(THE PATRIOT ZW) Story behind demos
By Patience Rusare -
September 1, 2016
ZIMBABWE, in recent weeks, has been rocked by violent demonstrations, mainly by MDC-T, Zimbabwe People First supporters and the ‘civil’ society, in a bid to effect regime change.
A spate of clashes spread on the streets of Harare as the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) fought running battles with violent protesters who hurled stones at law enforcement agents, set tyres ablaze, burnt a ZRP and a ZBC vehicle, while some razed to the ground the popular Copacabana flea market in the central business district (CBD).
They looted shops including one of the chain supermarkets Choppies and attacked innocent citizens, in the mayhem.
‘Managed Change Formula’
It is important to note that what is happening now is exactly what happened between
2007 and 2008 under ‘
Save Zimbabwe Campaign’, then led by
Dewa Mavhinga.
It is a repeat of the regime change agenda coined ‘Managed Change Formula’ by the International Crisis Group (ICG).
Managed Change Formula is a pre-programmed series of co-ordinated events taking place in different parts of the world, but timed to happen as part of a series with one event designed to influence the decisions of the next event and so on.
On March 5 2007, the ICG published a report titled Zimbabwe: An end to stalemate which claimed that a solution to the problem of Zimbabwe had been found as an agreement had been reached between the democrats of MDC and the moderates of ZANU PF to form an interim government.
In its report, long before people knew, the ICG, purported to be an intelligence supplier to Western governments documented that, ‘ZANU PF would negotiate with the MDC on a constitutional framework, power-sharing agreement, detailed agenda and benchmarks for a two-year political transition beginning in March 2008’.
And exactly six days later, there was violence as MDC senior party officials like Morgan Tsvangirai and Nelson Chamisa deliberately provoked the ZRP in order to be restrained physically.
The violence was timed to influence a meeting organised by the British Parliament to discuss the ‘Zimbabwean issue’.
Again, it was to influence the March 23 2007 US Congress meeting on Zimbabwe.
It is at the US Congress meeting where Dr Douglas Gwatidzo, who was chairperson of the Zimbabwe Association of Doctors for Human Rights; the same doctor who treated Tsvangirai, Chamisa and other MDC officials, gave an exaggerated medical report on the extent of the injuries.
In his accounts Dr Gwatidzo admitted to having been warned in advance to prepare to receive and treat injured people prior to the violence.
However, the climax was on March 28 2007, at a British sponsored hearing on Zimbabwe in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) where Britain called for Chapter Seven sanctions and Zimbabwe only survived the sanctions because China and Russia used their veto.
In events strikingly similar to the repetitive cycle of violence in 2007, the current disturbances, however, came at a time the MDC-T has reached a dead end and all opposition political parties on the table have no chance of winning elections.
After all failed attempts to give Tsvangirai and MDC countless political make-overs, US and the West ‘went shopping’ for a new face and voice with the same message (regime change).
The latest protests come nearly two months after a ‘stay-away’ advocated by a social media movement #ThisFlag led by one Pastor Evan Mawarire.
Enter Mawarire
Pastor Mawarire was barely known beyond his small congregation in Harare when he posted a ‘scripted video’ on the internet in April calling for Zimbabweans to ‘shutdown’ the country.
As part of his training to what he is doing now, Mawarire and his wife Samantha were in London, England, between 2007 and 2011 disguised as directors of church-cum companies His Generation Ministries and World Changers Limited respectively.
After his initial training he was despatched back to Zimbabwe in 2011 and set up his own church called ‘His Generation’ that has a congregation of about 50 – again another cover-up.
The narrative used to describe Pastor Mawarire as a simple pastor who came out of nowhere is not by coincidence.
And Mawarire is not a political accident who emerged as the voice of the voiceless Zimbabweans who took his creativity to the social media.
As part of further training, Mawarire had to undergo leadership development training.
In The Patriot of August 19-25 2016, a story headlined ‘Mawarire: Con artist or activist’ highlights that upon his return from Britain in 2011, Mawarire underwent some sort of leadership-development training, attending the Toastmasters International (TI) sessions.
Toastmasters International is a non-profit educational organisation that operates clubs worldwide for the purpose of helping members improve their communication, public speaking and leadership skills.
It offers a programme of communication and leadership projects designed to help people learn the art of speaking, listening and thinking.
After about 10 years of training, he knew exactly what to say, to ‘move’ the Nation.
Besides, he had a ‘good’ background; serving as child president in Zimbabwe between 1993 and 1994 after having been elected child MP for Mashonaland West Province’s Hurungwe constituency.
In 2011, he was chosen one of Zimbabwe’s 10 Outstanding Young People by the Junior Chamber International (JCI) for moral leadership.
The JCI is an American non-governmental organisation (NGO) of young people between 18 and 40 years old.
It’s supposed to encourage youths to be responsible citizens and to participate in efforts towards social and economic development and international co-operation, good-will and understanding.
Pre-meditated violence
Prior to the violent protests, international media was deployed to cover every form of violence against these groups for distribution to the rest of the world.
Last week’s protests were designed to damage the image of President Robert Mugabe at the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) VI summit in Kenya and at the 36th Southern African Development Community (SADC) summit in Swaziland.
The protests were designed to influence SADC to have Zimbabwe on their agenda.
It is our reading that the climax could be slated for the UN Security Council meeting running concurrently with the General Assembly to be held next month in New York, US.
Mawarire’s arrest was well orchestrated.
He wanted to be arrested and the ZRP unwittingly played right into his hands. He became the ‘victim’.
And the huge crowds that gathered at the Harare Rotten Row Magistrates’ Courts during his hearing were all staged to strengthen his profile.
He now had an excuse to leave the country and go to South Africa; first to garner support of fellow Africans, before travelling to US to mobilise support of Zimbabweans in the Diaspora sympathetic to opposition parties.
And the timing was also calculated.
Mawarire had to be in the US for at least a month, touring most strategic American states while mobilising support for demonstrations at the UN General Assembly in New York from September 17-21 2016 because President Mugabe will be attending the meeting.
Upon his arrival in the US, Mawarire visited different cities including Atlanta, Washington DC and Dallas.
He met with US personalities including former congressman Ambassador Andrew Jackson Young from Georgia.
Ambassador Young once served as the United States Ambassador to United Nations.
While in Washington DC, Mawarire had to put up a little drama as he wept while addressing a seminar at the Atlantic Council think tank.
The Patriot can reveal that Mawarire plans to stage the protests daily, with Saturday and Wednesday as the major days.
On Saturday September 17, protests will be at the Zimbabwe Consulate offices from 12pm to 4pm ‘to raise awareness to the world all over’.
“Saturday’s demo is mainly to raise awareness to the world all over,” said one of the organisers, Moses Mafusire, on facebook page North America #Thisflag.
“Protesting kuUN headquarters is a little complicated because security is tight, so our message might not be heard easily and second, there will be other protestors from different countries protesting about their issues, so we will be sharing attention.
“So on Saturday, we will be at the Zim UN offices, so the attention is focused on us and our objective to raise awareness is easily executed.”
Another organiser of the demonstrations, Chiwoniso Mpofu, urged protesters to come mainly on September 21 to ‘heckle’ President Mugabe as he gives his address to the General Assembly.
“Wednesday 21 is very important because this is the day Mugabe is going to give his speech and address the GA,” she said.
“It will be great if those who can attend during the week to come on Wednesday 21 and confront him.
“We won’t be able to see him, but while he talks we will be talking too.”
For the march, the organisers are yet to secure permits for various areas between Union Square, the Palace Hotel and the Zim Consulate buildings.
Apparently shuttle buses are to ferry people from nearby areas such as Manhattan, Brooklyn, Plainfield, White Plains and Iselin.
And accommodation is all in place for those travelling from Boston, Massachusetts, Virginia, Texas, Indiana, Philadelphia and Washington DC.
Some protestors are booked at The Courtyard Newark Downtown located at 858 Broad streel Newark NJ 07102 under the name ‘Zimbabwe Family Reunion Group’.
The organisers say they expect thousands of people to attend the demos and speakers include, Mawarire, Thomas Mapfumo, Dr Noah Manyika, Promise Mkwananzi of Tajamuka and Patson Dzamara.
Dr Manyika is the founder of ‘Build Zimbabwe’, an organisation opposed to ZANU PF.
Again the New York demonstrations are designed to ensure Zimbabwe is discussed at the Security Council and Chapter seven sanctions is enacted.
Concurrently back home, the protests will gain momentum.
They are planning on increasing the violent protests from once a week, to twice or thrice a week.
Protestors will continue to provoke the ZRP for clashes as the pictures will legitimise their claims of ‘gross human rights abuses’ in Zimbabwe at the international platform.
They want the UN to intervene under the pretext that the country is now a threat to international peace and security.
They are willing to go to any length to have Zimbabwe on the agenda.
On August 10 2016, at an Itai Dzamara-organised demonstration, demonstrators tried to use children as ‘human shields’.
Innocent children, flowers in hand, were put at the front to confront ZRP officers.
The protestors were hoping ZRP would beat or disperse the children with teargas and water cannons and have the pictures all over the world with headlines screaming ‘Gross human rights abuses’, but their efforts were in vain.
Riot police neither attacked the children nor adult protestors who had no police clearance, a prerequisite to hold a demonstration.
Could it be that opposition forces are becoming desperate by the day?
NERA: Another Save Zimbabwe campaign?
One thing the opposition is good at is re-inventing itself into coalitions or alliances by a variety of names.
National Electoral Reform Agenda (NERA) is just like the 2007 Save Zimbabwe Campaign that brought together most opposition political parties and major civil society organisations with the agenda of ousting President Mugabe from power.
Opposition parties that had become irrelevant have suddenly found their voices.
Mawarire’s call to remove a democratically elected Government presented them with an opportunity to become relevant.
They are well aware they are not capable of winning any elections hence their resorting to violence.
Opposition parties are thriving on violence.
They have nothing to lose in promoting the violence and in fact, it is only violence that gives them political relevance.
Who can explain why NERA, formed in December 2015, is suddenly active after eight months of hibernation?
Suddenly, from not more than five political party signatures since December to June 2016 to 22 political party signatures in just a month?
Is there a third force behind?
They have been told to join hands for what they call the ‘greater good’ of removing President Mugabe and ZANU PF from power.
While Mawarire is garnering for support from the West and the US, these opposition parties will continue to cause havoc in the country.
They have called for another demonstration (today) and hope innocent citizens get seriously injured or die in the process.
No wonder the false social media message that a soldier had stoned a boy to death last week Friday.
This is what agents of regime change want.
They are not worried about the safety of citizens, let alone the needs of citizens.
