Obama avoids great opportunity to contrast Ahmadinejad with his predecessor

Yesterday, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave a speech at the UN saying, among other things, that "The majority of the American people as well as other nations and politicians agree" that "some segments within the U.S. government orchestrated the attack to reverse the declining American economy and its grips on the Middle East in order also to save the Zionist regime."

Then today, Barack Obama was interviewed by Bakman Kalbassi of the BBC's Persian service, and the first question was about his reaction to the Ahmadinejad's speech. Obama:

For him to make a statement like that was inexcusable. And it stands in contrast with the response of the Iranian people when 9/11 happened.

When there were candlelit vigils and I think a natural sense of shared humanity and sympathy was expressed within Iran.

And it just shows once again sort of the the difference between how the Iranian leadership and this regime operates and how I think the vast majority of the Iranian people who are respectful and thoughtful think about these issues.

Nice of him to show his appreciation for "the response of the Iranian people when 9/11 happened", and to point out the contrast with "the Iranian leadership and this regime".

Remember how the Iranian leadership responded when 9/11 happened?
On that day, the New York Times reported:

In Tehran, the Iranian capital, President Mohammad Khatami condemned the attack, expressing "deep sorrow and sympathy" with the victims and all Americans.

"Terrorism is denounced," he said, "and the international community must identify it and take fundamental steps for rooting it out."

Then on September 20, 2001, the Times reported:

Last week, for the first time since the 1979 Islamic revolution, there were no chants of "death to America" at weekly Friday prayers around the country, which are controlled by the conservatives.

Ayatollah Khamenei was quoted:

"Islam condemns the massacre of defenseless people, whether Muslim or Christian or others, anywhere and by any means"

And in the same article:

[The United States has sent Iran a message responding to what officials viewed as Tehran's "positive statements" since last week's attacks, American officials quoted by Reuters news agency said.]

Israeli court agrees: it wouldn't be rape if he had been Jewish

Just too many possibilities here.

Protecting Israelis' existence from Noam Chomsky

The New York Times article about Chomsky's being refused entry to the Israeli-occupied West Bank last weekend quotes an opposition member of the Knesset who supports the decision:

"This is a decision of principle between the democratic ideal -- and we all want freedom of speech and movement -- and the need to protect our existence," said Otniel Schneller, of the centrist Kadima party, on Israel Radio. "Let's say he came to lecture at Birzeit. What would he say? That Israel kills Arabs, that Israel is an apartheid state?"

In another three months, Mr. Schneller went on, some Israeli would be standing over her son's grave, the victim of incitement "in the name of free speech." People like Professor Chomsky, he added, do not have to be granted permission to enter.

Mr. Schneller makes a good point that we need to remember: the only reason why people at Birzeit in Ramallah might think that "Israel kills Arabs, that Israel is an apartheid state" is that outside agitators like Chomsky tell them so. Chomsky hasn't been to Israel or its occupied territories since 1997, but his audience members live there year-round. It's not their everyday experience that makes them think Israel kills Arabs or that Israel is an apartheid state; it's only their irrational hatred of Israel that makes them suggestible to incitement.

KQED's Michael Krasny grills Ambassador Michael Oren on the occupation

Michael Oren, who was born and raised in the United States and is now (after switching his citizenship) Israeli ambassador to the United States, was a guest yesterday morning on KQED's Forum, a radio call-in show hosted by Michael Krasny in San Francisco. The host asked his guest a tough question about the occupation (at time 15:24):

Krasny: Does your, uh, government, your present government, um, pretty much bridle at the word "occupation"? What do you say, in other words, about the word "occupation" when that's thrown at you?

