Brinkmanship Unwise in Uncharted Waters

April 2, 2007 at 12:51 am | Posted in Blair, Britain, hostage-taking, Iran, Iraq, IRGC, Propaganda, UK | Leave a comment

Consortiumnews.com has published a rather good article on the eight RM Commandos and seven RN sailors detained by Iran for illegal entry into Iranian waters questioning the sense of the British strategy.

The frenzy in America’s corporate media over Iran’s detainment of 15 British Marines who may, or may not, have violated Iranian-claimed territorial waters is a flashback to the unrestrained support given the administration’s war-mongering against Iraq shortly before the attack.

The British are refusing to concede the possibility that its Marines may have crossed into ill-charted, Iranian-claimed waters and are ratcheting up the confrontation. At this point, the relative merits of the British and Iranian versions of what actually happened are greatly less important than how hotheads on each side—and particularly the British—decide to exploit the event in the coming days.

British Sponsored Terrorist Release Iranian Prisoners

March 27, 2007 at 1:56 pm | Posted in Blair, Britain, Iran, IRGC, Pasdaran, Terrorism | Leave a comment

Jundallah, the Wahhabi terrorist group released the three members of Iran’s Disciplinary Force (police) that it abducted in eastern Sistan and Baluchetan, earlier this month and then took into Pakistan, where they were held hostage.

Meanwhile Blair has suggested that if the British commandos being detained by Iran for illegally entering Iranian water are not released presently, the situation will move into a “new phase”.

Iran has said that Jundallah has links with British SIS, which of course Britain denies. However the release of these hostages would suggest otherwise.

Iraqi General confirms that Royal Navy were in Iranian waters when captured

March 26, 2007 at 12:17 am | Posted in Blair, Britain, Iran, Iraq, Pasdaran, UK | Leave a comment

IRIB reports

The Commander of Iraq’s Coastal Guard Brigadier General Hakeem Jassem, in an interview with al-Alam News Network Saturday, condemned the illegal entry of British forces into Iran’s territorial waters and said the 15 British troopers were detained outside Iraq’s waters by Iran’s naval border guards.

The Iraqi Commander termed the intrusion of British forces into Iran’s coastal regions as questionable, making it clear that his forces cannot support the British claims that their forces were captured by the Iranians in the Iraqi side of the waterway.

He disclosed that British marines and sailors stopped a commercial ship inside Iran’s territorial waters and boarded it, forcing the Iranian border guards to interfere and arrest the British troopers.

The detained British forces have confessed to their illegal entry into Iran’s territorial waters.

The Death of Tyrant

January 2, 2007 at 2:49 pm | Posted in Blair, Iraq, Saddam, tyrant | 6 Comments

There is much to say about the death of Saddam. I could give an account about the Basij; the Iranian civilians shelled in Bandar-e Anzali (where my family is from); the murder of Ayatullah al-Sadr and Ayatullah al-Hakim; the succour Saddam received from the West, Israel and the Soviet Union; the genocide and ethnic cleansing of the Iraqi Shia and Kurds; or the betrayal of Saddam by his Western allies.

However to do so offers no great insight or explanation why a man should be killed for his crimes and why so many in Europe should find it abhorrent and so many in the Middle East should rejoice.

The difference is one of perception; in Western Europe judicial executions do not take place and have not done so for many years. Very few people in Europe have witnessed a public execution. Therefore there is a false expectation about what takes place. Even many of those that support the reintroduction of the death penalty were sickened by the images of Saddam’s death.

In truth, Saddam’s execution was more dignified than most. The condemned is not executed for the sake of the law – he is executed for the sake of justice – so that those whom he has wronged may have a tangible sense of it. Thus he dies in front of those who revile him and for whom he is the personification of his crimes. Therefore when the condemned meets his death it is to the sound of jeers of derision, then finally to roars of applause, as his body twitches, passing from life to death.

In Europe such a scene is an anathema to justice and utterly inconceivable. For this Tony Blair will never be forgiven since this death sentence will remain an indelible mark upon New Labour Government and makes a mockery of its pretensions of an ethical foreign policy.

Blair’s culpability is undeniable, for Saddam’s death was as an inevitability the moment Blair failed to extract a guarantee that Saddam would be tried in the Hague as his price for Britain’s participation in the invasion of Iraq. Had he have done so, Saddam would not have hung.

A State Within A State

December 10, 2006 at 1:36 pm | Posted in Blair, Britain, Human Rights, Iran, Met Police, Racism | 1 Comment

The Investigatory Powers Tribunal ruled that in 1999 the Met Police Anti-Corruption squad unlawfully tapped the telephone conversations of Chief superintendent Ali Dizaei, the Met’s most senior Muslim officer and legal adviser to the National Black Police Association, in 1999. The operation – codenamed Helios – was directly overseen by Met Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair, back when he was deputy commissioner.