They do not care that the so-called ‘Arab spring’ did not bring any good summer to countries such as Egypt, Tunisia and much worse Libya.
Prior to 2011, Muammar Gaddafi had turned Libya into Africa’s most progressive welfare state. Libya had the highest Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita and highest life expectancy in Africa. Less people lived below the poverty datum line than in The Netherlands.
It boasted free healthcare, education and numerous subsidies to support the well-being of the Libyan people
But look at what happened to Libya after the US/NATO interventionism.
It is now a failed state in complete political anarchy, with a destroyed economy and a war-torn society.
Libya does not have a functioning government, control of its borders or basic public services.
It’s being torn apart by warlords and rival militant groups.
Leaked emails for investigation of US Hillary Clinton’s server scandal revealed that the war against Libya was waged for economic and political reasons.
Libya’s nationalised oil reserves and plans to use gold as the chief reserve currency in Africa to compete against the euro and US dollar threatened US capitalist penetration in Africa.
It was never about the Libyans and in Zimbabwe it is still not about Zimbabwean interests.
It is well documented that Zimbabwe is endowed with vast minerals.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has assessed that Zimbabwe is the richest country in terms of natural resources per person.
What is currently happening in Zimbabwe is a push towards a war to loot the country’s natural resources and leave Zimbabwe a destroyed state, just like Libya.
That is the real story behind these so-called demonstrations.
Labels: ICG, INTERNATIONAL CRISIS REPORT GROUP, NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR DEMOCRACY, NED
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US State Department-Funded BBC World Service "Jammed" in China
West feigns indignation as China allegedly shuts down US State Dept-funded BBC propaganda.
February 26, 2013 (AltThaiNews-Tony Cartalucci) - Headlines across the Western corporate-media read, "BBC says 'extensive, coordinated efforts' to jam world service frequencies in China" (Fox News), "BBC blocked in China just days after reporting on Chinese hackers" (Washington Post), and "BBC "strongly condemns" China's attempts to jam World Service broadcasts" (Radio Times), before weaving a lofty narrative of a "repressive regime" trying to gag freedom of the press.
In reality,
BBC's World Service is directly funded by the US State Department and is insidious propaganda admittedly designed to politically subvert not only China, but Iran, Russia, and many other nations perceived by Wall Street and London as intolerable competition. In March of 2011, the London Guardian in its report, "BBC World Service to sign funding deal with US state department," stated explicitly:
The BBC World Service is to receive a "significant" sum of money from the US government to help combat the blocking of TV and internet services in countries including Iran and China.
In what the BBC said is the first deal of its kind, an agreement is expected to be signed later this month that will see US state department money – understood to be a low six-figure sum – given to the World Service to invest in developing anti-jamming technology and software.
The funding is also expected to be used to educate people in countries with state censorship in how to circumnavigate the blocking of internet and TV services.
It is understood the US government has decided the reach of the World Service is such that it makes investment worthwhile.
Of course, "blocked" content translates to US State Department and other Western interests' propaganda in the form of the openly US State Department-run "Voice of America," and a myriad of faux-NGO's funded directly by the US government's National Endowment for Democracy (NED). In China particularly, NED has been cultivating a troupe of misfit "activists" and faux-fronts with names ranging from the cartoonish - the "Blind Activist" aka the "Barefoot Lawyer," to the very ironic - "China Labor Watch, Inc," which we must assume "watches" on, as exploited children and adults labor for WalMart and Apple.
RT would also report in 2011, in their report "BBC World Service and US State Department: new partners, new bias?," that:
This would not be the first time the BBC has accepted money from organizations with their own agendas. In 2008, the corporation faced accusations of pro-Europe bias after it was revealed it had taken out US $230 million in loans from the EU. The loans were given by the European Investment Bank, which strives to promote EU policies.
Member of European Parliament Gerard Batten has a long-running beef with the BBC.
"It is institutionally politically biased, certainly in favour of things like the European Union, mass immigration, and a whole other host of ‘politically correct’ ideas that I think it peddles to the public,” he told RT.
Batten says taking this money would expose the hypocrisy at the heart of the BBC.
"The EU bans sponsorship of any news and current affairs TV programs across the EU,” Batten said. “Now it would appear then, that if the US State Department is going to fund BBC that would appear to be in breach of the directive."
Biased, politically motivated enterprises like BBC's World Service in fact represent a breach of journalistic ethics, and not only was Beijing's decision to shut down World Services highly appropriate (if they in fact have done so), but so too would an investigation in both the US and the UK seeking to ascertain why in an economic crisis, money is being spent to sow political subversion overseas for the sake of corporate special interests, when people at home direly need assistance.
The BBC is an organization mired in controversy, and repeatedly exposed as exploiting people's trust in their reputation to push the agenda of well-paying special interests. The coordinated effort by the Western media to spin the BBC's latest confrontation from a well equipped nation-state who has decided to pull the plug, is indicative that the rot that has infected BBC, has spread far and wide across the West indeed.
Labels: BBC, CHINA, NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR DEMOCRACY, PROPAGANDA, VOA
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Who or What is Russia's "Pussy Riot?"
West's "Pussy Riot" media coverage worse than "Soviet era" propaganda.
by Tony Cartalucci
August 6, 2012 - Accurately described as bigots and hooligans, the 3 member musical band known as "Pussy Riot" is now on trial for "hooliganism motivated by religious hatred." This came after they burst into a church in Moscow, disturbing the peace while mocking the beliefs of practitioners in an attempt to protest against Russian President Vladimir Putin. Had skinheads done something similar in a synagogue in the West, surely they'd have long ago paid steep fines and begun their lengthy jail sentences for "public insults based on origin, religious affiliation, race or ethnicity" (and here).
The Guardian's article titled, "Pussy Riot trial 'worse than Soviet era'," opens immediately with overt propaganda, describing the courtroom and Russian flag as "shabby" and a police dog as "in search of blood." The British paper attempts to portray Russia itself as having a "stark divide" between conservatives and liberals, the latter fighting against the state "with any means it can."
Already the Guardian runs into trouble - by portraying Russia as "divided" it is dismissing recent elections that granted Vladimir Putin and his United Russia party a sound mandate to lead the country. And while it is true that in reality, between voter turnout and Putin's garnering the support of 63% of those that did turn out (in a 5-way race), only about 40% of Russia's total registered voters actually voted for Putin, his mandate is still sounder than that of US President Barack Obama's 32% in a mere 2-way race, or last year's victory here in Thailand by Yingluck Shinawatra with a tenuous 35%, a victory hailed by the Western media as a "sweeping" mandate.
Image: Screenshot taken from the National Endowment for Democracy website featuring US funding for the NGO "GOLOS." GOLOS allegedly was searching for "election irregularities" in Russia's recent elections" GOLOS and other US-backed NGOs and opposition parties are now attempting to trigger an "Arab Spring" in Russia. (click to enlarge.)....
It should also be noted that Russia's recent elections were marred by election monitoring NGO "GOLOS" attempting to call the results fraudulent. It would be later revealed that this NGO, billed as "independent" by the Western press, was in fact funded and directed by the US State Department via the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). Attempts by Wall Street and London to frame the elections as fraudulent set the groundwork for a wider campaign of political destabilization - a campaign "Pussy Riot" has now become a key player in.
Tasteless PR Stunt the Work of the US State Department
The Guardian however is absolutely correct when they call the "Pussy Riot" proceedings a "show trial." However, they are wrong in claiming that the showmanship is the work of the Russian Federation. Instead, it is showmanship put on by the Western media and the US State Department's vast network of faux-NGOs.
The Guardian's entire article is propaganda written with a literary rather than journalistic tone. The article itself cites the defendant's lawyer whose comments form the very basis of the article's title. And while the Guardian may prey successfully on the emotions of ill-informed, unsuspecting, but well-intentioned readers, it lets slip several telling clues as to who is really behind the showmanship.
According to the Guardian, the defense "tried to call 13 witness, including opposition leader Alexey Navalny." Navalny, of course, is a longtime operative receiving both political and financial support from the West in efforts to undermine the Russian government and bring back the days of Wall Street and London's unhindered plundering that marked the 1990's.
Alexey Navalny was a Yale World Fellow, and in his profile it states:
"Navalny spearheads legal challenges on behalf of minority shareholders in large Russian companies, including Gazprom, Bank VTB, Sberbank, Rosneft, Transneft, and Surgutneftegaz, through the Union of Minority Shareholders. He has successfully forced companies to disclose more information to their shareholders and has sued individual managers at several major corporations for allegedly corrupt practices. Navalny is also co-founder of the Democratic Alternative movement and was vice-chairman of the Moscow branch of the political party YABLOKO. In 2010, he launched RosPil, a public project funded by unprecedented fundraising in Russia. In 2011, Navalny started RosYama, which combats fraud in the road construction sector."
The Democratic Alternative, also written DA!, is indeed a National Endowment for Democracy fund recipient, meaning that Alexey Navalny is an agent of US-funded sedition. And despite posing as a champion for "transparency," Navalny is willfully hiding this from his followers. The US State Department itself reveals this as they list "youth movements" operating in Russia:
"DA!: Mariya Gaydar, daughter of former Prime Minister Yegor Gaydar, leads DA! (Democratic Alternative). She is ardent in her promotion of democracy, but realistic about the obstacles she faces. Gaydar said that DA! is focused on non-partisan activities designed to raise political awareness. She has received funding from the National Endowment for Democracy, a fact she does not publicize for fear of appearing compromised by an American connection."
Navalny was involved directly in founding a movement funded by the US government and to this day has the very people who funded DA! defending him throughout Western media. The mention of co-founder Mariya Gaydar is also revealing, as she has long collaborated, and occasionally has been arrested with, Ilya Yashin, yet another leader of a NED-funded Russian "activist" opposition group.
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/57163000/jpg/_57163773_013466994-2.jpg
Photo: Alexei Navalny, Yale World Fellow and co-founder of US National Endowment for Democracy Da! or "Democratic Alternative/Yes in Russian." It is yet another Otpor-esque organization courtesy of the United States government and willful traitors to their motherland. ....
If "Pussy Riot's" defense is calling up a documented agent of Western interests as a "witness," one wonders under what context and to what degree Navalny, and by consequence, the National Endowment for Democracy, is involved with the defendants. Navalny admits that he is "acquainted" with one of the band members, but was not actually a "witness," and rather would have testified in order to "defend law and justice."
Clearly then, the defense's attempts to include him in the trial were politically motivated, having nothing to do with either law or justice, and serves simply as a means to link "Pussy Riot" to the US State Department's subversive opposition, many of whose leaders were caught filing into the US Embassy in Moscow earlier this year.
