Erasing Iraq. The Human Costs of Carnage

Drei australische Autoren, der freie Journalist Michael Otterman und die Wissenschaftler Richard Hil und Paul Wilson, präsentieren mit diesem Buch der Weltöffentlichkeit die überfällige „Rechnung“, die der Überfall der USA und ihrer willigen Helfershelfer für das irakische Volk gekostet hat. Der „neue Irak“ über den die Okkupanten gerne reden, ist ein „brutaler Euphemismus für Tod und Zerstörung“, schreiben die Autoren. Die Absetzung Saddam Husseins wurde bereits unter der Präsidentschaft Bill Clintons zur offiziellen US-Politik erklärt. Vom ersten Tag seiner Präsidentschaft war George W. Bush und seine neokonservative Truppe darauf aus, den irakischen Autokraten zu stürzen. Der Umsturz des Saddam-Regimes wurde in mehreren Schreiben von Mitgliedern des „Project for a New American Century“ (Projekt für das neue amerikanische Jahrhundert) an Clinton gefordert, justament von denjenigen, die mit Bush an die Macht kamen. Dieser neokonservative „Think-Tank“ versteht sich als eine gemeinnützige Bildungseinrichtung und vertritt folgende Ansichten: Amerikanische Führerschaft ist nicht nur gut für Amerika, sondern auch für die Welt; diese Führungskraft erfordert militärische Stärke, diplomatische Energie und ein Engagement für moralische Prinzipien. Wohin diese politisch-ideologische Hybris den Westen geführt hat, kann an der Zerstörung des Iraks und Afghanistans exemplarisch besichtigt werden. Der Überfall auf den Irak war also schon längst beschlossene Sache, lange bevor die 9/11-Anschläge passierten. Die Bush-Administration musste also erst den Weg über Afghanistan nehmen, bevor sie in den Irak einfallen konnte. Jetzt stecken die USA und ihre willigen Helfershelfer in beiden Ländern bis zum Hals im politischen Morast und wollen sich nicht wie weiland Baron Münchhausen am Schopfe aus diesem befreien.

Ein zentrales Indiz für einen Daueraufenthalt in Irak stellen die Errichtung mehrerer riesiger Militärstützpunkte und der Bau einer völlig überdimensionierten Botschaft für 3 000 Mitarbeiter von der Größe der Vatikanstadt dar. Alles Gerede von einem „Abzug“ scheint an Rhetorikübungen zu erinnern. Aus der imperialen US-amerikanischen Geschichte ist bekannt, dass die USA aus einem Land, in dem sie sich einmal festgesetzt haben, nie freiwillig abgezogen sind. Die Geschichte der beiden vom Westen besetzten Länder, Afghanistans und Irak, lehrt ebenfalls, dass koloniale Mächte dort langfristig immer gescheitert sind.

In fünf Kapiteln beschreiben die Autoren die Tragödie, die das Hegemoniestreben der USA über das Land gebracht hat. Sie gehen nicht nur auf das angerichtete Desaster seit dem Überfall vom März 2003 ein, sondern beschreiben auch den brutalen elfjährigen Sanktionszeitraum, in dem über eine Million Irakis, die Hälfte davon Kinder, an dessen Folgen gestorben sind. Die damalige US-Außenministerin Madeleine Albright wurde in der US-Fernsehsendung „60 Minutes“ von Lesley Stahl gefragt, ob der Tod von 500 000 Kindern den Preis der Sanktionen wert gewesen sei, worauf Albright antwortete: „I think this is a very hard choice but the price – we think the price is worth it.“ Nach dem Einfall Saddams in Kuwait erließ der UN-Sicherheitsrat Sanktionen gegen das Land und hob diese erst zwei Tage nach der „Befreiung“ des Iraks am 22. März 2003 auf. Die Autoren besuchten Syrien, Jordanien und Schweden; in diesem Land lebt die größte irakische Gemeinde (80 000) im Exil. Sie sprachen mit den Flüchtlingen; ebenso analysierten sie verschiedene irakische Blogger.