Oren: Well, it um, it creates a certain problem. The state of Israel is a Jewish state. And the lands which the world say we occupy are in fact our ancient Biblical homelands. If you look in the Bible, there's no Haifa. If you look in the Bible, there is a Tel Aviv, but it's not, it's in Babylonia. Uh, the lands of the Bible are, are Jericho and Bethlehem, and, and, and, Beth El, and, uh, and these are the lands which you said are occupied. These are our tribal lands. It's very difficult for people to occupy its only, its own tribal land. But we recognize that, uh, we aren't the only people here. There's another people, there are the Palestinian people, and as painful and difficult it is, we know that we're going to have to, if we're ever to reach peace, we're going to have to, uh, divide our sacred land, our only homeland in the world, with another people. And that is no small sacrifice. I understand that it's a huge sacrifice for the Palestinians as well, because they understood that this is their homeland. There's really no way around this, Michael, we're going to have to learn to, to live together, to, uh, to divide this homeland and live side by side with one another.

Krasny: Well, some suggest that maybe things will work out for the better now that Iran has, uh, poised itself as such a serious adversary to Israel, because you come in with more common cause with Egypt and Saudi Arabia and the Arab states who are afraid of Iran, and that there can also be, as you indicated, economic interests, particularly with tourist trade. We had a guest on recently who said Israel and the Palestinians can band together in their own economic enhancement by really appealing to the tourist trade and working toward common economic purposes.

I don't know, maybe Krasny's initial question here was a little too bluntly worded and disrespectful to his guest. But he recovered somewhat in the follow-up. We should be relieved that he didn't quote from, say, a judgment of the Israeli Supreme Court: "Background: 1. Since 1967, Israel has been holding the areas of Judea and Samaria [hereinafter - the area] in belligerent occupation."

Tony Blair comments in Buffalo on international law, Gaza, and Goldstone: full transcript

Mondoweiss linked to a YouTube video of Tony Blair's response to a question by a student at the University of Buffalo last week. Apparently the questioner, Nicolas Kabat, got permission to speak at the microphone because he'd said he was going to ask about something else. Adam Horowitz and Helena Cobban have posted their reactions to Blair's "nonsense" (Cobban), but here is a transcript of just what was said.

Questioner:

A UN investigation found that Israel and Hamas committed war crimes and crimes against humanity in the recent Gaza conflict. Yet, the U.S. and Israel insist that the report was biased, and proceeding with the committee's recommendations would be harmful to the peace process. Why is international law not applied in this case, when the evidence exists, and please explain as Quartet envoy why the application of international law would be harmful to the overall peace process, and furthermore, why the siege on Gaza is not similarly demeed harmful to the peace process. Thank you.

Blair:

Well, of course international law should be applied. But you have given one view, but the trouble is there's another view. And so this is a matter of the most deep and profound contention between Israel and the Palestinians. And I'll tell you what I think very honestly, and I've been to Gaza twice within the last period, and it's a tragedy because the people there are hemmed in, it's very difficult for them, there is a blockade on Gaza. But it is also true, one of the things you learn about conflicts like this, and I learned this in Northern Ireland, is that you never solve these conflicts by taking one view and forgetting about the other. It is also true that in 2004-2005, Israel withdrew from Gaza. And Israel took their settlers with them, and rocket attacks came out of Gaza, on Israeli towns. Now, those rocket attacks have got to stop, as well. The Israeli soldier who is kidnapped for the moment, Gilad Shalit, should be released. You know, yes it's true, it's true that I have [inaudible] many times that our policy with respect to Gaza should be different. But so should the Hamas policy towards Israel be different, too. And therefore my view of this is very simple, you know, and I, this is sort of a difficult thing to say, don't misunderstand what I'm saying, because I believe that international law should apply to these situations, yes I do, but it's not in the end going to be resolved by that, by a debate over a report that is hotly supported on one side and hotly and deeply contested on the other. It's going to be resolved when we understand what the basic issue is. Israel needs security. The Palestinians need an independent state with the Israeli occupation lifted. The only way in my view we will get this is if we build from the bottom up as well as negotiate from the top down. What do I mean by that? I mean that we build the institutions of Palestinian statehood, as we're doing in the West Bank, as part of my role as Quartet envoy, building their economy, building their institutions of government, their security forces. Just to tell you some good news out of Israel and Palestine, [inaudible] there's a lot of bad news. When I first became the envoy, I couldn't have gone to a city like Jenin or Nablus on the West Bank. Today I go to Jenin and Nablus. We opened a hotel in Nablus just the other day. I go to places like Qalqilya. I go to Hebron, I go to Jericho, Ramallah obviously. In other words, I can go around the West Bank. And that's because the Palestinians, with European, American, and other support, are actually providing security; as a result of that, some of the major checkpoints are now open; and the Palestinians have a greater control over their territory. Now that's what we've got to build on, in my view. This dispute will only be resolved if everyone agrees to end violence, everyone agrees to a political negotiation, everyone agrees that the outcome of that negotiation is two states living side by side in peace, and the international community shows the will and commitment to deliver it. And believe me, I mean I've seen the situation in Gaza. It is horrific. But changing it is not a responsibility for Israel alone. It's a responsibility also for those who run Gaza, and it's a responsibility for us in the international community. I believe that you will think this strange, I actually believe it is possible to resolve this dispute, but it's only possible to resolve it on the basis that we understand the pain of either side, get them to understand that they are not alone in their pain, and ensure we have a just and fair [inaudible] solution that allows each, Israelis and Palestinians, their own state, to live together in peace.

