Tag: Democracy

  • Kiss Of ‘Democratic’ Death: Israel’s Plot To Take Down Syria I

    Kiss Of ‘Democratic’ Death: Israel’s Plot To Take Down Syria I

    israel syria
    The Zionist entity and its criminal network of allies have initiated operations to destroy Syria.

    by Jonathan Azaziah

    This is the first of a 2-part series that exposes the ‘Syrian Revolution’ as a destabilization operation commanded by the usurping regime of Israel and assisted by its allies in Washington D.C., Paris, London, Riyadh and other faces hiding behind masks of friendship and neutrality. This selection deals with the 40+ years of history that led to the unprecedented events unfolding now and how Tel Aviv and Riyadh have once again joined hands in modern day to eliminate Syrian Resistance once and for all…

    Al-Jumhuriyyah al-Arabiyyah as-Suriyyah, the Syrian Arab Republic, or simply, Syria, is being systematically assaulted by the world’s arrogant powers. No, Syria isn’t being bombarded with bombs and missiles from helicopter gunships or F-16s (at least… not yet). It is being bombarded by something else; something more sinister, more cunning and deadlier. It is being bombarded by an entity that is almost full of life in its undying intransigence: Zionist-designed, Zionist-enforced ‘democracy.’

    Like the poison dart frogs of the Amazon rain forest, the Angel’s Trumpet flowers scattered along the Andes Mountains from Colombia to Chile and the blue-ringed octopuses swimming through the tide pools of the Pacific from Japan to Australia, this ‘democracy’ is associated with the idea of an almost magnificent beauty. It is described as something of uniqueness, a creation indigenous to the higher-learning-infested institutes of the West; something alien to the other peoples of the world; the easterners, those of Arab and African descent. Fallacious however, are these assumptions.

    Also like the poison dart frogs, the Angel’s Trumpets and the blue-ringed octopuses, the beauty of ‘democracy’ is merely a front for the venom that lies beneath an eye-pleasing exterior. A venom that can kill. A venom that has killed. In the millions. Democracy is the kiss of death, bringing ruin, pillage and desecration while cloaked in the garments of freedom, equality and higher-learning. If democracy was an entity of female origin, it would be the succubus of mythological lore. If it were of male origin, it would be the incubus. And the easterners, Arabs and Africans, can speak for millennia about what this demonic ‘democracy’ actually represents. Syrians beware, ‘democracy’ is targeting you now; heed the lessons of the past, taught in blood by your oppressed brothers and sisters.

    The people of Iraq, irradiated by an eternity of depleted uranium, can tell you in graphic detail of the wonders democracy has brought them: 6 million Iraqis are now refugees, 2 million of which are displaced internally, 2 million Iraqi women are now widows, 5 million Iraqi children are now orphans and 80% of Iraqis have witnessed shootings, kidnappings, rapes, killings and other atrocities (1). The people of Afghanistan, reeling from more than 4 decades of American military-intelligence adventurism, can tell you in equally graphic detail of democracy’s glorious benefits: 7.4 million Afghan men, women and children are now living in hunger on the brink of death from occupation-induced starvation (2).

    syria 1
    The Zionist 'democracy' demon, seen here feasting on Gaza; it now hungers for Syria.

    Palestine, a holy and historic land that has been called home by prophets and saints, heroes and revolutionaries, has been occupied by a usurping entity for 63 years. This entity that calls itself ‘Israel’ also calls itself the ‘only democracy in the Middle East.’

    Palestinians scream at the world, day and night, at the top of their lungs, that this democracy is farcical. In the ethnically cleansed Palestinian land now known as ‘Israel,’ at least 30 laws exist that discriminate viciously against non-Jews (3). Weekly protests for freedom from occupation and respect of universal human rights are savagely suppressed by IOF with tear gas, ‘skunk’ water, live ammunition and sound bombs (4), and last month, a 16-year old Palestinian boy named Milad Ayyash was shot to death by an illegal settler (5).

    In the besieged Gaza Strip, 95% of the factories are closed and 93% of the water is contaminated due to Zionist pollution and the Zionist entity’s criminal siege (6). In the occupied Jordan Valley, Palestinians are denied education, health care, transportation, electricity and water (7). In occupied al-Quds, land still internationally recognized as Palestinian is ‘zionized’ daily, with the latest announcement being 7,900 new illegal settlements (8). These represent a fraction of the principles embedded in the ‘democracy’ of Zionism; occupation and apartheid, land theft and slow drip genocide.

    Kashmir is a place of such angelic gorgeousness it is commonly referred to as ‘heaven on earth.’ This heaven though, could not be any more miserable. It, like Palestine, is also occupied by a usurping entity and has been so for 64 years. This entity is known as Hindutva, a sister of Zionism, and it refers to itself as ‘India, the world’s largest democracy.’ Rape, torture, brutalization, murder, suppression of protests, epidemic-like influx of narcotics flooding the streets at the hands of Indian and Israeli intelligence, beatings, kidnappings, demolitions of homes, desecration of mosques and shootings are just a smidgen of what Kashmiris experience on a daily basis under the criminal Indian occupation (9). And for the record, Hindutvadi occupation forces carry out their heinousness with Israeli weaponry (10).

    bashar al assad
    Syrian President Bashar al-Assad: Zionism's next target.

    Taking this, never-ending fountain of ‘democracy’ into account, one word can describe what is taking place in Syria: woe; woe that mutates a little further into chaos and disaster with each passing moment.

    The late George Orwell, author of the masterpieces ‘1984’ and ‘Animal Farm,’ once eloquently wrote,  “Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac.” This scenario is being played out to the letter in Libya. Under the guise of saving ‘peaceful, pro-democracy’ Libyan protesters from the guns and air raids of ‘Mad Dog’ Muammar Qaddafi, a ‘humanitarian intervention’ was initiated at the behest of some of the greatest ‘humanitarians’ of modern times: Paul Wolfowitz, Dan Senor, Eric Edelman, Elliot Abrams, William Kristol, Robert Kagan, (a good portion of) the Zionist monsters responsible for orchestrating the mutilations of Iraq and Afghanistan (11).

    It became evident shortly after the Zionists’ intervention call that the protesters weren’t really protesters at all. They were armed insurrectionists being directed by the CIA to take down Qaddafi in a blatant regime change operation (12). These ‘rebels’ are now not only ready to recognize the usurping Zionist entity, something Muammar Qaddafi never did and never would (13), they are receiving on-ground orders and training from Israeli military advisors (14) and they have signed multiple agreements with Zionism, including one which would provide the occupier of Palestine with a military base in Libya (15). All the while, US-led NATO pounds Tripoli on a nightly basis with depleted uranium and white phosphorus (16). The latest attack murdered at least 9 Libyan civilians, including 2 toddlers (17).  Democracy’s ‘awe’ is being painfully felt in Libya; the ‘shock and awe’ of NATO’s criminal bombardment.

    The Zionist media-concocted scenarios that were used as justification to take down ‘homicidal maniac’ Qaddafi are now being recycled to take down ‘homicidal maniac’ Bashar al-Assad, vastly popular President of Syria and stalwart of the Resistance Axis that includes the Islamic Resistance of Lebanon, Hezbollah, and the Islamic Republic of Iran. It is a plot that involves major players, both regional and global. And at the very core of this sadistic agenda, which will only leave the Syrian people trapped in a bloodbath to pick up the shards of their lives, is the Zionist entity’s most ludicrous, nightmarish fantasy: Greater Israel. Syria is being destabilized by a ‘democratic’ demon intent on giving the Resistance government the kiss of death, sending it to the gallows forever and subsequently enslaving the Syrian people to the Zionist machine of neoliberalism and colonization.

    hafez al assad
    The late Hafez al-Assad, Bashar's father. Hafez faced the same Zionist plot over 30 years ago that his son is fighting now.

    History On The Fly I: The 1976-1982 ‘Uprising’

    From the moment Israel launched its criminal, preemptive war in June 1967, Syria was officially at war with Zionism. The usurping entity took over al-Jaulan (the Golan Heights, an ancient mountainous region in southern Syria) during that war and the illegal occupation has existed ever since. And in 1981, the Zionist entity engaged in yet another illegality: it ‘annexed’ al-Jaulan and imposed Israeli laws, jurisdiction and administration on the Syrian citizenry (18).

    The President during the time of the illegal annexation was none other than Hafez al-Assad, Bashar al-Assad’s father. Hafez had come to power on November 13,1970 in the Syrian Corrective Revolution, overthrowing Salah Jadid whose popularity sharply declined due to his poor domestic policies, political repression and loss to the Zionist entity in the 6 Day War. Hafez, like his son that would succeed him, was widely viewed with respect for his foreign policy and implementation of social justice-based policies at home. His 1973 constitution guaranteed equal rights and status for women throughout Syria, and also in ‘73, he gained back a portion of al-Jaulan after the Yom Kippur War. He invested Syria’s wealth in the sectors of education, medicine, the middle class and the rehabilitation of the urban areas throughout the nation. Under Hafez al-Assad, literacy and economic growth skyrocketed.

