Mid East Daily

Tension over the Iran nuclear issue is hotting up again. The IAEA report said Iran was co-operating but not pro-actively co-operating. In short the nuclear watch dog is saying the glass is half full. US and other western countries see the glass as being half empty. What worries the US the most is that Iran has the necessary 3000 centrifuges which can produce weapon grade plutonium in a year. In other words Iran may have an atom bomb in a year’s time.

The US is not going to sit around and twiddle its thumb waiting for that to happen. It is losing its patience about any diplomatic solution emerging. It has warned China to drag its feet on any international initiative and sanctions against Iran to make it stop in its nuclear ambitions.

China and Russia have been responsible for watering down the earlier two UN Security Council resolutions. The US will not tolerate any such dilly-dallying. If it feels its aims are not being met diplomatically [sanctions against Iran supported by the major powers] it will not hesitate to take military action. Israel has been clamouring for long that The US do something about it. Iranian president Ahmadinejad has said before that he would like to nuke Israel. And in Iran’s internal power struggles [between the Ahmadinejad and the more moderate Rafsanjani factions], the former is emerging stronger.

All this portents doom for the Middle east. Bush has already said that if Iran goes nuclear the result will be World War 3.
Guardian

Image credit AFP

Violence begets violence. This saying is proving itself true once again in Iraq. The CIA and US intelligence agencies have overstepped all boundaries of humanity while dealing with captured militants in Iraq.

This has so concerned the US lawmakers that democrats in the House of Representatives have made one of the conditions [AP/Instablogs]in the latest bill passed bythe house [besides of course that US stop military action in Iraq by December 2008] that that all government [the wicked men of the CIA] interrogators rely on the Army Field Manual. Now that would mean they would have to follow the Geneva Conventions and the government has flatly refused to do so, saying terrorists merit no mercy.

But the utter brutality seems to harming the US army in Iraq. Concerns are being raised at the above normal rates of suicides [MSNBC/Reuters]amongst both US and British[Telegraph] soldiers posted in Iraq. The mental scars sustained by soldiers in Iraq remain long after they leave the war-torn country and in some instances Iraq veterans have killed their wives before committing suicide.

Since students all over the world have a right to be violent, they are easy prey to all sorts of extremist-provocations. Also like all students everywhere, this gives them an opportunity to avoid studying. Iraqi students are using their sectarian identities to threaten each other and their teachers. The students have now put on a mask of religiosity. But in fact it is all about escapism. Academics scare most. The Holy Quran starts with the word Iqra; it exhorts one to read and search for knowledge, for meaning in life. It does not ask anyone to murder.

East Baghdad’s Mustansiriya University has become a Shiite stronghold. There are now regular celebrations of the birth of Shiite imams like Hassan al Askari. Gun trotting guards heckle Sunni students if they do not join in the celebrations. An unnoticed fact in the midst of US provoked civil war is the blow suffered by the education system of the country.

These are critical times for Iran and the middle-east as a whole. With Tehran’s nuclear standoff still to be peacefully resolved, it is apparent that the Islamic republic’s radical leader president Ahmadinejad is in no mood to give in to American and European pressures. But things are not all that rosy within the Iranian domestic political structure. Many experts feel that president Ahmadinejad faces greater domestic uncertainty than it appears from the outside.

Although violence in war-ravaged Iraq has come down in recent months, neighboring Iran’s political and military shadow hangs over the country’s majority Shiite population which is undoubtedly of great concern to the United States of America.

There is no doubt to the fact that Tehran’s hardliners desperately want a Shia-dominated government in Baghdad to enjoy the political benefits arising out of an ideologically similar neighbor. But for this to happen, the Iranians know that Iraq should be freed from American influence.

The people of Gaza are suffering and suffering badly. The latest to raise concerns about the misery of Palestinians living there is Karen Koning AbuZayd of the United Nations Works and Relief Agency.

She is not the only one to do so. Ten human rights groups have moved the Israeli Supreme Court to stop the Israeli government from cutting further the electric supply to Gaza.

Pope Benedict XVI in his book Jesus of Nazareth defines Christian communities as pockets of hope and signs of contradictions. It is in this spirit he has gifted to the people of Iraq their first modern Cardinal. Cardinal Emmanuel III Delly is an Islamic scholar. His PhD deals with dialogue between Catholicism and Islam. Iraq or ancient Mesopotamia is important for understanding the genesis of Christianity. Christ was of the House of David which traces itself to Iraq. We hardly think of Iraq as being Christian. Also a few weeks ago Islamic scholars had asked the Pope to continue dialogue with Islam. They fear the annihilation of the world unless there is peace between Catholics and Muslims. These are the two most numerous religions in the world. Cardinal Delly answers the Muslim request. He is the bridge we were all waiting for. The Cardinal speaks Italian, French and English, not to speak of his own Arabic. He comes from a family of priests and is known to be an austere and humble man.

Condoleezza Rice is a happy woman. She has brokered peace in the warring Gaza strip. And now all parties involved there are going to sit down soon in Annapolis and have all their problems sorted out. There will be created a definite Palestinian State. Terrorism will cease; Hamas will give up arms and its members will live to be retired grand-fathers savoring ripe olives many years from now.

In the future, right wing orthodox rabbis will often come to Palestine and chit-chat the so many names of Yahweh and Allah with their Muslim brethren. The Washington Post has reported the Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas expecting the creation of a Palestinian State within 2009. This is only a dream apt to become nightmarish fast. One feels bad for the hasty Abbas.

It seems that US is in no mood to give diplomacy a chance when dealing with Syria and Iran (countries included in America’s axis of evil). Syria is long been accused by the United States of fomenting unrest in Lebanon and Iraq, but the brand new economic sanctions against some Syrian individuals is a clear sign that Washington wants Damascus to stay away from meddling in Lebanese domestic affairs. The imposition of sanctions against the Syrians is another way of undermining the role of the United Nations in the region, which for many is the only organization that can bring stability to the region, if it acts properly without the influence of Washington or other western nations.

It’s true that Syria does have a negative influence on Lebanese politics, given the bitter history of Lebanese civil war and subsequent Syrian military intervention in Lebanon. But, US should give the diplomacy a chance to deal with the situation. What does the US hope to win in sanctioning four Syrian individuals, when the problem is such deep-rooted?

The wicked of this earth never change. Rapists continue raping, murderers get addicted to serial-killing and pedophiles carry on abusing children. Drug-traffickers enjoy sending our kids to death while their own bank accounts swell. Mistaken, cravenly human rights groups are always there for the perpetrators of monstrosities. The victims are forgotten and their families advised to accept the untimely and meaningless deaths.

It is in this context that we must review the strict Islamic law followed in Saudi Arabia which allows public beheadings of various perverts for heinous crimes. 124 men this year and 5 recently were executed. When last week Prince Saud al-Faisal visited UK, he faced the ire of human rights group who clubbed these executions with other human rights’ violations in Saudi Arabia.

This is unfair to the Arabs. Capital punishment is one issue. Other human rights violations are another issue. The former is needed to check unspeakable horrors. The latter is clearly reprehensible and condemnable. Anything but brutal execution is construed by the yet uncaught psychopaths as weakness and license to do whatever they want. Execution becomes them.