Just Foreign Policy News, February 28, 2012
Israel claims won’t warn U.S.; Sachs calls 4 World Bank prez who knows development
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Go Straight to the News Summary
I) Actions and Featured Articles
*Action: Help Keith Ellison & Walter Jones Stand Up for Diplomatic Engagement with Iran
Ellison and Jones are circulating a letter to their colleagues urging that the U.S. step up diplomatic efforts to achieve agreements with Iran over its disputed nuclear program. Ask your Rep. to sign the Ellison-Jones letter.
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/act/ellison-jones
Keith Ellison and Walter Jones Stand Up for Diplomatic Engagement with Iran
Largely missing from the recent political debate, until now, has been a full-throated defense of diplomatic engagement with Iran towards negotiated agreements that would resolve or mitigate international concerns about its disputed nuclear program.
http://www.truth-out.org/keith-ellison-and-walter-jones-stand-diplomatic-engagement-iran/1330367025
Medea Benjamin: AIPAC Undermines Democracy at Home and in the Middle East
Ten reasons why AIPAC is dangerous.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/02/28-9
Bureau of Investigative Journalism: Fresh evidence of CIA civilian deaths in Pakistan revealed
In a study of ten major drone strikes in Pakistan since 2010, Associated Press deployed a field reporter to Waziristan and questioned more than 80 local people about ten CIA attacks. The results generally confirm the accuracy of original credible media reports – and in two cases identify previously unrecorded civilian deaths.
http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2012/02/27/fresh-evidence-of-cia-civilian-deaths-in-pakistan-revealed/
March 2: Occupy AIPAC
Under the banner of Occupy AIPAC, this long weekend will include a policy summit with panels on Iran, the Arab uprisings, Palestine/Israel and AIPAC, film screenings, mass protests, a teach-in on diplomacy and alternatives to war, creative actions, a cultural night, workshops, and a Capitol Hill policy briefing on the impact of U.S. military aid to Israel on Palestinians.
http://www.occupyaipac.org/
II) Summary:
U.S./Top News
1) Israeli officials say they will not warn the U.S. if they decide to launch a strike against Iranian nuclear facilities, AP reports. Israel is frustrated with the White House, AP says. After a visit by National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, the Israelis became convinced the Americans would neither take military action, nor go along with unilateral action by Israel against Iran.
U.S. intelligence and special operations officials have tried to keep a dialogue going with Israel despite the high-level impasse, offering options such as allowing Israel to use U.S. bases in the region to launch such a strike, as a way to make sure the Israelis give the Americans a heads-up, AP says.
2) U.S. officials have traditionally viewed the World Bank as an extension of U.S. foreign policy and commercial interests, writes Jeffrey Sachs for Project Syndicate. Now many members, including Brazil, China, India, and several African countries, are raising their voices in support of more collegial leadership and an improved strategy that works for all.
From the Bank’s establishment until today, the unwritten rule has been that the US simply designates each new president: all 11 have been Americans, and not a single one has been an expert in economic development, the Bank’s core responsibility, or had a career in fighting poverty or promoting environmental sustainability. Instead, the US has selected Wall Street bankers and politicians, presumably to ensure that the Bank’s policies are suitably friendly to US commercial and political interests.
But that policy is backfiring on the US and badly hurting the world, Sachs writes. Many projects have catered to US corporate interests rather than to sustainable development. The Bank has cut a lot of ribbons on development projects, but has solved far too few global problems.
The Bank’s new president should have first-hand professional experience regarding the range of pressing development challenges, Sachs writes. A World Bank leader who once again comes from Wall Street or from US politics would be a heavy blow for a planet in need of creative solutions to complex development challenges. The Bank needs an accomplished professional who is ready to tackle the great challenges of sustainable development from day one.
3) As nearly every current and former U.S. military and intelligence official has warned, war with Iran would not just have immense costs, it would likely be self-defeating, write Jamal Abdi and Trita Parsi of NIAC in The Hill. But the only real alternative to war, a diplomatic resolution through sustained negotiations, has been largely kept off the table by hard-liners on all sides of the conflict who have demonized the very idea of engagement.