Durch das Sanktionsregime wurde der Irak von einem wirtschaftlich gut entwickelten Land auf den Status eines armen Entwicklungslandes „herunterentwickelt“. Das Land war das am weitesten säkularisierte in der arabischen Welt, das über eine starke Mittelklasse verfügte. Die Gleichberechtigung der Frauen stand dem des Westens in nichts nach. Analphabetismus war unbekannt; der Industrialisierungsgrad entsprach dem eines Schwellenlandes. Bagdad war ein Ort der Bildung, wohin Tausende von Studenten aus den arabischen Ländern zur Ausbildung kamen. Als „Wiege der Zivilisation“ verfügte Irak über enorme Kulturgüter und Kunstschätze von unsagbarem Wert sowie über Tausende von Kulturstädten. Das Sanktionsregime unterminierte die Fundamente der gesamten Gesellschaft. Was diese Zeit überdauerte wurde durch den Überfall der USA endgültig in Trümmer gelegt. Symbolisch dafür kann die Entscheidung der Besatzer gelten, nur das Öl- und Innenministerium bewachen zu lassen, aber bei der Plünderung der Museen und kulturellen Städten ungerührt zuzusehen. Der einzige Kommentar von US-Verteidigungsminister Donald Rumsfeld war: „stuff happens“, leider „dumm gelaufen“!

Die Autoren zeigen auf, dass Saddam eine Kreation der USA gewesen ist, wie weiland Osama bin Laden. Saddam gehörte zu einem Team von sechs Personen, die von der CIA rekrutiert worden sind, um Ministerpräsident Abd al Karim Qasim zu ermorden. Seither unterhielten die USA enge Beziehungen zum Irak, insbesondere als Saddam 1979 Präsident wurde. Während des Irak-Iran-Krieges von 1980 bis 1988 lieferten die USA dem Regime nicht nur konventionelle, sondern auch chemische und biologische Kampfstoffen. Saddam setzte dieses Gas nicht nur gegen die Kurden im Norden, sondern auch gegen die iranischen Soldaten ein. Die Schutzbehauptung der USA, Iran habe ebenfalls chemische Waffen eingesetzt, konnte bis heute nicht beweisen werden. Bevor Saddam Kuwait überfiel, ließ er die US-amerikanische Botschafterin April Glaspie zu sich kommen, um von ihr zu erfahren, ob die USA etwas gegen seinen Plan einzuwenden hätten. „We have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait.“ (Wir haben keine Meinung zu den arabisch-arabischen Konflikten, wie Ihre Grenzstreitigkeiten mit Kuwait.“) Pflichtgemäß dementierte die US-Administration diese Aussage ihrer Botschafterin. Zwei Wochen später überfiel Saddam das Scheichtum.

Obgleich viele der Befragten das Saddam-Regime als schlecht und brutal beschreiben und zahlreiche Menschen wegen ihrer politischen Opposition ums Leben kamen oder leiden mussten, beschrieben sie die Sanktions- und Besatzungszeit als „schrecklich“. Insbesondere unter der Besatzungsherrschaft versank das Land im Chaos. Die Autoren schreiben, dass sie viele Irakis trafen, welche die Absetzung Saddams begrüßten, aber keinen, der die andauernde Besetzung für gut befand. Bis in die Mitte der 1990er Jahre war Irak sehr säkular. Religiöse Verfolgung gab es nicht. Saddams Regierung bestand aus Muslims, Christen und Kurden. Nach 2003 spaltete sich die Gesellschaft entlang religiöser und ethischer Zugehörigkeit. Dieser Spaltung sind die in die Zehntausende gehenden Morde geschuldet.

Die Autoren nennen konkrete Zahlen, die das ganze Ausmaß der humanitären und der politischen Katastrophe den Lesern/Innen verdeutlicht: weit über eine Million Tote; über zwei Millionen Flüchtlinge; über vier Millionen innerstaatliche Flüchtlinge sowie die Zerstörung der kompletten Infrastruktur des Landes. Die westlichen Neokolonialisten kamen nicht allein. In ihrem Gepäck hatten sie zehntausende von Söldnern, unzählige Nichtregierungsorganisationen, koloniale Feministinnen (Haifa Zangana), und US-amerikanische evangelikale Fundamentalisten, die sich um die kümmern, die den Überfall überlebt haben. Der US-amerikanische „Prokonsul“ Paul Bremer trug durch seine irrationalen Entscheidungen wesentlich zum Desaster im Irak bei. So löste er nicht nur die irakische Armee auf, sondern verweigerte allen Mitgliedern der Baath-Partei sich am Aufbau des „neuen Irak“ zu beteiligen. So installierte er durch seine „Befehle“ Nr. 57 und 77 „US-Aufpasser“ und „US-Inspektoren“ in allen Ministerien und stattete sie mit unumschränkten Vollmachten aus. Mit dem „Befehl“ Nr. 17 erhielten ausländische Unternehmer und die Mitglieder der privaten Sicherheitsdienste „Immunität“, schreiben die Autoren.