    But yet, despite Hafez al-Assad’s popularity and his commitment to providing for the Syrian people, there was a disconnect with a marginal, but powerful party within Syrian society: the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). From 1976-1982, the MB waged armed warfare against Hafez al-Assad’s government, though the Zionist media would like the globe to believe the protests were ‘peaceful.’ This ‘uprising’ was fully backed by the Zionist-occupied government residing in Washington DC, the dictatorial regime of the US-Israeli puppet Saddam Hussein and of course, Tel Aviv itself (19).

    syrian muslim brotherhood
    The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood tried to overthrow Hafez al-Assad from 1976-1982.

    This was no peaceful uprising but an attempt at a coup d’etat, fully incited by the puppet regimes of the Western-client states of Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Jordan (20). The reasons? To strike back at Hafez al-Assad for supporting Iran during the Iran-Iraq War, an act of aggression supported and funded by the GCC, the US and Israel (21), and to weaken his government to prevent it from properly intervening in the Lebanese Civil War, 15 years of massacres and bloodshed manipulated by the Zionist entity and America to fractionalize Lebanon into smaller, subservient-to-Zionism satellite states (22).

    The MB, armed by the Saddam Hussein regime and the powerful Saudi Arabian monarchy, was ruthless in its campaign of terror against the Assad government. It conducted assassinations of high-level government officials and murdered thousands of civilians, including dentists, teachers and doctors, and off-duty soldiers and policemen. In June of 1980, the MB went after Hafez al-Assad himself in Damascus, adding yet another unequivocal proof that the ‘uprising’ was anything but peaceful (23).

    The Saudi-financed, Zionist-supported Syrian Muslim Brotherhood’s insurrection against Hafez al-Assad’s government came to an end in the city of Hama in February 1982. Media reports and ‘documentation’ from ‘human rights groups’ stretching far and wide, coast to coast, have labeled what took place in Hama as a massacre. Typically, nothing could be further from the truth.

    hama syria
    Hama, Syria: the site where Hafez al-Assad where defeated the Tel Aviv-Riyadh plot and ended the MB uprising.

    In the realm of the real, Hama was a war zone. In the realm of the real, there were heavy casualties on both sides. It began when the MB opened fire on mosques frequented by government officials and their families, as well as their homes, murdering men, women and children without mercy. The MB then mutilated the bodies in the streets. Syrian security forces responded by raiding a massive weapons cache that was central to the MB’s anti-government activities to subdue the uprising. But when the MB’s killings continued, two full brigades of soldiers, a new special operations militia and special security units were deployed into Hama to defeat the conspiracy, which Hafez al-Assad accurately described as ‘the US interfering in Syrian affairs,’ once and for all. After brutal fighting continued for several weeks, the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood’s insurrection was beaten and its leaders were sent into exile, with thousands dead in a full-scale civil war-like bloodbath, and relative calm had returned to Hama (24).

    The aforementioned human rights groups and the propaganda that they disseminated (and are still disseminating) in regards to the battle of Hama are the same human rights groups disseminating vile, warmongering propaganda against Bashar al-Assad now. These organizations are always at the forefront of any Zionist-instigated war/invasion, posing as the defenders and upholders of the oppressed while delivering them to the democracy demon.

    amnesty interntional
    Amnesty International is always there with a false story when Zionism needs cover to destroy a nation.

    Leading the pack, is Amnesty International, the internationally-renowned organization that is self-described as politically independent. Indeed, independent of all ideologies excluding those that bring ruin to enemy nations of the hegemonic powers. Amnesty stated that somewhere between 10,000-25,000 were killed by Syrian security forces in the ‘Hama massacre,’ with most casualties being civilians (25). ‘Government sympathizes,’ i.e. those who are interesting in acquiring the truth of the matter, put the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood’s casualties between 3,000-5,000 fighters (26).

    Amnesty International is no stranger to falsehood. It is intimately linked to the internationalist-Zionist war criminal billionaire George Soros and was an integral part of Soros’ color revolutions in Eastern Europe, spreading propaganda against the now-overthrown regimes and it serves this exact purpose to this very day (27). Amnesty is also a ‘Standard Corporate Member’ of the Chatham House, Britain’s version of the Council on Foreign Relations, the parasitic ‘mother of all think tanks’ in America. The Chatham House, like the CFR, is funded by a who’s who of globalist mega-corporations and media outlets including the Rothschild-owned Economist, Zionist-run BBC and Zionist-dominated Goldman Sachs. Its most recent criminal activity involved generating malicious propaganda to give credence to a color revolution in Thailand (28).

    But the lie that Amnesty International is most famous for propagating, is what led to the 20-year annihilation of Iraq: 312 Kuwaiti babies being murdered in their incubators by Iraqi forces (who invaded Kuwait on the green light from the Zionist-occupied US government), based on the testimony of the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to the US posing as a witness to the murders. Not only did the story turn out to be completely, totally and utterly false, it was revealed to be a high-level Zionist operation with British intelligence assets within Amnesty working closely with ultra-Zionist war criminal Tom Lantos and his Congressional Caucus for Human Rights to pave the groundwork for the invasion (29). What followed, as it is said, is history… bloody, genocidal history. These three instances of Amnesty’s subversive activities alone, along with its shady Zionist backers, funders and collaborators, expose it for what it truly is.

    Another organization that has targeted Syria for the Hama massacre and other alleged abuses at Syria’s Tadmor Prison, is the notorious Human Rights Watch (HRW). Although HRW admits within the report that the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood engaged in open, brutal warfare against the Hafez al-Assad government, and although HRW admits within the report that it cannot verify a single account of abuse at Tadmor prison before, during or after the battle for Hama, it still pleads its case to the international community of warmongers, kleptocrats and hypocrites that Syrian officials must be brought to justice for their crimes (30).

    Human Rights Watch by Zain Art 88
    HRW: the best friend of Mossad, CIA and the Zionist lobby.

    HRW is another tentacle of Zionist billionaire-criminal George Soros’ octopus-like empire, one that he vehemently and publicly supports and funds to the tune of $100 million (31). HRW worked hand in hand with the CIA, Mossad and Zionist Lobby organizations like JINSA (Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs) and AIPAC itself to perpetrate the ‘Kurdish Genocide’ myth, a story that the Zionist cabal in the White House would cling to and wield as its last weapon to justify the criminal invasion of Iraq in 2003 (32). There is not a drop of evidence that Saddam Hussein carried out any such atrocity against the Iraqi Kurds, nor is there a drop of evidence that Saddam Hussein carried out the Halabja massacre, another HRW fabrication (33). Saddam was a loyal puppet to the Zionist power axis and a criminal, but a mass murderer he was not. Thanks to the money poured into HRW by Soros, HRW is deeply embedded in the global media sphere and can transform anyone it pleases into mass murderers. Rivers of blood stain its corrupt hands.

    syrian human rights committee
    The SHRC is a London-based promoter of several Soros-funded and Mossad-affiliated groups.

    The Syrian Human Rights Committee (SHRC) is the least well-known of the ‘human rights’ militias that assaulted Hafez al-Assad’s government for what took place in Hama, accusing the Assad government of murdering 30,000-40,000 civilians with ‘all kinds of artillery’ and demanding Assad and other party officials be brought before the International Criminal Court for war crimes (34). Of course, no evidence is provided for this outlandishness. Though the SHRC doesn’t have the notoriety of the previously mentioned organizations, it is just as dangerous for it represents ‘indigenous’ activism and criticism of Hafez al-Assad and therefore, its perceived indigenousness grants legitimacy to its claims, no matter how bizarre of farfetched. Don’t let the name hoodwink you however; the Syrian Human Rights Committee is anything but indigenous. It is self-admittedly based in London (35).

    A closer look at SHRC’s affiliations reveals what its real agenda is, and it is by no means one based on human rights, dignity and prosperity for the Syrian people. Not only does SHRC avidly promote the Soros-funded, propaganda-manufacturing institutions of Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, it is an affiliate of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan {PUK} (36), headed by Kurdish-Iraqi war criminal and current Iraqi President Jalal Talabani. PUK and the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), headed by Massoud Barzani, are willingly overseeing the Zionist entity expand into occupied Iraq, take over multiple religious shrines and through a Mossad campaign of false flag terror, ethnically cleanse northern Iraq of indigenous Christians (37). These parties have been proxies of the illegitimate Israeli regime since the 1950s (38) and the militias of PUK and KDP are both Israeli-trained (39). What kind of organization proclaims to be representative of the Syrian people and the Syrian nation, a people and nation at war with the Zionist entity, while promoting groups subsidized by Zionists and Israeli intelligence? Rhetorically, an organization serving a Zionist purpose.

    Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Syrian Human Rights Committee with resurface shortly and even Hama will be revisited, as all are integral to the current Zionist plot being orchestrated against Hafez al-Assad’s son, Bashar.

    israeli warplanes syria
    Prior to the current uprising, Israel tried on multiple occasions to draw Syria into war.

    History On The Fly II: Oded Yinon, A Clean Break and Direct Israeli Aggression

    It is nowhere near a coincidence that the same month (February of 1982) Hafez al-Assad’s government weathered the storm of chaos inflicted upon Syria by the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, a disturbing essay appeared in the Kivunim Journal For Judaism and Zionism, a magazine published by the World Zionist Organization’s Department of Publicity, entitled ‘A Strategy For Israel In The Nineteen Eighties.’ The essayist was Oded Yinon, a senior Israeli foreign policy advisor. Yinon laid out a twisted plan of ethnic cleansing and partitioning on sectarian lines to break up Arab nations into smaller states that would effectively (and perpetually) serve as Zionist clients. One of the Arab nations discussed was Syria.

    Yinon put forth not just a string of theories, but foreign policy objectives that he considered essential to the survival of the usurping entity. He viewed Syria’s dissolution a primary long term goal and the dismantlement of its army the short term goal for Zionism. He wrote that Syria will fall apart if his plan is followed; an Alawi state on the Syrian coast, a Sunni state in the Aleppo area, another Sunni state in Damascus that would be hostile to the government in Aleppo and lastly, a Druze state to be set up in southern Syria, preferably in occupied al-Jaulan, to be governed by the Israeli military (40). This plan is not only disturbing but bone-chilling, considering these very areas are the areas rocked with unrest today. The Saudi-Israeli-American axis failed in Syria in 1976-1982. Oded Yinon’s strategy was put forth to regroup, rearm and re-engage.

    Fast forward 14 years later to 1996, and another work of Zionist treachery placed the Syrian nation in the crosshairs. Known as ‘A Clean Break: A New Strategy For Securing The Realm,’ or simply, the ‘Clean Break Papers,’ the Zionist warmongers responsible for ravaging Iraq into oblivion, led by Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, Robert Loewenberg, David Wurmser, and Meyrav Wurmser, penned this essay as the main governing policy for the butcher of Gaza, Benjamin Netanyahu.

    richard perle
    Zionist war criminal Richard Perle: the leader of the pro-Israel team that produced the 'Clean Break' papers.

    The ‘Clean Break’ authors wrote that Netanyahu’s government should bomb targets of Syrian interest in Lebanon in hopes of provoking Syria, as well as the Lebanese Islamic Resistance movement, Hezbollah, into a greater war. If this didn’t work, the deranged authors opined, then Zionism should just bomb Syria outright. The ‘Clean Break Papers’ also reinforced the lies about the battle for Hama and suggested that the Syrian government participates in obscene levels of drug trafficking. Taking it a step further, Perle and company wrote that the Zionist entity should reject peace with Syria, reject the return of al-Jaulan and move to ‘contain, weaken and roll back’ the Syrian state for its own hegemonic interests (41). This document, like Yinon’s, transcends the realm of disturbing and breaches the realm of bone-chilling, as it reflects several events involving Zionism’s assault on Syria in recent years. Most notably, it states that Zionism should ‘diplomatically, militarily and operationally’ support Jordan and Turkey in destabilization efforts against Syria. Exactly what is taking place today.

    On February 14th 2005, the car bomb heard ‘round the world detonated at the St. George Hotel in Beirut, Lebanon. The target of the assassination was former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. The Zionist media and puppet governments across the Western world immediately blamed Syria and Hezbollah for the hit. Evidence? Telecommunications data obtained by the Israeli-British-US-financed United Nations’ Special Tribunal For Lebanon (STL). There was one problem with this data however. It came from an Israeli spy line, planted by the Zionist entity’s assets in its all-out penetration of the Lebanese telecommunications sector (42).

    Apart from the obviousness of the benefits that the usurping entity would acquire with the assassination, i.e. a revamp of civil war in Lebanon and the further isolation of Syria and Hezbollah, this piece of evidence by itself cast light on possible Zionist involvement. But then his eminence, Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, took it a step further in August 2010, over 5 years after the assassination. The Sayyed stepped forward because the STL was wreaking more and more havoc in Lebanon, and to a lesser extent, in Syria. He had to clear Hezbollah’s (and Syria’s) name(s) before Israel obtained its desired result: another war. In a live conference via video feed from his bunker, Sayyed Nasrallah presented video evidence and sworn testimony from apprehended Zionist agents that debunked the Zionist media’s lies and exposed Rafiq Hariri’s assassination as an Israeli intelligence operation (43).

    israel bombs syria
    The Zionist entity bombed Syria in 2007 as per the objectives laid out in the 'Clean Break' papers.

    Following the Hariri assassination, the Zionist entity upped the ante with a new round of aggression against Syria. And this time, it wasn’t by proxy. It was direct. In late 2006, Mossad hacked the laptop of a senior Syrian government official while he was staying in London and after planting a Trojan horse, the Zionist intelligence service obtained information about a Syrian facility known as al-Kabir. The information illegally obtained would lead to Israel’s ‘Operation Orchard,’ the criminal, unilateral September 6th, 2007 bombing of al-Kabir by Zionist warplanes. Israel and the United States accused Syria of building a nuclear facility, and the powers then cited the IAEI finding uranium on the scene as proof. Bashar al-Assad vociferously rejected the allegations and maintained that it was nothing more than a conventional military facility and that Israel committed an act of war. He further said that the uranium found at al-Kabir was planted by Zionism (44).

    Despite the Zionist media’s best attempts at whitewashing the act of Israeli aggression against Syria as ‘justifiable’ because a nuclear facility belonging to an ‘enemy state’ was bombed, its narrative repeatedly crashed and burned. Intelligence experts, citing precision satellite imaging (45), several investigative journalists (46) and the director of nuclear policy at the Center for American Progress (47) all confirmed that al-Kabir was nothing more than a military warehouse that stored various armaments, including rockets and missiles. There was absolutely nothing nuclear about it.

    mossad
    Surprise, Surprise: Mossad was behind the killing of top Syrian General, Mohammad Suleiman.

    This flagrant violation of Syria’s sovereignty wasn’t enough for the Zionist entity however, as it never is. No, the usurping Israeli state needed blood. And it needed blood that would send a message to not only Syria, but the Resistance Axis as a whole. On August 1st, 2008, Syrian General and Special Presidential Advisor for Arms Procurement and Strategic Weapons Mohammed Suleiman was assassinated by sniper fire in the port city of Tartus. Suleiman was extremely close to Bashar al-Assad, he was in charge of financing and arming the Syrian military and most importantly, he was also the Syrian government’s liaison to Hezbollah. The most likely suspect in the killing was obviously the Zionist entity. Typically, the Israeli regime denied any involvement, but its denial was utterly bizarre. An Israeli defense source told Zionist-owned, Zionist-run Sky News, “To the best of my knowledge, we didn’t do it (48).” It seems, that on this day, the hasbara was sloppy.

    Disregarding Tel Aviv’s pathetic attempts at covering its tracks, the assassination of General Suleiman was indeed revealed to be part of a three-prong Israeli intelligence operation, attached to its bombing of al-Kabir and its criminal extrajudicial killing of Hezbollah commander Imad Mughniyeh (49). Long-time Israeli spy (since 1982) Ali Jarrah confessed to providing essential logistics for the killing of General Suleiman, as he scouted various points in Tartus that would later be used in the Zionist operation (50). Additionally, Syrian sources later confirmed that Mossad was behind the high-profile murder and act of war, and that the sniper was an Israeli agent (51).

    Despite multiple attempts at provoking Syria into war by violating its sovereignty and waging nonstop war on its ally, the Lebanese Islamic Resistance of Hezbollah, the Zionist entity failed. And as events unfold in Syria today, with innocent blood flowing from moment to moment, it is clear that Israel has reverted back to its original plan, what nearly achieved success decades ago in ousting Assad’s father and crushing the Resistance Axis, and what was laid out by Oded Yinon and the ‘Clean Break’ study group: an armed, insurrectionist coup d’etat, manipulated by Israel and its regional allies under the guise of a ‘democratic’ revolution. ‘Kiss of Death’ 2.0 initiated.

    israel and saudi arabia
    Israel and Saudi Arabia: United against Syria.