Also telling, is that Oksana Chelysheva - board member of the Finnish-Russian Civic Forum and a steering committee member of the NED, convicted criminal George Soros Open Society-funded FIDH, Open Society, Ford Foundation, Sigrid Rausing Trust-funded Front Line Defenders, and US State Department-run Amnesty International-affiliated EU-Russia Civil Society Forum - is heading "Pussy Riot's" support campaign
Images: "Pussy Riot's" support campaign is spearheaded by Oksana Chelysheva of the US State Department-funded "Russian-Chechen Friendship Society," a clearing house for Chechen terrorist propaganda. Along with US State Department-subsidized Alexey Navalny and the West's media outlets on their side, the hooligan anti-establishment "punk rockers" now on trial in Moscow have a decidedly "establishment" backing. (click images to enlarge)
....
Chelysheva was also "Deputy Executive Director" of the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society, fully funded by the US State Department via the National Endowment for Democracy. The "Friendship Society" was essentially a public relations front of Al Qaeda-aligned Chechen terrorists ravaging Russia's Caucasus region - a plot offered new relevance as the US, NATO, and Gulf States openly support similar groups of terrorists now ravaging Syria. The "Friendship Society" served a similar function to the now discredited "Syrian Observatory for Human Rights."
While it is unknown, so far, whether or not the members of "Pussy Riot" were contacted by any of these groups, or by the US State Department or its subsidiaries to carry out their hooliganism, it is clear that these groups and the US State Department itself has turned an otherwise tasteless disturbance of peace and a violation of Church-goers' rights to practice their faith without harassment, into a point of political leverage against Russia.
Helping to push down on this political lever are propaganda outfits like the Guardian, portraying the trial as a case of liberal Russian opposition groups fighting against a judicial throwback to the Soviet Union. In reality, it is another Wall Street-London production in the same vein as Serbia's US-funded Otpor movement, the Kony 2012 fraud and the US-engineered "Arab Spring."
Labels: COLOUR REVOLUTIONS, NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR DEMOCRACY, PROPAGANDA, RUSSIA
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COMMENT - EISA on
it's wikipedia page, lists the National Endowment for Democracy, USAID and the DfID as among it's funders. EISA also list
the notorious and CIA interlinked NED on their links page, although it is not clear what their exact relationship is.
ZEC in dodgy deal
Saturday, 05 November 2011 22:36
[Picture: downrangereport] Sunday Mail Reporter
THE Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (Zec) has requested assistance from the Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa (EISA) in the running of next year’s national elections, in a dodgy partnership analysts fear could influence the poll outcome. Last month, the two organisations signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) that will see them “work closely” on voter education.
They also intend to make the office of the chairperson of Zec and that of EISA’s executive director the focal points of the joint operation. Political analysts quickly warned that
the involvement of EISA could open the door to the West to interfere with the electoral process.
Zec acting chairperson Mrs Joyce Kazembe, however, maintained the partnership was above board. She said EISA would only provide technical support while ZEC remained in the driver’s seat.
“Yes, we signed the agreement after they approached us, but simply for the purpose of tapping into their experience of handling various facets of elections such as the media and political parties,” she said.
“Let me make it clear that we are driving the process. We went through all the various approval processes, which include consulting with our line ministry, which is the Ministry of Justice and Legal Affairs.
“It is clear we are in charge of the whole process. If anybody thinks that by signing an MoU with us they are in charge, they are day-dreaming. We are an independent body and we will not be influenced by anybody.”
EISA was founded in 1996 to “promote credible elections, participatory democracy and human rights culture”. It also claims to advocate the strengthening of governance institutions for the consolidation of democracy on the continent.
It is the mother body of the Zimbabwe Election Support Network (Zesn).
Among the organisation’s main financiers are the Swedish International Development Authority (Sida), the Belgian government, Norwegian Centre for Human Rights and the European Union, all of which have for long been pushing for regime change in Zimbabwe.
According to the MoU, the initial activities under the partnership will be funded by a grant provided to EISA by Sida and the Royal Norwegian Embassy.
The implementation of all activities under the MOU will also be subject to further grants provided to EISA by other donors, including Sida and the Royal Norwegian Embassy.
Part of the document, co-signed by Mrs Kazembe and EISA acting executive director Ms Ilona Tip, reads: “Should ZEC secure funds and solicit EISA’s technical assistance in collaborative activities under this MoU, EISA will avail itself based on mutual consultations.
“The MoU enters into effect on the date of signature of this memorandum and concludes on December 31 2012, subject to extension based on mutual agreement between the two parties.”
A political analyst who preferred anonymity said donors pour funds into EISA which, in turn, routes the money to Zesn. The analyst said the West was working to influence the outcome of the impending elections via Zec.
“It is the mandate of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission to conduct voter education as provided for by the Constitution. Enlisting the services of EISA, therefore, raises eyebrows,” said the analyst.
“They (EISA) want to appear to be working with ZEC while, in fact, working against the establishment. It would appear they want to effect regime change between now and 2012.”
Zimbabwe is due to hold elections following the expiry of the lifespan of the inclusive Government.
Zanu-PF insists the polls should proceed in line with the stipulations of the country’s Global Political Agreement while the MDC-T appears to be dragging its feet.
Labels: NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR DEMOCRACY, NEOCOLONIALISM, NGOs, ZEC
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Israel and Libya: Preparing Africa for the “Clash of Civilizations”
Introduction by Cynthia McKinney
by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
Global Research, October 11, 2011
Third of Four Installments on Libya: Israel and Libya
Once again, Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya peels away the veneer of legitimacy and deception enveloping the U.S./NATO genocide currently taking place in Libya. In his first article, Nazemroaya exposed the mechanism by which the world came to "know" of the need for a humanitarian intervention in the Libyan Arab Jamahirya and U.S./NATO admissions of targeted assassination attempts against the Leader of the 1969 Libyan Revolution, Muammar Qaddafi. In his first of these four installments since his return from Libya, Nazemraoya makes it clear that there never was any evidence given to the United Nations or the International Criminal Court to warrant or justify United Nations Resolutions 1970 and 1973 or current U.S./NATO operations inside Libya.
In his second article detailing this very sad story, Nazemroaya exposes the relationships between the major Libyan protagonists/NATO collaborators and the U.S. Congress-funded National Endowment for Democracy. Incredibly, when leading Members of Congress publicly proclaimed repeatedly that they did not know who the Libyan "rebel" NATO collaborators were, select so-called rebel leaders were political intimates with stakeholders at the National Endowment for Democracy.
The leaders of the National Transitional Council, contrived to appear highly influential to publics in former colonial capitals, have very little influence or support inside Libya, and can be likened to a Hamid Karzai type of morally bankrupt neo-colonial authority that presides over and gives a fig-leaf of "legitmacy" to those outsiders whose objective is the total destruction of recalcitrant citizens who demand self-determination over their own communities and country. Nazemroaya also exposes that, despite its Global War on Terror, the U.S. government actually financed Libyan terrorists and criminals wanted by INTERPOL.
In this, his third of four installments, Nazemroaya removes the U.S./NATO fig leaf and what he reveals are the abhorrent, obnoxious, inhumane, and cynical machinations of the pro-Israel Lobby that is the only political force that seems to be able to command the mightiest of militaries and the strongest of leaders to act in ways that threaten the peace and tranquility of their own political parties and national security of their own governments. Indeed, by its policy to support Israel, no matter how belligerent its policies, the United States has eroded its own national interest, as warnings from U.S. military leaders continue to point out.
In fact, my own personal experiences with the pro-Israel Lobby inside the United States demonstrate Israel's intense interest in Africa. I have written about my experience with "the pledge" to support Israel that is forced on every candidate for the U.S. Congress; refusal to sign it, as I did, means not one dollar of the millions expended each election cycle in campaign contributions and can ensure the most vicious media demonization as the major descriptor of the un-cooperating candidate.
The demonization of Alabama's first Black Member of Congress since Reconstruction, Earl Hilliard, in his 2002 re-election campaign, with specific regard to his visits to Libya, immediately come to mind. Weeks later, many of the New York contributors against his re-election, reappeared in my own opponent's campaign coffers. While I was portrayed in letters to supporters of the pro-Israel Lobby as anti-Israel, I will continue to believe that it was my very real activities in Africa that the pro-Israel Lobby found most threatening. From land reform to blood diamonds to various warnings I sent to certain African oil-producing countries to support for African self-determination and against artificial efforts to create divisions in Cote d'Ivoire, Zaire/Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, and Sudan, I found an incredible interest in all things African on the part of the pro-Israel Lobby.
In fact, I was invited to lease my "Black" face to these very interests and get arrested in front of the Sudan Embassy to sow the very "Black versus Arab" narrative being tragically created in Libya which Nazemroaya describes so thoroughly in this current text. I note here that some Blacks inside and outside of the U.S. Congress did choose to accept this particular invitation and get arrested. My representative was present at the meeting where these activities were planned, finance was arranged, and actions put in motion. This was a purposeful manipulation of U.S. policy and more importantly, of the despicable behaviors in Sudan that led to human rights abuses and crimes against humanity. My own legislation to de-list corporations from the U.S. stock exchange that aided or abetted or engaged in any way in human rights abuses in Sudan was deemed by guardians of the pro-Israel agenda inside the Congress to be an unacceptable answer to the very real abuses taking place in that country.
Additionally, while I was in prison in Israel, the point of the mostly African female prisoners on my Ramle Prison cell block was that they were adherents of "the wrong religion." The purging of Christians inside Israel is a fact. The scribblings on the wall of my Israeli holding room in another prison complex before my release made it clear that those Christians being deported were not wanted in Israel and they felt that it was because of their religion. Israel's recent push, despite its non-Jewish residents, to identify itself as a "Jewish state" is telling.
While in Libya, I met many Africans who said that they chose to live there because of the pan-Africanism of the policies of the Libyan Jamahirya. In fact, while at an "Africans in the Diaspora Conference" there in January/February of 2011, I personally witnessed, along with a delegation of others from the United States, Muammar Qaddafi pledge $90 billion to a "United States of Africa" that would work together to build the Continent and counter the efforts to penetrate and recolonize it. Blacks in the United States who struggled for dignity, self-determination, and against U.S. oppression and imperialism during the 1960s and 1970s have a relationship with Muammar Qaddafi and the Jamahirya government that goes back decades. At the 29-stops of my Libya Truth Tour, I met many U.S. citizens who reminded the audiences of the contributions of Muammar Qaddafi and the Jamahirya government against British imperialism in Northern Ireland. Continental Africans attending these Tour-stops reminded audiences of Muammar Qaddafi's support for Nelson Mandela and Africans struggling to rid the Continent of Apartheid at a time when Israel shared an alliance with that government. They also noted the Jamahirya government's current support for many development projects throughout the Continent and for the budget of the African Union, itself. Therefore, many alarmed observers have pointed out that the U.S./NATO attack on Libya is actually an attack on all of Africa. Nazemroaya eloquently makes this point while revealing the underlying motives for the "uber-violence" that we see in Libya and that is opposed by large majorities of voters in NATO member states, if reported polling results can be trusted. What comes to my mind is how anyone who identifies with the peace community could support such an attack on Libya, especially while the people of Libya valiantly resist NATO domination.
