Ahmadinejad treats Netenyahu the same way Netenyahu treats the Palestinians!

On 24 October 2009, Israeli prime minister Benjamin 'Bibi' Netenyahu took the podium before the
UN general assembly. With grand gestures, he unfolded a Nazi plan of a concentration, in order to silence the 'holocaust denier' Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the president of the Islamtic Republic of Iran. He then proceeded to excoriate Tehran which his old ally and former US president George Bush, had labeled an 'axis of evil' state. Israel has a nervous finger on the bomb button to teach Iran a lesson by 'pre emptively' attacking one or two or many underground nuclear installations. But his American proconsul in Washington has denied him that opportunity. Little wonder, an Israeli attack on Iran would ignite the fuse on the powder keg that is the Middle East. And so short of the black art of propaganda and sabotage, Mr. Netenyahu has little choice but to vilify Iran.

Iran's Ahmadinejad, a wily politician he, knows how to tweak the tail of the Lions of Judea. He simply denies that the Holocaust took place. Which understandably serves one purpose: to set Israel's nerves on edge. It matters little that Holocaust survivors are alive and living in Israel and in other lands, the Irani president willingly speaks out that the destruction of some 6 million Jews and more millions of Poles, Communists, dissident Christian clergy, homosexuals, mentally and physically disabled, and Roms or Gypsies, perished in a Nazi lunatic plan of 'Lebensraum' or what we today call 'ethnic cleansing'. It is a deliberate ploy of the Irani president. Usually in the same breath, Mr. Ahmadi nejad speaks of the sorry plight of the Palestinians who are living under sorry conditions and badly treated by 42 years of Israeli occupation where day by day they are subjected to the complete disdain of the Israeli occupier who not only demeans and debases their humanity, by steals their land, in a calculated move to redeem the Biblic'. al Judea and Samaria, and realise the Zionist dream of one country from the Mediterrenean to the banks of the Jordan river. Not only that, it has waged brutal military assaults on Palestinians, especially those in Gaza who refuse, under the democratically elected Hamas government, to recognise the state of Israel.

Now, president Ahmadi nejad might not or might truly belong to Holocaust deniers, but he has the authority of a rival state in a neighbourhood that Israel's military and economic might think that they control. Wrong. By his 'denial', he has Mr. Netenyahu by the short hairs. By insisting on the rights of, and the wrongs done to the Palestinians, the Irani president has challenged Israli's monopoly on the Palestine narrative. And there is little Israel can do about it short of ''manu militari'. Israel's brutal war against Gaza the victims of which were overwhelming civilian, has lost it friends, or if not, has raised serious doubts or questions of its political sense and sensibility if not sanity.

And that is the object all sublime of Mr. Ahmadi nejad's 'denial of the Holocaust'. It is a hard lesson for Israel to learn. It is not anti Semitism as such but it does wash Mr. Netenyahu in the clotted mud that Israel has for the last 60 years tried to bury Palestinians' rights and aspirations, in. Mr. Ahmadi nejad has dare to vilify, to treat with utter contempt the right to another people's land. Since the Likud government that Mr. Netenyahu heads refuses the littlest of acknowledgements of Palestine's right to exist as a sovereign nation, nor stop illegally grabbing Palestinian land, but affirms Gold Meir's contemptable utterance, 'the Palestinian people, they don't exist', Iran's attacks against it won't strong. They will encourage more questioning of Israel's intransigeance in bringing peace to Palestine. And that is the lesson, Mr. Netenyahu hasn't learnt, nor, it seems, is capable of understanding and correcting. Mr. Ahmadi nejad's denial of the Holocaust simply put, says that Israel is a usurper of other people's land, and therefore illegitimate in its claim to a state and a seat among other nations. It's a hard lesson to learn for Israel.

Israel and Iran were friends once upon a time. Certainly during the days of the Shah. And yes, they co operated even after the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Remember Ronald Reagan's underhanded banking rolling the Contras in Nicaragua. And Israel served as the middle man. [Vide, Trita Parsi's ground breaking study of the exchange of money for guns!]

