War crimes and military gangsters

The world waited sixteen years for the Bosnian Serb General and military gangster  Ratko Mladic to be arrested. Without doubt the Serb authorities knew of his whereabouts for years but chose to remain silent and to some degree excused his genocidal massacres of Muslims.
But at least he was captured alive and will eventually be tried at the Hague.
Pakistan was accused of withholding knowledge of Osama Bin Laden's whereabouts but once found he was not given the benefit of a trial but was extrajudicialy  killed. The rule of law was not seen to have taken place. A dangerous precedent.
Both were responsible for murder and death on a great scale and their respective trial or assassination will not bring back the thousands who died or were maimed or whose presence on earth was denied.
Yet there are others who have killed more and hide behind their offices or uniforms that still have not been brought to justice.The International Criminal Court awaits them all.
In the west Tony Blair and George W Bush spring to mind.
In the Middle East Hosni Mubarak might escape the Hague tribunal by his failing health. King Hamad ibn Issa Al Khalifa of Bahrain and Zine El Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia by Saudi intervention. Ali Saleh Abdullah by an amnesty deal and Gaddafi most probably by a NATO bomb unless Jacob Zuma is able to negotiate an exit-exile strategy for him and his family. Omar Al Bashir of Sudan for the moment will escape due to Qatari intervention. However we have sen how fickle friends can be when you are no longer of use to them so no doubt those that survive old age or the assassins bullet may yet see the inside of  a courtroom.
Then we come to Palestine and the Goldstone report. Has the International community become so corrupt that it chose to ignore these war crimes just because Israel was involved?  Is this report now relegated to wipe our collective bottoms with? Has our humanity reached such depths of depravity that we allow the Children of Palestine to be ignored,or for that matter the Children of Syria to be continued to be massacred, some being tortured and flayed like young Hamza Al Khatteeb?
No doubt the universe has a way of correcting itself and Bashar Al Asaad and his bloodthirsty regime will be brought to task. Meanwhile his Uncle Rifaat is still swagging around the five star hotels of Europe casually boasting to those that care to listen about his role in the massacres in  Hama, Syria which claimed thirty eight thousand lives. Where is the ICC now?
A one rule approach is the only way to insure that these military gangsters know that the days of ethnic cleansing, genocide torture and repression are over.The carnage they have collectively wrought means they have to be brought to justice even when their expected conviction will not bring back the hundreds of thousands hurt, maimed, or killed in the slaughters there will be an emotional rejoicing in the knowledge that we are a people of laws.
Laws are what separate us from beasts let us not forget that. 

Armageddon and Hypocritical Diplomacy.

Rumours are abounding of a dangerous and ill conceived  secret Saudi Israeli deal being hatched for Saudi backing for a military option against Iran with America having negotiated the supply of armaments and weaponry including state of the art jet fighters and military bases in a sixty billion plus $US, this if verified ,brings the region ever closer to Armageddon .
As The Syrian regime plunges deeper into the chasms of brutality with the International Community remaining shamefully silent and Saudi Arabia pushing for a new Saudi ruled republic in southern Yemen it is astonishing to what degree America and Europe are willing to sacrifice their ideals for short term commercial pragmatism .
In Libya meanwhile Gaddafi is still ignoring the will of the International Community despite having finally lost the backing of Russia. The Cameron-Sarkozy visit to Benghazi supposedly to give backing to the transitional government will once again prove to be only a photo opportunity.
Whilst double standards and hypocritical approaches are applied to the desire for freedom and self determination then one can rule out any meaningful change in the region.
Israeli intransigence to finding a fair and equitable peace with the Palestinians will only add fuel to this fire.
Real freedom and peace must be universally applied. Hope has be able to triumph over adversity and commercialism otherwise our morality will be outflanked our perversions.

Look east .