The team of 40 officers monitored over 3,500 phone calls made by Ali Dizaei from Kensington police station and the NBPA offices. Ostensibly the investigation was looking into unfounded allegations that Dizaei was an Iranian spy, although Keith Jarrett, president of the NBPA, cast doubt over the sincerity of the investigation:

“The significance of this judgment is to tell the Met that they can’t treat people in this way. It was an attempt to destroy the NBPA, not a corruption inquiry.”

At the time Dizaei was advising officers who were suing the Met for racial discrimination and victimisation. Moreover, despite the fact that this was the biggest police corruption case ever mounted, costing millions, it failed to substantiate any criminal allegation against Dizaei. A token prosecution was brought for an alleged £270 false expense claim but Dizaei was acquitted.

What is most alarming about this case, is not that the Met Police Commissioner headed an unlawful racist and political motivated investigation or indeed that the Met Anti-Corruption squad is itself tainted by racism and corruption; it is that the Prime Minister and then Home Secretary, David Blunkett, would have been fully appraised of the details of operation Helios yet still approved Sir Ian Blair’s appointment as Met Police commissioner. This signals an approval of what amounts to a state within a state.

Trevor Phillips adds fuel to the fire

October 23, 2006 at 3:33 pm | Posted in Blair, Islam, Muslim | 1 Comment

Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the CRE has suggested that the teaching assistant, Aishah Azmi, suspended by Dewsbury’s Headfield Church of England Junior School School for refusing to remove her veil in front of a male teacher, “would be doing everybody, including herself, a great favour were she to decide either that she were to comply with the requirements for teaching in the classroom or to decide she didn’t want to do that job.”

The employment tribunal held that she had not be discriminated against but had been victimised by the school and also recognised the serious subjudice issues in this case.

Whilst, one might on the face of it think that Phillips has a point, his remarks where inconsistent with his office, he is the chair of a government agency, with statutory legal powers on race equality. This intervention, is extraordinary; he is urging a woman to abort a civil suit in the national interest.

In fact, not only does she have the right to pursue her case – all things being equal – she has every prospect of success. In fact it is startling that neither Blair nor Woolas have been held in contempt of court – unquestionably their comments were subjudice -for this reason alone, the case is a more than worthy of being a test case. Government ministers (the Prime Minister no less) really ought not to be indulging in subjudice, no matter how politic.

Muslim letter to Blair

August 12, 2006 at 9:52 pm | Posted in Blair, Islam, Muslim | Leave a comment

The letter from Muslim MPs, Peers, the MCB and others to the Prime Minister:

Prime Minister,

As British Muslims we urge you to do more to fight against all those who target civilians with violence, whenever and wherever that happens.

It is our view that current British government policy risks putting civilians at increased risk both in the UK and abroad.

To combat terror the government has focused extensively on domestic legislation. While some of this will have an impact, the government must not ignore the role of its foreign policy.

The debacle of Iraq and now the failure to do more to secure an immediate end to the attacks on civilians in the Middle East not only increases the risk to ordinary people in that region, it is also ammunition to extremists who threaten us all.

Attacking civilians is never justified. This message is a global one. We urge the Prime Minister to redouble his efforts to tackle terror and extremism and change our foreign policy to show the world that we value the lives of civilians wherever they live and whatever their religion.

Such a move would make us all safer.

If one has nothing to say it is better to say nothing.

What this letter does not say but should say, and quite unambiguously, is that if Britain visits political violence upon Afghanistan and Iraq and give succour to those who visit political violence on Palestinians, Lebanese and Iranians, then you must surely expect that there will be those who will visit political violence on the UK. However this hardly needs non representative Muslim bodies and individuals largely intertwined with the British government to spell it out.

The letter could have been bold and said that the British Muslim community supports Lebanese and Palestinian resistance to Zionist aggression and call upon the Prime Minister to adopt a policy of neutrality towards the Middle East.

It could have also pointed out that the bombers on the 7th July like the Madrid bombers were in fact Wahhabi fanatics associated with Al-Qaeda and that Wahhabism is an off-shoot of Islam that was the brain child of the British Foreign Office, looking to foster an Arab uprising against the Ottoman empire in the 19th Century and that al-Qaeda itself was set up by the United States.

The letter could also have said suggested that the anger in most of Britain’s diverse Muslim communities against British foreign policy has not fueled more than one act of violence on our shores.

Moreover, it could have said that the British government’s support for Israel was extremist; rather than read as a veiled threat to the British government, should it not change its foreign policy

Bush and Blair Should Apologise

August 12, 2006 at 9:49 pm | Posted in Blair, Bush, Iran, Mossadegh | Leave a comment

Jean-Pierre Lehmann, Professor of International Political Economy and founding director of the Lausanne-based Evian Group (an international coalition of corporate, government and opinion leaders) suggested in a letter to the Financial Times published Friday,

“Ideally, Mr Blair and Mr Bush should go to Tehran, ask the Iranian people for forgiveness, and then, as they say, take it from there.”

