Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has a unique way of making it hard to agree with him.The Iranian president graced the UN stage today and raised several valid areas of injustice: the Western imbalance towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the disproportionate death-toll between 9/11 and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. And with US President Barack Obama highlighting progress in these theaters amid a flood of doubt, then admonishing the Palestinians while keeping silent on Israel’s behavior, Ahmadinejad had the West aligned in his sights.
Then, somewhere between defending Iran’s nuclear program, Ahmadinejad accused elements in the US government of orchestrating 9/11 to save “the Zionist regime.” US, EU, and allied officials staged a premeditated walkout, and the media predictably devolved into Ahmadinejad’s rant.
US officials correctly observed that his time would have been better spent addressing and expressing the will and needs of the Iranian people to the international community. Fortunately for them Ahmadinejad didn’t address Palestine and Afghanistan with any real design either. He had ample material from next door as Afghanistan’s parliamentary election steams toward a messy outcome and US generals evaporate Obama’s July 2011 deadline. He could have simply read the latest Associated Press report indicating that Israeli settlement construction hasn't been “significantly reduced,” as Obama and Israeli officials claim.
Instead Ahmadinejad skewered his own red herring, distracting his audience rather than forcing them to confront the ugly reality that America still faces in the Middle East. His 9/11 conspiracy even drowned out what could have been a sensible argument that, as Ahmadinejad alluded to, many Americans and non-Americans find the entirety of 9/11 suspicious.
“The majority of the American people as well as other nations and politicians,” don’t see 9/11 as a Zionist plot, as Ahmadinejad apparently believes. On the other hand, given its exploitation in justifying Afghanistan, Iraq, and a seemingly endless “Global War on Terror,” many do believe 9/11 has sanctioned potentially illegal wars and operations. Afterward PJ Crowley, a spokesman for the US State Department, denounced Ahmadinejad’s speech as "totally outrageous."
"[Those killed in the attacks] were people of all faiths, all nationalities. They were killed by 19 people, a plot perpetrated by al-Qaeda," he said. "We know who did it and they have admitted who did it. This idea that nine years later there is still some debate about who did it and why is outrageous."
But the main conspiracies don’t revolve around who did it - rather who in Washington allowed it to happen and why. Ahmadinejad should have concentrated his energy here to avoid a US/EU walkout while accurately framing the conspiracy. Ask why years of intelligence were ignored or suppressed in the run-up to 9/11, both on al-Qaeda in general and its plotters. Raise the very awkward question of why US military jets, which normally deploy with unshakable swiftness, were nowhere to be found during the events of 9/11. Explain how al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden had become a burden for the Taliban, who attempted to unload him in the moments before and after 9/11.
And forget Israel for once. Obama had dealt more damage with his one-sided address to the UN than Ahmadinejad is capable of.
The power of rhetoric proved itself today. Wrapped in an optimistic glow and once again rejecting his favorite punching bags - skeptics and cynics - Obama declared the time ripe for peace between Israelis and Palestinians. That many are skeptical of Washington’s mediation, not just Israeli or Palestinian leadership, went unmentioned in the US media, as did Obama’s imposed, one-year deadline for his own political agenda.
He also expended one line on Iraq, which still lacks a government, and another on Afghanistan, where US forces are, “pursuing a strategy to break the Taliban’s momentum and build the capacity of Afghanistan’s government and security forces.” And as we will get to shortly, Obama "accidentally" left the word Kashmir while championing for human rights.
Ahmadinejad, conversely, scarred reality with his own distortions and turned himself into an international mockery. Truth can be hidden by beauty and grime. A typical day at the UN though - more bark than bite.
PJ Crowley is "totally outrageous."
ReplyDeleteOur reaction to 9/11 was "totally outrageous."
Our occupation of Iraq, and Afghanistan is "totally outrageous."
Our green lights for Israel are "totally outrageous."
The lip service that our government gives us is "totally outrageous."
The continuation of endless wars without borders is "totally outrageous."
I believe Ahmadinejad was playing to his base when he made the conspiracy comments. But I totally agree they got him no where.
He missed, and botched a great opportunity.
(Jpeg available from Amazon.com, Borders.com & Barnesandnoble.com)
ReplyDeleteNEW YORK - THE PALESTINE CONSPIRACY, a genre spy-thriller by Robert Spirko, was fourth on the best-seller list at Atlasbooks, Inc., a national book distributor, and at Amazon.com.
“Everyone tells me there will never be peace in the Middle East, but I tell them they are wrong. Israel and Egypt have had a peace treaty for 30 years. Jordan and Israel signed a peace agreement 15 years ago. A Palestinian State can be created. It can be done and it will be done,” Spirko reiterates. “Thirty years of peace is better than 30 years of war.”
“We’re not talking about a serpent-tongued, false prophet who will negotiate this peace between Israel and the Islamists, it will be done by a U.S. president and those parties involved in the peace process who will finally achieve it through hard work, tough compromises, and by making specific decisions fair to both sides to agree to end the violence once-and-for-all – by those leaders who want a future for their children,” Spirko says.
“Besides, Israel wants a Palestinian state now, too.”
Spirko's key ideas at the 2000 Camp David Peace Talks were to make Jerusalem the simultaneous capital of both Israel and a Palestinian state with congruent borders - one precisely overlapping the other - using two maps - one for the Palestinian state and one for Israel. The city would become an international, undivided open city for people of all religions to visit and the municipality would be governed by a city council of equal Palestinians and Jews with God, Allah or Jehovah as the central sovereign. The Knesset and Palestinian authority would then govern their respective states from that dual capital. In effect, Jerusalem would become a governing district much like the District of Columbia in Washington, D. C. This idea won traction at the 2000 Camp David Peace Talks and was virtually agreed upon, but where the talks broke down and failed was when both sides capitulated to pressures from their own political factions over right of return and reparations. Mr. Spirko has an idea to solve that problem also.
Spirko states, "The chief threat in the region I see right now is the threat to Saudi Arabia by Iran and Al Qaeda. If Al Qaeda were to overthrow the present royal family in Saudi Arabia or attack the Strait of Hormuz, cutting off the oil supply to western nations including Japan and China, it would bring down entire world economies."
“Another looming concern is Iran which wants to develop nuclear weapons to couple with their Shahab 4, 5 & 6 missiles on the drawing boards which have a range to hit London, Israel, all of Europe, southern Russia and the United States. Also, the Iranian government has said it initially had 300 centrifuges to enrich uranium to weapons grade material. They have increased that to 3,000. They will soon increase that again to 10,000 centrifuges,” Spirko says. “They have the additional capacity to add another 20,000 centrifuges in mass production techniques that will enable them to produce at least seven nuclear bombs in about a year. Another point Spirko makes on the Mideast is that, “It is time for the Israelis and Palestinians to return to the Peace Talks, resume where they left off and "freeze in place" the already-agreed-upon negotiating points,” Spirko says.
"And, it's all related to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict which I said back in 1987 was the crux of my book. It always has been, and always will be until it's settled,” Spirko says. “That linkage is exactly what Osama Bin Laden stated in a taped message aired the weekend before the election in November of 2004, and again just recently. Whether you believe him or not is beside the point. That's what's he told us, and we'd better take that into account."