Die Autoren weisen mehrfach darauf hin, dass die USA nicht die zivilen Toten ihrer Feinde zählten. Dies haben sie weder im ersten und zweiten Golfkrieg getan, noch tun sie es in Afghanistan. Auch zu Beginn des Vietnamkrieges kümmerte man sich nicht darum, bis Senator Edward M. Kennedy dies durch eine massive Intervention im US-Senate erzwang. Wie sagte Herald Pinter in seiner Nobelpreisrede 2005: „Die irakischen Toten existieren nicht. Sie werden noch nicht einmal als tot registriert.“ Auch unter der Obama-Administration wird diese „Tradition“ fortgesetzt. Als Obama in seiner Rede am 27. Februar 2009 den „Abzug“ ankündigte, erinnerte er nur an das „Leiden“ der eigenen Soldaten, ganz zu schweigen von dem irregeleiteten Narrative, den auch Bush hätte nicht besser formulieren können. So dankte er dem US-Militär, für „extending a precious opportunity to the people of Iraq“ und fügte in völliger Verdrehung der Tatsachen hinzu, dass sein Land nicht „Tyrannei und Chaos“ verursacht, sondern diese bekämpft habe. Und um die Chutzpah noch zu steigern, erklärte er: „We Americans have offered our most precious resouces – our young men and women – to work with you ro rebuild what was destroyed by despotism; to root out our common enemies; and to seek peace and prosperity for our children and grandchildren, and for yours.” Besser hätte es auch George W. Bush nicht sagen können; nur die Verursacher von Tod und Chaos haben Opfer gebracht, wohingegen das millionenfache Leid und die totale Verwüstung des Iraq angeblich durch „despotism“ herbeigeführt worden sind. Oder meinte Obama vielleicht mit „despotism“ das elfjährige tödliche Sanktionsregime der USA und Großbritanniens? Die Autoren jedenfalls sehen klarer: „Obama´s speech revealed the deep disconnect between truth and political discourse that still poisons so much of the debate on Iraq.“

Was der Überfall der USA im Iraq angerichtet hat, umschreiben die Autoren mit „Sociocide“ in Anlehnung an die Untersuchung von Keith Doubt über die Vorgänge in Bosnien. Nach Doubt verbirgt sich hinter „Sociocide“ ein „coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the distruction of the essential foundations of society“. Es beinhaltet die soziale Zerstörung, das heißt, „solidarity, identity, family, social institutions, self-consciousness“, und zieht einen korrupten Staat mit katastrophalen Folgen nach sich, in dem „distrust and bad faith become the dominant orientations of human beings living together”. Trotz dieser verheerenden Auswirkungen sehen die Autoren doch einen Hoffnungsschimmer für Iraq. „Sociocide did not run ist cause. Despite a coordinated attack on Iraqi people and institutions, vibrant social strands remain intact. Iraqis like Youkhanna, Eskander, Riverband and Sunshine – plus the countless others that have worked to restore Iraq and document its destruction – reveal an ethos of resilence amid carnage. Against all odds, Iraqi identity has not been destroyed.”

Michael Ottermann, Richard Hil und Paul Wilson sehen nur noch eine Aufgabe für die USA und ihre willigen Helfershelfer: “payment of reconstruction, resettlement and reparations”. Als letzte Konsequenz muss noch der totale umgehende Abzug hinzukommen. Eine Übersetzung ins Deutsche wäre hilfreich, weil auch in Deutschland ein Schleier des Schweigens sich ausgebreitet hat über das, was „der Westen“ im Namen von Demokratie, Freiheit und westlichen Werten in diesem Lande angerichtet hat. Das Buch war überfällig und sollte die politischen Eliten über eine Teilnahme ihrer Länder an möglichen weiteren Abenteuern, die in den USA oder anderen Orts ausgeheckt werden, nachdenken lassen. Dass die Verursacher dieser Verbrechen vor den Internationalen Strafgerichtshof in Den Haag gehören, versteht sich von selbst.

Erasing Iraq. The Human Costs of Carnage

Nobody seems to talk anymore about the human sufferings and the costs of the US-led invasion of Iraq. Under President Barack Obama the US is still unwilling to end the illegal occupation of this country and take the partners of the “coaltion of the willing” and live the country. All the talk about a prospective “withdrawal” from Iraq seems mere rhetoric. Large military facilities are popping up like mushrooms all over the place, and in Baghdad they are building an embassy of the size of Vatican City. Modern history tells us that when the US takes over a country it will stay until it is thrown out like was the case in Vietnam or Iran. The long-term prospects of remaining an occupier in Iraq or Afghanistan are rather dim, taking the history of resistance against foreign occupation in both countries into account.

