[Peace-discuss] Review…

[Morton K. Brussel]

  Some will be interested in the review below of the past month's  
events, supplementing Carl's fine weekly reports for AWARE . It is  
distributed from UFPJ. It is clear-headed, although by now a little  
out of date (e.g., the Watada case).

--mkb


Washington's Wars and Occupations:
Month in Review #21
January 29, 2007
By Max Elbaum, War Times/Tiempo de Guerras

THE ANTI-SURGE GETS ROLLING

It's not about Bush's surge anymore. It's the Antiwar Surge that's
capturing the headlines and threatening to upset all the warmakers'  
calculations.

On Jan. 27 "a raucous and colorful multitude" (Washington Post) brought
their "Out Now!" message to the streets of Washington. With participants
ranging from active duty GI's to members of Congress, the  
demonstration put
the peace movement's muscle on display at a crucial moment. Washington's
failure in Iraq has become too naked to hide - and the policy-making  
elite is becoming
more nervous and divided with each passing day.

Republican Senator Chuck Hagel says Bush's plan to send more troops  
to Iraq
is "Alice in Wonderland." Longtime hawk and former National Security  
Adviser
Zbigniew Brzezinski declares that Bush's Iraq policy "reflects a  
profound
misunderstanding of our era. America is acting like a colonial power  
in Iraq. But
the age of colonialism is over."

The wing of the Democratic Party that has been pressed and prodded  
into a get-out-fast
stance has become larger and bolder: the Martin Luther King Day call  
by John Kerry's
former running mate (and 2008 presidential candidate) John Edwards to  
pull out now
signals this important shift. Democratic heavyweights who still  
insist that it's
"irresponsible" to just leave (Hillary Clinton et al) are feeling the
heat.	

The pressure comes from a U.S. public that is fed up with the Iraq  
war. More that
65% of the population opposes sending more troops to Iraq. Over 70%  
think Bush has
no clear plan for the war. A majority thinks that invading Iraq was a  
mistake to
begin with. And 64% (including 31% of Republicans) think Congress has  
not been assertive
enough in challenging Bush's conduct of the war!

Worldwide, the occupation of Iraq has caused disapproval of U.S.  
policy to reach
record levels. A new BBC poll shows 73% of people in 25 countries  
opposing Washington's
policy.

Bush's attempt to sell his "surge" has failed so badly the thing has
been renamed "plus-up." But the antiwar movement is shouting its real
name - an ESCALATION of the war. And activists are laying plans to  
carry the momentum
from last November's electoral "thumping" and Jan. 27's street
energy into the coming months.	

BAGHDAD: "NEW" STRATEGY WON'T WORK

Today's surge of antiwar sentiment is driven by one over-raiding  
factor: Washington's
total failure in Iraq. The occupation is more hated by Iraqis than  
ever. Anti-U.S.
armed attacks, and U.S. casualties, are at their peak. Sectarian  
Sunni-Shia violence
- Iraq's civil war - grinds along. U.S. troops are not just unable to  
provide
security; their very presence is a major source of insecurity for all.	

Since the U.S. invasion, move than 1.7 million Iraqis have become  
refugees. As Dick
Cheney drones on that "we've made enormous progress," 100,000 more
Iraqis flee their homes every month.

Middle East expert Juan Cole reported Jan. 26: "Guerillas fired  
rockets into
the Green Zone in central Baghdad. The attack seriously wounded one  
person and lightly
injured five others. The Green Zone has often taken mortar fire, but  
seldom has
suffered casualties. That nearly four years into the war, the U.S. HQ  
in Iraq is
subjected to rocket fire just underlines how helpless Gulliver is  
before the supposed
Lilliputians."	

Even Bush's remaining supporters don't think his "new strategy"
will succeed. Nine Republicans voted against the non-binding "we  
oppose the
surge" resolution which passed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee  
12-9
Jan. 24. Almost every one declared before voting that they didn't  
want to "send
the wrong message" but they didn't think sending more U.S. troops was  
going
to work!

EXPAND THE WAR, ATTACK IRAN?

Staring defeat in the face, the John Murthas and now the John  
Edwardses of the U.S.
establishment have decided that withdrawal from Iraq is the "least  
worse"
of the bad options available. The hard-nosed authors of Baker- 
Hamilton were unwilling
to go that far. The Baker-Hamilton team - squarely in the center of  
the U.S. elite
- still holds out hope that some kind of lower-profile occupation,  
combined with
skillful diplomacy, can avert taking the huge hit that would  
accompany a forced
U.S. exit. Their nightmares involve not just loss of direct control  
over Iraq and
its resources (oil), but the blow to U.S. political and military  
credibility that
would ripple outwards from the geo-strategic Middle East to all parts  
of the globe.