This month, Sens. Graham, Lieberman and Casey introduced a resolution – expected to be pushed hard by AIPAC during its upcoming conference – that would severely constrain U.S. diplomatic options by stating that even a civilian nuclear program in Iran cannot be contained, which does not just directly lower the threshold for war, but is a non-starter for talks.
But now Reps. Keith Ellison and Walter Jones have begun circulating a bipartisan letter to President Obama in support of a diplomatic initiative to implement an inspections-based solution to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapon and prevent war.
4) Israel’s civil defenses are not ready to protect the population in a missile war, an opposition lawmaker said on Monday, fuelling debate about the feasibility of an attack on Iran’s nuclear program, Reuters reports. Israel’s slow digging in on the homefront and the fact that a successor has yet to be named for outgoing Civil Defense Minister Matan Vilnai may support that idea that the Netanyahu government does not really see a showdown with Iran as imminent, Reuters says.
Israel/Palestine
5) A group of U.S. congresswomen on a J Street delegation were clearly moved by watching Palestinians queue at an Israeli checkpoint, JTA reports. Several Israeli settlers described a scenario in which Palestinians could stay in their homes but not receive national or voting rights. That drew a sharp reply from the congresswomen, five of whom are African Americans, JTA says. "Some people would call that apartheid," said Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), the only white congresswoman on the trip.
6) A Washington State court dismissed a lawsuit against members of the Olympia Food Co-op board of directors for their decision to boycott Israeli goods, calling it a SLAPP, and said it would award the defendants attorneys’ fees, costs, and sanctions, the Center for Constitutional Rights reports. "We are pleased the Court found this case to be what it is – an attempt to chill free speech on a matter of public concern. This sends a message to those trying to silence support of Palestinian human rights to think twice before they bring a lawsuit," said Maria LaHood, a senior staff attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights.
Brazil
7) Brazil has said that developing nations would be happy to provide more money to ease the eurozone’s debt crisis, in return for more power within the IMF, the BBC reports. Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega said: "Emerging countries will only help under two conditions; first that [the Europeans] strengthen their firewall and second for the IMF [voting rights] reform be implemented."
Bolivia/Venezuela
8) According to company emails published by WikiLeaks, Stratfor’s Vice President stated that in the past Washington would have assassinated the Presidents of Bolivia and Venezuela, Upside Down World Reports. "Back in the day, we would have been planning his (and Chavez’s) helicopter ‘accident,’" wrote VP Fred Burton, a former deputy chief of the State Department’s counter terrorism division, in an email regarding Bolivian President Evo Morales. "Guess I’m getting old." [Enterprising researchers may wish to explore who had "helicopter accidents" when Burton was deputy chief of the State Department’s "counter terrorism division" – JFP.]
Contents:
U.S./Top News
1) AP sources: Israel would not warn US on Iran strike
Kimberly Dozier, Associated Press, February 28, 2012
http://news.yahoo.com/ap-sources-israel-not-warn-us-iran-strike-153536099.html
Washington – Israeli officials say they will not warn the U.S. if they decide to launch a pre-emptive strike against Iranian nuclear facilities. The pronouncement, delivered in a series of private, top-level conversations with U.S. officials, sets a tense tone ahead of meetings in the coming days at the White House and in Congress.
Israeli officials said that if they eventually decide a strike is necessary, they would keep the Americans in the dark to decrease the likelihood that the U.S. would be held responsible for failing to stop Israel’s potential attack, said one U.S. intelligence official familiar with the discussions. The U.S. has been working with the Israelis for months to convince them that an attack would be only a temporary setback to Iran’s nuclear program.
Israeli defense officials confirmed that there are no plans to alert the U.S. ahead of time about any operation against Iran, though they stressed no decisions have been made on whether to attack. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing a confidential security matter.