Nazemroaya makes the essential point: "An attempt to separate the merging point of an Arab and African identity is underway." The Voice of America has exposed the psychological aspects of its brutal intervention and hints at the mindset of the U.S./NATO Libyan pawns; several stories suggest that the "new" Libya will turn more toward its Arab identity than its African identity. And U.S./NATO successful imposition of the psychological chains of identity denial are the most longlasting of chains. While in Tunisia, I actually came face to face with the fruits of this project when a taxi driver born in Tunisia told me that he was not African! Muammar Qaddafi drove home to all Libyans that Libya, as its geography dictates, is an African country. It seems ludicrous on its face to have to reiterate such a fact except for the racism, brainwashing, and psychological underpinnings of current U.S./NATO policy and its colonial antecedents that Nazemroaya exposes.
Finally, Walter H. Kansteiner has moved in and out of various positions within the foreign policy apparatus of the United States government and has been the voice for exactly the policies described by Nazemroaya. Among Kansteiner's positions are stints as Africa Director at the State Department and National Security Council Director for African Affairs during the Presidency of George Herbert Walker Bush and Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs during the Presidency of George W. Bush. During these stints, Mr. Kansteiner was in a position to initiate the balkanization of Africa that we now see reaching fruition on the Continent. I was forced to write a letter to President Bush in 2001 expressing my alarm at his suggestions for Democratic Republic of Congo. In my opinion, Laurent Kabila was murdered because he refused to balkanize Congo. (He personally related his last conversation with a certain U.S. representative who encouraged him to betray Congo. In his last words to me, "I will never betray Congo.")
Cynthia McKinney, 10 October 2011.
Cynthia McKinney is a former U.S. Congresswoman who served in two different Georgia federal districts in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1993 to 2003 and from 2005 to 2007 as a member of the U.S. Democratic Party. She was also the U.S. Green Party presidential candidate in 2008. While in the U.S. Congress she served on the U.S. Banking and Finance Committee, the U.S. National Security Committee (later renamed the U.S. Armed Services Committee), and the U.S. Foreign Affairs Committee (later renamed the U.S. International Relations Committee). She also served on the U.S. International Relations subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights. McKinney has conducted two fact-finding missions to Libya and also recently finished a nationwide speaking tour in the United States sponsored by the ANSWER Coalition regarding the NATO bombing campaign on Libya.
America's Conquest of Africa: The Roles of France and Israel
- by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, Julien Teil - 2011-10-06
Terrorists not only fight for Washington on the ground, they also act as frontmen for regime change through so-called human rights organizations that promote democracy. Introduction by Cynthia McKinney
Libya and the Big Lie: Using Human Rights Organizations to Launch Wars
- by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya - 2011-09-29
The war against Libya is built on fraud. The UN Security Council passed two resolutions against Libya on the basis of unproven claims that Qaddafi was killing his own people in Benghazi...
ISRAEL AND LIBYA: PREPARING AFRICA FOR THE "CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS"
Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
Under the Obama Administration the United States has expanded the "long war" into Africa. Barack Hussein Obama, the so-called "Son of Africa" has actually become one of Africa's worst enemies. Aside from his continued support of dictators in Africa, the Republic of Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) was unhinged under his watch. The division of Sudan was publicly endorsed by the White House before the referendum, Somalia has been further destabilized, Libya has been viciously attacked by NATO, and U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) is going into full swing.
The war in Libya is just the start of a new cycle of external military adventurism inside Africa. The U.S. now wants more military bases inside Africa. France has also announced that it has the right to militarily intervene anywhere in Africa where there are French citizens and its interests are at risk. NATO is also fortifying its positions in the Red Sea and off the coast of Somalia.
As disarray and turmoil are once again uprooting Africa with external intervention, Israel sits silently in the background. Tel Aviv has actually been deeply involved in the new cycle of turmoil, which is tied to its Yinon Plan to reconfigure its strategic surrounding. This reconfiguration process is based on a well established technique of creating sectarian divisions which eventually will effectively neutralize target states or result in their dissolution.
Many of the problems afflicting the contemporary areas of Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Southwest Asia, South Asia, East Asia, Africa, and Latin America are actually the result of the deliberate triggering of regional tensions by external powers. Sectarian division, ethno-linguistic tension, religious differences, and internal violence have been traditionally exploited by the United States, Britain, and France in various parts of the globe. Iraq, Sudan, Rwanda, and Yugoslavia are merely a few recent examples of this strategy of "divide and conquer" being used to bring nations to their knees.
The Upheavals of Central-Eastern Europe and the Project for a "New Middle East"
The Middle East, in some regards, is a striking parallel to the Balkans and Central-Eastern Europe during the years leading up to the First World War. In the wake of the First World War, the borders of the multi-ethnic states in the Balkans and Central-Eastern Europe were redrawn and reconfigured by external powers, in alliance with local opposition forces. Since the First World War until the post-Cold War period the Balkans and Central-Eastern Europe have continued to experience a period of upheaval, violence and conflict that has continuously divided the region.
For years, there have been advocates calling for a "New Middle East" with redrawn boundaries in this region of the world where Europe, Southwest Asia, and North Africa meet. These advocates mostly sit in the capitals of Washington, London, Paris, and Tel Aviv. They envisage a region shaped around homogenous ethno-religious states. The formation of these states would signify the destruction of the larger existing countries of the region. The transition would be towards the formation of smaller Kuwait-like or Bahrain-like states, which could easily be managed and manipulated by the U.S., Britain, France, Israel, and their allies.
The Manipulation of the First "Arab Spring" during World War I
The plans for reconfiguring the Middle East started several years before the First World War. It was during the First World War, however, that the manifestation of these colonial designs could visibly be seen with the "Great Arab Revolt" against the Ottoman Empire.
Despite the fact that the British, French, and Italians were colonial powers which had prevented the Arabs from enjoying any freedom in countries like Algeria, Libya, Egypt, and Sudan, these colonial powers managed to portray themselves as the friends and allies of Arab liberation.
During the "Great Arab Revolt" the British and the French actually used the Arabs as foot soldiers against the Ottomans to further their own geo-political schemes. The secret Sykes–Picot Agreement between London and Paris is a case in point. France and Britain merely managed to use and manipulate the Arabs by selling them the idea of Arab liberation from the so-called "repression" of the Ottomans.
In reality, the Ottoman Empire was a multi-ethnic empire. It gave local and cultural autonomy to all its peoples, but was manipulated into the direction of becoming a Turkish entity. Even the Armenian Genocide that would ensue in Ottoman Anatolia has to be analyzed in the same context as the contemporary targeting of Christians in Iraq as part of a sectarian scheme unleashed by external actors to divide the Ottoman Empire, Anatolia, and the citizens of the Ottoman Empire.
After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, it was London and Paris which denied freedom to the Arabs, while sowing the seeds of discord amongst the Arab peoples. Local corrupt Arab leaders were also partners in the project and many of them were all too happy to become clients of Britain and France. In the same sense, the "Arab Spring" is being manipulated today. The U.S., Britain, France, and others are now working with the help of corrupt Arab leaders and figures to restructure the Arab World and Africa.
The Yinon Plan
The Yinon Plan, which is a continuation of British stratagem in the Middle East, is an Israeli strategic plan to ensure Israeli superiority. It insists and stipulates that Israel must reconfigure its geo-political environment through the balkanization of the Middle Eastern and Arab states into smaller and weaker states.
Israeli strategists viewed Iraq as their biggest strategic challenge from an Arab state. This is why Iraq was outlined as the centerpiece to the balkanization of the Middle East and the Arab World. In Iraq, on the basis of the concepts of the Yinon Plan, Israeli strategists have called for the division of Iraq into a Kurdish state and two Arab states, one for Shiite Muslims and the other for Sunni Muslims. The first step towards establishing this was a war between Iraq and Iran, which the Yinon Plan discusses.
The Atlantic, in 2008, and the U.S. military's Armed Forces Journal, in 2006, both published widely circulated maps that closely followed the outline of the Yinon Plan. Aside from a divided Iraq, which the Biden Plan also calls for, the Yinon Plan calls for a divided Lebanon, Egypt, and Syria. The partitioning of Iran, Turkey, Somalia, and Pakistan also all fall into line with these views. The Yinon Plan also calls for dissolution in North Africa and forecasts it as starting from Egypt and then spilling over into Sudan, Libya, and the rest of the region.
Note: The following map was drawn by Holly Lindem for an article by Jeffery Goldberg. It was published in The Atlantic in January/February 2008.
Map Copyright: The Atlantic, 2008.
Note: The following map was prepared by Lieutenant-Colonel Ralph Peters.
It was published in the Armed Forces Journal in June 2006, Peters is a retired colonel of the U.S. National War Academy.
Map Copyright Lieutenant-Colonel Ralph Peters 2006.
The Eradication of the Christian Communities of the Middle East
It is no coincidence that Egyptian Christians were attacked at the same time as the South Sudan Referendum and before the crisis in Libya. Nor is it a coincidence that Iraqi Christians, one of the world's oldest Christian communities, have been forced into exile, leaving their ancestral homelands in Iraq. Coinciding with the exodus of Iraqi Christians, which occurred under the watchful eyes of U.S. and British military forces, the neighbourhoods in Baghdad became sectarian as Shiite Muslims and Sunni Muslims were forced by violence and death squads to form sectarian enclaves. This is all tied to the Yinon Plan and the reconfiguration of the region as part of a broader objective.
In Iran, the Israelis have been trying in vain to get the Iranian Jewish community to leave. Iran's Jewish population is actually the second largest in the Middle East and arguably the oldest undisturbed Jewish community in the world. Iranian Jews view themselves as Iranians who are tied to Iran as their homeland, just like Muslim and Christian Iranians, and for them the concept that they need to relocate to Israel because they are Jewish is ridiculous.