    The Syrian Revolution: 100% Manufactured by Israel and Saudi Arabia

    When events that reflect a greater geopolitical shift begin to unfold, there are two questions that must be asked regarding the game-changers to accurately assess why the said shift is occurring: Who is behind the events? And, who benefits from them? In the case of what is being referred to by the international Zionist media as the ‘Syrian Revolution,’ the organizers and benefactors of the unrest beleaguering Syria are the Zionist entity and the House of Saud, controllers of ‘Saudi’ Arabia.

    Since 2004, Mossad had not only been funding Syrian opposition groups with millions of US dollars, but directing them. The funding continued until the end of 2009. Mossad was running a unit of cyber dissidents, training them to spread hasbara against Bashar al-Assad and the Resistance Axis and even offering them sanctuary in Israeli logistics facilities. Mossad worked hand in hand with the Zionist-run, Zionist-founded National Endowment for Democracy (NED) in recruiting these dissidents to incite violence within Syria. NED of course, has been at the heart of the ‘Arab Spring’ from the very beginning. NED’s involvement with Mossad in organizing Syrian opposition groups explains the $6 million given to such groups by the Likudnik Bush administration in 2006 (52). What is most telling however, is that several of the meetings held between Mossad and the Syrian opposition were hosted by former Syrian Vice President Abdel-Halim Khaddam and the Comptroller General of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood (53).

    Despite repeated (and ongoing) Zionist media reports of ‘pro-democracy’ opposition, there was something very wrong, violently wrong, with the Syrian Revolution from the beginning. Protesters chanted, “No Iran, no Hezbollah, we want a president who fears Allah!” as they burned the flags of the Lebanese Resistance and the Islamic Republic (54). The vile, vicious, racist chants continued, “Alawiyya in coffins and move all the Christians to Beirut (55)!” These chants were heard throughout the protest strongholds, including Aleppo and Damascus. But the worst of all, was heard in Daraa, where eyewitnesses stated, “Let Obama come and take Syria. Let Israel come and take Syria. Anything is better than Bashar al-Assad (56).” This is not the behavior of the righteous Syrian people, who support the Resistance wholeheartedly, who have rejected sectarianism completely, living together harmoniously for centuries and who would rather die with dignity than ever grant recognition to the Zionist regime.

    obama israel
    'Pro-Democracy' Syrian protesters chanted for Obama and the Zionist regime to 'come take Syria.'

    It is essential to note, that Bashar al-Assad publicly acknowledges that there is an opposition movement in Syria, “We make a distinction between those with legitimate grievances and the saboteurs who represent a small group which has tried to exploit the goodwill of the Syrian people for its own ends (57).” Equally essential, is that the Syrian opposition publicly states that it isn’t trying to topple the Assad government, instead stating, “Bashar Al-Assad is our president and we are trying to achieve a solution to escape the current crisis. The opposition here is not trying to topple the regime like the opposition in Libya, but it demands real reform which is possible in the current system (58).” The opposition in Libya, as previously discussed in the opening, is an armed group of Israeli-advised CIA rebels who are seeking the ouster of Muammar Qaddafi. Syria’s opposition is the exact opposite.

    Who then, are these saboteurs, these infiltrators, these insurrectionists? They are split into two camps, one led by assets of the Zionist regime, who will be addressed in a moment, and the other led by Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia’s Syrian Muslim Brotherhood sits at the head of the opposition to pass off the idea that the uprising is indigenous (59). It was the MB that openly led a massive ‘Day of Rage’ demonstration at the end of April (60). The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood’s involvement is explicitly indicative of why such vile rhetoric was being chanted by protesters: the House of Saud despises Hezbollah and Iran with a passion.

    jeffrey feltman
    Jeffrey Feltman: US State Dept official and major player in the Zionist operation to topple Bashar al-Assad.

    A crown prince of the UAE, staunch ally of Saudi Arabia and GCC member, provided opposition groups with cell phones to coordinate their anti-government activities. The cell phones were loaded with special satellite-linked SIM cards from not only the UAE, but Jordan as well. As the opposition began preparing for its ‘democratic’ assault on the ground, the Future Movement of Saad Hariri, former Lebanese Prime Minister and well-known Western-Saudi puppet, began coordinating the press campaign with none other than ubiquitous Zionist war criminal US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffery Feltman and US Ambassador to Israel, Zionist Dan Shapiro (61).

    The cell phones provided by the Zionist-Saudi ‘pro-democracy’ army are important to bringing down the Syrian Revolution’s house of cards. March 15th was the day that the Syrian Revolution began, and it was on this day, that many residents in Damascus were filing complaints with telecommunications firms, reporting unwanted text messages sent to them that called for all Syrians to join the protests. A Syrian investigation revealed that the text messages were sent from an Israeli military base in Tel Hashomer, near Tel Aviv. The Syrian official went on record, “The Israeli enemy could not have done this without help from one of the satellite communications companies (62),” i.e. the satellite-linked cell phones provided by Saudi Arabia’s UAE ally. Once again, the Zionist-Saudi nexus is exposed.

    farid al ghadry
    Farid al-Ghadry: House Arab, Syrian opposition leader and avid Zionist.

    The assets of the Zionist regime in Syria were being led by the notorious Syrian exile Farid al-Ghadry, who had been disseminating information to the Western press through his Reform Party of Syria from the very beginning of the Syrian Revolution (63). The ‘unofficial spokesperson’ for the protesters in Syria was another infamous Syrian exile, Ammar Abdulhamid (64). Al-Ghadry and Abdulhamid are funding, guiding and organizing the protests of the tech-savvy insurrectionists who are mobilizing on the ground via the satellite phones that Israel’s miliary has direct access to. Al-Ghadry is staunchly pro-Zionism and is a proud member of AIPAC. Al-Ghadry also holds the putrid distinction of being the only Syrian to give a speech in front of the racist Israeli institution known as the Knesset. Abdulhamid is a fellow at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, one of the most powerful Zionist think tanks in America (65).

    Former Vice President Abdel-Halim Khaddam, who facilitated contacts between Mossad and the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, has also surfaced as a leader during the Syrian Revolution, calling for the West to intervene in Syria and take down Bashar al-Assad (66). Khaddam’s call echoes that of the same neoconservative mass murderers behind the invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and the drone bombings in Yemen and Pakistan; leading the way on Syria is Zionist war criminal Elliot Abrams (67).

    abdul halim khaddim
    Ex-Syrian VP Abdel-Halim Khaddam is very close to Saudi Arabia and integral to Zionist destabilization in Syria.

    Khaddam is extremely intimate with Saudi Arabia. He accepted $30 million from the House of Saud in 2005 to step down from Bashar al-Assad’s government and the Saudi rulers later secured his safe passage from Damascus to Paris following his resignation. Subsequently, he initiated an alliance with the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood and outwardly plotted the removal of Bashar al-Assad. Over the years, Khaddam has been at Saudi Arabia’s beckoned call, his entire family enjoys Saudi citizenship and is directly related to fellow Saudi-stooge Saad Hariri and House of Saud ruler Abdullah due to their wives being sisters. Khaddam’s leadership role in Syria’s Revolution was mapped out at the Saudi embassy in Brussels, where he was transferred via Saudi transport just prior to the beginning of the Syrian Revolution. He became a director of the revolt, alongside al-Ghadry and Abdulhamid in the US. The Saudi Embassy in Brussels became a joint operational headquarters for the Israel-America-Jordan-Saudi nexus to plunge Syria into total chaos. Jordan’s role was vital, as it was in charge of providing weapons to the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood’s soldiers in its ‘capital’ cities of Daraa and Homs (68).

    Jordan’s role was reaffirmed when Muthanna al-Dhari, son of Iraqi Resistance leader Sheikh Harith Suleiman al-Dhari, was apprehended by Syrian security forces for terrorist activities within Syria. Al-Dhari was expelled from occupied Iraq by his father at the beginnings of the occupation for being involved with the Mossad false flag bombings that have ravaged Iraq and for repeatedly meeting with Zionist military establishment leaders in Tel Aviv. Syrian officials uncovered that al-Dhari had set up a base of operations in Jordan and held a meeting at the base with a representative of Abdel-Halim Khaddam. It was also uncovered that al-Dhari was working with Israeli intelligence to coordinate Iraq-like terror attacks in Syria (69). This should not be surprising; Jordan has kowtowed to the occupying Zionist regime’s every whim for decades.

    With the Saudi-Israeli-directed protesters continuing to pour into the streets and insult Iran, Hezbollah, slander Ayatollah Sayyed Ruhollah Khomeini and despicably burn photographs of Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah (70), former Mossad chief Meir Dagan declaring that it is in Israel’s best interest to overthrow Bashar al-Assad and install a ‘Sunni’ regime to weaken Hezbollah (71) and the Zionist-occupied United States government routinely contacting the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood (72), the whole picture should be illuminated now: the Syrian Revolution is 100% manufactured by the Zionist entity and the House of Saud.