[…] The secret warning is likely to worry U.S. officials and begin the high-level meetings with Israel and the U.S. far apart on how to handle Iran.
But the apparent decision to keep the U.S. in the dark also stems from Israel’s frustration with the White House. After a visit by National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, the Israelis became convinced the Americans would neither take military action, nor go along with unilateral action by Israel against Iran. The Israelis concluded that if there were any strike they would have to conduct it unilaterally – a point they are likely to hammer home in a series of meetings over the next two weeks in Washington, the official said.
[…] U.S. intelligence and special operations officials have tried to keep a dialogue going with Israel despite the high-level impasse, offering options such as allowing Israel to use U.S. bases in the region to launch such a strike, as a way to make sure the Israelis give the Americans a heads-up, according to the U.S. official and a former U.S. official with knowledge of the communications.
[…]
2) A World Bank for a New World
Jeffrey D. Sachs, Project Syndicate, 2012-02-24
http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/sachs187/English
[Sachs is Professor of Economics and Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. He is also Special Adviser to United Nations Secretary-General on the Millennium Development Goals.]
New York – The world is at a crossroads. Either the global community will join together to fight poverty, resource depletion, and climate change, or it will face a generation of resource wars, political instability, and environmental ruin.
The World Bank, if properly led, can play a key role in averting these threats and the risks that they imply. The global stakes are thus very high this spring as the Bank’s 187 member countries choose a new president to succeed Robert Zoellick, whose term ends in July.
The World Bank was established in 1944 to promote economic development, and virtually every country is now a member. Its central mission is to reduce global poverty and ensure that global development is environmentally sound and socially inclusive. Achieving these goals would not only improve the lives of billions of people, but would also forestall violent conflicts that are stoked by poverty, famine, and struggles over scarce resources.
American officials have traditionally viewed the World Bank as an extension of United States foreign policy and commercial interests. With the Bank just two blocks away from the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue, it has been all too easy for the US to dominate the institution. Now many members, including Brazil, China, India, and several African countries, are raising their voices in support of more collegial leadership and an improved strategy that works for all.
From the Bank’s establishment until today, the unwritten rule has been that the US government simply designates each new president: all 11 have been Americans, and not a single one has been an expert in economic development, the Bank’s core responsibility, or had a career in fighting poverty or promoting environmental sustainability. Instead, the US has selected Wall Street bankers and politicians, presumably to ensure that the Bank’s policies are suitably friendly to US commercial and political interests.
Yet the policy is backfiring on the US and badly hurting the world. Because of a long-standing lack of strategic expertise at the top, the Bank has lacked a clear direction. Many projects have catered to US corporate interests rather than to sustainable development. The Bank has cut a lot of ribbons on development projects, but has solved far too few global problems.
For too long, the Bank’s leadership has imposed US concepts that are often utterly inappropriate for the poorest countries and their poorest people. For example, the Bank completely fumbled the exploding pandemics of AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria during the 1990’s, failing to get help to where it was needed to curb these outbreaks and save millions of lives.
Even worse, the Bank advocated user fees and "cost recovery" for health services, thereby putting life-saving health care beyond the reach of the poorest of the poor – precisely those most in need of it. In 2000, at the Durban AIDS Summit, I recommended a new "Global Fund" to fight these diseases, precisely on the grounds that the World Bank was not doing its job. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB, and Malaria emerged, and has since saved millions of lives, with malaria deaths in Africa alone falling by at least 30%.
The Bank similarly missed crucial opportunities to support smallholder subsistence farmers and to promote integrated rural development more generally in impoverished rural communities in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. For around 20 years, roughly from 1985 to 2005, the Bank resisted the well-proven use of targeted support for small landholders to enable impoverished subsistence farmers to improve yields and break out of poverty. More recently, the Bank has increased its support for smallholders, but there is still far more that it can and should do.
