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<H3 class="post-title entry-title" itemprop="name">US and Israel Middle East
policy threatens us all. </H3>
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<DIV id=post-body-8304803929589190418 class="post-body entry-content"
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<DIV style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; CLEAR: both" class=separator><A
style="MARGIN-BOTTOM: 1em; FLOAT: left; CLEAR: left; MARGIN-RIGHT: 1em"
href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jG9co3VRtx0/UYPURcXjSDI/AAAAAAAAHtk/AiP50Wz9IlE/s1600/images.jpg"
imageanchor="1"><FONT size=4><IMG border=0
src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jG9co3VRtx0/UYPURcXjSDI/AAAAAAAAHtk/AiP50Wz9IlE/s320/images.jpg"
width=320 height=320></FONT></A></DIV><FONT size=4>by Richard Mellor, Afscme
Local 444, retired <BR><BR>I picked up a Wall Street Journal this morning and
the first headline I see is: <I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“US Bulks Up
to Combat Iran.<B style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal">” </B></I><B
style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal">.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN></B>It seems the war boys at the Pentagon have spent $400 million of our
money upgrading the <I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“Massive Ordinance
Penetrator”,</I> or MOP for short or<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“bunker buster” </I>bomb in more
popular jargon.<BR></FONT>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><BR></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>I am confused.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Has Iran threatened to invade the United
States?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Are the Iranians preparing
to bomb our cities and towns?<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>It doesn’t appear so.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The concern is that Iran has a nuclear
program and Israel, the only state in the region with nuclear weapons, hundreds
of them by all accounts, <SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>opposes
any other nation achieving nuclear statehood.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The Zionists have threatened many times
to bomb Iran unilaterally. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>The US admits that Iran has repeatedly
announced that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. <I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“..Iran refines fuel it maintains is
intended for civilian use but the U.S. and its allies believe is destined for a
nuclear weapons program.”, </I>says the Wall Street Journal.<I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal"> “Its allies”</I> primarily means Israel,
but no matter what Iran says, both Washington and Tel Aviv will not accept it;
being the only one armed in a conflict is a handy thing.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The possession of a nuclear arsenal
though is the safest protection against US imperialist aggression.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Iranian bases do not surround the US.
Iranian warships and submarines do not patrol the California coastline or have a
major presence in Baja or the Gulf of Mexico.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Iran is not a threat to US workers and
our families.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Iran is a threat to
Dick Cheney and all the coupon clippers that profit from the oil business just
like Unions are a threat to them. If the Mullahs were willing to share the loot
and do Wall<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Streets bidding, the
oppression, lack of democracy, wouldn’t prevent a strong friendship between
Tehran and Washington from developing. The US has stood idly by as an absolute
monarchy has crushed violently a movement for reform in neighboring Bahrain
where the US has 30,000 troops. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>It appears the warmongering and threats that
emanate from Washington and the Pentagon are driven by Tel Aviv.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>US officials believe the <I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“enhanced” </I>bunker busting device, <I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“..decreases the chances that Israel will
launch a unilateral bombing campaign against Iran this year….”</I> The WSJ
reports.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>US officials have been falling over themselves
in their efforts to show their pro Zionist credentials, even as the Europeans
have warmed somewhat to the plight of the Palestinians cramped in to the Gaza
concentration camp or spread throughout the state, often at the mercy of the
fascistic settler movement that the Israeli military protects. . </FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><I
style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“President Obama and Mr Hagel have used
recent visits to Israel to stress Israel’s right to decide for itself whether to
strike Iran.”</I> The WSJ reports.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>The problem with this is that the consequences of such an action affects
the entire world.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The reason the
Zionists could take such action is that US Imperialism is behind them.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It would be easy to prevent Israel from
"unilaterally" bombing anyone, we could simply stop supplying them with heavy
equipment, weapons and money<BR><BR>These US politicians, and some celebrities
like Madonna for example, visit Israel and don’t go to Gaza.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>These people are complicit in the racist