As for Bush, Cheney and Co., accepting defeat in Iraq is simply not  
yet on their
possibility list. (What predominates among the reasons why - from  
Bush/Cheney's
view of imperial imperatives and close relations to "big oil" to  
domestic
political calculations, messianic religious zealotry and concern for  
Bush's
"personal legacy" - will have to be sorted out by historians.) Instead,
the White House has a dangerous impulse to go in a different  
direction: try to salvage
its lost Iraq adventure by attacking Iran.

Threats to Iran were a prominent part of Bush's State of the Union  
speech. U.S.
troops have raided Iranian consular offices and arrested Iranian  
diplomats inside
Iraq. The U.S. actions - officially authorized by President Bush -  
were denounced
by the Iraqi government.

A White House campaign blaming Iranian agents for attacks against  
U.S. troops in
Iraq is in full swing. It is part of a larger effort - aimed at Arabs  
in the Middle
East as well as the U.S. public - to fan Sunni anger at Shiites and  
paint Iran as
the main danger to the region. The state-controlled media of Egypt,  
the Gulf States
and Jordan are now making Iran the main target of criticism, putting  
reports of
Israeli violence against Palestinians or U.S. atrocities in Iraq on  
the back burner.
Shia-Sunni tensions - in Iraq and region-wide - are not a simple U.S.  
invention.
But they are being currently used by Washington (and Israel) in an  
effort to turn
attention away from the illegal occupations of Iraq and Palestine and  
lay the groundwork
for justifying new military adventures.

Meanwhile a drumbeat of voices continues to advocate a "pre-emptive"  
strike
against Iran's nuclear program. (Despite U.S. claims, there is still  
no evidence
of Iran having a weapons program as opposed to a program for peaceful  
use of nuclear
energy.) A lengthy article by Yaakov Katz in the Jerusalem Post Jan.  
4 (and a similar
piece in the London Times) described planning in Israel for such an  
attack, possibly
even including the use of nuclear weapons.

There is at least the beginning of explicit criticism of Bush's anti- 
Iran policy
on Capitol Hill. The new chairman of the Senate Intelligence  
Committee, John Rockefeller,
attacked the Bush administration's stance last week, declaring "To be  
quite
honest, I'm a little concerned that it's Iraq again."

LEBANON: RESISTANCE FROM BELOW

A one-day general strike shut down Beirut Jan. 23. The main sponsor  
was the Shiite-based
Hezbollah. But few U.S. papers reported that (1) that important  
Christian-based
figures are allied with Hezbollah in its protests against the U.S.- 
backed government;
(2) Lebanon's Trade Union Confederation, which includes members of  
all faiths,
called for a strike the same day; and (3) the protesters' demands  
were not rooted
in a "pro-Syria/Iran vs. pro-West" frame but revolve around the  
government's
anti-poor-people economic policies and a system of political  
representation that
allots government posts based on long-out-of-date census data and  
denies one-person,
one-vote democracy.

During and after the strike there has been some violence and a number  
of deaths.
The situation is tense. Reports from Lebanon indicate that the  
country's majority
does not believe the threat of large-scale violence or civil war  
stems from Hezbollah.
Rather, they fear that the government, caving in to pressure from  
Israel and the
U.S., will launch a bloody crackdown, after which events could spin  
out of control.

"INDEED THERE IS APARTHEID IN ISRAEL"

As attacks on Jimmy Carter's book, "Palestine: Peace or Apartheid,"
continue in the U.S. media, Shulamit Aloni  - winner of the Israel  
Prize and a former
Minister in the Israeli Cabinet - cuts through the fog in Israel's  
largest-circulation
daily:

"Jewish self-righteousness is taken for granted among ourselves to  
such an
extent that we fail to see what's right in front of our eyes. It's  
simply
inconceivable that the ultimate victims, the Jews, can carry out evil  
deeds... The
U.S. Jewish Establishment's onslaught on former President Jimmy  
Carter is based
on him daring to tell the truth which is known to all: through its  
army, the government
of Israel practices a brutal form of Apartheid in the territory it  
occupies. Its
army has turned every Palestinian village and town into a fenced-in,  
or blocked-in,
detention camp. All this is done in order to keep an eye on the  
population's
movements and to make its life difficult. Israel even imposes a total  
curfew whenever
the settlers, who have illegally usurped the Palestinians' land,  
celebrate their
holidays or conduct their parades.