In Lebanon, Israel has been working to exacerbate sectarian tensions between the various Christian and Muslim factions as well as the Druze. Lebanon is a springboard into Syria and the division of Lebanon into several states is also seen as a means to balkanizing Syria into several smaller sectarian Arab states. The objectives of the Yinon Plan are to divide Lebanon and Syria into several states on the basis of religious and sectarian identities for Sunni Muslims, Shiite Muslims, Christians, and the Druze. There could also be objectives for a Christian exodus in Syria too.
The new head of the Maronite Catholic Syriac Church of Antioch, the largest of the autonomous Eastern Catholic Churches, has expressed his fears about a purging of Arab Christians in the Levant and Middle East. Patriarch Mar Beshara Boutros Al-Rahi and many other Christian leaders in Lebanon and Syria are afraid of a Muslim Brotherhood takeover in Syria. Like Iraq, mysterious groups are now attacking the Christian communities in Syria. The leaders of the Christian Eastern Orthodox Church, including the Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, have also all publicly expressed their grave concerns. Aside from the Christian Arabs, these fears are also shared by the Assyrian and Armenian communities, which are mostly Christian.
Sheikh Al-Rahi was recently in Paris where he met President Nicolas Sarkozy. It is reported that the Maronite Patriarch and Sarkozy had disagreements about Syria, which prompted Sarkozy to say that the Syrian regime will collapse. Patriarch Al-Rahi's position was that Syria should be left alone and allowed to reform. The Maronite Patriarch also told Sarkozy that Israel needed to be dealt with as a threat if France legitimately wanted Hezbollah to disarm.
Because of his position in France, Al-Rahi was instantly thanked by the Christian and Muslim religious leaders of the Syrian Arab Republic who visited him in Lebanon. Hezbollah and its political allies in Lebanon, which includes most the Christian parliamentarians in the Lebanese Parliament, also lauded the Maronite Patriarch who later went on a tour to South Lebanon.
Sheikh Al-Rahi is now being politically attacked by the Hariri-led March 14 Alliance, because of his stance on Hezbollah and his refusal to support the toppling of the Syrian regime. A conference of Christian figures is actually being planned by Hariri to oppose Patriarch Al-Rahi and the stance of the Maronite Church. Since Al-Rahi announced his position, the Tahrir Party, which is active in both Lebanon and Syria, has also started targeting him with criticism. It has also been reported that high-ranking U.S. officials have also cancelled their meetings with the Maronite Patriarch as a sign of their displeasure about his positions on Hezbollah and Syria.
The Hariri-led March 14 Alliance in Lebanon, which has always been a popular minority (even when it was a parliamentary majority), has been working hand-in-hand with the U.S., Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the groups using violence and terrorism in Syria. The Muslim Brotherhood and other so-called Salafist groups from Syria have been coordinating and holding secret talks with Hariri and the Christian political parties in the March 14 Alliance. This is why Hariri and his allies have turned on Cardinal Al-Rahi. It was also Hariri and the March 14 Alliance that brought Fatah Al-Islam into Lebanon and have now helped some of its members escape to go and fight in Syria.
A Christian exodus is being planned for the Middle East by Washington, Tel Aviv, and Brussels. It is now being reported that Sheikh Al-Rahi was told in Paris by President Nicolas Sarkozy that the Christian communities of the Levant and Middle East can resettle in the European Union. This is no gracious offer. It is a slap in the face by the same powers that have deliberately created the conditions to eradicate the ancient Christian communities of the Middle East. The aim appears to be the resettling of the Christian communities outside of the region so as to delineate the Arab nations along the lines of being exclusively Muslim nations. This falls into accordance with the Yinon Plan.
Re-Dividing Africa: The Yinon Plan is very Much Alive and at Work...
In the same context as the sectarian divisions in the Middle East, the Israelis have outlined plans to reconfigure Africa. The Yinon Plan seeks to delineate Africa on the basis of three facets:
(1) ethno-linguistics;
(2) skin-colour;
(3) religion.
It seeks to draw dividing lines in Africa between a so-called "Black Africa" and a supposedly "non-Black" North Africa. This is part of a scheme to create a schism in Africa between what are assumed to be "Arabs" and so-called "Blacks."
An attempt to separate the merging point of an Arab and African identity is underway.
This objective is why the ridiculous identity of an "African South Sudan" and an "Arab North Sudan" have been nurtured and promoted. This is also why black-skinned Libyans have been targeted in a campaign to "colour cleanse" Libya. The Arab identity in North Africa is being de-linked from its African identity. Simultaneously there is an attempt to eradicate the large populations of "black-skinned Arabs" so that there is a clear delineation between "Black Africa" and a new "non-Black" North Africa, which will be turned into a fighting ground between the remaining "non-Black" Berbers and Arabs.
In the same context, tensions are being fomented between Muslims and Christians in Africa, in such places as Sudan and Nigeria, to further create lines and fracture points. The fuelling of these divisions on the basis of skin-colour, religion, ethnicity, and language is intended to fuel disassociation and disunity in Africa. This is all part of a broader African strategy of cutting North Africa off from the rest of the African continent.
Israel and the African Continent
The Israelis have been quietly involved on the African continent for years. In Western Sahara, which is occupied by Morocco, the Israelis helped build a separation security wall like the one in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. In Sudan, Tel Aviv has armed separatist movements and insurgents. In South Africa, the Israelis supported the Apartheid regime and its occupation of Namibia. In 2009, the Israeli Foreign Ministry outlined that Africa would be the renewed focus of Tel Aviv.
Israel's two main objectives in Africa are to impose the Yinon Plan, in league with its own interests, and to assist Washington in becoming the hegemon of Africa. In this regard, the Israelis also pushed for the creation of AFRICOM. The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies (IASPS), an Israeli think-tank, is one example.
Washington has outsourced intelligence work in Africa to Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv is effectively involved as one of the parties in a broader war not just "inside" Africa, but "over" Africa. In this war, Tel Aviv is working alongside Washington and the E.U. against China and its allies, which includes Iran.
Tehran is working alongside Beijing in a similar manner as Tel Aviv is with Washington. Iran is helping the Chinese in Africa through Iranian connections and ties. These ties also include Tehran's ties to private Lebanese and Syrian business interests in Africa. Thus, within the broader rivalry between Washington and Beijing, an Israeli-Iranian rivalry has also unfolded within Africa. [1] Sudan is Africa's third largest weapons producer, as a result of Iranian support in weapons manufacturing. Meanwhile, while Iran provides military assistance to Khartoum, which includes several military cooperation agreements, Israel is involved in various actions directed against the Sudanese. [2]
Israel and Libya
Libya had been considered as "a spoiler" which undermined the interests of the former colonial powers in Africa. In this regard, Libya had taken on some hefty pan-African development plans intended to industrialize Africa and transform Africa into an integrated and assertive political entity. These initiatives conflicted with the interests of the external powers competing with one another in Africa, but it was especially unacceptable to Washington and the major E.U. countries. In this regard, Libya had to be crippled and neutralized as an entity supportive of African progress and pan-African unity.
The role of Israel and the Israeli lobby was fundamental in opening the door to NATO's military intervention in Libya. According to Israeli sources, it was U.N. Watch that actually orchestrated the events in Geneva to remove Libya from the U.N. Human Rights Council and to ask the U.N. Security Council to intervene. [3] U.N. Watch is formally affiliated with the American Jewish Committee (AJC), which has influence in the formulation of U.S. foreign policy and is part of the Israeli lobby in the United States. The International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH), which helped launch the unverified claims about 6,000 people being slaughtered by Qaddafi, is also tied to the Israeli lobby in France.
Tel Aviv had been in contact simultaneously with both the Transitional Council and the Libyan government in Tripoli. Mossad agents were also in Tripoli, one of which was a former station manager. At about the same time, French members of the Israeli lobby were visiting Benghazi. In a case of irony, the Transitional Council would claim that Colonel Qaddafi was working with Israel, while it made pledges to recognize Israel to president Sarkozy's special envoy Bernard-Henri Lévy who would then convey the message to Israeli leaders [4]. A similar pattern (to that of Israel's links to the Transitional Council) had also developed at an earlier stage in South Sudan, which was armed by Israel.
Despite the Transitional Council's position on Israel, its followers still tried to demonize Qaddafi by claiming he was secretly Jewish. Not only was this untrue, but it was also bigoted. These accusations were intended to be a form of character assassination that equated being a Jew as something negative.
In reality, Israel and NATO are in the same camp. Israel is a de facto member of NATO. Had Qaddafi been conniving with Israel while the Transitional Council was working with NATO, this would mean that both sides were actually being played as fools against one another.
Preparing the Chessboard for the "Clash of Civilizations"
It is at this point that all the pieces have to be put together and the dots have to be connected.
The chessboard is being staged for a "Clash of Civilizations" and all the chess pieces are being put into place.
The Arab World is in the process of being cordoned off and sharp delineation lines are being created. These lines of delineation are replacing the seamless lines of transition between different ethno-linguistic, skin-colour, and religious groups.
Under this scheme, there can no longer be a melding transition between societies and countries. This is why the Christians in the Middle East and North Africa, such as the Copts, are being targeted. This is also why black-skinned Arabs and black-skinned Berbers, as well as other North African population groups which are black-skinned, are facing genocide in North Africa.
What is being staged is the creation of an exclusively "Muslim Middle East" area (excluding Israel) that will be in turmoil over Shiite-Sunni fighting. A similar scenario is being staged for a "non-Black North Africa" area which will be characterized by a confrontation between Arabs and Berber. At the same time, under the "Clash of Civilizations" model, the Middle East and North Africa are slated to simultaneously be in conflict with the so-called "West" and "Black Africa."
This is why both Nicolas Sarzoky, in France, and David Cameron, in Britain, made back-to-back declarations during the start of the conflict in Libya that multiculturalism is dead in their respective Western European societies. [5]
Real multiculturalism threatens the legitimacy of the NATO war agenda. It also constitutes an obstacle to the implementation of the "Clash of Civilizations" which constitutes the cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy. In this regard, Zbigniew Brzezinski, former U.S. National Security Advisor, explains why multiculturalism is a threat to Washington and its allies: "[A]s America becomes an increasingly multicultural society, it may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues [e.g., war with the Arab World, China, Iran, or Russia and the former Soviet Union], except in the circumstances of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat. Such a consensus generally existed throughout World War II and even during the Cold War [and exists now because of the 'Global War on Terror']." [6]
Brzezinski's next sentence is the qualifier of why populations would oppose or support wars: "[The consensus] was rooted, however, not only in deeply shared democratic values, which the public sensed were being threatened, but also in a cultural and ethnic affinity for the predominantly European victims of hostile totalitarianisms." [7]
Risking being redundant, it has to be mentioned again that it is precisely with the intention of breaking these cultural affinities between the Middle East-North Africa (MENA) region and the so-called "Western World" and sub-Saharan Africa that Christians and black-skinned peoples are being targeted.