Where to start?

• Avoiding any judgment of the content of the Goldstone Commission report, Blair says it is "hotly supported on one side and hotly and deeply contested on the other." But Blair is speaking four days after the Palestinian Authority decided not to bring up the issue with the UN Human Rights Council, so which side is he saying the PA is on? Or does he not know or care?
  
• Using the word "kidnapped" (rather than "captured") to describe the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit would suggest that this was the work of some criminal gang acting in defiance of legitimate authority. So then what is the legitimate authority here? It can't be the Israel Defense Forces, because Blair reminds us that "in 2004-2005, Israel withdrew from Gaza." Shalit was a soldier of a hostile army who was captured on Israel's border with Gaza. And of course, as others have pointed out, Israel holds many thousands of Palestinians it has captured (or kidnapped), but Blair doesn't mention any of them.
  
• "When I first became the envoy, I couldn't have gone to a city like Jenin or Nablus on the West Bank." Mentioning this is just weird, because Israel, and only Israel, would have been preventing him from going there. He goes on to say that now, "I can go around the West Bank ... because the Palestinians, with European, American, and other support, are actually providing security; as a result of that, some of the major checkpoints are now open." These Palestinians are providing security for Israelis, not for Palestinians.
  
• Tony Blair may have been prevented from going to some West Bank cities when he was appointed Quartet envoy two years ago, but just last December, the UN-appointed envoy Richard Falk, the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in the Palestinian Territories, was expelled on arrival by Israel and prevented from even setting foot into the Palestinian Territories to do his job. By coincidence, the day before Blair's appearance in Buffalo, Falk gave a lecture at the Palestine Center in Washington on "Imagining Israel-Palestine Peace: Why International Law Matters." It is worth hearing or reading for a dose of sanity after Blair's comments.
  

George Galloway refused entry to Canada

Citizenship and Immigration Canada has deemed George Galloway to be "inadmissible on security grounds."

I'm struck by some of the bad reporting here in The Globe and Mail, which is generally considered to be Canada's newspaper of record. The article calls Galloway a "Scottish MP". It's true that he's of Scottish origin, but he is a member of the British (not Scottish) parliament, and he represents a constituency in London, England. The article also says Galloway is "considered a renegade in Britain's Labour party". Well, yeah, that's why he was expelled from the Labour party. That was before he won the most recent election to Parliament as a member of the RESPECT party, defeating a Labour incumbent. Don't reporters even have time to look at Wikipedia?

The article quotes Bernie Farber, CEO of the Canadian Jewish Congress, as saying that "The government's decision was the right one from legal, security and moral viewpoints." Yet the same day, the same Mr. Farber has an op-ed in the National Post, which is the Globe and Mail's rival to the title of Canada's national newspaper, where he writes:

George Galloway has every right to speak here in Canada, no matter how offensive most Canadians would find his views and actions. But he does not have the right to raise funds for terrorist causes while on our shores. He does not have the right to promote terrorism or incite hatred.