"...there are 'Jewish only' roads. Wonderful roads, well-paved roads,
brightly lit at night - all that on stolen land. When a Palestinian  
drives on such
a road, his vehicle is confiscated and he is sent on his way. On one  
occasion I
witnessed such an encounter between a driver and a soldier. 'Why?' I  
asked
the soldier. 'It's an order - this is a Jews-only road', he replied.
I inquired as to where was the sign indicating this fact. His answer  
was nothing
short of amazing. 'It is his responsibility to know it, and besides,  
what do
you want us to do, put up a sign here and let some anti-Semitic  
reporter or journalist
take a photo so he that can show the world that Apartheid exists here?'"

TOWARD A SURGE FOR "OUT NOW"

Convinced that the tide has turned, activists in every sector of the  
antiwar movement
are intensifying their activity.

Groups focused on pressuring Congress are swinging into high gear.  
MoveOn.org -
which called on its 3.2 million-member internet list to support Jan.  
27 - just announced
"a huge new plan to get Congress to stop the escalation and bring the  
troops
home. We're planning a sustained campaign with the intensity normally  
reserved
for the final month before an election." MoveOn has joined with SEIU,  
other
unions and religious and other groups to launch Americans against  
Escalation in
Iraq and put pressure especially on Democrats and Republicans who are  
not yet committed
to turn their statements critical of Bush's policy into antiwar votes.

In Congress itself a host of bills mandating a U.S. pullback are  
being introduced,
including one by Rep. Lynn Woolsey that repeals Congress' 2002  
authorization
for war and provides for removal of all U.S. troops and military  
contractors from
Iraq within six months of enactment.

At the grassroots, the "Put the War on Trial" campaign defending Lt.  
Ehren
Watada (the first officer to refuse deployment to Iraq) has become a  
focal point
for expanded efforts to support antiwar military personnel and bring  
their voice
to ever-wider sectors of the population. The next period will see  
intensified effort
by Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, and a range of  
local and national
counter-recruitment groups, as well as other organizations focused on  
particular
sectors (such as U.S. Labor Against the War) or rooted in specific  
localities. The
steadily-growing movement pressing for Bush's impeachment will pick  
up steam.

New possibilities exist for more visible expressions of the  
overwhelming antiwar
sentiment that exists in African-American and Latino communities; for  
more people
to see the connections between the Iraq war, the racist attacks on  
immigrants, and
the continuing criminal government policy regarding post-Katrina New  
Orleans.

For direct action-oriented activists, the shifts in public opinion  
mean fresh openings
to gain support for civil disobedience protest and nonviolent actions  
that directly
confront institutions that are involved in or complicit with the war.  
The upcoming
fourth anniversary of the war this March will be a focal point for  
protests, including
use of direct action, in cities and towns across the country, many  
called for by
United for Peace and Justice which sponsored January 27's march in DC.

With the antiwar movement's expansion and the prospect of exercising  
real political
clout come new complexities. Cooperation between groups and sectors  
that have widely
varying politics, cultures and tactics will not be easy. There will  
be temptations
in some quarters to echo the racist argument that the disaster in  
Iraq is the fault
of Iraqi backwardness rather than U.S. occupation. Different groups  
will have different
assessments of different pieces of congressional legislation; of what  
tactics are
most effective at a given moment; of the relationship between the war  
in Iraq and
Afghanistan, Palestine, Iran and domestic issues. The anti-empire,  
and-racist section
of the antiwar movement will face many challenges in trying to  
achieve maximum unity-in-action
across all these boundaries and making sure Washington gets no rest  
at all on its
most vulnerable point, while simultaneously expanding the number of  
people dedicated
to long-term organizing against the systemic roots of imperial  
adventures.

But these are the kinds of challenges it is an advance to have. It is  
indeed a new
moment for the antiwar movement: a time when building an Out Now  
Surge can make
a real difference.

War Times/Tiempo de Guerras is a fiscally sponsored project of the  
Center for Third
World Organizing. Donations to War Times are tax-deductible; you can  
donate on-line
at http://www.war-times.org or send a check to War Times/Tiempo de  
Guerras, c/o
P.O. Box 99096, Emeryville, CA 94662.