Ethnocentrism and Ideology: Justifying Today's "Just Wars"
In the past, the colonial powers of Western Europe would indoctrinate their people. Their objective was to acquire popular support for colonial conquest. This took the form of spreading Christianity and promoting Christian values with the support of armed merchants and colonial armies.
At the same time, racist ideologies were put forth. The people whose lands were colonized were portrayed as "sub-human," inferior, or soulless. Finally, the "White Man's burden" of taking on a mission of civilizing the so-called "uncivilized peoples of the world" was used. This cohesive ideological framework was used to portray colonialism as a "just cause." The latter in turn was used to provide legitimacy to the waging of "just wars" as a means to conquering and "civilizing" foreign lands.
Today, the imperialist designs of the United States, Britain, France, and Germany have not changed. What has changed is the pretext and justification for waging their neo-colonial wars of conquest. During the colonial period, the narratives and justifications for waging war were accepted by public opinion in the colonizing countries, such as Britain and France. Today's "just wars" and "just causes" are now being conducted under the banners of women's rights, human rights, humanitarianism, and democracy.
Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya is a Sociologist and Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montréal. He specializes on the Middle East and Central Asia. He was on the ground in Libya for over two months and was also a Special Correspondent for Flashpoints, which is a program based in Berkeley, California. Nazemroaya has been releasing these articles about Libya in conjunction with aired discussions with Cynthia McKinney on Freedom Now, a show aired on KPFK, Los Angeles, California.
NOTES
[1] The Economist, "Israel and Iran in Africa: A search for allies in a hostile world," February 4, 2011.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Tova Lazaroff, "70 rights groups call on UN to condemn Tripoli," Jerusalem Post, February 22, 2011.
[4] Radio France Internationale, "Libyan rebels will recognise Israel, Bernard-Henri Lévy tells Netanyahu," June 2, 2011.
[5] Robert Marquand,"Why Europe is turning away from multiculturalism," Christian Science Monitor, March 4, 2011.
[6] Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives (New York: Basic Books October 1997), p.211
[7] Ibid.
ANNEX I: MAP OF DIFFERENT WORLD CIVILIZATIONS REFLECTING SAMUEL HUNTINGTON'S MODEL
* These civilizational divisions and categories are incorrect. There are no clearcutting divisions between many of these so-called and supposedly "distinct civilizations."
ANNEX II: MODEL OF SAMUEL HUNTINGTON'S "CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS"
Global Research Articles by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
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Labels: CYNTHIA MCKINNEY, ISRAEL, LIBYA, NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR DEMOCRACY, NEOCOLONIALISM
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Israel and Libya: Preparing Africa for the “Clash of Civilizations”
Introduction by Cynthia McKinney
by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
Global Research, October 11, 2011
Third of Four Installments on Libya: Israel and Libya
Once again, Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya peels away the veneer of legitimacy and deception enveloping the U.S./NATO genocide currently taking place in Libya. In his first article, Nazemroaya exposed the mechanism by which the world came to "know" of the need for a humanitarian intervention in the Libyan Arab Jamahirya and U.S./NATO admissions of targeted assassination attempts against the Leader of the 1969 Libyan Revolution, Muammar Qaddafi. In his first of these four installments since his return from Libya, Nazemraoya makes it clear that there never was any evidence given to the United Nations or the International Criminal Court to warrant or justify United Nations Resolutions 1970 and 1973 or current U.S./NATO operations inside Libya.
In his second article detailing this very sad story, Nazemroaya exposes the relationships between the major Libyan protagonists/NATO collaborators and the U.S. Congress-funded National Endowment for Democracy. Incredibly, when leading Members of Congress publicly proclaimed repeatedly that they did not know who the Libyan "rebel" NATO collaborators were, select so-called rebel leaders were political intimates with stakeholders at the National Endowment for Democracy.
The leaders of the National Transitional Council, contrived to appear highly influential to publics in former colonial capitals, have very little influence or support inside Libya, and can be likened to a Hamid Karzai type of morally bankrupt neo-colonial authority that presides over and gives a fig-leaf of "legitmacy" to those outsiders whose objective is the total destruction of recalcitrant citizens who demand self-determination over their own communities and country. Nazemroaya also exposes that, despite its Global War on Terror, the U.S. government actually financed Libyan terrorists and criminals wanted by INTERPOL.
In this, his third of four installments, Nazemroaya removes the U.S./NATO fig leaf and what he reveals are the abhorrent, obnoxious, inhumane, and cynical machinations of the pro-Israel Lobby that is the only political force that seems to be able to command the mightiest of militaries and the strongest of leaders to act in ways that threaten the peace and tranquility of their own political parties and national security of their own governments. Indeed, by its policy to support Israel, no matter how belligerent its policies, the United States has eroded its own national interest, as warnings from U.S. military leaders continue to point out.
In fact, my own personal experiences with the pro-Israel Lobby inside the United States demonstrate Israel's intense interest in Africa. I have written about my experience with "the pledge" to support Israel that is forced on every candidate for the U.S. Congress; refusal to sign it, as I did, means not one dollar of the millions expended each election cycle in campaign contributions and can ensure the most vicious media demonization as the major descriptor of the un-cooperating candidate.
The demonization of Alabama's first Black Member of Congress since Reconstruction, Earl Hilliard, in his 2002 re-election campaign, with specific regard to his visits to Libya, immediately come to mind. Weeks later, many of the New York contributors against his re-election, reappeared in my own opponent's campaign coffers. While I was portrayed in letters to supporters of the pro-Israel Lobby as anti-Israel, I will continue to believe that it was my very real activities in Africa that the pro-Israel Lobby found most threatening. From land reform to blood diamonds to various warnings I sent to certain African oil-producing countries to support for African self-determination and against artificial efforts to create divisions in Cote d'Ivoire, Zaire/Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, and Sudan, I found an incredible interest in all things African on the part of the pro-Israel Lobby.
In fact, I was invited to lease my "Black" face to these very interests and get arrested in front of the Sudan Embassy to sow the very "Black versus Arab" narrative being tragically created in Libya which Nazemroaya describes so thoroughly in this current text. I note here that some Blacks inside and outside of the U.S. Congress did choose to accept this particular invitation and get arrested. My representative was present at the meeting where these activities were planned, finance was arranged, and actions put in motion. This was a purposeful manipulation of U.S. policy and more importantly, of the despicable behaviors in Sudan that led to human rights abuses and crimes against humanity. My own legislation to de-list corporations from the U.S. stock exchange that aided or abetted or engaged in any way in human rights abuses in Sudan was deemed by guardians of the pro-Israel agenda inside the Congress to be an unacceptable answer to the very real abuses taking place in that country.
Additionally, while I was in prison in Israel, the point of the mostly African female prisoners on my Ramle Prison cell block was that they were adherents of "the wrong religion." The purging of Christians inside Israel is a fact. The scribblings on the wall of my Israeli holding room in another prison complex before my release made it clear that those Christians being deported were not wanted in Israel and they felt that it was because of their religion. Israel's recent push, despite its non-Jewish residents, to identify itself as a "Jewish state" is telling.
While in Libya, I met many Africans who said that they chose to live there because of the pan-Africanism of the policies of the Libyan Jamahirya. In fact, while at an "Africans in the Diaspora Conference" there in January/February of 2011, I personally witnessed, along with a delegation of others from the United States, Muammar Qaddafi pledge $90 billion to a "United States of Africa" that would work together to build the Continent and counter the efforts to penetrate and recolonize it. Blacks in the United States who struggled for dignity, self-determination, and against U.S. oppression and imperialism during the 1960s and 1970s have a relationship with Muammar Qaddafi and the Jamahirya government that goes back decades. At the 29-stops of my Libya Truth Tour, I met many U.S. citizens who reminded the audiences of the contributions of Muammar Qaddafi and the Jamahirya government against British imperialism in Northern Ireland. Continental Africans attending these Tour-stops reminded audiences of Muammar Qaddafi's support for Nelson Mandela and Africans struggling to rid the Continent of Apartheid at a time when Israel shared an alliance with that government. They also noted the Jamahirya government's current support for many development projects throughout the Continent and for the budget of the African Union, itself. Therefore, many alarmed observers have pointed out that the U.S./NATO attack on Libya is actually an attack on all of Africa. Nazemroaya eloquently makes this point while revealing the underlying motives for the "uber-violence" that we see in Libya and that is opposed by large majorities of voters in NATO member states, if reported polling results can be trusted. What comes to my mind is how anyone who identifies with the peace community could support such an attack on Libya, especially while the people of Libya valiantly resist NATO domination.
Nazemroaya makes the essential point: "An attempt to separate the merging point of an Arab and African identity is underway." The Voice of America has exposed the psychological aspects of its brutal intervention and hints at the mindset of the U.S./NATO Libyan pawns; several stories suggest that the "new" Libya will turn more toward its Arab identity than its African identity. And U.S./NATO successful imposition of the psychological chains of identity denial are the most longlasting of chains. While in Tunisia, I actually came face to face with the fruits of this project when a taxi driver born in Tunisia told me that he was not African! Muammar Qaddafi drove home to all Libyans that Libya, as its geography dictates, is an African country. It seems ludicrous on its face to have to reiterate such a fact except for the racism, brainwashing, and psychological underpinnings of current U.S./NATO policy and its colonial antecedents that Nazemroaya exposes.
Finally, Walter H. Kansteiner has moved in and out of various positions within the foreign policy apparatus of the United States government and has been the voice for exactly the policies described by Nazemroaya. Among Kansteiner's positions are stints as Africa Director at the State Department and National Security Council Director for African Affairs during the Presidency of George Herbert Walker Bush and Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs during the Presidency of George W. Bush. During these stints, Mr. Kansteiner was in a position to initiate the balkanization of Africa that we now see reaching fruition on the Continent. I was forced to write a letter to President Bush in 2001 expressing my alarm at his suggestions for Democratic Republic of Congo. In my opinion, Laurent Kabila was murdered because he refused to balkanize Congo. (He personally related his last conversation with a certain U.S. representative who encouraged him to betray Congo. In his last words to me, "I will never betray Congo.")
Cynthia McKinney, 10 October 2011.
Cynthia McKinney is a former U.S. Congresswoman who served in two different Georgia federal districts in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1993 to 2003 and from 2005 to 2007 as a member of the U.S. Democratic Party. She was also the U.S. Green Party presidential candidate in 2008. While in the U.S. Congress she served on the U.S. Banking and Finance Committee, the U.S. National Security Committee (later renamed the U.S. Armed Services Committee), and the U.S. Foreign Affairs Committee (later renamed the U.S. International Relations Committee). She also served on the U.S. International Relations subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights. McKinney has conducted two fact-finding missions to Libya and also recently finished a nationwide speaking tour in the United States sponsored by the ANSWER Coalition regarding the NATO bombing campaign on Libya.