The G8 wrapped up it's spring jamboree.The Presidents and prime ministers of Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States had met in the French resort of Deauville. The end result was another photo opportunity as they all congratulated themselves on what a good job they were doing.
The Good Doctor must be laughing in Damascus as he barely got a telling off for his continued brutality and talk of an exile strategy for Mad Mo and his psychotic family got an unimpressed Libyan response that the G8 was "an economic summit " and they were therefore " not concerned by its decisions".
With the usual rhetoric about democracy , freedom and the likes they cobbled together a paltry $forty billion as an incentive to democratize parts of the Middle East that are unimportant for them strategically but if that ever materializes no doubt it will be spent on goods from the donor countries and will not trickle down to the people whose aspirations they claim to be championing.
If that is the best the world has to offer in leadership then the decline of civilization as we know it is guaranteed.
Look east that is where the future is,the morally corrupt West is a lame duck.

The left hander

Seeing President Obama signing the visitors book at Westminster Abbey must have brought joy to those that believe in the American Dream.
Here we have the first black President brought up by his impoverished though hard working white family whilst his Kenyan father is obliterated from the history books. Against all odds he rises to the challenges before him and gets elected to the Worlds most powerful job.
Though he starts with enthusiasm and good intentions he soon realizes that is not how Washington works. 
Having lost control of both houses in the mid term elections he turns his attention to foreign policy where in principle he has a semblance of control.
For good measure he starts his own war in Libya but he can justify that and everybody knows you need your own war.
As events become more fluid he is told not to interfere in other areas where his allies interests are diametrically opposed to human rights and the rule of law.
So he gently  rebukes Syria, vaguely mentions Bahrain , ignores Saudi Arabia and whilst still brimming with hope makes the mistake of mentioning the Palestinian Israeli issue using  generally acknowledged parameters for peace.
The wrath of Netanyahu is unleashed before him as he is forced to back pedal to the all powerful AIPAC. Meanwhile his nemesis enjoys standing ovation after standing ovation as he plunges the area into guaranteed chaos with his clever forked tongue.
A foreign trip would make it all right there he is greeted like a superstar and no one mentions his humiliation. But then he has to sign the visitors book and guess what, he mentally goes back to a quieter time and writes May 2008 when the world really was his oyster.
In his clumsy left hand he scrawls his message.
Left hand? What in an Abbey that was built in the Middle Ages at a time they believed that a person writing with their left hand was possessed by the Devil.
How appropriate though I am sure that Netanyahu can be exorcised . Sinistra really. 

New middle east order

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's  President, called Barak Obama on the phone late one night. 
"I've had a remarkable dream, Mr. Obama" he said, "and it's something you should know about." 
"Well Mr. ,Ahmadinejad what was your dream all about?", queried the President. 
"I dreamed that the USA had gone through an enlightening reformation", he said, "and in front of every house was a huge banner." 
"That's intriguing, Mr. Ahmadinejad Tell me, what did it say on these banners?", asked Obama
"They all said the same thing: Allah is God, Allah is great", stated Mahmoud, as if he could taste victory. 
"It's quite odd that you should call me about a dream, as I had one the other night as well", said obama
"And what was your dream about, Mr Obama?
"I dreamed that Iran had gone through a reformation as well, and on every house was a flagpole." 
"So, what was on the flags?", asked the Iranian. 
"I have no idea", said Obama, "I can't read Hebrew."

The snake in the Garden of Eden had more morals

With Obama enjoying the full Monty on his State visit to the United Kingdom , talking about the "essential relationship" between the UK and the US and meeting the the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to make up for his obvious absence at the royal wedding , Netanyahu used the opportunity to humiliate the US President once again.
This time in his speech to both houses of the US congress where he was received with no less than twenty five standing ovations as he spewed his distorted message to a hungry audience that is reliant on AIPAC's ability to raise money for the upcoming elections.
It makes a mockery of the principles that the United States were founded upon as lie after lie was lapped up.
 As Netanyahu said, to loud applause (and with President Obama clearly in mind), peace cannot be imposed. It must be negotiated. And Israel does not have a negotiating partner, thus exposing what all have known that it is his government that has no desire for peace.
Peace is a process not an an event and even an emasculated Palestinian State is a no starter for him. As one analyst put it it the Palestinians would " only be in control of the hight of their buildings and the depths of their graves" not any real semblance of sovereignty .
Shame on all who clapped and all who allowed this repulsive man to spin his eloquent web of deceit. The snake in the Garden of Eden had more morals.