    ~ End Of Part I ~

    Next: Al-Jazeera’s shadowy role in the ‘kiss of democratic death’ placed on Syria, Turkey’s two-faced involvement and Israel’s ‘greater’ agenda…

    Sources:

    (1) Iraq Today: 5 Million Orphans by Zaineb Alani, Socialist Action

    (2) UN: 7.4 Million Afghans Are Living With Hunger And Fear Of Starvation by Michelle Nichols, RAWA News

    (3) Haneen Zoabi: A Palestinian Woman Fighting For Equality In Israel by Khaled Khalefa, Xinhua

    (4) 10 Injured In Non-Violent Weekly Protests Friday by IMEMC and PNN; The Weight Of Nationalism In Nabi Saleh by Joseph Dana, 972 Magazine

    (5) Interview With Milad Ayyash’s Sister by Palestine Monitor

    (6) B’TSelem: Gaza, 95% Factories Are Closed, 93% Of Water Is Polluted by Haitham Sabbah, Sabbah Report

    (7) Life In Jordan Valley Strangled By Israeli Military Control by Jillian Kestler-D’Amours, The Electronic Intifada

    (8) Jerusalem’s Israeli Municipality Discusses Plans To Build 7600 Units by WAFA

    (9) Israel And India: Brothers In Occupation Of Kashmir by Jonathan Azaziah, Mask of Zion

    (10) CRPF Troopers In IHK Get New Israeli Assault Rifles by Kashmir Media Service

    (11) US Neo-Cons Urge Libya Intervention by Jim Lobe, Al-Jazeera English

    (12) Mounting Evidence Of CIA Ties To Libyan Rebels by Patrick Martin, Global Research

    (13) Libyan Rebels Will Recognize Israel, Bernard-Henri Levy Tells Netanyahu by Radio France Internationale

    (14) Libya War Is About Theft Of State Assets And Total Restructuring Of A Nation by Martin Iqbal, Empire Strikes Black

    (15) NATO Operation In Libya Is Collective Punishment – Ex-Congresswoman by Russia Today

    (16) Libya Under NATO Attack by Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, Dissident Voice

    (17) Libyan Gov’t Claims ‘Barbaric’ NATO Raid Killed Civilians, Children by The Raw Story

    (18) UNSC Resolution 497 Invalidating Israel’s Annexation Of The Golan Heights by The Institute For Middle East Understanding

    (19) Special Commentary: Iranian Reaction To The Great Syrian Revolt by Babak Rahimi, The Jamestown Foundation

    (20) Saudi Arabia, Jordan Behind Syria’s Unrest by Hassan Hanizadeh, Press TV

    (21) Ofergate: The Latest Zionist Propaganda Blitz Against Iran by Jonathan Azaziah, Mask of Zion

    (22) Lebanon Marks 36th Anniv. Of Civil War by Serena Shim, Press TV

    (23) Asad: The Struggle For The Middle East by Patrick Seale

    (24) February 24, 1982: Syria Offers Picture Of Hama Revolt by John Kifner, The New York Times

    (25) Dreams And Shadows: The Future Of The Middle East by Robin Wright

    (26) Destruction Of Hama and Hums In Syria by The UN Refugee Agency

    (27) George Soros’ International School Of Youth Corruption by Marek Glogoczowski, Free Speech Project

    (28) Naming Names: Your Real Government by Tony Cartalucci, Land Destroyer Report

    (29) Incubator Babies, “Stonings” And Amnesty International’s Dirty Propaganda War by Aion Essence, Alter Net

    (30) Syria’s Tadmor Prison: Dissent Still Hostage To A Legacy Of Terror by Human Rights Watch

    (31) George Soros Gives $100 Million To Human Rights Watch by Ed Pilkington, The Guardian

    (32) What Happened In Kurdish Halabja? by Professor Mohammed al-Obaidi, Global Research

    (33) Flashback: What Do Fallujah And Halabja Have In Common? by Ghali Hassan, Uruk Net

    (34) The Massacre Of Hama (1982): Law Application Requires Accountability by The Syrian Human Rights Committee

    (35) About Us by The Syrian Human Rights Committee

    (36) Links: Government And Politics by The Syrian Human Rights Committee

    (37) Israel Hopes To Colonize Parts Of Iraq As ‘Greater Israel’ by Wayne Madsen, Online Journal

    (38) The Israeli-Kurdish Relations by Sergey Minasian, 21st Century, Number 1, April, 2007

    (39) Israelis ‘Train Kurdish Forces’ by Magdi Abdelhadi, BBC News

    (40) A Strategy For Israel In The Nineteen Eighties by Oded Yinon, Kivunim

    (41) A Clean Break: A New Strategy For Securing The Realm by The Institute For Advanced Strategic and Political Studies

    (42) The Hariri Assassination: The Role of Israel? by Rannie Amiri, Global Research

    (43) Sayyed Nasrallah: “Israel” Behind PM Hariri’s Assassination by Nour Rida, Moqawama English

    (44) Mossad Hacked Syrian Official’s Computer Before Bombing Mysterious Facility by Kim Zetter, Wired

    (45) Syria Rebuilds On Site Destroyed By Israeli Bombs by William J. Broad, The New York Times

    (46) Sy Hersh Confirms: Syrian Facility Bombed By Israel Was Not Nuclear by David Edwards and Muriel Kane, The Raw Story

    (47) What Did Israel Bomb In Syria? by Pepe Escobar, The Real News

    (48) Israel Denies Involvement In Syrian General’s Assassination by Yoav Stern, Haaretz

    (49) Defence Chiefs Urge Hawk Netanyahu To Strike Deal With Syria by Uzi Mahnaimi, The Sunday Times

    (50) Spy For Israel ‘Admits’ Scouting Mughniyeh Hit Site by The Daily Star

    (51) Israel Implicated In Suleiman Shooting by The Tehran Times

    (52) US ‘Secretly Funded Syrian Opposition’ by Li Ying, Global Times

    (53) British Report: Mossad Unprecedentedly Penetrates The Syrian Opposition Financially And Politically by Jouhina Portal News

    (54) “A President Of Afraid Of Allah” by Michael J. Totten, Pajamas Media

    (55) From Syria With Doubt by As’ad Abu Khalil, The Angry Arab News Service

    (56) ‘Let Israel Come And Take Syria’ by Ynet

    (57) Syria’s Assad Offers Dialogue, Rejects Chaos by Ma’an News Agency

    (58) We Are Not Seeking To Topple Assad: Syrian Opposition Member

    (59) In Syria, The Regime Lies And So Does Elements Of The Opposition–US Government Confirms The Presence Of Religious Armed Groups by As’ad Abu Khalil, The Angry Arab News Service

    (60) AP: Muslim Brotherhood Behind Syria’s New ‘Day Of Rage’ by Jonathon M. Seidl, The Blaze

    (61) Syria, In The Eye Of The Storm – Part II by Nidal Hmedeh and translated by Eslam al-Rihani, Al-Manar

    (62) Syria: Israel Behind Anti-Government Rallies by Roee Nahmias, Ynet

    (63) Syria, In The Eye Of The Storm – Part I by Nidal Hmedeh and translated by Eslam al-Rihani, Al-Manar

    (64) Syrian Rebels Don’t U.S. Aid, At Least For Now by Eli Lake, The Washington Times

    (65) Uprisings In Syria Appear To Be The Work Of Foreign Agitators by Keith Johnson, American Free Press

    (66) Syria, In The Eye Of The Storm – Part III by Nidal Hmedeh and translated by Eslam al-Rihani, Al-Manar

    (67) Neocons Target Assad Regime by Jim Lobe, Antiwar.com

    (68) Saudi Arabia, Jordan Behind Syria’s Unrest by Hassan Hanizadeh, Press TV

    (69) Syria Nabs Israeli-Backed Terrorist by Press TV

    (70) Syrian Protesters Turn On Iran And Hezbollah by France 24

    (71) Dagan Doubts ‘Arab Spring’ by Yoav Zitun, Ynet

    (72) US And Syrian Muslim Brotherhood by As’ad Abu Khalil, The Angry Arab News Service

    http://www.maskofzion.com/2011/07/kiss-of-democratic-death-israels-plot.html, 6 July 2011


  • Turkey’s model must rest on democracy

    Turkey’s model must rest on democracy

    By Katinka Barysch
    The Daily Star

    The outcome of the Turkish parliamentary election on June 12 was a foregone conclusion. For a third time, voters rewarded the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP, and its popular leader, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, for presiding over almost a decade of economic growth and Turkey’s rise as a regional power.

    However, a Turkey ruled by an overly strong and increasingly intolerant AKP is less likely to continue with reform and democratization at home. It would hardly be an inspiration for the millions of Muslims striving for freedom in the Middle East and North Africa.