America's Conquest of Africa: The Roles of France and Israel
- by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, Julien Teil - 2011-10-06
Terrorists not only fight for Washington on the ground, they also act as frontmen for regime change through so-called human rights organizations that promote democracy. Introduction by Cynthia McKinney
Libya and the Big Lie: Using Human Rights Organizations to Launch Wars
- by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya - 2011-09-29
The war against Libya is built on fraud. The UN Security Council passed two resolutions against Libya on the basis of unproven claims that Qaddafi was killing his own people in Benghazi...
ISRAEL AND LIBYA: PREPARING AFRICA FOR THE "CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS"
Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
Under the Obama Administration the United States has expanded the "long war" into Africa. Barack Hussein Obama, the so-called "Son of Africa" has actually become one of Africa's worst enemies. Aside from his continued support of dictators in Africa, the Republic of Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) was unhinged under his watch. The division of Sudan was publicly endorsed by the White House before the referendum, Somalia has been further destabilized, Libya has been viciously attacked by NATO, and U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) is going into full swing.
The war in Libya is just the start of a new cycle of external military adventurism inside Africa. The U.S. now wants more military bases inside Africa. France has also announced that it has the right to militarily intervene anywhere in Africa where there are French citizens and its interests are at risk. NATO is also fortifying its positions in the Red Sea and off the coast of Somalia.
As disarray and turmoil are once again uprooting Africa with external intervention, Israel sits silently in the background. Tel Aviv has actually been deeply involved in the new cycle of turmoil, which is tied to its Yinon Plan to reconfigure its strategic surrounding. This reconfiguration process is based on a well established technique of creating sectarian divisions which eventually will effectively neutralize target states or result in their dissolution.
Many of the problems afflicting the contemporary areas of Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Southwest Asia, South Asia, East Asia, Africa, and Latin America are actually the result of the deliberate triggering of regional tensions by external powers. Sectarian division, ethno-linguistic tension, religious differences, and internal violence have been traditionally exploited by the United States, Britain, and France in various parts of the globe. Iraq, Sudan, Rwanda, and Yugoslavia are merely a few recent examples of this strategy of "divide and conquer" being used to bring nations to their knees.
The Upheavals of Central-Eastern Europe and the Project for a "New Middle East"
The Middle East, in some regards, is a striking parallel to the Balkans and Central-Eastern Europe during the years leading up to the First World War. In the wake of the First World War, the borders of the multi-ethnic states in the Balkans and Central-Eastern Europe were redrawn and reconfigured by external powers, in alliance with local opposition forces. Since the First World War until the post-Cold War period the Balkans and Central-Eastern Europe have continued to experience a period of upheaval, violence and conflict that has continuously divided the region.
For years, there have been advocates calling for a "New Middle East" with redrawn boundaries in this region of the world where Europe, Southwest Asia, and North Africa meet. These advocates mostly sit in the capitals of Washington, London, Paris, and Tel Aviv. They envisage a region shaped around homogenous ethno-religious states. The formation of these states would signify the destruction of the larger existing countries of the region. The transition would be towards the formation of smaller Kuwait-like or Bahrain-like states, which could easily be managed and manipulated by the U.S., Britain, France, Israel, and their allies.
The Manipulation of the First "Arab Spring" during World War I
The plans for reconfiguring the Middle East started several years before the First World War. It was during the First World War, however, that the manifestation of these colonial designs could visibly be seen with the "Great Arab Revolt" against the Ottoman Empire.
Despite the fact that the British, French, and Italians were colonial powers which had prevented the Arabs from enjoying any freedom in countries like Algeria, Libya, Egypt, and Sudan, these colonial powers managed to portray themselves as the friends and allies of Arab liberation.
During the "Great Arab Revolt" the British and the French actually used the Arabs as foot soldiers against the Ottomans to further their own geo-political schemes. The secret Sykes–Picot Agreement between London and Paris is a case in point. France and Britain merely managed to use and manipulate the Arabs by selling them the idea of Arab liberation from the so-called "repression" of the Ottomans.
In reality, the Ottoman Empire was a multi-ethnic empire. It gave local and cultural autonomy to all its peoples, but was manipulated into the direction of becoming a Turkish entity. Even the Armenian Genocide that would ensue in Ottoman Anatolia has to be analyzed in the same context as the contemporary targeting of Christians in Iraq as part of a sectarian scheme unleashed by external actors to divide the Ottoman Empire, Anatolia, and the citizens of the Ottoman Empire.
After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, it was London and Paris which denied freedom to the Arabs, while sowing the seeds of discord amongst the Arab peoples. Local corrupt Arab leaders were also partners in the project and many of them were all too happy to become clients of Britain and France. In the same sense, the "Arab Spring" is being manipulated today. The U.S., Britain, France, and others are now working with the help of corrupt Arab leaders and figures to restructure the Arab World and Africa.
The Yinon Plan
The Yinon Plan, which is a continuation of British stratagem in the Middle East, is an Israeli strategic plan to ensure Israeli superiority. It insists and stipulates that Israel must reconfigure its geo-political environment through the balkanization of the Middle Eastern and Arab states into smaller and weaker states.
Israeli strategists viewed Iraq as their biggest strategic challenge from an Arab state. This is why Iraq was outlined as the centerpiece to the balkanization of the Middle East and the Arab World. In Iraq, on the basis of the concepts of the Yinon Plan, Israeli strategists have called for the division of Iraq into a Kurdish state and two Arab states, one for Shiite Muslims and the other for Sunni Muslims. The first step towards establishing this was a war between Iraq and Iran, which the Yinon Plan discusses.
The Atlantic, in 2008, and the U.S. military's Armed Forces Journal, in 2006, both published widely circulated maps that closely followed the outline of the Yinon Plan. Aside from a divided Iraq, which the Biden Plan also calls for, the Yinon Plan calls for a divided Lebanon, Egypt, and Syria. The partitioning of Iran, Turkey, Somalia, and Pakistan also all fall into line with these views. The Yinon Plan also calls for dissolution in North Africa and forecasts it as starting from Egypt and then spilling over into Sudan, Libya, and the rest of the region.
Note: The following map was drawn by Holly Lindem for an article by Jeffery Goldberg. It was published in The Atlantic in January/February 2008.
Map Copyright: The Atlantic, 2008.
Note: The following map was prepared by Lieutenant-Colonel Ralph Peters.
It was published in the Armed Forces Journal in June 2006, Peters is a retired colonel of the U.S. National War Academy.
Map Copyright Lieutenant-Colonel Ralph Peters 2006.
The Eradication of the Christian Communities of the Middle East
It is no coincidence that Egyptian Christians were attacked at the same time as the South Sudan Referendum and before the crisis in Libya. Nor is it a coincidence that Iraqi Christians, one of the world's oldest Christian communities, have been forced into exile, leaving their ancestral homelands in Iraq. Coinciding with the exodus of Iraqi Christians, which occurred under the watchful eyes of U.S. and British military forces, the neighbourhoods in Baghdad became sectarian as Shiite Muslims and Sunni Muslims were forced by violence and death squads to form sectarian enclaves. This is all tied to the Yinon Plan and the reconfiguration of the region as part of a broader objective.
In Iran, the Israelis have been trying in vain to get the Iranian Jewish community to leave. Iran's Jewish population is actually the second largest in the Middle East and arguably the oldest undisturbed Jewish community in the world. Iranian Jews view themselves as Iranians who are tied to Iran as their homeland, just like Muslim and Christian Iranians, and for them the concept that they need to relocate to Israel because they are Jewish is ridiculous.
In Lebanon, Israel has been working to exacerbate sectarian tensions between the various Christian and Muslim factions as well as the Druze. Lebanon is a springboard into Syria and the division of Lebanon into several states is also seen as a means to balkanizing Syria into several smaller sectarian Arab states. The objectives of the Yinon Plan are to divide Lebanon and Syria into several states on the basis of religious and sectarian identities for Sunni Muslims, Shiite Muslims, Christians, and the Druze. There could also be objectives for a Christian exodus in Syria too.
The new head of the Maronite Catholic Syriac Church of Antioch, the largest of the autonomous Eastern Catholic Churches, has expressed his fears about a purging of Arab Christians in the Levant and Middle East. Patriarch Mar Beshara Boutros Al-Rahi and many other Christian leaders in Lebanon and Syria are afraid of a Muslim Brotherhood takeover in Syria. Like Iraq, mysterious groups are now attacking the Christian communities in Syria. The leaders of the Christian Eastern Orthodox Church, including the Eastern Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, have also all publicly expressed their grave concerns. Aside from the Christian Arabs, these fears are also shared by the Assyrian and Armenian communities, which are mostly Christian.
Sheikh Al-Rahi was recently in Paris where he met President Nicolas Sarkozy. It is reported that the Maronite Patriarch and Sarkozy had disagreements about Syria, which prompted Sarkozy to say that the Syrian regime will collapse. Patriarch Al-Rahi's position was that Syria should be left alone and allowed to reform. The Maronite Patriarch also told Sarkozy that Israel needed to be dealt with as a threat if France legitimately wanted Hezbollah to disarm.
Because of his position in France, Al-Rahi was instantly thanked by the Christian and Muslim religious leaders of the Syrian Arab Republic who visited him in Lebanon. Hezbollah and its political allies in Lebanon, which includes most the Christian parliamentarians in the Lebanese Parliament, also lauded the Maronite Patriarch who later went on a tour to South Lebanon.
Sheikh Al-Rahi is now being politically attacked by the Hariri-led March 14 Alliance, because of his stance on Hezbollah and his refusal to support the toppling of the Syrian regime. A conference of Christian figures is actually being planned by Hariri to oppose Patriarch Al-Rahi and the stance of the Maronite Church. Since Al-Rahi announced his position, the Tahrir Party, which is active in both Lebanon and Syria, has also started targeting him with criticism. It has also been reported that high-ranking U.S. officials have also cancelled their meetings with the Maronite Patriarch as a sign of their displeasure about his positions on Hezbollah and Syria.
The Hariri-led March 14 Alliance in Lebanon, which has always been a popular minority (even when it was a parliamentary majority), has been working hand-in-hand with the U.S., Israel, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the groups using violence and terrorism in Syria. The Muslim Brotherhood and other so-called Salafist groups from Syria have been coordinating and holding secret talks with Hariri and the Christian political parties in the March 14 Alliance. This is why Hariri and his allies have turned on Cardinal Al-Rahi. It was also Hariri and the March 14 Alliance that brought Fatah Al-Islam into Lebanon and have now helped some of its members escape to go and fight in Syria.