Advice to Obama.

With rock star status Obama's Irish visit was for him a much needed boost after the humiliating drubbing he received from Netanyahu in his own office.
Though he had to leave early due to volcanic ash heading over from Iceland he did have a pint of the black stuff before heading over to London.
He must have needed that as he back peddled in front of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee as he attempted to alleviate their concerns by saying that the the final Israeli Palestinian borders would differ from the 1967 lines because of " mutually agreed swaps" he had advocated.
He would be better served to try for the forty odd million American Irish votes as AIPAC are out to crucify him.
With nothing of great substance expected to arise from his European tour Obama will use this trip as a photo opportunity and try to deflect the critics over his handling of the obnoxious Israeli premier who is rapidly proving a burden to America, Israel and peace itself.
Let us hope fiscal realities will also play a part in getting the process moving. 
Enjoy Europe Mr President, don't gloat over the  extrajudicial killing of Bin Laden with the drubbing Netanyahu gave you and your hypocritical approach to the various aspects of the Arab desire for dignity and self determination you need to maintain a gravitas that has recently been lacking and with all their faults Europe respects the law.

A man of promises

As Obama arrives in Ireland ahead of his visit to the United Kingdom we are all left trying to digest the hypocrisy and the mediocrity of his major Middle East Spring speech.
Having been publicly rebuked by Netanyahu in his own office  over the Palestine Israel issue the rhetorical orator then grovels and back pedals in his speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee the most powerful of Israel's voice in America.
Though he was politely applauded it is obvious that this is a President that is not either willing or able to do anything of substance whilst still in electioneering mode.
The losers are the children of Palestine and Israel, of Bahrain and of Syria and let us not forget the children of America who have to live with a squandered moral compass.
Alas we thought he was a man of promise only to discover he is a man of promises. 

Obama's humiliation.

Benjamin Netanyahu publicly humiliates Barak Obama in his own office by rejecting the US Presidents efforts on a Palestinian Israeli peace based on 1967 border demarkations  thus confirming Arab fears that Obama is really not committed to putting pressure on Israel especially as US Presidential elections are not that far away.
It was quite sad to see a grinning President as he was scolded quite the contrast from when he was gloating over the extrajudicial killing of Osama Bin Laden.
With the same old faces that have failed over decades still advising the President it is no wonder that Netanyahu feels empowered. Dennis Ross being instrumental in orchestrating this humiliation  instead of serving Americas interests.
Time and regional dynamics have changed however and if Israel remains intransigent and continues to suppress Palestinian aspirations then not only are they doomed but American influence will become irrelevant as the region will evolve using a different formula.
The moral high ground is with the forces of peace however Israel's continued rejection of peace despite it being the only long term viable option may give a voice to extremism which would keep wounds festering and only add to the chaos.
America should use its cheque book diplomacy to force Israel to accept the new realities on the ground instead of being frightened by the political logrolling that Israel and it's lobbyists  command in both the Senate and House of Representatives.  

An orgy of rhetoric .

In an orgy of rhetoric Obama's speech on the Arab spring was generally disappointing to both his Arab partners and his Israeli constituency .
Yes he scolded the homicidal regime in Syria whilst still giving the Good Doctor a get out of jail free card.
Yes he talked about self determination yet subjected the Palestinians to a budget version of it.
Yes for the fist time he talked about the 1967 borders for an Israeli Palestinian solution though warned about a UN vote on a Palestinian state where then America has a legal responsibility to ensure its implementation . 
Whatever hold Netanyahu has over Obama it seems to work as simultaneously he announced the urgent building of more settlements thus publicly humiliating Obama's  historic efforts . It still astounds me that both the Israelis and Americans don't realize that their relationship is a burden on not only themselves but to the International community. With changing  regional dynamics intransigence and unequivocal support is no longer acceptable or workable.
The pittance that was offered to Tunisia and Egypt pales in comparison to the $60 billion deal that they are currently negotiating with the Saudis.
All in all I think an opportunity was missed and though certain messages were sent the vagueness of it all smells of weakness on a President that is electioneering  and will most probably win by default.
When fundamental principles are sacrificed for political  and commercial advantage then any moral high ground and the right to pontificate falls on fallow ground.
So the West can not complain about the outcome of change if they are so hypocritical  in their approach to the same desires of populations in the various countries that make up the Arabian Spring.
China where are you? 