Obama falters on Palestine and Israel

US president Barack Obama [BHO] may know a thing or two about dealing with street gangs in the ghettos of Chicago, but he's outclassed and klewless on bringing peace to Israel and Palestine and furthering negotiations for a two state solution.
Talking about a gang of thugs in the Middle East, Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netenyahu takes the pride of place as king pin. BHO is no match for him, even though the American president holds a hand full of aces. He has softened his mild stand on illegal settlements in Palestinian land which Israel holds in its steel vice of occupation since 1967.
BHO can and should exert economic pressure on the Likud government. Israel is a US client, but the way things are going it looks as though the US is Jerusalem's eunuch. BHO should take a page out of Dwight Eisenhower's book. During the Suez crisis, Mr. Eisenhower sent a strong message to Israel's prime minister David Ben Gurion: either you withdraw from Suez or we are going to stop economic and military aid. And Ben Gurion folded his tent and sneaked away in the night. This is not BHO's style, which is a cream pie in his own face.
Unless the US tells its client to whom it furnished untold billions in economic and military aid, without demanding reimbursement!, to stand down, the two state solution is condemned to the dung heap of fantasy.
BHO may deliver moving speeches, but he does not follow through. He's congentially unable to talk the talk, walk the walk. And the victims of his spaghetti spined policy are the Palestinians whom the Israeli have caged in Bantustan islands of their own territory which Jerusalem has the termity to Samaria and Judea, long gone.

Goldman Sachs evaluates North Korea?

If the nay sayers do not see movement on dealing with the DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of Korea aka North Korea], the mighty investment house of Goldman Sachs' analyst suddenly discover the economic clout, Pyongyang would bring to a re unified Korean peninsula. Goldman Sachs smells money in Korea. Suddenly, in spite of its planned economy, the economic strong suit of North Korea suddenly emerges like a genie out long time imprisoned in a bottle.
The mighty Wall Street investment banking house's conclusion that one Korea would surpass the Germany and Japan in growth in the next 30-40 years. Now, that's hedging one's bets!
Pointing out the DPRK mineral wealth which the ROC [Republic of Korea aka South Korea] lacks, North Korea would benefit from the lessons Seoul's first world economy can teach it.

Goldman Sachs is peddling warmed over rice. And it is engaging in gimcrack research on what anyone with mild curiosity could copy from the 'Encyclopedia Britannica'. Until now, for the US
the DPRK has been a 'pariah state', and one unworthy of attention. This has dramatically changed, the more especially owing to Washington's inept diplomacy in discussions with Pyongyang on a host of questions, not the least being its nuclear programme.

Within the last fortnight the US state department announced 'quietly' that the Obama administration will engage in direct talks with North Korea; for its part the DPRK will soon rejoin the six party talks in Beijing which he swore that it would never do.

Citizen Bill Clinton 'private mission of mercy' has opened the floodgates of diplomatic activity on issues with North Korea. And South Korea's hard line president Lee Myung bak has soften his approach to the North, in line with Washington's change of heart.

Even the doyen of business magazines 'Fortune' in its 15 September 2009 issue carried a long article on 'the man who loves North Korea', a certain Mr. Kim, originally from the ROC now living in the US, who is building a private science and technology university in Pyongyang, which the articles says will also award MBAs.

Goldman Sachs' analysis talks of the weaknesses of the North Korean ecovnomy which the pundits and talking heads have been predicting complete collapse for the last 15 years, but it does not track the flexibility that Pyongyang has initiated or overtaken by severe famine which loosened coontrol of family farming and open air 'free' markets, nor the slow reforms put in place. It fails to appreciate that the fiercely nationalistic North Korean state acts in its own interests on its own terms.

Nonetheless, the Goldman Sachs 'report' is a bellwether for the big bracket banks and business to look seriously at investing in North Korea, and of course, with the long term view of re unifying the divided Korean peninsula.

Guam Diary wonders how much the house that Goldman and Sachs built pays attention to history and the political realities of both Koreas. But you can count on one thing, where Goldman Sachs sticks it nose in, there is lots of money that it is hoping to be made!