The Bank’s staff is highly professional, and would accomplish much more if freed from the dominance of narrow US interests and viewpoints. The Bank has the potential to be a catalyst of progress in key areas that will shape the world’s future. Its priorities should include agricultural productivity; mobilization of information technologies for sustainable development; deployment of low-carbon energy systems; and quality education for all, with greater reliance on new forms of communication to reach hundreds of millions of under-served students.
The Bank’s activities currently touch on all of these areas, but it fails to lead effectively on any of them. Despite the excellence of its staff, the Bank has not been strategic or agile enough to be an effective agent of change. Getting the Bank’s role right will be hard work, requiring expertise at the top.
Most importantly, the Bank’s new president should have first-hand professional experience regarding the range of pressing development challenges. The world should not accept the status quo. A World Bank leader who once again comes from Wall Street or from US politics would be a heavy blow for a planet in need of creative solutions to complex development challenges. The Bank needs an accomplished professional who is ready to tackle the great challenges of sustainable development from day one.
3) Don’t let Iran be a second Iraq
Jamal Abdi and Trita Parsi, The Hill, 02/27/12 07:53 PM ET
http://thehill.com/opinion/op-ed/212901-dont-let-iran-be-a-second-iraq
[Abdi is the director of policy for the National Iranian American Council (NIAC). Parsi is the president of NIAC and the author of A Single Roll of the Dice – Obama’s Diplomacy with Iran.]
Just as with the lead-up to the Iraq War, the pathway to war with Iran will be paved with false assertions, self-fulfilling saber rattling and political weakness that might seem insignificant now, but will in retrospect turn out to be disastrous.
As nearly every current and former U.S. military and intelligence official has warned, war with Iran would not just have immense costs, it would likely be self-defeating. When the Bush administration considered a monthlong bombing campaign against Iran, "the consensus was that it would guarantee that which we are trying to prevent: an Iran that will spare nothing to build a nuclear weapon and that would build it in secret," according to former CIA Director Michael Hayden.
But the only real alternative to war, a diplomatic resolution through sustained negotiations, has been largely kept off the table by hard-liners on all sides of the conflict who have demonized the very idea of engagement. That the United States has, throughout history, had the courage to stand face to face with dictatorial regimes like the Soviet Union and China to secure our interests has been apparently lost in the political winds.
Now, just as it appears that Iran, the United States and the other permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany (P5+1) are finally ready for a new round of diplomacy, some are working to constrain and sabotage diplomacy yet again.
Earlier this month, Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Bob Casey Jr. (D-Pa.), introduced a resolution – expected to be pushed hard by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee during its upcoming conference – that contradicts the U.S. red line established by the president regarding Iran’s nuclear program. The measure severely constrains U.S. diplomatic options by stating that even a civilian nuclear program in Iran cannot be contained, which does not just directly lower the threshold for war, but is a non-starter for talks.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) warned that the Graham-Lieberman-Casey resolution could sabotage diplomacy at a critical moment. "I really believe that these negotiations should proceed without any resolutions from us right now," she told CQ. "This is a very sensitive time. Candidly, I think diplomacy should have an opportunity to work without getting involved in political discussions about a resolution."
It is high time for the adults in the room to grab the reigns of our Iran policy.
Reps. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) and Walter Jones (R-N.C.) have begun circulating a bipartisan letter to President Obama in support of a diplomatic initiative to implement an inspections-based solution to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapon and prevent war. The stakes could not be higher, and the demands of the moment can only be met if the efforts are sustained and given the domestic political space to succeed.
We have only had two rounds of diplomacy with Iran since Obama took office, and they were both scuttled prematurely by domestic political factors in Washington and Tehran. The confidence building deal the United States thought it had achieved in October 2009 was shelved by political infighting in Tehran. And when Brazil and Turkey thought they had delivered the same deal months later in Tehran, the Obama administration rejected it due in large part to political factors at home – including pressure from Congress.