A Christian exodus is being planned for the Middle East by Washington, Tel Aviv, and Brussels. It is now being reported that Sheikh Al-Rahi was told in Paris by President Nicolas Sarkozy that the Christian communities of the Levant and Middle East can resettle in the European Union. This is no gracious offer. It is a slap in the face by the same powers that have deliberately created the conditions to eradicate the ancient Christian communities of the Middle East. The aim appears to be the resettling of the Christian communities outside of the region so as to delineate the Arab nations along the lines of being exclusively Muslim nations. This falls into accordance with the Yinon Plan.
Re-Dividing Africa: The Yinon Plan is very Much Alive and at Work...
In the same context as the sectarian divisions in the Middle East, the Israelis have outlined plans to reconfigure Africa. The Yinon Plan seeks to delineate Africa on the basis of three facets:
(1) ethno-linguistics;
(2) skin-colour;
(3) religion.
It seeks to draw dividing lines in Africa between a so-called "Black Africa" and a supposedly "non-Black" North Africa. This is part of a scheme to create a schism in Africa between what are assumed to be "Arabs" and so-called "Blacks."
An attempt to separate the merging point of an Arab and African identity is underway.
This objective is why the ridiculous identity of an "African South Sudan" and an "Arab North Sudan" have been nurtured and promoted. This is also why black-skinned Libyans have been targeted in a campaign to "colour cleanse" Libya. The Arab identity in North Africa is being de-linked from its African identity. Simultaneously there is an attempt to eradicate the large populations of "black-skinned Arabs" so that there is a clear delineation between "Black Africa" and a new "non-Black" North Africa, which will be turned into a fighting ground between the remaining "non-Black" Berbers and Arabs.
In the same context, tensions are being fomented between Muslims and Christians in Africa, in such places as Sudan and Nigeria, to further create lines and fracture points. The fuelling of these divisions on the basis of skin-colour, religion, ethnicity, and language is intended to fuel disassociation and disunity in Africa. This is all part of a broader African strategy of cutting North Africa off from the rest of the African continent.
Israel and the African Continent
The Israelis have been quietly involved on the African continent for years. In Western Sahara, which is occupied by Morocco, the Israelis helped build a separation security wall like the one in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. In Sudan, Tel Aviv has armed separatist movements and insurgents. In South Africa, the Israelis supported the Apartheid regime and its occupation of Namibia. In 2009, the Israeli Foreign Ministry outlined that Africa would be the renewed focus of Tel Aviv.
Israel's two main objectives in Africa are to impose the Yinon Plan, in league with its own interests, and to assist Washington in becoming the hegemon of Africa. In this regard, the Israelis also pushed for the creation of AFRICOM. The Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies (IASPS), an Israeli think-tank, is one example.
Washington has outsourced intelligence work in Africa to Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv is effectively involved as one of the parties in a broader war not just "inside" Africa, but "over" Africa. In this war, Tel Aviv is working alongside Washington and the E.U. against China and its allies, which includes Iran.
Tehran is working alongside Beijing in a similar manner as Tel Aviv is with Washington. Iran is helping the Chinese in Africa through Iranian connections and ties. These ties also include Tehran's ties to private Lebanese and Syrian business interests in Africa. Thus, within the broader rivalry between Washington and Beijing, an Israeli-Iranian rivalry has also unfolded within Africa. [1] Sudan is Africa's third largest weapons producer, as a result of Iranian support in weapons manufacturing. Meanwhile, while Iran provides military assistance to Khartoum, which includes several military cooperation agreements, Israel is involved in various actions directed against the Sudanese. [2]
Israel and Libya
Libya had been considered as "a spoiler" which undermined the interests of the former colonial powers in Africa. In this regard, Libya had taken on some hefty pan-African development plans intended to industrialize Africa and transform Africa into an integrated and assertive political entity. These initiatives conflicted with the interests of the external powers competing with one another in Africa, but it was especially unacceptable to Washington and the major E.U. countries. In this regard, Libya had to be crippled and neutralized as an entity supportive of African progress and pan-African unity.
The role of Israel and the Israeli lobby was fundamental in opening the door to NATO's military intervention in Libya. According to Israeli sources, it was U.N. Watch that actually orchestrated the events in Geneva to remove Libya from the U.N. Human Rights Council and to ask the U.N. Security Council to intervene. [3] U.N. Watch is formally affiliated with the American Jewish Committee (AJC), which has influence in the formulation of U.S. foreign policy and is part of the Israeli lobby in the United States. The International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH), which helped launch the unverified claims about 6,000 people being slaughtered by Qaddafi, is also tied to the Israeli lobby in France.
Tel Aviv had been in contact simultaneously with both the Transitional Council and the Libyan government in Tripoli. Mossad agents were also in Tripoli, one of which was a former station manager. At about the same time, French members of the Israeli lobby were visiting Benghazi. In a case of irony, the Transitional Council would claim that Colonel Qaddafi was working with Israel, while it made pledges to recognize Israel to president Sarkozy's special envoy Bernard-Henri Lévy who would then convey the message to Israeli leaders [4]. A similar pattern (to that of Israel's links to the Transitional Council) had also developed at an earlier stage in South Sudan, which was armed by Israel.
Despite the Transitional Council's position on Israel, its followers still tried to demonize Qaddafi by claiming he was secretly Jewish. Not only was this untrue, but it was also bigoted. These accusations were intended to be a form of character assassination that equated being a Jew as something negative.
In reality, Israel and NATO are in the same camp. Israel is a de facto member of NATO. Had Qaddafi been conniving with Israel while the Transitional Council was working with NATO, this would mean that both sides were actually being played as fools against one another.
Preparing the Chessboard for the "Clash of Civilizations"
It is at this point that all the pieces have to be put together and the dots have to be connected.
The chessboard is being staged for a "Clash of Civilizations" and all the chess pieces are being put into place.
The Arab World is in the process of being cordoned off and sharp delineation lines are being created. These lines of delineation are replacing the seamless lines of transition between different ethno-linguistic, skin-colour, and religious groups.
Under this scheme, there can no longer be a melding transition between societies and countries. This is why the Christians in the Middle East and North Africa, such as the Copts, are being targeted. This is also why black-skinned Arabs and black-skinned Berbers, as well as other North African population groups which are black-skinned, are facing genocide in North Africa.
What is being staged is the creation of an exclusively "Muslim Middle East" area (excluding Israel) that will be in turmoil over Shiite-Sunni fighting. A similar scenario is being staged for a "non-Black North Africa" area which will be characterized by a confrontation between Arabs and Berber. At the same time, under the "Clash of Civilizations" model, the Middle East and North Africa are slated to simultaneously be in conflict with the so-called "West" and "Black Africa."
This is why both Nicolas Sarzoky, in France, and David Cameron, in Britain, made back-to-back declarations during the start of the conflict in Libya that multiculturalism is dead in their respective Western European societies. [5]
Real multiculturalism threatens the legitimacy of the NATO war agenda. It also constitutes an obstacle to the implementation of the "Clash of Civilizations" which constitutes the cornerstone of U.S. foreign policy. In this regard, Zbigniew Brzezinski, former U.S. National Security Advisor, explains why multiculturalism is a threat to Washington and its allies: "[A]s America becomes an increasingly multicultural society, it may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues [e.g., war with the Arab World, China, Iran, or Russia and the former Soviet Union], except in the circumstances of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat. Such a consensus generally existed throughout World War II and even during the Cold War [and exists now because of the 'Global War on Terror']." [6]
Brzezinski's next sentence is the qualifier of why populations would oppose or support wars: "[The consensus] was rooted, however, not only in deeply shared democratic values, which the public sensed were being threatened, but also in a cultural and ethnic affinity for the predominantly European victims of hostile totalitarianisms." [7]
Risking being redundant, it has to be mentioned again that it is precisely with the intention of breaking these cultural affinities between the Middle East-North Africa (MENA) region and the so-called "Western World" and sub-Saharan Africa that Christians and black-skinned peoples are being targeted.
Ethnocentrism and Ideology: Justifying Today's "Just Wars"
In the past, the colonial powers of Western Europe would indoctrinate their people. Their objective was to acquire popular support for colonial conquest. This took the form of spreading Christianity and promoting Christian values with the support of armed merchants and colonial armies.
At the same time, racist ideologies were put forth. The people whose lands were colonized were portrayed as "sub-human," inferior, or soulless. Finally, the "White Man's burden" of taking on a mission of civilizing the so-called "uncivilized peoples of the world" was used. This cohesive ideological framework was used to portray colonialism as a "just cause." The latter in turn was used to provide legitimacy to the waging of "just wars" as a means to conquering and "civilizing" foreign lands.
Today, the imperialist designs of the United States, Britain, France, and Germany have not changed. What has changed is the pretext and justification for waging their neo-colonial wars of conquest. During the colonial period, the narratives and justifications for waging war were accepted by public opinion in the colonizing countries, such as Britain and France. Today's "just wars" and "just causes" are now being conducted under the banners of women's rights, human rights, humanitarianism, and democracy.
Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya is a Sociologist and Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montréal. He specializes on the Middle East and Central Asia. He was on the ground in Libya for over two months and was also a Special Correspondent for Flashpoints, which is a program based in Berkeley, California. Nazemroaya has been releasing these articles about Libya in conjunction with aired discussions with Cynthia McKinney on Freedom Now, a show aired on KPFK, Los Angeles, California.
NOTES
[1] The Economist, "Israel and Iran in Africa: A search for allies in a hostile world," February 4, 2011.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Tova Lazaroff, "70 rights groups call on UN to condemn Tripoli," Jerusalem Post, February 22, 2011.
[4] Radio France Internationale, "Libyan rebels will recognise Israel, Bernard-Henri Lévy tells Netanyahu," June 2, 2011.
[5] Robert Marquand,"Why Europe is turning away from multiculturalism," Christian Science Monitor, March 4, 2011.
[6] Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives (New York: Basic Books October 1997), p.211
[7] Ibid.
ANNEX I: MAP OF DIFFERENT WORLD CIVILIZATIONS REFLECTING SAMUEL HUNTINGTON'S MODEL
* These civilizational divisions and categories are incorrect. There are no clearcutting divisions between many of these so-called and supposedly "distinct civilizations."
ANNEX II: MODEL OF SAMUEL HUNTINGTON'S "CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS"
Global Research Articles by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
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Labels: CYNTHIA MCKINNEY, ISRAEL, LIBYA, NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR DEMOCRACY, NEOCOLONIALISM
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