He also states,

“The interventions and impositions by the ‘west,’ both Europe and the US, in the Middle East have been almost invariably negative, both in their motivations and in their consequences.”

He urged that them to acknowledge that the UK and the US overthrew the government of Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953 and then,

“imposed and strongly supported the dictatorial monarchical rule of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi as shah of Iran until he was finally overthrown by the Iranian people in 1979.”

He also pointed out that the current Iranian government was,

“chosen by the Iranian people and ultimately it is up to the Iranian people whether it wants to maintain it or not.”

Professor, states that although there is much for the West to apologise for in Iran,

“the Mossadegh issue has the advantage of being quite clear-cut and could go a long way to providing a solution for the current Iranian crisis. This will be infinitely more effective than sanctions, let alone warfare.”

Here I would have to disagree with with Professor Lehmann, the Western fixation with TP Ajax (the CIA/SIS operation to overthrow Mossadegh) misses the point. An apology for this one incident would satisfy the malcontents but it would do little to appease the overwhelming majority of Iranians or the current popular government.

Mossadegh appeals to Western liberals, he was a democratic, secular Iranian leader, who was deposed by the West or so the legend goes. The Iranian revolution, led to the political use of the phrase blow back. Western liberals, posing as experts on Iran, often suggest that had only the US and British not opposed Mossadegh, there would have been no Islamic revolution. However, the planners of TP Ajax knew better.

Mossadegh was not democratically elected, his popularity was his policy of nationalising Iranian oil, a policy that like the current Iranian nuclear energy policy has widespread popular support. Mossadegh as an individual had little support amongst the populous, he was largely unknown. In Iran in 1953, the BBC Persian World Service, was the only radio station that Iranian’s listened to, however Iranians placed no faith in the BBC. What Iranians learned of the news, they learned in the Mosque or the Chaikhaneh (teahouse). The real populist leader was Ayatullah Kashani.

Thus the aim of TP Ajax was to destroy the coalition of Ayatullah Kashani, Tudeh (the Iranian communists) and Dr Mossadegh. Ultimately it proved all too easy, having convinced Mossadegh that the Tudeh party and Ayatullah Kashani had turned against him, Mossadegh tried to impose himself as dictator and sought to make a deal on the oil. Upon seeing this, Ayatullah Kashani and Tudeh, decided that he had betrayed the country and turned against him. Iranians sided with Ayatullah Kashani not Mossadegh.

What Professor Lehmann fails to grasp is that apologies are of no consequence whilst certain realities are ignored. The US and Britain sponsored Shahist Iran in the full knowledge that it was a predominately Jewish tyranny that oppressed and persecuted the majority Muslim population; and that more Iranians died under that Zionist regime than Palestinians who have died during the Israeli Occuaption. Until this is publicly acknowledged by Britain and the US, apologies for a conspiracy over fifty years ago will appear fickle. This is what the Clinton administration also failed to understand.

Blair’s Delusional Megalomania

August 2, 2006 at 9:19 pm | Posted in Blair, Crusade, Hamas, Hezbullah, Islam | Leave a comment

If there was ever any doubt that for Blair the “War on Terror” is a euphemism for a Crusade against, he has dispelled it. Blair:

“we have to empower moderate, mainstream Islam to defeat reactionary Islam.”

A comment that is not dissimilar to Pope Urban II call for Christians:

“to destroy that vile race from the lands of our friends”.

Then of course the friends were Byzantine Christians and the vile race was Muslims. Just who Blair’s moderates are is unclear, but his reactionaries are Urban II vile race: Muslims.

Blair calls Hizbullah an example of “reactionary Islam”, he identifies mainstream Shia Islam and Sunni Islam as “reactionary”. He says:

“We posed a threat not to their activities simply: but to their values, to the roots of their existence.”

Yet even the Herald Tribune concedes that Arab street is behind Hizbullah. In fact, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and Hizbullah were even recently feted in Al-Azhar and the most influential Sunni Scholar:

“the chairman of the World Union of Moslem Clerics, Dr. Yusuf Kardawi issued a statement in which he called on Jihad in Lebanon and Palestine employing oneself, money, speech and writing; and condemned all methods of failure, frustration and criticism.”

The committee head of Jabhat al-Amal al-Islami, the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan, Mr. Ibrahim Al-Keelani said,

“I call on the Arab rulers as I call on the nations to be with the resistance and jihad and support Hizbullah and Hamas”.

Thus Blair’s defintion of Islamic extremism is in fact mainstream Islam. Blair is calling for the defeat of a religion of over 1.5 Billion; this surely has to be regarded as delusional megalomania.

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