Time and History

Bizarre weekend as ever with Lady Gaga, who normally looks like a chambermaid staying at the Abu Dhabi owned Lanesborough  hotel while the IMF chief and possible French presidential candidate Dominique Strauss-Kahn is taken off a plane to be charged with sexual assault and attempted rape following accusations by a New York hotel chambermaid.
Meanwhile in the Middle East the murders continue as despots and dictators attempt to cling on to power.
The israelis not to be outdone decide to kill a few Palestinians for old times sake and perhaps knowing that their intransigence has been their undoing in their last 63 years.
With Assad rumoured to be under house arrest and his wife in London the foundations of Syria look shakier than ever with fear no longer a factor the regime is on its way out.
Libya will shortly be liberated and unless reforms are quick the shackles or tyranny will fall elsewhere. Time and history is not on their side .

Maids Politicians and Me

 It emerges that Osama Bin Laden was shot in his underwear therefore confirming that it was an extrajudicial assassination as he could not have possibly been wearing a vest bomb despite the substantial pornographic collection that was also alleged to have been found . Meanwhile the IMF chief and possible French presidential candidate Dominique Strauss-Kahn is to be charged with sexual assault and attempted rape following accusations by a New York hotel maid, police say.
I remember the days that New York Chambermaids came with the room and governments did not discuss the perversions of the dead.

Headless chickens, war and robes

With the U.S Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell resigning over what I suspect is Israeli intransigence over the continued expansion of Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian Territory just days before Benjamin Netanyahu's visit to Washington may show at last to the world Israeli lack of resolve in finding a permanent solution to the Palestine issue.
 Fatah and Hamas having signed a unity accord last week has put the fox in the chicken coop with Netanyahu running around like a headless chicken as another barrier towards a Palestinian State falls. "You can not have peace with both Israel and Hamas" he warned.
The Israelis are now spreading rumours that Obama is actively courting the  Islamic brotherhood with the extrajudicial assassination of Osama Bin Laden being the fist step in eliminating radical Islam whilst supporting  the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood's Sura Council member Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh, who said he would run as an independent, for the Egyptian Presidency.
Meanwhile Suzanne Mubarak has supposedly suffered a heart attack whilst being interrogated for graft. Syria and Yemen should take note the longer you hang on the more likely you will be tried for your past crimes regardless of your age.
More deaths are being reported in Syria  and the Good Doctors cousin Rami Makhlouf was reported  as saying that Syria would go to war against Israel if the U.S and their allies did not back off from supporting the uprising. An unlikely scenario as the whole reason the Assad regime has survived is that it has been enjoying a cold peace with Israel.
Further proof that the regime is showing signs of weakness are the  rumours that the glamorous First lady Asma Al Assad has fled to London with her children while Hizbollah has decided to pull its heavy weaponry out of storage in Syrian military facilities as the suppression has become harder in the light of the dissemination of information and lack of fear the protesters are showing.
And me I think I have to get those robes flowing after all.

Kings and the dish-dash business

As Jordan and Morocco inch closer to becoming members of the Gulf Cooperation Council though neither are in the Arabian Gulf the benefits to them  are potentially  great.
In return for supplying security  they get access to cheep  oil and inward investments while belonging to a sort of Monarchs Club. Sort of the same criteria that was used to invite them to the Royal Wedding here in April.
The brutal Al Khalifa regime will be able to survive with perhaps the once all powerful prime minister there being sacrificed.Shameful really.
In Yemen a natural GCC partner Ali Saleh is still running circles around efforts to get him to resign. The longer he stays the worse off the region will be. Now if he had only made himself a King they might have asked him to stay.
Meanwhile in Syria rumours abound that the Good Doctors wife has done a runner with her three children and is now holed up in London. Let us hope she has done it for the right reasons namely she does not want her children to grow up knowing they will have to kill to stay stay in power. It won't be much longer now as the pillars of Assad's power begin to show signs of weakness.
In Libya the struggle continues against Mad Mo 's regime.
As for me I think I should get into the dish- dash business well with all these newly made Gulfies someone has to dress them in their flowing robes.