It takes three Australians, a freelance journalist and two scholars, to ask questions about the costs of carnage not only of the US attack on Iraq in 2003 but also of the deadly sanctions period that started days after Saddam Hussein´s invasion into Kuwait in 1990 and remained in place for more than 11 years after the restoration of Kuwait´s sovereignty in February 1991. The authors present a terrifying picture of this devastated country, whose population has paid a heavy price in blood and impoverishment. The authors visited Syria, Jordan, and Sweden, where the largest community of Iraqis live in exile, and talked to the refugees. They also analyze the writings on Iraqi blogs.

For almost two decades the US and its “willing executioners”, especially the United Kingdom, have persecuted war and aggression in Iraq. They turned a county that was once the most secular of Arab countries, in which nation resources were used to increase literacy, industrialization and women emanzipation, that it was a major center of Arab learning – students from all over the Arab world went to study in Baghdad, into a living hell. In earlier times, the colonialist carried with them missionaries who converted the pagans into Christians. Today, the neo-colonialists not only infade a country with their superior militarily forces, but bring along tens of thousends of merceneries, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), colonial feminists, and US-evangelical fundamentalists. They intent to take care of those human beings who survived the military assault. What Frantz Fanon writes in “The Wretched of the Earth” that ”colonialism shamelessly pulls every string ” paradicmatically holds true for Iraq and Afghanistan.

The authors point out that Saddam Hussein was a creation of the US - “a regional strongman charged with checking Soviet and Iranian influence in the Middle East”. The earliest contacts between the US and Saddam stretch back to the Cold War era. In 1959, Saddam was part of a six-men team recuited by the CIA to assassinate Prime minister Abd al Karim Qasim. Since then, the US administration maintained close relations with Saddam, especially after he became Iraq´s president in 1979. During the war between Iraq and Iran, the US government supplied Saddam not only with conventional, but also with chemical and biological, weapons. Ronald Reagan`s special envoy Donald Rumsfeld paid a visit to the autocrat and “conveyed (to him) the President´s greetings and expressed his pleasure at being in Baghdad”. Saddam returned these niceties by using US heliocopers to gas the Kurds in Halabdsha and to fight the Iranians with these poisonous weapons. Admittedly, the US condemed Iraq´s use of weapons of mass destruction (MWD), but conditioned it by saying that there were “indications” that Iran had used chemical weapons too, which could never be proven.

Saddam fell into US disgrace when he attacked Kuwait in August 1990. Two weeks before this happened, he summoned US ambassador April Glaspie to his palace where she commented on the build-up of Iraqi troops at the Kuwaiti border as follows: “We have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait.” US administration officials later disputed this statement. In contrast to Bush junior, his father obtained the approval of the UN-Security Council to restore Kuwait´s sovereignty by force. The US used massive firepower, including depleted uranium (DU) ammunition. The radioactive fallout caused not only a high death-rate of cancer and fatal deformities, but affected also thousands of US soldiers. “Even cockroaches were seemingly affected by DU”, write the authors.

Special attention by the authors are paid to the sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council in August 1990, which lasted until the attack in March 2003. During this period it is estimated that more than one million Iraqis died, half of them children. Asked on national TV what she thought about the death of half a million children in Iraq due to sanctions, Madeleine Albright, then US Secretary of State, answered: “we think the price is worth it”. During the sanctions period Iraq was reduced to the status of a poor third world country. The US and the United Kingdom established, without UN mandate, two no-fly zones, one in the north, in the Kurdish areas, and one in the predominantly Shiite south, where only they could fly. From these areas, US and UK aircraft regularly bombed Iraq. As the humanitarian situation in Iraq deteriorated further and further, the UN established in 1996 a program called “Oil for Food”, under which Iraq was permitted to sell oil and import humanitarian goods for the proceeds. The first humanitarian coordinator, Denis J. Halliday, resigned in 1998 because his conscience did not allow him to participate in this humanitarian charade. After leaving for ethical reasons his career as a high UN official, he began a tournée of lecutres in which he described the sanctions as a form of genocide. His seccessor, Hans van Sponeck, also quit in protest because the program could not satisfy basic human needs. This did not prevent President Bill Clinton from declaring in 1997: “Sanctions will be there until the end of time or as long as he (Saddam) lasts.” Since 1998, through the “Iraq Liberation Act” the removal of Saddam from power became official US policy.