Xinjiang twists the Chinese dragon's tail

Meeting Chinese official abroad, say, at symposia or luncheons or informally, is interesting. The younger ones and more oft than not the middle aged ones, and the few, old and more senior ones are polite, and schooled in a civility and a pattern of speech agreeable to foreign ears, especially westerns'. Furthermore, they have matriculated in US or British or continental European schools of higher learning. They have done their homework, and the results can be impressive.
Yet, mention Tibet or the Dalai Lama or Xinjiang or Rebiya Kadeer, now residing in the US and spokeswoman of her fellow Turkmans' aspiration, the tone of the conversation turns south and frosty, if not hostile.
China's central government, ruled by the CCP [Communist Party of China]'s reaction is more extreme, and might be designated by 'ballistic' or 'off the wall' in icalumny, viciosius misinterpretation, character assassination, and downright slander and gutter language.
Consider the film 'The 10 conditions of love' about the once feted, now damned documentary on the World Qyghur Congress' leader Rebiya Kadeer. Shown at an Australian film festival, Beijing not only lodged complaints of interference in the internal affairs of China but the festival organisers were handmaidens of the devil splitters of the Chinese motherland, by trying to estrange the Qyghurs of Xinjiang from the bosom of the Han motherland. The organisers were not amused nor persuaded by high emotions; they did not give into black mail easily. So, Beijing played a strong suit: it forced its own film makers to withdrew from the festival. The festival went on anyway, but the only casualties were China's 'metteurs en scene'!
Now '10 conditions...' is coming to Taiwan, which mainland China is trying to woo back into its fold. 'Resolutely opposing' the projection of the film which brings the horrible plight of the Qyghurs in Xinjiang to the wider world, blue in the face with indignation, its 'demarches', protests, strong pungent language, won't stay Rebiya Kabeer's image from flashing across the cinema screen. Beijing forgets that on Taiwan a flourish democracy prospers, and a degree of free speech exists which is what dreams are made of on mainland China.
In less that 8 weeks, China has had to drink bowls of bitter tea when its come to Taiwan. It had to swallow the visit of the Dalai Lama, after the torrential rains and mud slides which laentombed thousands in the south of Taiwan. And now, another arch enemy of the Han, Rebiya Kabeer's appeal for the indigenous rights of the Qyghurs, long abused by the CCP, gains a hearing on Taiwan.
Beijing cannot escape the fallout of its repressive policies in Tibet and in Xinjiang. One October, the CCP will be celebrating year 60 of its seizure of power. On the matter of the right of self determination of its minorities, Tibetan or Qyghur [Turkman], it has failed miserably through armed repression, encouraging emigration of the Han majority to swamp Tibet and Xinjiang by massive infusions of Chinese settlers with privileges denied to Tibetans and Qyghurs, repressive regulations and laws, the marginalisation of minority culture, language, religious practices, so on and on. In brief, a mental genocide and a factory line production of ersatz Han. China has created its own shameful legacy and it cannot nor won't be erased by threats and objections and childish stamping of feet.

Another black eye for Israel

The much awaited Goldstone Report on Israel's war in Gaza, commissioned by the United Nations [UN] is out. The 574 report did not have Israel's Likud Government support nor cooperation. Its conclusions are damning for Israel. It is quite damaging to Israel the more especially since South Africa's international respected jurist Richard Goldstone is not only Jewish but he is a Zionist. Yet, which his heart may inform him, does not in any way influence his judgment, probity, and integrity.
Hamas does not escape blame, and may be guilty of war crimes. But the lion's share of the judge's censure belongs to Israel. Its IDF [Tsuhal or Israel Defense Force] committed crimes of war against the civilian population of Gaza. It is estimated that 1400 defenceless women, children, and men perished in Israel's 21 day war in Gaza in June 2009. The destruction of property ranges in the hundreds of millions of $US. Jerusalem carried out a war of collective guilt which is against the Geneva Convention. Israel suffered 13 deaths and minimal damage to property, but its citizens near Gaza's borders may have sustained psychological distress, they are at least alive and enjoy very little damage to infrastructure damage, nor spend nights in bombed outbuilding or in tents, nor are they subject to a deliberate policy of obtaining the very minimum nourishment which a steel trapped Israeli blockade enforce.
Israel and Hamas have a period in which to reply to the report. Jerusalem has brazenly announced, it won't. In fact, it has reissued an IDF report which absolves it of any blame. If Israel persists, the International Tribunal in The Hague will consider charges of war crimes against Jerusalem.
Israel's protector and banker the US will block any such move.