Wave goodbye while you can.

The world should hang its head in shame over the lack of action the International Community is taking over the massacres that have become commonplace in Syria. This lack of resolve,  a result of the policy of convenience namely to deal with the devil you know, is despicable.
In the age of tweets and blogs information can not be suppressed despite this evil regimes attempts to ban coverage of their brutality.
With it's regional neighbours silent over his heinous acts I am surprised that the Good Doctors wife can remain silent as more innocents are slaughtered. The London born Syrian should know better as her parents immigrated from Homs a city not far from Hama where her father in law and his brother massacred forty odd thousand citizens.
With an ill timed fluff piece in Vogue a few months ago fawning over her and declaring Syria the safest country in the Middle East it seems she has accepted being married into this homicidal family and the fact that her children will be forced to kill if this regime is to survive another generation.
Ah well Vogue  might have got it wrong and there is still time to wave goodbye while she can to this murderous life for the sake of her own children and that of Syria.

Friday bloody Friday

As Syria braces itself for new wave of protests Tanks were reported to have taken up positions in the urban centres of Homs, Rastan and Banias.Expect a bloody Friday after prayers.
The Good Doctor is has enjoyed the ways of murder and taken to them like a duck to water.
With little or muted response from the International Community at the atrocities that are being inflicted by him on a civilian population that have been suppressed for far too long, the Doctor no doubt feels embolden by the extrajudicial killing of Osama Bin Laden.
Well if the Americans can do it why can't he?
 The hypocrisy that has plagued dealings in the Middle East by the West has to come to an end. 
The legitimate demands and aspirations of the people of the Middle East will be met one way or the other and these decrepit dictatorships have shown they cannot react rapidly enough to conform to modern  norms of good governance .
Now with their evil villain dead who can these Dictators blame?  There is no Islamic bogeyman just a wish by a people to be free, and adherence to the rule of law is a good start for all of us.

Snuff Movies and perverts

When Jessica Dawn Lynch was rescued by US Special Operation Forces after her capture in Iraq we were inundated with film footage of her rescue, the first successful rescue of an American Prisoner of War since the second world war.
Big news at the time but the Pentagon spin subsequently was proven to be a fabricated and enhanced account of her capture and resulting rescue.
Ironically she was born in Palestine, though the one in West Virginia  not the Middle East.
Fast forward from March 2003 to May 2011  and another secret operation which was hailed as the most significant achievement in Obama's Presidency and footage of the extrajudicial execution of an unarmed Osama Bin Laden Americas most wanted terrorist is not being shown.
The bounce that Obama is experiencing in the polls due to his decisive decision may well evaporate when the significance of taking out Bin Laden outside the parameters of law sinks in and the operation to kill an unarmed man looks less heroic than the spin Washington is trying to put on a perverted President watching a man being executed in what effectively was a snuff movie.
God help us all if the Nation built on Law  continues to act outside it and a President is complicit in his lies.

Cinco de Mayo, the Arab psyche and the last whip maker .

 As Mexicans prepare to celebrate Cinco De Mayo, originally to commemorate their victory over French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862 it now more of a holiday to commemorate Mexican civic pride and heritage.
Civic pride is something that has been lacking until recently in the Middle East as fatigued populations capitulated to the whims of their dictators.The unlikely event of a poor Tunisian fruit vendor burning himself to death in December 2010 in protest at his treatment by police has changed all that with pro-democracy rebellions erupting across the Middle East. He reinstalled  civic pride in the Arab psyche.
Though lip service has been paid to this wave of enthusiasm which was about real aspirations and the struggle for human dignity the Western World has embraced this change in a hypocritical manner.
In Egypt the change up until now has been mainly cosmetic, and as bloodthirsty and homicidal the regime in Syria has proved to be Assad has barely got a slap on the wrist for his murderous ways.
With America leading the way in ignoring the rule of law in the extrajudicial killing of Bin Laden and Obama's gloating as he watched effectively a snuff movie of Bin Laden's execution it is no wonder regimes in the Gulf can ignore even the most basic principles of human rights.
Change is inevitable and it is up to the West to either embrace the aspirations and desire for freedom and dignity or lose another generation to extremism and violence.
It is no good being the last whip maker if buggies are extinct. 