But some are intent on playing political games that are all too reminiscent of the shameful campaign to drag us into Iraq. The sponsors of the Senate resolution glibly claimed their measure supports the president’s red line that an Iranian nuclear weapons capability is unacceptable. The president has said no such thing. Nuclear weapons capability is such a nebulous and ill-defined term that every country possessing civilian nuclear capability – from Norway to Canada to Japan to Iran – could technically be considered to have the capability to build a weapon if they so chose. The president and every other top administration official who has commented on the issue have been very clear and precise: Iranian acquisition of a nuclear weapon is the U.S. red line.
To stake the question of war on such a deliberate confusion – and to misstate the policy articulated by the commander in chief – is as dangerous as it is shameless. Time exists for diplomacy to work, but not if we continue to allow political tricks or meekness to sabotage diplomacy and prevent us from securing our vital national security interests.
4) Israel seen slow to dig in as Iran war talk simmers
Dan Williams, Reuters, Mon, Feb 27, 2012
http://news.yahoo.com/israel-seen-slow-dig-iran-war-talk-simmers-121449699.html
Jerusalem – Israel’s civil defenses are not ready to protect the population in a missile war, an opposition lawmaker said on Monday, fuelling debate about the feasibility of an attack on Iran’s nuclear program.
Almost one in four Israelis lack access to bomb shelters, whether communal or reinforced rooms in private homes, said Zeev Bielski, chairman of a parliamentary panel on Israel’s home defense preparations. "Are we prepared for a war? No," he told Reuters. "Things are moving too slowly and we are wasting very precious time."
Such shelters could be vital if Israel were to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities and Tehran struck back, either directly or through its allies on the borders of the Jewish state.
Israel says 100,000 rockets and missiles are pointed at it, many of these held by Syria, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas, although they may decide to sit out any war between Israel and Iran.
[…] A new report by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies said Iran’s ballistic missiles would be "lucky" to hit within a 1-2 km (1 mile) range of their targets in Israel. But it noted that Israel is 92 percent urbanized — making even random strikes potentially devastating.
[…] Ofer Shelah of Maariv newspaper said the neglect of civil defenses showed Israel preferred to prepare "an offensive military, rather than a military for protecting its citizens".
Many independent experts believe Israel lacks the firepower to take on Iran’s distant, numerous and fortified nuclear sites alone. The veiled threats to attack may be aimed at stiffening world powers’ resolve against Tehran, they say.
Israel’s slow digging in on the homefront and the fact that a successor has yet to be named for outgoing Civil Defense Minister Matan Vilnai may support that idea that the Netanyahu government does not really see a showdown with Iran as imminent.
Udi Segal, diplomatic correspondent for Israel’s top-rated Channel Two TV news, said Barak and Netanyahu saw playing up the specter of war as a means of "making the Iranians feel fear, the Americans take action, and the Europeans impose sanctions".
Israel/Palestine
5) U.S. congresswomen see Israel, Palestinians in the eyes of J Street
Linda Gradstein, JTA, February 27, 2012
http://www.jta.org/news/article/2012/02/27/3091869/on-mideast-trip-us-congresswomen-see-israel-palestinians-in-the-eyes-of-j-street
Kalandiya, West Bank — The U.S. congresswomen get off the bus and stand in the chilly shadows of the Kalandiya crossing point between the West Bank and Jerusalem.
It’s late morning, well past the rush hour when thousands of Palestinians congregate here, and only a few dozen Palestinians stand in line. To cross, the Palestinians go through a series of metal turnstiles and wait with their documents until they are called, one by one, to approach the Israeli soldiers sitting behind bullet-proof barriers.
One Palestinian man strikes up a conversation. "I have American citizenship but I am not allowed to travel through Ben Gurion Airport because I have a Palestinian ID card," Hamad Hindi of Louisiana tells the congresswomen. "We are seen as guilty of something because we are Palestinian."
After crossing to the Palestinian side, the congresswomen — part of a trip to Israel and the West Bank organized by the J Street Education Fund — head to Ramallah.