    The uprisings in its neighborhood will force the next Turkish government to make some tough choices. These are best made in a political system that has strong checks and balances and allows for open debate.

    The next Turkish government will remain officially opposed to Western intervention into Arab countries – as it was initially when the United Kingdom, France and the United States decided to protect the Libyan rebels.

    It will also remain cautious about calling for the demise of autocratic regimes around its borders, fearing political instability, a resurgence of Kurdish separatism and refugee flows. However, sooner or later Erdogan will have to acknowledge that the time for dictatorships in the Middle East is over if Turkey is to maintain its regional leadership and credibility.

    During his election rallies, Erdogan promised to use his renewed mandate to adopt a new Constitution and improve Turkey’s infrastructure. Foreign policy has played a secondary role.

    Erdogan is unlikely to take the steps necessary to unfreeze Turkey’s European Union accession talks as long as Cyprus, France and other EU members keep blocking progress on the European side.

    Instead, Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkey’s clever and energetic foreign minister, will continue his efforts to implement a “zero problem with the neighbors” policy. Even the main opposition party, the secularist Republican People’s Party (CHP), promised to stay on a similar foreign policy course in the unlikely event of a victory, although it vowed to improve strained relations with the U.S. and Israel.

    Nevertheless, Turkey’s foreign policy will inevitably change in coming years – and the election will have been crucial in determining how. Turkey matters hugely for the regions to its east and south: both for what it is, as a model and inspiration for the Muslim world, and what it does, a hyperactive player in a troubled neighborhood.

    Most Turks dismiss the idea of their country being a model for the transformations taking place in North Africa and the Middle East. Yet there’s no doubt that many people in the Arab world and beyond are inspired by the fast-growing, predominantly Muslim and secular democracy that has started to address intractable minority issues.

    Turkey’s democracy is far from flawless. True, elections are free and mostly fair. Civil liberties, minority rights and the status of women have all been strengthened. And the army no longer plays a strong role in politics. Yet the ruling AKP, just like the CHP before it, stands accused of using the judiciary, the ministries and other bits of the state apparatus to tighten its grip on power, hold down opponents and reward cronies.

    The political scene is deeply split, while intolerance bordering on paranoia poisons the political atmosphere. Some 60 journalists now languish in jail, many on spurious charges of wanting to overthrow the constitutional order or split the country. About 10,000 cases against writers and broadcasters are still pending.

    For many Turkey watchers in the West, these democratic shortcomings threaten to invalidate Turkey’s EU applications. But for most people in say, Syria, Iran or Libya, Turkey probably still looks infinitely better than their own autocratic, poor, battle-weary countries.

    In fact, Turkey’s imperfections might add to its appeal in the Muslim world. Few Egyptians or Tunisians appear to have much appetite for European or American sermons about the right way to build a democracy or market economy.

    Turkey is seen as a country that grapples relatively successfully with familiar problems, such as how to combine democracy and religious authority, determine the military’s role in post-revolutions politics and enacting economic reforms that create jobs for an eager young population.

    While proud of their achievements, Erdogan and Davutoglu have made a point not to lecture their neighbors about how to run their affairs.

    Many previous governments in Ankara regarded their neighbors mainly as potential threats to Turkey’s territorial integrity and secular regime. By contrast, Erdogan has highlighted reconciliation, trade integration and people-to-people contacts.

    Until recently, Erdogan managed to maintain close personal ties with autocrats such as Syria’s Bashar Assad, Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi, while at the same time appealing to the so-called Arab street through his strident criticism of Israel and defense of the Palestinian cause.

    Turkey also gained kudos trying to be an honest broker in some of the region’s more intractable conflicts, such as between Israel and Syria or Afghanistan and Pakistan, albeit with limited success.

    Turkey’s “zero problem” policy started to look threadbare even before the Arab Spring. Its attempted reconciliation with Armenia has foundered, relations with Israel deteriorated while Turkey’s policy toward Iran upset its traditional Western allies. Turmoil in its neighborhood now forces Turkey to make hard choices.

    With instability now on Turkey’s borders, in particular in Syria, security considerations once again are climbing the Turkish foreign-policy agenda. Erdogan was quick to call for political change in Egypt, a regional rival with which Turkey has scant ties, but he took time to criticize Gadhafi and Assad for unleashing their armies on their own people.

    In the new political climate, Erdogan can no longer easily rub shoulders with the likes of Ahmadinejad while being a hero to millions of Muslims.

    Many people in the Middle East and North Africa look to Turkey not only for inspiration but for active support in their struggle for freedom and prosperity. Turkey could be well placed to share its experience in building a multiparty democracy and functioning state institutions – but only if its democratization process continues at home.

    Erdogan had hoped to gain a super-majority, allowing him to push through a new Constitution, as promised since 2007, without much input from the opposition. He was unable to achieve this.

    Such an option would have further deepened Turkey’s pernicious political divide and set a bad example for neighboring countries threatened by sectarianism and political strife.

    What’s more, many observers assume that the AKP would have sought to create a presidential system through the new Constitution, with Erdogan himself ascending to a strengthened presidency in a few years. For Turkey – an already a highly centralized country – this would have been a bad move.

    The result would not so much have been Islamization, as Erdogan critics often claim, but Putinization: a political system focused on one strongman with weak or nonexistent checks and balances, bad decision-making and a withering opposition.

    Such a Turkey could not inspire its neighbors and it could hardly have been relied upon to help the Middle East on its path to political and economic openness.

    Katinka Barysch is deputy director of the Centre for European Reform, an independent London-based think tank. This commentary is reprinted with permission from YaleGlobal Online (www.yaleglobal.yale.edu). Copyright © 2011, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, Yale University.

    A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Daily Star on June 17, 2011, on page 7.

    Read more:

    (The Daily Star :: Lebanon News :: http://www.dailystar.com.lb)

  • Happy Turks

    Happy Turks

    Real democracy is an intricate everyday process, as Turkey has found and continues to learn, writes Abdel-Moneim Said

    amsaidIt had been at least 10 years since my last visit to Istanbul, the capital of the Byzantine Empire since the fourth century, the capital of the Ottoman Empire since the 15th century, and the effective commercial, economic and even political capital of the Turkish Republic since 1923. In that decade the city has totally changed. It has become more vibrant and elegant than it was at the turn of the millennium and, more importantly, it has grown more composed and reconciled with itself. Ten years ago, it seemed gripped by a kind of schizophrenia, its personality torn between the East and West and between Europe and the Islamic world. The condition was evident in women and men’s clothing, in politics and the economy, in the divides between the military and civilians, secularists and the religious, and moderates and extremists, and in so many other social and cultural traits. Even with respect to the outside world, Turkey stood seething at the EU doorway as other lesser countries were allowed in one after the other while it was kept waiting in the queue. At the same time, its relations were tense with virtually all its neighbours: Syria, Iraq, Iran, Armenia, Russia, and of course Greece and Bulgaria. This is no longer the case now that it has adopted a foreign policy based on the principle of “zero conflict”, a term one hears from every politician from the president to petty officials.

    My latest visit was occasioned by an invitation from the Council of Europe. One of Europe’s oldest institutions, the Council was established in 1949 in Strasbourg, France, before the European drive to create other cooperative organisations that eventually evolved to become the EU. Although the Council of Europe and the EU share the same flag, the former is more comprehensive, with 47 member states (nearly all European countries with the exception of Belarus) with a combined population of 800 million. The primary focal areas of the council are human rights, rule of law and democracy, and cultural cooperation. Although it has similar bodies to the EU, such as an executive secretariat, ministerial council and parliamentary assembly, its decisions are not binding on its members. However, in its field of specialisation, namely human rights, anyone has the right to file a complaint against his government before the European Court of Human Rights, which formulates its rulings on the basis of international conventions on human rights.

    The Council had invited me to participate in a discussion that included some 50 participants, most of who came from the Greek and Turkish parts of Cyprus. This was the last of a series of meetings that aimed to foster rapprochement and mutual understanding between younger representatives of the two peoples of this island through education and promoting liberal democratic means and approaches to handling conflict issues. My role, together with other professors, was to discuss various experiences in democratic transformation and, naturally, the “Arab Spring” was the subject of my lecture on the causes, problems and future of the current wave of transformation in the Arab region. Subsequent lectures would cover the experiences of countries that preceded us in this process, such as Ukraine, Serbia and other Eastern European countries.