Although some of the interviewed by the authors state that life under Saddam was bad and his regime was brutal and people had to suffer out of political opposition to the regime, they describe the period from 1991 to 2003 and beyond as horrific. In the aftermath of the attack in 2003, Iraq desended in every respect into chaos. Michael Otterman, freelance journalist, maintains that comparing the Saddam regime with the current situation is akin to comparing apples with oranges. He met numerous Iraqis who supported the ousting of Saddam, but he did not meet any Iraqi who supported this prolonged occupation. Until the mid 1990s, Iraq was a very secular society. Religious persecution was unknown. Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz was a Christian. The government included Kurds. But after 2003 the society split along ethnic and religious lines, a divide to which many of the killings are attributed. The human costs of this carnage were “tremendous”, so were the cultural ones. The US occupation forces guarded the Interior and the Oil ministries, but did not care about the massive lootings of all museums and the tens of thousends cultural sides. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld´s only remarks were: “stuff happens”.

The US assault caused the death of more than one million Iraqis; 2,2 million refugees, mainly in Syria and Jordan, 4 million internally displaced people, and the social infrastructure totally destroyed. The authors call this “sociocide”, using the termed coined by Keith Doubt in his book “Understanding Evil: Lessons from Bosnia”. It means that the basic elements of Iraqi society were destroyed, including “solidarity, identity, family, social institutions, self-consciousness”. Instead “distrust and bad faith become the dominant orientations of human beings living together”. But amids this societal and moral devastations the authors found a positive outlook, especially on the blogger-scene: “Iraqis now endure precarious peace punctuated by assassinations and suicide attacks and a fragile democracy still split along ethnic and sectarian lines. But sociocide did not run its course. Despite a coordinated attack on Iraqi people and institutions, vibrant social strands remain intact. Iraqis like Youkhanna, Eskander, Riverband and Sunshine – plus the countless others that have worked to restore Iraq and document its destruction – reveal an ethos of resilence amid carnage. Against all odds, Iraqi identity has not been destroyed.”

For the main perpetrator, the US government and its “willing executioners”, the authors see only one passive role involving “payment of reconstruction, resettlement and reparations” to the Iraqi people, that could well into run into trillions of dollars. One aspect is highlighted by the authors: They mention repeatedly that the US does not engage into body.count of the enemy. This held true for the first US war against Iraq (1991), as well as for the latest attack. This was also true in Vietnam, where the US military accounted for every bomb they dropped and every screw they have used, but did not care how many Vietnamese died. Only after Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts intervened massively, the US government started counting civilian casualties in Vietnam. The occupation forces of Afghanistan do not hold either a body-count of dead Afghans. The late Harold Pinter said in his Nobel speech in 2005: “Their (Iraqi) deaths don´t exist. They are blank. They are not even recorded as being dead.”

This reviewed book is the first that gives the victims of occupation a voice and documents the war crimes, the crimes against humanity and other atrocities, which have been perpetrated upon the Iraqi people by the Western quest for hegemony and domination. In the presence of this desaster the book leave the reader with two justified conclusions: Immediate withdrawal and massive financial compensations. For these war crimes, the perpetrators have to be brought to the International Court of Justice.

Published by Pluto Press, London-New York 2010.
First published: MWC News, May 27, 2010, and here: Australia.to News, May 27, 2010.

Ein ungerechter Krieg

Am 3. Mai 2010 habe ich folgenden Leserbrief an die Redaktion des Magazins "Der Spiegel" zum Kommentar „Ein gerechter Krieg“ von Matthias Matussek mit der Bitte um Abdruck gesandt, der nicht entsprochen worden ist.