The gloating President

More confusion surrounds the events leading to the execution of Osama Bin Laden as it emerges he was unarmed and was captured alive. Apart from the dangerous precedent this sets the way Obama gloated over this extrajudicial killing showed a dark side to this President who like the dictators that are plaguing the Middle East has gotten the taste for blood.
A year before elections he had hoped that this reckless act would save his pitiful presidency. Instead we have to brace ourselves for a series of reprisals making the world a less safer place and losing any moral high ground that the war on terror may have commanded.
The rule of law is paramount and by ignoring the very tenants of good governance we are all endangered.

Pandora's box.

Israel pauses to mark Holocaust Day and the Western world rejoices that Bin Laden is taken out with Obama declaring that justice was done. Even the President of Peru claims it was Pope John Paul's  second miracle.
What has happened here is a very dangerous precedent. If the rule of law is ignored then everyone becomes a legitimate target. The operation to get Bin Laden was designed to kill him not capture him and put him on trial, now that may be convenient for Obama who seems to be enjoying failure after failure and was gloating at the execution of an overspent zealot who had already become a footnote in history, however in doing so he has opened Pandora's box.
God save us from every nutter who will try to exact revenge for this extrajudicial killing.

Osama Bin laden and reform

Just about every woe to befall dictators around the world has been blamed on Osama Bin Laden and his network. We are repeatedly told that Al Qaeda is behind every every terrorist plot from  9/11 to the 1998 bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and the 2000 bombing of the warship USS Cole in Yemen.
In recent months He has been accused of being behind the Arab Spring by every one of the beleaguered  dictators.
"Justice has been done," Mr Obama said in a dramatic White House speech announcing the death of the elusive mastermind.
Cameron was quick to congratulate Obama, as were many leaders in European capitals.
Hailed as a major achievement it is strange that this former American vassal living in a small village could be such a bogyman .
After his body was recovered, supposedly to  help convince any doubters that Bin Laden is really dead, it was quickly buried at sea.

Now who are we all going to blame for our woes? Many dictators in the Middle East will be unhappy that this invisible nemesis has been taken out of the equation and they may have to actually reform or leave. If only ideas were as easy to kill.

The Lion tamer

As the death toll rises in Syria the United Nations  top human rights body has finally after a 26-9 vote "unequivocally condemns the use of lethal violence" by Syrian authorities against peaceful demonstrators paving the way for a full investigation by the United Nations and hopefully the International Criminal Court.
Assad, which means lion in Arabic is getting the taste for blood. He has to be made accountable for the crimes against humanity he is inflicting on the good people of Syria as well as those he committed on the good people of Lebanon.
With Gaddafi apparently loosing one son and three grandchildren in a NATO air strike he may finally feel the pain he has inflicted on others.
True to form was the Israeli knee-jerk reaction to the two Palestinian factions making up by suspending tax payments due to them. This continued intransigence is so puerile and short sighted and the Israeli government is so concerned  at the changing dynamics in the Middle East, and that America's adversaries may miscalculate U.S. intentions that it is privately urging Washington to make it clear that the U.S. would intervene in Saudi Arabia should the survival of that government be threatened.
The continued hypocritical approach taken by World Powers as how to deal with the legitimate desires and aspirations of the Arabs for freedom both economical and political, must surely be reexamined in the context of the new realities.
Human dignity and the value of the rule of law must take precedence over purely commercial considerations to ensure long term stability.
As the circus continues, where is that Lion Tamer?