    It was no coincidence that Turkey was chosen as the host country for this seminar. This was not because Ankara was an early member of the Council of Europe, but because Turkey had undergone such a profound transformation over the past decade and because it is on the threshold of yet another fundamental change. Following forthcoming elections on 12 June, the Turks will begin to draft a new constitution, which will crown the country’s progress and probably propel it further forward. In addition to its historic status and the cultural diversity it passed through, it is also likely that Istanbul was chosen as the venue for this event because it embodies Turkey’s transitional process, which has freed it from the tensions referred to above. Now the city appears at peace with itself, as pictures of Recep Tayyip Erdogan proliferate preparatory to the forthcoming polls. All political parties have staked as much ground around the city in the run-up to the polls; even the Turkish Communist Party has a tent in one of the major streets. The call to prayer is sounded at the stipulated time, confirming that this city is not like other European cities. However, a European city is not characterised by the absence of the call to prayer, but by the presence of industriousness, enterprise, an open market and advanced technology.

    Tension has ended between the veil and the non-veiled, or at least that was my impression. At any rate, during my three days in Istanbul, I did not see a single woman wearing a niqab, but I did observe headscarves and generally modest attire plus a noticeable tolerance for the country’s guests whose customs and cultures differ from their Turkish counterparts. Ultimately, freedom of choice is there, as it should be. After all, the success of a government is contingent upon its proficiency in managing the country’s resources and on its ability to come out ahead in the international race. There is no need for those displays that hail from Afghanistan and similar places, and that feed tension and fear.

    From the moment you arrive at Ataturk Airport you find people ready to help you. Somehow you know that they are doing this both out of the goodness of their hearts and in order to help increase GNP. When a country ranks 15th in the world on the basis of a GDP per capita of $13,500 using the purchasing power parity method, or even 17th in the world on the basis of a GDP per capita of $10,400 using the current exchange rate method, you also know that happiness and efficacy are attributes that come closest to describing the state of the country and its people, and that their sense of pride before their admiring guests is well deserved.

    Happiness, today, in Turkey is fed in part by what is happening in the Arab world. From the Turkish perspective, the Arab democratic spring found its inspiration in the changes that took place in Turkey and in its unique blend of religious culture and secularism. If Amr Moussa detected the powerful khamasin winds in the Arab Spring, the Turks see it more in terms of the inevitable birth pangs at a moment of momentous change. Which brings us precisely to the subject of the discussion circle in Istanbul.

    Winston Churchill famously said that democracy is the worst form of government, aside from all the others tried from time to time. His remark was meant to underscore that complicated process that is set in motion by the tough choices that confront a society at moments when it needs to address difficult and complex issues and problems. This choosing process does not exist in non-democratic societies where a ruler or ruling clique, a political party bureau, a guardianship committee, a central guidance council, or some other narrow ruling body takes decisions on behalf of the people. In a democratic system, in which popular participation in government is the prime defining characteristic, the people have to make choices and to exercise responsibility.

    Another difficulty with democracy is that the people and their politicians have to accept a government whose authority is limited. This is not just because the legislative and judicial authorities restrict its powers, but also because a democratic society must accept that the political majority and minority can change with every election and that all political forces must bow to a prevailing set of rules and tenets, namely the constitution and the fundamental principles of human rights. The problem then is not just that a government needs to be brought into power through democratic mechanisms, but also that this government has to be an effective one, capable of managing the state’s bureaucracy and resources efficiently towards the realisation of certain goals. Such a government is not the type that keeps its people’s hopes pinned on the results of a national mega project such as Toshka or the “Development Corridor”. It is one that can accomplish things now, make significant improvements in its standards of performance and levels of achievement, and solve the country’s social and economic problems in keeping with the programme it had set for itself at the outset. Politics, in the end, is the process of managing and allocating resources. It is a complex process that a government should not attempt to avoid by means of high-profile long-range mega projects, even if such projects might be part of its work. But nor should citizens try to evade the problem, because they too must bear responsibility, which they exercise through work, production, consumption and, more crucially, through their political participation which makes them part of the processes of choice and decision-making.

    The Turkish participants in the seminar in Istanbul were certainly familiar with the complexities of the problem. Their country has come a long way in building the “infrastructure” of democracy in terms of education, the media, fundamental values and peaceful political practices. Yet in spite of all they have accomplished, the most important being reconciliation with themselves and their intricate history, they realise that they still have a number of complexes to overcome. In order to forestall political fragmentation, the Turkish electoral system introduced the condition that in order to be represented in parliament, a political party must obtain 10 per cent of the national vote. This election threshold effectively limits membership to only three parties, in spite of the fact that Turkey has 50 political parties. Also, in spite of the intellectual and cultural openness that produced a match between secularism and a ruling party with a religious outlook, everyone in Turkey is aware that one of the foremost obstacles to their country’s accession to the EU is their human rights record. According to a report by the Turkish Journalists Association, 58 per cent of Turkish journalists have been imprisoned at least once between 1998 and 2008. Also, during this period, some 1,600 cases have been brought before the European Court of Human Rights, most involving human rights abuses and torture.

    Turks are very familiar with these figures. They are aware of the need to address this problem through major security reforms, which in itself is indicative of how difficult the democracy-building process is, and then through the promulgation of a new constitution and the addition of further improvements every day.

  • The Weak Foundations of Arab Democracy

    The Weak Foundations of Arab Democracy

    By TIMUR KURAN

    Times Topic: Middle East Protests (2010-11)

    29kuranimg articleLarge v2

    THE protesters who have toppled or endangered Arab dictators are demanding more freedoms, fair elections and a crackdown on corruption. But they have not promoted a distinct ideology, let alone a coherent one. This is because private organizations have played only a peripheral role and the demonstrations have lacked leaders of stature.

    Both limitations are due to the longstanding dearth, across the Arab world, of autonomous nongovernmental associations serving as intermediaries between the individual and the state. This chronic weakness of civil society suggests that viable Arab democracies — or leaders who could govern them — will not emerge anytime soon. The more likely immediate outcome of the current turmoil is a new set of dictators or single-party regimes.

    Democracy requires checks and balances, and it is largely through civil society that citizens protect their rights as individuals, force policy makers to accommodate their interests, and limit abuses of state authority. Civil society also promotes a culture of bargaining and gives future leaders the skills to articulate ideas, form coalitions and govern.

    The preconditions for democracy are lacking in the Arab world partly because Hosni Mubarak and other Arab dictators spent the past half-century emasculating the news media, suppressing intellectual inquiry, restricting artistic expression, banning political parties, and co-opting regional, ethnic and religious organizations to silence dissenting voices.

    But the handicaps of Arab civil society also have historical causes that transcend the policies of modern rulers. Until the establishment of colonial regimes in the late 19th century, Arab societies were ruled under Shariah law, which essentially precludes autonomous and self-governing private organizations. Thus, while Western Europe was making its tortuous transition from arbitrary rule by monarchs to democratic rule of law, the Middle East retained authoritarian political structures. Such a political environment prevented democratic institutions from taking root and ultimately facilitated the rise of modern Arab dictatorships.

    Strikingly, Shariah lacks the concept of the corporation, a perpetual and self-governing organization that can be used either for profit-making purposes or to provide social services. Islam’s alternative to the nonprofit corporation was the waqf, a trust established in accordance with Shariah to deliver specified services forever, through trustees bound by essentially fixed instructions. Until modern times, schools, charities and places of worship, all organized as corporations in Western Europe, were set up as waqfs in the Middle East.

    A corporation can adjust to changing conditions and participate in politics. A waqf can do neither. Thus, in premodern Europe, politically vocal churches, universities, professional associations and municipalities provided counterweights to monarchs. In the Middle East, apolitical waqfs did not foster social movements or ideologies.

    Starting in the mid-19th century, the Middle East imported the concept of the corporation from Europe. In stages, self-governing Arab municipalities, professional associations, cultural groups and charities assumed the social functions of waqfs. Still, Arab civil society remains shallow by world standards.

    A telling indication is that in their interactions with private or public organizations, citizens of Arab states are more likely than those in advanced democracies to rely on personal relationships with employees or representatives. This pattern is reflected in corruption statistics of Transparency International, which show that in Arab countries relationships with government agencies are much more likely to be viewed as personal business deals. A historically rooted preference for personal interactions limits the significance of organizations, which helps to explain why nongovernmental organizations have played only muted roles in the Arab uprisings.

    Timur Kuran, a professor of economics and political science at Duke, is the author of “The Long Divergence: How Islamic Law Held Back the Middle East.”

    Read More : The Weak Foundations of Arab Democracy – NYTimes.com.

  • Democratic Police Republic of Turkey

    Democratic Police Republic of Turkey

    BURAK BEKDİL

    These days, Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey looks like a very good example of very bad democracy. The prime minister’s firm belief in uncompromising majority rule perpetually creates scenes reminiscent of the German Democratic Republic, or GDR, of the 1970s: the Turkish Stasi is as good as the East German one, if not better.

    Sadly, the Turkish Stasi has only been incapable of finding the culprits behind a flurry of professionally-plotted, produced and released sex tapes, which practically ended the political careers of (so far) 11 top opposition politicians, including the former leader of the main opposition Republican People’s Party, Deniz Baykal.

