Playing With Fire: The Salafist Option in the Middle East

April 7, 2012

tags: Salafists, Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism

Salafist bookshop in the Tunis medina, at what used to be called `Place des Israelites’…

by Ibrahim Kazerooni and Rob Prince

In March 2004 , one of us submitted an op-ed to Denver Post titled “Wahhabism is a threat to World Peace.” The article posited that it was of no wonder that Wahhabism, the official religion of Saudi Arabia, has become the philosophical guide for terrorist organizations like al-Qaeda and Taliban. It fits the terrorist mentality well. Its pseudo-philosophy dictates dogmatic, outward acts of worship and rigid intolerance to others; its opposition to any refinement of Islamic culture, philosophy, theology, and the arts freezes cultural innovation. Its austere and regressive world view, and with its inflexible doctrine sows intolerance, discord, sedition, violence and hatred in the Muslim world and elsewhere.

Still, we are not surprised that a piece like this never saw the light of day in the American mainstream media. It might be difficult to openly criticize Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians; It is even more difficult to challenge the Saudi  regime.

Initial Call for a Colorado Statewide Peace Conference to Oppose Attacking Iran

Dear Friends

The cry for an attack on Iran has reached unprecedented, near-hysterical proportions in certain well known quarters.

Like the period before the attack on Iraq, many of the same themes are at play with many of the same players trying to drive US to war again: creating or greatly exaggerating a threat; vilifying the country’s leadership to suggest that they are `crazy’ and capable of anything; the pliant media that swallow pro-war propaganda and spit it out as truth.

Far from preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons, an attack would justify their pursuit and will in all probability trigger a regional if not world war, in anticipation of which oil prices have spiked and threaten to a global recession if not worse.

Our elected representatives both in the Oval Office and in Congress  who succumb to this propaganda are complicit in dragging us once again down the path to death and destruction as they have in Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen and Somalia.

We must stop this madness

With this in mind, the Colorado Coalition Against Attacking Iran was formed recently with representatives from Boulder, Ft. Collins and the Denver Metro Area.

The Coalition is already active:

One of our first steps is to organize a conference on Saturday, May 12, at the First Unitarian Society of Denver Church (14th and Lafayette) in Denver from 9 am to 5 pm. The goal is to organize a Colorado statewide campaign to oppose attacking Iran and for re-orienting our country’s priorities toward rebuilding our fragmented and devastated communities. (Detailed program will follow)

We, the undersigned, long-time Colorado peace activists, endorse this conference and urge you to help build the conference and the campaign to stop yet another insane step toward the abyss. Please contact the Coalition to invite speakers to your area or organization to build the Conference and Campaign.

You can contact the coalition at:

https://sites.google.com/site/cocaati/

or contact:

Tom Mayer: Thomas.Mayer@Colorado.Edu

Ibrahim Kazerooni: mikazerooni@gmail.com

Rob Prince: robertjprince@comcast.net

Yours,

Ida Audeh

Clair Cafaro

Stuart Chase

Cheryl Distaso

Bill and Genie Durland

Nancy Fey

Ron Forthofer

Alan Gilbert

Nader Hashemi

Pat Hewett

Ibrahim Kazerooni

Bob Kinsey

Leslie Lomas

Tom Mayer

LeRoy Moore

Rob Prince

Michael Rabb

Tom Rauch

Ken and Mag Seaman

Cheryl Stevenson

Doug Vaughan

Ernesto Vigil

Evan Weissman

Dan Winters

Joseph Mitchener

Obama and Netanyahu: Horsetrading Iran For Palestine – Part One

tags: Barak Obama, Benjamin Netanyahu, Ehud Barak, Hormuz, Perisian Gulf

Mohammed Mossadegh, Iranian prime minister who nationalized Iranian oil and was overthrown by C.I.A/MI5 orchestrated coup d’etat in 1953

(Note: this article appeared at Foreign Policy In Focus : for Part Two of the series, click here)

Part One:

By Ibrahim Kazerooni and Rob Prince.

In politics, a `gaffe’ is a politically inconvenient truth. The `first’ George Bush committed a gaffe when he said that the idea that cutting taxes would increase government revenue was “voodoo economics”. Similarly, it was a gaffe when Barack Obama said that insecure right-wingers “cling” to religion and guns.

Obama and Netanyahu: Horsetrading Iran For Palestine- Part Two

 

Protest against the Reagan military build up

Links:

Obama and Netanyahu: Horsetrading Iran For Palestine – Part One

_______________________

Part Two

By Ibrahim Kazerooni and Rob Prince.

1.  Thirty years ago, the Reagan Administration went on a crash program to increase the U.S. military budget, cut social programs, escalate the nuclear arms race to a degree unprecedented during the Cold War (1945-1989) and revive U.S. interventionalism in the Third World.

Looking back, it’s not hard to discern the Reagan Strategy:

The Israeli Pickle: Iran

A media leak oddly revealed few days ago a conversation between Obama and French President Nicolas Sarkozy in which the latter tells the former that he, Sarkozy is `fed up’ with Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu  and `considers him a liar’. This comes some six weeks after German Chancellor Angela Merkel `read Netanyahu the riot act’ over the Israeli decision to build 1000 new homes in the West Bank settlement of Gilo.

Netanyahu is not used to being kicked around that way, at least not by Israel’s European allies. Are Sarkozy and Merkel merely saying more or less out loud what Obama dares not say? Are they `giving Netanyahu a message’ and if so, what? Merkel was annoyed (the word `infuriated’ was circulated in the media) by Netanyahu’s settlement announcement, Sarkozy’s outburst most probably has to do with something else – French (and perhaps U.S.) frustration with the Israeli Prime Minister over a possible Israeli military strike against Iran. It could be that Sarkozy’s comment was a simple warning: Don’t Do It; Don’t Attack Iran.

What is clear is that Israel is in a pickle over Iran. It is considering its options, one of which, once again, is to attack the Islamic Republic to destroy its nuclear program. At least that is the commonly used pretext.

Resurrecting the Iranian Threat…. (old wine in a new bottle)

U.S. military bases surrounding Iran…

Any story we are told has four parts, the main character, the plot, the setting and the ending, and one might add here, who is making it up. It is only through analysis of these components that the reader will decide whether the story is pure fiction, concocted for political capital or not. The story of alleged attempt on the life of Saudi ambassador in Washington is a claim or a story that need to be flushed out.

We are being told that the government in Tehran would use an American citizen of Iranian descent, a second hand car dealer from Corpus Christi, Texas, who has criminal records and been accused of forging checks, well known in his town for being eccentric to say the least, to hatch a scheme with a Mexican drug cartel to kill the Saudi ambassador to the United States, involving less than two million dollars. A second alleged conspirator who is in Iran, have not been indicted yet.

Israel’s illicit stockpile of nuclear weapons is the real threat to Middle East peace (Part 3)

In the final part of this three part series on Israeli nuclear threat to peace, I intend to look at the claim made by Zionist and other Israeli supporters calling for what one may call “Israeli Exceptionalism.” The essence of their argument is based on the premiss that Israel has never threatened any other country and does not intend to do so, and although it has not signed the Nonproliferation treaty, it has never violated the charter and has kept its nuclear arsenal for self defense. Hence we should not liken Israel’s nuclear policy with other regimes in the Middle East.