Man möchte dem „Geostrategen“ Matthias Mattusek zurufen: Schuster, bleib bei deinen Leisten! Auch wenn es in „Der Spiegel“ steht, wird aus einem ungerechten kein „gerechter Krieg“. Insgeheim scheint der Autor es zu bedauern, dass es in Deutschland immer noch keine Kriegsbegeisterung gibt wie weiland in den USA: „God bless you, boys!“ Es ist gut so, dass in Deutschland Gott nicht für Kriege in Anspruch genommen wird. Matussek scheint vergessen zu haben, dass deutsche Soldaten schon einmal mit Gott in den Krieg gezogen sind: „Gott mit uns“ prangerte von den Koppelschlössern der Soldaten im Ersten und im Zweiten Weltkrieg nur bei den Wehrmachtssoldaten, und das Völkerschlachtdenkmal wird von diesem Slogan geziert. Auch sein martialischer Wortschwall, mit dem er das obskure Taliban-Regime charakterisiert, wie „Killer-Kollektive“, „religiöse Gangster, die Schulen abfackeln, Frauen steinigen, Teenager mit Koranversen zu Killern abrichten und ihre Waffen mit Drogengeldern finanzieren“, ändert nichts an der Tatsache, dass die 9/11-Terroranschläge nicht von Afghanistan und den Afghanen ausgeführt worden sind, sondern von überwiegend saudiarabischen Studenten (15 von 20) aus dem Westen. Ein Blick ins Völkerrecht hätte genügt, um festzustellen, dass dieser Krieg illegal ist. Auch der These von der Bündnissolidarität fehlt die rechtliche Grundlage, weil die USA von keinem Land angegriffen worden sind, sondern von Kriminellen in den USA. Es lag also kein "Bündnisfall" vor. Die Kriege „des Westens“ gegen Afghanistan und den Irak werden in weiten Teilen der muslimischen Welt als „Kriege gegen den Islam“ wahrgenommen, ob uns das passt oder nicht. Will Matussek allen Ernstes insinuieren, dass das korrupte Regime von Hamid Karzai verteidigungswert sei? Unter ihm ist der Drogenhandel erst richtig aufgeblüht. In der Tat sollte der Terrorismus dort bekämpft werden, "wo er gebrütet wird", und zwar in Hamburg, London und Madrid oder anderen Orts mit den Mittel der Sicherheitsdienste. Es ist bekannt, dass die Terroristen nicht aus Afghanistan eingefolgen worden sind. Neudeutsch nennt man das "home-grown terrorism". Als Ex-Kulturchef des „Spiegel“ müsste ihm die Ballade „Trauerspiel Afghanistan“ von Theodor Fontane bekannt sein, die dieser anlässlich des britisch-afghanischen Krieges vor 160 Jahren schrieb und die wie folgt endete:

Die hören sollen, sie hören nicht mehr,
Vernichtet ist das ganze Heer,
Mit dreizehntausend der Zug begann,
Einer kam heim aus Afghanistan.

Hoffen wir, dass den in Afghanistan stationierten Soldaten ein solches Schicksal erspart bleibt. Für einen Abzug ist es auch nach neun Jahren noch nicht zu spät.

Open Secrets - Israel Shahak revisited

The neocons and the Fawning Corporate Media (FCM) in the United States of America are on a war spree again; this time against Iran. This Muslim country and its leadership are demonised by neocons and some public interest groups as the embodiment of the ultimate evil. Like in the case of Iraq, the Americans have a distorted picture of reality due to a selective information policy by the FCM. According to opinion pool made by CNN 71 percent believe that Iran possesses nuclear weapons. One would have expected that after the Iraq fiasco, Americans would become a little smarter.

The anti-Iranian bias of the U. S. political elite rests at least on three pillars: firstly, the hostage crisis between November 4, 1979 and January 20, 1981, secondly, the permanent pressure by Israeli governments and their U. S. supporters over the last 20 years. But, thirdly, the most important one are geopolitical considerations. Here, the book by Israel Shahak comes into play, in which he exposes Israel´s stategic policy as it really is. Drawing exclusively on the Hebrew press, Shahak reveals that the Israeli ideology is widely misunderstood outside, since, as in the case of foreign policy, “no attention is paid to what the Israeli establishment says to Israeli Jews about its intenions and policies” (p. 7). They cannot be understood according to what they say to the outside world, writes the author.

Apart from providing an analysis on Israel´s foreign and nuclear policy, the book is in many ways a discription ot Israeli Hebrew media. Prof. Shahak´s radical thesis is supported from Israeli politicans and military people. In the preface, Shahak has interesting things to say about this relationship. „Israeli long-range plans are decided upon by army generals, intelligence seniors and high officials. The government and the Prime Minister only rarely initiate policy. In all wars stated by Israel, its government has been informed of decisions to attack when troops were already in position.“ As a result, the author quotes mainly souces from the security establishment that take up much space in the media. Another aspect, underestimated by Western pundits, is the significance of Zionist ideology. “In Israel, power is firmly in the hand of the Security System and of the Zionist parties whose deep commitment to Zionist ideology has not been challenged.” (p. 176)

Prof. Israel Shahak was an extraordinary person. Untill his retirement, he was tenured as a professor of Organic Chemistry at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. A survivor of the Warsaw ghetto and Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, he emigrated in 1945 to Palestine (now Israel). He was a humanist, a live-long human rights activist. For many years he was chairman of the Israeli Human Rights League and consistently criticized Zionism, Israel`s policy towards the Palastinians, the reactionary elements in Jewish religion, and Jewish fundamentalism. He passed away on July 2, 2001 at the age of 68. Along Yeseyahu Leibowitz, he could be regarded as one of Israel´s last prophets.