    On Friday, a friend told us what he had seen at the town center, Kızılay, earlier during the day: About a dozen left-wing students on a sit-in protest against self-paid university education as their amateurish placards and more amateurish slogans told passers-by. They were surrounded by literally hundreds of policemen anxiously waiting for one single word against the prime minister so that they could “remove the students.” I know the East Germans did not have the liberty to protest, but blame the slight nuance on the fact that Turkey in the year 2011 is not in the Iron Curtain club; it is a European Union member candidate.

    Last week, in Ankara’s Keçiören district where Mr. Erdoğan was to make a public speech, his bodyguards noticed a big banner decorating the façade of a building. It simply read: “Esteemed Prime Minister. Did you come by metro, for which you had broken the ground eight years ago? Signed: The locals of Keçiören.”

    Apparently, some locals of this overwhelmingly pro-Justice and Development Party and pro-Nationalist Movement Party, or MHP, district were politely protesting the unfinished metro line. No insults. No racist propaganda. Most importantly, nothing illegal in the script. The protest message even addressed Mr Erdoğan in the most cordial way possible in Turkish: Esteemed Prime Minister. But the Turkish Stasi was clever enough to notice the sarcasm, and they forcefully brought down the banner.

    Shortly before that, the Stasi had successfully filmed and identified 12 of about 100 journalists who marched to protest the detention of journalists Nedim Şener and Ahmet Şık. The journalists had merely peacefully marched and demanded their colleagues’ release. Now they must pay a fine for that as tickets issued by the governor’s office tell them to do: 154 Turkish Liras each.

    And at the weekend, locals in the city of Adapazarı saw a political banner covering the façade of a building on one of the town’s busiest streets. Crafted by the local MHP branch, the banner was a collage of photos, all publicly available, well-known and legal.

    The photos showed a pro-Kurdish deputy slapping a police officer on the face, available in all newspaper archives, the parade-like entrance from the Habur border gate of PKK members, available in all newspaper archives, one public remark by the prime minister, available in all newspaper archives, an AKP deputy visiting Diyarbakir’s pro-Kurdish mayor, Osman Baydemir, available in all newspaper archives, and the remains of a city bus in Istanbul after a Molotov cocktail attack by PKK sympathizers, also available in all newspaper archives.

    But the Turkish Stasi cleverly thought that when all these legal photos are brought together in an ugly collage for a political message they suddenly became illegal. Naturally, the police forcefully removed the banner from the building without a court order. Last year, a similar photo had been removed from another building in the Hendek Township on orders from the local election board before the Sept. 12 referendum. None of that should be surprising in a country where the prime minister a few years ago sued a lady who received a prison sentence because she had held out a placard that read: Who’s prime minister are you?

    I am not sure if the Turkish version operates a branch similar to Stasi’s famous Division for Garbage Analysis, which was responsible for analyzing garbage for any suspect western food and/or material. But Mr. Erdoğan’s Turkey in the year 2011 certainly looks inspired by Stasi’s two other divisions: Main Administration for Struggle Against Suspicious Persons, and the famous Administration 12, which was responsible for the surveillance of mail and telephone.

    But Turkey in the year 2011 is certainly different from the GDR four decades ago. No East German company could dare put out newspaper advertisements that appealed to “politicians, high-ranking bureaucrats and businessmen” with a view to marketing its state-of-the-art products that blocked and jammed bugs, listening devices and hidden camera recorders. “Devices for your full safety are available,” the Turkish ads read on the same day a news article in daily Habertürk told of ‘politicians’ rushing to private detective offices in Ankara.” Two bugs were found, the article said, one hidden in a TV set, the other inside the alarm system.

    via Democratic Police Republic of Turkey – Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review.

  • Turkey and Middle Eastern democracy

    Turkey and Middle Eastern democracy

    By Eli Martin

    Harvard Political Review, Harvard U. via UWIRE

    Dani Rodrik is the Rafiq Hariri professor of International Political Economy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. His father-in-law, Cetin Dogan, is a lead defendant in Turkey’s Sledgehammer trial.

    Harvard Political Review: How has Turkey responded to the recent events and uprisings in the Middle East?

    Dani Rodrik: Turkey was caught unaware by the Middle East revolutions. Turkey’s relationship with the countries of the Middle East was largely based on a strategy of establishing good relationships with the existing political leadership. To that extent, I think that Turkish leadership was at a loss as to how to respond and they did so in a relatively ad-hoc manner.

    HPR: Do you think Turkey would like to see democracy throughout the Middle East, in an ideal situation?

    DR: I think ultimately Turkey would like to see itself as a leader in a broadly democratic Middle East. There are a couple of things mitigating against that: Some economic interests with existing governments played a conflicting role. Part of the reason Turkey was behind the ball in Libya was that a significant amount of Turkish investment existed in Libya, and Turkey wanted to ensure the safety of those investments, thus delaying their willingness to be on the side of popular protests.

    I think the second important factor that’s going to make it hard for Turkey to lead is that if Egypt does become a democratic country, it is going to be a much more central focus in a democratic Middle East, given its size and importance. Turkey could find itself in competition with Egypt if Egypt, as one hopes, emerges as a robust democracy.

    HPR: You published a book in December on the trials of a broad range of individuals allegedly part of the “Sledgehammer plot” to overthrow the Turkish government. You wrote on your blog that you never imagined yourself having to write this book. Is this a sign of how much Turkey has changed recently?

    DR: Turkey faces huge problems in terms of its political system. I think it is unfortunately going in an authoritarian direction, just as the rest of the region is going in the opposite direction.

    I was hopeful until two years ago that the current government was interested in deepening democracy in Turkey and in strengthening the rule of law. Unfortunately, having watched the ongoing political and military trials closely, it is clear that the rule of law is being systematically undermined and that this would be impossible without the support of the government behind the scenes. Therefore, I see that the government is moving Turkey in a direction that is increasingly authoritarian rather than more democratic. I think the Western media missed this because of Turkey’s story—it looked like a straightforward and appealing narrative of a popularly elected government finally prevailing and enabling the judiciary to address the transgressions of the secular old guard. However, these trials are much closer to show trials.  Look at them closer, and what you find is that the evidence used to lock defendants up ranges from the circumstantial to the demonstrably fabricated. Their real purpose seems to be to demonize the opposition, mobilize domestic support and ensure that state institutions remain under the control of the government for a very long time, rather than to enforce the rule of law.

    HPR: Could you describe Turkey’s current political situation in greater detail?

    DR: There are three groups you need to consider to understand Turkish politics. The first are the representatives of the old order—the military, and the ultra secular groups of the past, which tended to dominate the universities, state institutions, and the higher courts until recently. This group has been the big loser during the last decade.

    That leaves the other two groups in charge. One is the governing party, the Justice and Development Party (AKP), led by Prime Minister Recep Erdogan.

    And the third group, which very few people know much about, is a religious network—the Gulen network—directed by an Islamic preacher, Fetullah Gulen, who lives in Pennsylvania. This is a vast network, very wealthy and very influential, which runs an educational and media empire. Its representatives occupy key positions in the national police and the judiciary. The Gulenists and the AKP have made common cause against the old guard. But given that the old guard has now lost its power, it may turn out that the tension between these two groups will come out into the open in the form of direct competition. I see neither Erdogan nor the Gulenists as a force for democracy.

    HPR: Does the AKP have an Islamist agenda to turn Turkey into an Islamic state? Is that something that people should fear, either about the AKP, or about the Gulenist movement?

    DR: I’m more worried about the Gulen movement, because it lacks transparency and much of the dirty tricks in Turkish politics and judiciary seem to be linked to it. Gulenist police and prosecutors have mounted sham trials under the guise of cleansing the system from coup plotters.  Gulenist media are engaged in systematic disinformation about these trials. These activities are very difficult to reconcile with the moderate, liberal and humane version of Islam that the movement preaches. As for the AKP, I worry less about its Islamist leanings, and more about an ingrained authoritarianism. My worry is less that Turkey will become the next Iran, but that Turkey will become a worse version of Russia, where the media and the judiciary are effectively controlled and manipulated by pro-government forces.

    HPR: Do you think the central tenets of your most recent book, The Globalization Paradox—that economic globalization, national sovereignty and democracy are incompatible—can be applied to the current situation of the Turkey and the Middle East?

    DR: The Middle East crisis reminds us of the centrality of national governments in people’s lives, in economic, political and social affairs, and of the need to have good governance at the national level.

    Despite all the talk about how the world has become “flat” and national borders don’t matter anymore, the well-being of people by and large still revolves around what national governments do and don’t do. The countries that are in the best position to reap the rewards of economic globalization are in fact the ones that have strong, well-governed states and national governments.

    This interview has been edited and condensed.

    Read more here:

    Copyright 2010 Harvard Political Review