Farber's piece is worth reading because in some places it looks like a parody:

Many Canadians will be shocked at the sort of organizations that are providing support for this speaking tour. The Toronto Women's Bookstore, which several years ago refused to distribute pins calling for an end to suicide bombings in Israel while concomitantly selling buttons that some believed supported Palestinian terrorism, is one backer.

Apparently, many Canadians are easily shocked. But Farber's strongest point is this:

This MP has not only offered moral support to terrorists, but when visiting Gaza during the latest conflict with Israel, he spoke proudly of providing financial assistance to internationally recognized terror groups. He told the Web site Islam Online, "I have offered [Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh] corporeal and financial support. I know that what we have offered is not enough, but it is highly symbolic."

Naturally those brackets arouse suspicion. Here is a longer quote from Galloway's interview in Islam Online:

My visit has more than one reason. ... The third and the main one is to stand beside the legal Palestinian prime minister, Ismail Haniya. The entire world knows that he was elected, apparently, democratically. I have offered him corporeal and financial support. I know that what we have offered is not enough, but it is highly symbolic.

Farber would be more persuasive if he addressed Galloway's point that Ismail Haniya is the legal, democratically elected Palestinian prime minister, because everybody knows that, right? Well, OK, maybe not.

As for the government's reason for excluding Galloway, the Globe and Mail article tells us:

Mr. Kenney's spokesman, Alykhan Velshi, called the decision to bar Galloway a "matter of law" taken by border officials in accordance with Section 34(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which bans those who provide material support for terrorist groups.

Section 34(1) of Canada's Immigration and Refugee Protection Act states:

A permanent resident or a foreign national is inadmissible on security grounds for
(a) engaging in an act of espionage or an act of subversion against a democratic government, institution or process as they are understood in Canada;
(b) engaging in or instigating the subversion by force of any government;
(c) engaging in terrorism;
(d) being a danger to the security of Canada;
(e) engaging in acts of violence that would or might endanger the lives or safety of persons in Canada; or
(f) being a member of an organization that there are reasonable grounds to believe engages, has engaged or will engage in acts referred to in paragraph (a), (b) or (c).

Didn't I hear something about a foreign national who was allowed entry into Canada this week despite clearly falling under the category of (b) above, and didn't I hear that he even admitted something about that fact publicly during his visit?

Zoroastrian new year

John McCain at the Alfred E. Smith charity dinner in New York on October 16, 2008:

"Finally, when Larry King asked President Clinton a couple weeks ago what was the delay and why wasn't he out there on the trail for Barack, Bill said his hands were tied until the end of the Jewish high holidays.

"Now, you've got to admire that ecumenical spirit. I just know Bill would like to be out there now, stumping for Barack until the last hour of the last day. Unfortunately, he is constrained by his respect for any voters who might be observing the Zoroastrian new year."

As the punchline of a joke, "Zoroastrian new year" brought some of the biggest laughs in McCain's whole comedy routine that night, in an audience of rich and powerful people including Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. I don't know of any pundits who noticed the gaffe, aside from one anonymous commenter on Free Republic. Even the Federation of Zoroastrian Associations of North America didn't bother to issue a press release. But now President Obama has chosen to observe the actual Zoroastrian new year by giving a video message to the Iranian people. The interesting thing about the White House web page about the speech is that it actually highlights what is by far the least conciliatory portion:

"You, too, have a choice. The United States wants the Islamic Republic of Iran to take its rightful place in the community of nations. You have that right -- but it comes with real responsibilities, and that place cannot be reached through terror or arms, but rather through peaceful actions that demonstrate the true greatness of the Iranian people and civilization. And the measure of that greatness is not the capacity to destroy, it is your demonstrated ability to build and create."

Switching the names of the countries, President Ahmadinejad could easily use those exact same words in a message to the people of the United States, but how would such a message be received by Americans? This must have been intended as boilerplate for domestic consumption. After all, there are probably more Americans who are concerned that Obama might be too conciliatory with Iran, rather than not conciliatory enough.

Meanwhile, President Shimon Peres of Israel, widely acknowledged as the father of his country's nuclear weapons program, has also chosen this day to address the Iranian people, telling them that their leaders should "stop spending their days dealing with bombs and uranium — is this in the name of God?"