Editorial

By Lawrence Davidson

Two Democratic Elections

There have now been two democratic elections in the Middle East as a consequence of the Arab Spring. One was in Tunisia in October 2011, and the recent staggered elections of December 2011-January 2012 for a lower house of parliament in Egypt.

Read more: Democratic Elections in the Middle East: Why the Islamists Win

By Richard Falk

Desirable, Necessary, and Impossible

Finally, there is some argumentation in the West supportive of a nuclear free zone for the Middle East. Such thinking is still treated as politically marginal, and hardly audible above the beat of the war drums. It also tends to be defensively and pragmatically phrased as in the NY Times article by Shibley Telhami and Steven Kull (I.15..2012) with full disclosure title, “Preventing a Nuclear Iran.” The article makes a prudential argument against attacking Iran based on prospects of a damaging Iranian retaliation and the inability of an attack to destroy Iran’s nuclear program at an acceptable cost. The most that could be achieved for would be a short delay in Iran’s acquisition of weaponry, and maybe not even that. An attack seems likely to create irresistible pressure in Iran to everything possible to obtain a nuclear option with a renewed sense of urgency.

Read more: Nuclear Free Middle East

By Ludwig Watzal

American and Israeli politicians and their neoconservative extremist friends in Western Europe and the United States do their very best to provoke the Iranian leadership to react irrationally against the different terrorist attacks by their intelligence services. So far, the Iranian regime has kept cool. But Western media propaganda runs at full speed to rally the public behind the flag of war. Especially in the U. S., it seems easy to manipulate the minds of the benighted population as was the case in relation to Iraq. 

Read more: Iranian 'nuclear threat' and Israeli political realism

By Richard Falk

The public discussion in the West addressing Iran’s nuclear program has mainly relied on threat diplomacy, articulated most clearly by Israeli officials, but enjoying the strong direct and indirect backing of Washington and leading Gulf states.  Israel has also engaged in covert warfare against Iran in recent years, somewhat supported by the United States, that has inflicted violent deaths on civilians in Iran. Many members of the UN Security Council support escalating sanctions against Iran, and have not blinked when Tel Aviv and Washington talk menacingly about leaving all options on the table, which is ‘diplospeak’ for their readiness to launch a military attack. At last, some signs of sanity are beginning to emerge to slow the march over the cliff.

Read more: Stop Warmongering in the Middle East

By Gideon Polya

Zionists defamation of anti-racist Jews

Many Zionists falsely defames anti-racist Jews critical of Apartheid Israel as “anti-Semitic”. A core moral message from the WW2 Jewish Holocaust is “never again to anyone”. Accordingly, decent, anti-racist, humanitarian Jews are morally obliged speak out against the Palestinian Genocide and the racist abuses of Apartheid Israel but this typically elicits false defamation by pro-Zionists as exampled below. All decent folk must defend anti-racist Jews from false defamation by pro-Zionists.

Read more: Zionists attack ‘The Promise’