PALESTINE — The U.S.VETO : A Declaration of WAR

The United States is about to oppose its veto to the application of Palestine for full membership of the U.N. This veto represents a resounding declaration of war not only to the one and a half billion Muslims who want justice done to Palestinians, but also to those who aspire for self determination and liberation from oppression and captivity.
The George W. Bush administration granted Israel $10 billion for building houses in the Occupied Territories ; Barack Obama gave it $300 million to shore up its defences against Palestinian home made rockets and $3 billion for the acquisition of 20 F35, the most advanced fighter aircraft in the world, an aircraft that even the U.S. Air Force cannot afford, according to an official statement.
It is the avowed policy of the U.S. to provide Israel with an unassailable military superiority over its neighbours in the Middle East. It has also used chequebook diplomacy to neutralise Egypt and Jordan, while it can count on other Arab countries in the region to be quiescent.
The U.S. is not therefore an honest broker to reconcile Israel with Palestine. It has shown its hand and taken side unmistakably with the Zionists. Under Obama there was hope a new era would dawn for the Palestinians, especially following his speech in Egypt, earlier in his administration and his address to Congress. But Obama will be known for being long on rhetoric and short on delivery. He promised to shut down Guantanamo, to resolve the Israel Palestine conflict, to introduce a Medicare programme to benefit the poor, to redress the U.S. economy and create jobs. He has failed on all counts. That is why he will be, like Jimmy Carter, a one term wonder who will end up in the colourless role of an international mediator, given his remarkable gift of the gab.
Peace Talks ? What Peace Talks ?
Negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis have always foundered on the intransigence, arrogance and obdurate superiority complex of the Zionists. The U.S. knows this fully well. What purpose will it serve to exhort Palestinians to go back to the negotiating table for peace talks ? Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister, refused Obama the extension of two months of the moratorium on the building of new housing colonies in the West Bank. While Joe Biden was on an official visit to Israel, the Israeli government announced new housing projects in the occupied lands.
Palestinian home made devices have caused barely a score of Israeli casualties whereas Israel’s disproportionate retaliation has killed thousands of Palestinians. The Palestinians hold one Israeli soldier prisoner, but there are over 10,000 Palestinians prisoners in Israeli jails. Who are then the “terrorists” ?
The simple truth is that Israel has driven the Palestinian into a gutter and expects them to remain there, resigned to their fate, beyond human compassion. Aggression, assassination, blockade, separation, wall of infamy, destruction of houses, schools and hospitals, passing Israel exports for Palestinian goods to benefit from customs exemption : the catalogue of miseries of the Palestinian people is endless.
Whether the U.S. likes it or not, Hamas is a democratically elected government, but for the U.S. (slavishly followed by the European Union) to label it a “terrorist” organisation is a facile and shameful ploy to deny it legitimacy and justify the hunting down of its members. Hamas, however, is a product of Israeli intransigence and overkill – and the U.S. strategy won’t work.
Fear of a sovereign Palestinian State
What credibility does Israel have in now insisting it wants to negotiate ? For all the previous concessions of Yasser Arafat and Mahmood Abbas, the Israelis have yielded nothing. For the Israelis “a good Arab is a dead Arab”, borrowing heavily from the early pioneers of the U.S., who treated the Indians as less than human beings and for whom “a good Indian was a dead Indian”. The U.S. government confined the native Americans to “Reservations”, where they were held captive and denied basic human rights. Trying to emulate the Americans, the Zionists have created a vast concentration camp for 1.5 million men, women and children, denying them liberty of movement and legitimate human aspirations.
Fear of Palestinian Sovereignty
Israel now fears that a sovereign Palestine can reclaim its land, not only from 1967, but from 1948 ; at the partition of the region, as international law does not allow annexation by conquest. Palestine can demand the return of East Jerusalem ; worse it can take Israel to the International Court of Justice for its atrocities and put an end to its territorial aggrandisement. Israel will not also be allowed to bully its neighbour as it has done with impunity for decades. If Israel was honest about the two state solution it would have honoured the Oslo Agreement, which provided a sound foundation for further progress. It is too late now.
The Americans are simple minded people with a superficial grasp of world issues and scant regard for constitutional law or legal propriety. After Obama delivered a rousing speech to Congress on the Israel Palestinian conflict, in which he publicly advocated return to the 1967 frontiers and two states living in peace and security, the same Congress invited Benjamin Netanyahu to address it in that same hallowed, historic auditorium – an opportunity which Netanyahu used to contradict the U.S. President, denounce his proposals and stubbornly stick to the illegal, iniquitous policies and exactions of the Zionist state – and he was given a standing ovation !
No nation with a modicum of self-respect would have allowed a client state to humiliate its Executive President in this fashion. But the Americans will do anything to placate the Jewish lobby, which is more powerful, persuasive and manipulative than any pressure group in the U.S. The Jewish lobby has caught the U.S. government by the seat of its pants and can push it in any direction it wants. How can the American people live with this ?
A More Dangerous World
There is no country where the people are not inclined to favour statehood for the Palestinians. These include the U.S., France, the U.K., China, Russia and even Germany, despite their own Jewish lobbies, but the U.S. Administration remains unrepentant in its denial of Palestinian rights.
As a result of the U.S. veto the world will be a more dangerous place and those who try to buck the course of history will have to brace themselves for it.
The U.S. veto in the U.N. security council will be without precedent, an act of senseless provocation to a people who have suffered most grievously and still reel under the boot of an oppressor, reminiscent of Nazi Germany, who had exhausted all avenues of conciliation and peace and seen their hopes dashed to pieces by the oppressor’s refusal to see reason. It is also like throwing the gauntlet to 1/5 of the human race and deriding their just expectations.
The U.S. veto also raises the issue of whether the objection of a single country can be allowed to frustrate the will of the majority of the U.N.’s 193 members. There is no doubt that this action will further accelerate the moral decline of the U.S. and lower its standing in the community of nations. The U.S. realises this : that is why it is apprehensive of the vote of the General Assembly.
A Bond for Muslims
No other issue unites the Muslims of the world more strongly than the plight of Palestinians under the heel of Israel for over sixty years. The failure of American intelligence in this regard is baffling. Had the U.S. administration been free to think lucidly and act in accordance with the ideals of its Founding Fathers, it would have long ago leaned upon Israel to come to terms with the two states prescription. Sadly this could not happen while the Jews control the press, T.V., Hollywood, financial institutions, the administration and political funding. Just see Jewish representation in Congress and the Administration. Representing less than 5% of the U.S. population Jews have far more congressmen and officials than Afro-Americans, who account for nearly 15% of the nation.
Incalculable Consequences
The consequences of the U.S. veto are incalculable in the frantic, passionate awakening of the Arab world and its determination to shake off the dictators and oppressors that have ruled it with the active support of Western nations. U.S. citizens will not be safe any more anywhere outside their homeland – assuming they are safe there. By defying the Islamic nations and a great majority of members of the U.N. General Assembly, the U.S. is committing worse than a crime : it is aligning itself with international violations, racism and the denial of fundamental human rights to a people whose only aspiration is to join the community of free and independent nations.
For many simple minds across the world the natural disasters and other violent events that have afflicted the U.S. in recent years are a deserved retribution for its iniquities. According to Islam the prayer of the oppressed is always heard. The Palestinians will never give up hope or surrender. They trust their prayer will eventually be answered, never mind the U.S. veto.