and brutal assault on the Palestinian people and their culture.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Why would US policy be dictated by
what this tiny little enclave called Israel decides?<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Israel could not possibly do what
it does in the region without the financial support and weaponry it receives
from the US taxpayer.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It is a
murderous and racist regime that is the elephant in the room, the main
destabilizing factor in the region.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>As the Arab spring has shown, the Zionist
regime is the only reliable ally for US imperialism in the region that allows
the continued plunder of the region’s main resource, oil.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The revolutionary potential of the Arab
masses is well understood by the folks at the Pentagon.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>US imperialism will and has supported
any regime that will allow its plunder of the region to continue unabated and
even the brutal Saudi thugs are not seen as the most secure allies if and when
the Saudi masses along with its imported labor force moves in to more open
conflict with the regime.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The US
supplies these thugs with the weaponry and technological know how to keep the
masses at bay but there is a strong Arab identity encompassing million of
workers and this is always a threat.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN><BR><BR>Israel, once referred to by the British governor of Jerusalem as
British Imperialism’s <I style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">“Loyal little
Ulster in the Middle East”</I> after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, is the
safest bet as a launching pad to defend US capitalism’s interests in the
region.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Israel, the persecuted
minority surrounded by a sea of hostility.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</SPAN>The siege mentality is useful to some, just like the Zionists benefiting
from anti-semitism, peace would be an obstacle to plunder and peace can never be
achieved on a permanent basis under capitalism.<BR><BR>After the US overthrew
the democratic secular regime of Mohammed Mossadegh in 1953, Washington
installed the murderous Shah, known to us as the Shah of Iran.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>He slaughtered any opposition to his
puppet regime and was renowned for his torture chambers and his secret police,
the SAVAK.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Democratic secular
forces were driven underground or in to the protective custody of the Mosques,
those that weren’t tortured and murdered by the Shah and his US
partners.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>The anti-democratic misogynistic theocracy
that governs Iran is a direct result of British and US Imperialist meddling in
the region. The Iranians have good reason to be suspicious of western
intentions.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>No worker or trade
Unionist can support such a regime, but this writer for one is not afraid of
Iran.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The US and its Zionist allies
in the region are the most destabilizing factor in the region. Even in the
Syrian conflict, it appears the US is following the same disastrous road but
they are driven by the internal forces of capitalism to pursue this road.
</FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><FONT size=4>For workers while offering no support to the
Mullahs it is in our interests to build links with and strengthen the Iranian
workers movement which has a militant and rich history, particularly the oil
workers of Abadan. But for this writer, it is not the Mullahs I fear but the
strategists at the Pentagon and the few thousand unelected leaders that govern
the US and direct foreign and domestic policy.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV class=MsoNormal><BR><FONT size=4>Workers are under assault in the US,
people have been evicted from their homes, denied health care, lost jobs.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>The future is one of further austerity
as US capitalism puts its own workers on rations to pay for its imperialist
ventures. There is real danger if we do not step to the plate.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Bombing Iran would be a global
disaster.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>It would strengthen
Islamic fundamentalism and weaken international worker solidarity. It is in our
interests to actively intervene to stop the war plans of the folks in Washington
and the Pentagon. The Iranian workers have a long history of struggle for
economic and political freedom; they are our allies, or potential allies
depending on our relationship to those who will likely decide to wage war
against a another country killing many workers in the process, there and
here.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>We cannot allow capitalists
and bankers to negotiate on our behalf, be the global face of America.<SPAN
style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Iranians can’t eat oil; they have to
sell it.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Our goal must be to
negotiate with them as workers, equally and with the goal of improving the lives
of everyone.<BR><BR>Present US foreign policy is simply an extension of domestic
policy. The policy of austerity for workers and the middle class in the quest
for profits for a few. It is not our policy and will lead to disaster if workers
do not enter the stage with force.<BR><BR>Down with Wall Street, down with the
Mullahs.<SPAN style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </SPAN>Build international
working class solidarity </FONT></DIV></DIV></FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>