"This is a ticking bomb waiting to go off," says Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Tex.) "There must be some other way to do this. After so many years there should be some resolution for this issue."
The congresswomen clearly are moved by their experience at the checkpoint, and that’s the point.
[…] The J Street trip also included visits with Jewish settlers in the West Bank.
From Ramallah, the group drove to Shiloh, a Jewish town in the heart of the West Bank halfway between Ramallah and Nablus that because of its location likely would not be incorporated into Israel in any two-state settlement.
A group of Jewish women from several area settlements met with the congresswomen and told them they have no intention of leaving their homes. "I’m holding the Bible; Shiloh was our first capital before Jerusalem and it has layers and layers of history," Tzofiah Dorot, the director of Ancient Shiloh, told the women. "This is the heart of Israel and I don’t see a future for the state if you take the heart out."
All of the women said they were sure that their settlements would remain part of Israel. "This is our homeland, the homeland of the Jewish nation — period," Tamar Aslaf told the delegation. "A Palestinian who lives here is welcome to stay. It’s his home but it’s our homeland."
Several of the settlers described a scenario in which Palestinians could stay in their homes but not receive national or voting rights. That drew a sharp reply from the congresswomen, five of whom are African Americans.
"Some people would call that apartheid," said Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), the only white congresswoman on the trip.
[…]
6) Judge Dismisses Lawsuit Filed Over Boycott of Israeli Goods
Court Finds Suit Is Effort to Chill Boycotters’ Public Statements
On Issue of Public Concern
Center for Constitutional Rights, February 27, 2012
http://ccrjustice.org/newsroom/press-releases/judge-dismisses-lawsuit-filed-over-boycott-of-israeli-goods
Olympia, WA and New York, NY – Today, in a lawsuit brought against current and former members of the Olympia Food Co-op board of directors for their decision to boycott Israeli goods, a Washington State court dismissed the case, calling it a SLAPP – Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation – and said that it would award the defendants attorneys’ fees, costs, and sanctions. The judge also upheld the constitutionality of Washington’s anti-SLAPP law, which the plaintiffs had challenged.
In a court hearing last Thursday, lawyers from the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and Davis Wright Tremaine LLP argued that the court should grant the defendants’ Special Motion to Strike and dismiss the case because it targeted the constitutional rights of free speech and petition in connection with an issue of public concern.
"We are pleased the Court found this case to be what it is – an attempt to chill free speech on a matter of public concern. This sends a message to those trying to silence support of Palestinian human rights to think twice before they bring a lawsuit," said Maria LaHood, a senior staff attorney with the Center for Constitutional Rights.
[…]
Brazil
7) Brazil wants more IMF power for extra eurozone funds
BBC, 26 February 2012 05:12 ET
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17170157
Brazil has said that developing nations would be happy to provide more money to ease the eurozone’s debt crisis, in return for more power within the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The comments were made by Brazilian Finance Minister Guido Mantega as he met with his opposite numbers at a G20 meeting in Mexico.
[…] Mr Mantega said: "Emerging countries will only help under two conditions; first that they strengthen their firewall and second for the IMF [voting rights] reform be implemented."
[…]
Bolivia/Venezuela
8) WikiLeaks: Stratfor VP States Washington Would Have Assassinated Presidents of Bolivia and Venezuela
Cyril Mychalejko, Upside Down World, Monday, 27 February 2012 16:19
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/3479-wikileaks-stratfor-vp-states-washington-would-have-assassinated-presidents-of-bolivia-and-venezuela-in-past-years
According to internal company emails published by WikiLeaks, Austin-based intelligence firm Stratfor’s Vice President stated that in the past Washington would have assassinated the Presidents of Bolivia and Venezuela.
"Back in the day, we would have been planning his (and Chavez’s) helicopter ‘accident,’" wrote VP Fred Burton, a former deputy chief of the State Department’s counter terrorism division, in an email regarding Bolivian President Evo Morales. "Guess I’m getting old."
[…]
–
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