actually between the 1830s and 1860s, IIRC, but whatever -- as the primary goal of the Christian restorationist movement. Which was then popular in Britain, proto-German Austria, and the United States, although it's only popular and powerful in its current form in the United States;

(c) since the aforementioned secular and religious powers that invested their time, money and energy in realizing the zionist enterprise in its earliest beginnings back in the 1830s haven't yet realized the return on investment they're aiming for, they haven't yet cashed out of that enterprise. In fact, they've continued to invest in it, although (no doubt) those investments have changed imperial western hands at various points; and

(d) the contemporary shareholders who ended up inheriting enough of them to have an influential seat on the board of directors -- which emphatically includes the government of the state of Israel, especially the current fucking government of the state of Israel -- have very different and sometimes fiercely opposed and irreconcilable ideas about what kind of outcome would constitute a return on investment.

It's a clusterfuck, in short. And also a criminal confederacy that has many more crime families than the ones visibly holding the reins or manning the heavy artillery of the state of Israel.

And that's not just background trivia, for the obvious reason: Because if (or when) someone does get around to wiping the state of Israel as its currently constituted off the face of the map -- irrespective of who does it and for what reason -- the forces presently oppressing and destroying the lives of the Palestinian people would still be alive, kicking, oppressive, and homicidal.

From their point of view -- to again quote the Arab Nationalist you may or may not remember my having mentioned chatting with before, from whom I swiped the phrase:

"Jews, Arabs, they're all Arabs."…

Part of which I tried to put across to Percival and in answer to a query by barracuda, without getting much by way of reaction.

But what's more important is that, with all due respect to Alice, when I read this I immediately thought of posting with her in mind to say: Alice, you're awesome and you've taught me a lot, and your analysis is great, BUT it's on its head. If you'd just turn it right side up you'd see what c2w is saying here. She's where it's at. (From what I can tell obviously.)

So, what am I trying to say? It's great to read your posts for sheer weight of well considered sanity. Not to say that alice is insane, she's not. I just think she's too close sometimes. Then again, I may be wrong.

•

[17breezes]

First let have a little discussion. I am a white guy. Do I and other white guys get to define racism against blacks, Hispanics? Will our definitions count as much as theirs?

I'll bite. It's a complicated question. The real world answer is that the hegemonic culture always defines the nature and extent of their own faults, and defines them in order to effectively diminish their significance as much as possible, and to benefit from them if they can. The idealised answer is that only the oppressed can know the extent of their own personal feelings of oppression, but they cannot necessarily articulate or even see the parameters of their true oppression. A race-slave, for example, may know he is being used, but that doesn't always mean he knows or can define the actual mechanism of use he is being forced into in the larger picture of, say, the economic or political goals of his oppressors, and so might not really be able to define the reality of the racism he his constrained by, or which he may unknowingly encounter in his day-to-day life.

Of course, the answer you are seeking is simply "no", and to a certain extent, I will grant that in order to hear you proceed with your definition of antisemitism, and get off the fucking merry-go-round.

I was seeking no particular answer since in a free world, white men CAN define racism though they may not be well received. First of all, there is no racism; it's a misnomer since there is only one race. What people mean is hate, prejudice, discrimination and all that entails. Antisemitism is simply all that directed specifically at Jews. The EUMC puts it nicely:

Rhetorical and physical manifestations of anti-Semitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities. In addition, such manifestations could also target the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity. Antisemitism frequently charges Jews with conspiring to harm humanity, and it is often used to blame Jews for “why things go wrong”. It is expressed in speech, writing, visual forms and action, and employs sinister stereotypes and negative character traits. Contemporary examples of anti-Semitism in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere could, taking into account the overall context, include, but are not limited to:

* Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion.

* Making mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as a collective – such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions.

* Accusing Jews as a people of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group, or even for acts committed by non-Jews.

* Denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people at the hands of National Socialist Germany and its supporters and accomplices during World War II (the Holocaust).

* Accusing the Jews as a people, or Israel as a state, of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.

* Accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations.

* Examples of the ways in which antisemitism manifests itself with regard to the State of Israel taking into account the overall context could include:

* Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g. by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.

* Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.

* Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (e.g. claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterize Israel or Israelis.

* Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.

* Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the State of Israel.

However, criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic.

So, if you actually believe in hegemony, how can antizionism be anything BUT an hegemony designed to deny Jews what ever other human group is allowed. Ergo-prejudice. Ergo antisemtism. Short answer......look for the hate. If it's there, antisemitism is there.

http://www.antisemitism.org.il/eng/Work ... tisemitism

It's not rocket science.

[American Dream]

17breezes, if it's really not rocket science, then please reduce your working definition of anti-Semitism to a clear sentence or two.

[17breezes]

17breezes, if it's really not rocket science, then please reduce your working definition of anti-Semitism to a clear sentence or two.

Well I thought I did that in my conclusion. See, arguments have a thesis statement, a body and a conclusion. Please look at my conclusion.

So, if you actually believe in hegemony, how can antizionism be anything BUT an hegemony designed to deny Jews what ever other human group is allowed. Ergo-prejudice. Ergo antisemitism. Short answer......look for the hate. If it's there, antisemitism is there.

Heh I wonder if anyone sees the irony of your request given the constant rabid accusations against me of "hit and run." Gotta love this place.