The author calls a spade a spade. His opinion differs markedly from those of Western pundits who solely relay on offical communiqués because they can´t read the Hebrew press. That is why Shahak comes to totally different conclusions about Israeli policy aims. These “aims of the State of Israel (and its predecessor the Zionist Movement) at any given period of time have to be understood according to what the Israeli leaders say to their followers, and now especially by what they say to the Israeli Jewish elite. They cannot be understood according to what they say to the outside world“. (p. 1) For Shahak „the ´wish for peace`, so often assumed as the Israeli aim, is not in my view a principle of Israeli policy, while the wish to extend Israeli domination and influence is.“ (p. 2)

Shahak describes the principals on which Israeli policies are based on: „In the first place they are regional in their extent; their subject is the entire Middle East from Morocco to Pakistan, and in addition they have an important global aspect, especially prominent in the 1990s.“ (p. 3) However, the global aspects have taken a back seat to Israel´s regional aims. The latter have two intertwined goals: „hegemony-seeking and the support of the `stability´ of most of the now-existing regimes in the Middle East, with the notable exception of Iran, and (only for a relatively short period, now ended) of Iraq.“ (p. 3) Israel´s enmity toward Iran and its arguments then and now are strikingly similar.

After the ousting ot the Shah, the main Israeli policy aim was the overthrow of the Islamic Iranian regime.The argument used was the removal of „Islamic fundamentalism“ for the supposed benefit of the West. According to Shahak, this argument was a fallacy, although, „tamely accepted by many U. S. ´experts`“: Firstly, he argues, Israel has for years tacitly supported Hamas and other Islamic fundamentalist organizations against the PLO. Secondly, the most fundamentalist Islamic state in the Middle East is Saudi Arabia, which Israel is not opposing. Today, the Israeli politicians, their supportes in the U. S., the FCMs, and almost the whole U. S. Congress support the „argument“ that the non-existent Iranian nuclear weapons would pose an imminent danger not only for Israel but to world peace. Looking at the facts, this claim could not be further more from reality than the forecast of the coming of the Messia tomorrow. The U. S. and its allies have to come to grips with the political demonisation of Iran by the neconservative warmongers and dread brokers in order to stay politically sane. What happens to a society where „fear agents“ have a say, is described by Gideon Levy in his article „What would happen if Israel stopped fighting the world?“, published in „Haaretz“ of April 8, 2010.

Shahak writes that Israel can´t accept another power in the region, that could challenge its hegemony. Consequently, it pursues a policy of „coalition building“ against Iran, which „may led to war“, writes Shahak. Israel´s efforts to establish an anti-Iranian front are detailed in chapter two. According to Shahak, Israeli strategists are not bothered by the oppression of the Palestinians. What they are concerned with „establishing a hegemony over the entire Middle East, conceived of as extending from India to Mauretania. Of course,the first victim of Israeli expensionism in search of such a hegemony is the Palestinian nation.“ (p. 32) Shahak quotes a 1981 speech by then Defense Minister Ariel Sharon in which „he defined the extension of Israel´s influence ´from Mauretania to Aghanistan` as an Israeli aim“. (p. 32) While Israeli politicians depict the Iranian regime in the darkest colors, Shahak holds up a mirror to Israel´s political elite. He warns: “The prosect of Gush Emunim (The Block of the Faithful), or some secular right-wing Israeli fanatics, or some of the delirious Israeli Army generals, seizing control of israeli nuclear weapons and using them in accordance with their ´knowledge`of politics or by the authority of ´divine command` cannot be precluded either. In my view the likelihood of the occurence of some such calamity is growing. We should not forget that while Israeli Jewish society undergoes a steady political polarization, the Israeli Security System increasingly relies on the recruitment of cohorts from the ranks of the extreme right.“ (p. 37-38)