Meanwhile the major American newspapers have already begun skewering the Goldstone Report's conclusions, apportioning equal blame to Hamas and Israel. The blame of course is not evenly shared. The facts are there to see that Israel should and has to shoulder the consequences and the blame for a brutal war against a civilian population. But Americans on the whole do not go in for facts much, so willful ignorance will absolve blame of Israel in the US.

Judge Goldstone's daughter speaking in Hebrew to the Israeli media, defended her father's record and his integrity. Nonetheless, judging by anyone who dares criticise Israel, the internationally renowned jurist will be smeared with the brush of 'self hating Jew'.

Still, Israel's war in Gaza has stripped it of any pretensions that it is a David battling the Arab hordes. Israel is armed to the teeth; it has a nuclear arsenal; its arms industry is flourishing; and it has to don the clothing of the bully in the Middle East. It can never escape the judgment of the Goldstone Report, nor its sagging reputation and the moral decline of a corrupt country.

The US takes the diplomatic road

Yesterday Guam Diary's 'US DPRK breaks the ice'. Yet the Obama administration's breaking ground on North Korea [DPRK or the Democratic People's Republic of Korea] has got lost in the media shuffle, going greatly under reported. Today's it signals a willingness to sit down to discussions with the Islamic Republic of Iran breaks out in large and occasionally banner headlines, which momentarily burying in the back pages news of a new initiative in talks with the DPRK.
The grand market place that the United Nations becomes every September when the leaders of its members take to the podium, and cross paths in VIP lounges or ranking diplomats run into one another or talk in shaded alcoves or share drinks, will tell of the direction the talks will take.
It is reasonable to point out that any items on announced agendas or press releases or stories in the press, are starting points, for the long weeks or even months of sharp horse trading, in order to arrive at agreed upon outcomes.
Yet, the DPRK and Iran are part of a larger diplomatic thrust that the Obama state department has launched. The influential US press bruit stories of a breakthrough with Castro's Cuba, where New Mexico's governor and old Clinton administration trouble shooter, Bill Richardson turned up a few weeks ago. [See, Guam Diary's 'the peripatetic Bill Richardson] Rumours abound that Mr. Richardson might be Washington's first ambassador to Havana should restoration of normal diplomatic channels take place. Nonetheless, rumours are simply bits and snippets of gossip which usually have little substance.
On the Dafur front, president Obama [BHO] is forging ahead with crafting an agreement which would put a final chapter on a horrible onslaught against Sudan's nomadic Muslim population.
BHO's diplomatict offeinse has so far no echo in the NATO war in Aghanistan. Already powerful committees in the houses of Congress and in more senior military circles are having second thoughts of persecuting a war which suddenly reminds them of the fiasco that was Vietnam.
It is hoped that secretary of state Hillary Clinton who has a hawkish position on Afghanistan, is also exploring back channels with amenable Taliban elements, the better to wind down a draining war in Central Asia.
Little mention is made of Spanish and Portugese speaking America. Mme. Clinton has dragged her feet on the coup in Hondorus which stays afloat thanks to the Yankee economic and military dollar. Will she extend BHO's hand to smooth ruffled feathers in a vast continent with its oil reserves, mineral resources, and its growing sense of this continent's standing and power?
Africa poses a delicate problems. Furthermore, solutions are less easy to come by, owing to endemic corruption, immense health problems, drought, and general low level of development.
And finally, there the push by veteran negotiator George Mitchell, to untie the knots of the Israeli Palestine imbroglio. He has his work cut out for him: he has to contend with a feral Israel, an anemic Palestinian Authority, which suffers from the steel grip of more than 40 years of Israel
occupation. He has to somehow, way, shape or form, bring Hamas into the equation. He has his work cut out for him. The outcome is far from secure.