In an interview with the Egyptian newspaper Al Ahram, the then Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said: „Israel is ready to make peace with any Middle Eastern state with the exception of Iran.“ (p, 67) At that time, Saddam Hussein was still alive and kicking before he was turned into a monster by the Israeli leadership, the neocons and „the boy-emporar from Crawford, Texas“ at the helm. Shahak writes that once the Israels generals decided that Iran is the most dangerous enemy for Israel and the whole Middle East, they did everything to promote this conviction abroad. He continues that „it is perfectly credible that stirring up any conceivable country against Iran remains the guiding principle of the new and independent Israeli policies“. Quoting Aluf Benn, who wrote in Haaretz from September 28, 1995 that Yitzhak Rabin´s strategy was “to push the U. S. and other western powers into a confrontation with Iran. If Israel confronts Iran on its own, it may get involved in a religious war against the entire Muslim world.” (p. 91) The Israeli propaganda (Hasbara) depicted the rulers of Iran as “a danger to peace in the entire world and a threat to equilibrioum between Western civilization and Islam”. (p. 91) Recently, this arguments were revived by Minister President Binyamin Netanyahu.

Israel Shahak belonged to the very few Israeli who entertained no illusions about the so-called peace process and about the role of Yassir Arafat in this drama for the Palestinian people. Anybody who has read Hebrew newspapers carefully, like Shahak did, could have known since September 7, 1993 that the Palestinians in Oslo were pulled over the barrel by Israeli diplomacy. Shahak quotes Yitzhak Rabin from the Israeli daily Yediot Ahronot where he boasted about his victory: “The entire united Jerusalem will be outside the autonomy (...) Jewish settlements will be placed under an exclusive Israeli jurisdiction; the Autonomy Council will have no authority over them. The forces of the Israeli Army will be redeployed on locations determined only by us.” (p. 162) The term withdrawal was only used for the Gaza Strip, not for the West Bank. Rabin did not bother to specify the exact borders of the land in question. Already in September 1994 the plan for the “bypassing roads” (roads to be only used by Jewish settlers and the military) was discussed and revealed in the Hebrew press in November 1994: “All to clearly, the plan favoured the settlers and was intended to perpetuate the Israeli conquest of the Territories more effectually than before, by using `control from outside`”. (p. 167) Shahak is very critical of the Zionist left, such as the organization Peace Now, which “extolled this racist plan as ´a positive sign of implementation of the peace process`”. (p.167) And for Meron Benvenisti was clear, that “Israel grants Arafat a semblance of a state, no relief can be expected in the conditions of oppression, control and exploitation”. (p. 168)

The author sheds light on the ideological dimension of Zionist policy since the 1920s. “The laws of the State of Israel pertaining to the use of land are based on the principle of discrimination against all non-Jews. The State of Israel has turned most of the land in Israel (about 92 per cent) into ´state land`. After those lands are defined as owned by the State of Israel they can be leased for long periods only to Jews. The right to a long-term lease of such land is denied to all non-Jews without a single exception. This denial is enforced by placing all state lands under the administration by the Jewish National Fund, a branch of the World Zionist Organization, whose racist statutes forbid their long-term lease, or any use, to non-Jews.” (p. 169) This land is leased for 49 years with an automatic renewal for another 49-year period. Sub-leasing to non-Jews is forbidden by the administrative authority. Land-leasing to non-Jews is only allowed for grazing and is limited to eleven month. Shahak debunks the allegedly “socialist” or “utopian” character of the collective settlements designated as kibbutzim (plural of kibbutz) and moshavim (plural of moshav), because only Jews are allowed to live in them.”Non-Jews who desire to become members of a kibbutz, even a kibbutz whose Jewish members are atheists, must convert to Judaism.” (p. 170)

Shahak´s book should prompt the U. S. and Western political elite not to adopt the Israeli anti-Iranian bias. Iran is in reality neither a threat to Israel nor to the West and much less to the U. S. Israel has several hundred nuclear weapons, the U. S. have over 5,000 and France and Great Britan also have quite a few. In 2007, a U. S. Intelligence Estimate stated that Iran had halted its military nuclear program in 2003. The Obama administration must do everything to prevent the warmongers from drawing the U. S. into another deadly adventure. A war against Iran would not be another “cakewalk”, as assumed by the neocons. Shahak´s book provides a deep insight into the true aims of Israel´s foreign policy towards Iran. Studying it could prevent a looming war. A must read for everybody.

The book was first published in 1997 by Pluto Press, London-Chicago.