China Calls on U.S. to Control Deficit

Nov. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao urged the U.S. to limit the size of its deficit to ensure the stability of the dollar, Reuters reported.

America should play a responsible role in contributing to a global recovery, Wen was quoted as saying yesterday at a briefing in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. It should keep the deficit at an appropriate size, the premier said.

Wen is renewing concerns expressed in March, when he said he was “worried” about China’s holdings of Treasuries and wanted assurances that the nation’s U.S. investments were safe. The dollar fell today after the Group of 20 governments agreed to keep stimulus measures and remained silent on the greenback’s decline this year.

The U.S. currency has dropped about 13 percent against a basket of currencies of major trading partners in the past seven months and the International Monetary Fund indicated in a Nov. 7 report that it may still be overvalued.

China’s foreign-exchange reserves climbed to a record $2.273 trillion in September and the nation is the largest holder of U.S. Treasuries, owning $797.1 billion of the securities in August.

China is closely watching its U.S. assets, which are a very important part of the nation’s wealth, Wen was quoted as saying. He reiterated that his government sought safety, liquidity and good value when investing its currency holdings.

China is facing calls to let its own currency gain against the dollar.

Chinese central bank Governor Zhou Xiaochuan told Bloomberg News on Nov. 6 that “the pressure from the international community to allow yuan appreciation is not that big,” deflecting calls from Europe and Japan to let it rise.

Seymour Hersh’s latest article only portrays his well-known anti-Pakistan bias: Pakistani FO spokesman

Associated Press of Pakistan

ISLAMABAD, Nov 8, 2009 (APP): Commenting on Mr. Seymour Hersh’s latest article "Defending the Arsenal-In an unstable Pakistan, can nuclear warheads be kept safe?" posted on the website of "The New Yorker" magazine, the Foreign Office Spokesman termed the assertions made in the article as utterly misleading and totally baseless. "The author of the article yet again portrays his well-known anti-Pakistan bias by making several false and highly irresponsible claims by quoting anonymous and unverifiable sources".

"The article is thus nothing more than a concoction to tarnish the image of Pakistan and create misgivings among its people," the Spokesman said in statement here on Sunday.

The Spokesman underlined that Pakistan’s strategic assets are completely safe and secure. The multi-layered custodial controls, which have been developed indigenously, are as foolproof and effective as in any other nuclear weapons state, he added.

"Pakistan therefore does not require any foreign assistance in this regard. Nor will Pakistan, as a sovereign state, ever allow any country to have direct or indirect access to its nuclear and strategic facilities".

"Any suggestion to this effect is simply preposterous. Our second-to-none professional armed forces are fully capable to take care of our nuclear arsenal", he added.

The Spokesman further said, "to set the record straight, no talks have ever taken place on the issue of the security of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal with US officials".

He said it needs to be emphasized that contrary to what Mr. Hersh claims, the US has repeatedly expressed its full confidence in our custodial controls. Most recently, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton herself denied any US concerns in this regard, he added.

The Spokesman said that Mr. Hersh is known to write sensational stories premised in far-fetched and imaginary scenarios. "His latest article is no exception and is, therefore, strongly rejected", he added.

US-Israel military drill involved chemical arms

Press TV - November 9, 2009 17:20:34 GMT

In a joint military drill held in October, the US and Israeli military
simulated unconventional attacks on Israeli towns, a report says.

Israeli and American soldiers launched the three-week Juniper Cobra military exercise in October 21, during which they fired chemical and biological warheads into Tel Aviv, the Jerusalem Post reported.

Israeli soldiers from the Home Front Command and American soldiers from the Ohio National Guard's Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and high-yield Explosive Enhanced Response Force (CERF) took part in the drill.

During the Home Front Command-Ohio National Guard CERF exercise, chemical protection suits were donned by participants, the report said.

The soldiers in protective suits were hosed down with water to practice avoiding overheating.

"Israelis and US soldiers need to train to prepare for the defense of their countries, whether that training involves firing a weapon or preparing for any scenario," US Army spokesman Maj. Daniel J. Meyers told the post.

The US has brought advanced-capability Patriot missiles into Israel for the drill, which lasted until November 5.

West Bank rabbi: Jews can kill Gentiles who threaten Israel

Israeli settlers from the Yitzhar settlement watch after a Palestinian olive tree field was set ablaze by a group of Jewish settlers on June 19, 2008 in the West Bank village of Burin.

(AFP Getty Images)

09/11/2009
Haaretz

Just weeks after the arrest of alleged Jewish terrorist, Yaakov Teitel, a West Bank rabbi on Monday released a book giving Jews permission to kill Gentiles who threaten Israel.

Rabbi Yitzhak Shapiro, who heads the Od Yosef Chai Yeshiva in the Yitzhar settlement, wrote in his book "The King's Torah" that even babies and children can be killed if they pose a threat to the nation.

Shapiro based the majority of his teachings on passages quoted from the Bible, to which he adds his opinions and beliefs.
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"It is permissable to kill the Righteous among Nations even if they are not responsible for the threatening situation," he wrote, adding: "If we kill a Gentile who has sinned or has violated one of the seven commandments - because we care about the commandments - there is nothing wrong with the murder."

Several prominent rabbis, including Rabbi Yithak Ginzburg and Rabbi Yaakov Yosef, have recommended the book to their students and followers.

Japanese FM Rules Out Base Deal During Obama Visit

Massive Protests Against US Base on Okinawa

by Jason Ditz, November 08, 2009

Though the rising dispute over US military bases in Okinawa has been a hot subject for Japanese foreign policy, Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada says that his government will not finalize any deals during President Obama’s visit later this week.

US bases (red) on Okinawa

Tensions have been rising between Japan and the United States since Japan’s Democratic Party (DPJ) took power in August, the first major regime change the nation has seen since World War 2. The DPJ ran on the basis of ending US dictation of Japanese foreign policy, and called for a renegotiation of the Okinawa base deal.

But the US has absolutely ruled out any renegotiations, and has demanded the new government accept the deals the previous government signed, even though the unpopularity of those deals was in no small way responsible for the DPJ’s election. The US has grown impatient with the delay, and Japan has threatened to oust them entirely from Okinawa.

Which it seems may suit the Okinawans just fine, as an estimated 21,000 organized a massive protest along the beach calling for the removal of the US Marine base. Okinawans have complained that since the US occupation, they have been asked to bear an inordinate amount of responsibility for housing American forces, and the crime and pollution they bring with them.

Source

Nuclear sites to be fast-tracked as Government warns of energy shortage

By Tim Shipman
November 9, 2009

The Government today insisted the country needed nuclear power as it prepared to unveil plans to fast-track a new generation of nuclear power stations.

Energy Secretary Ed Miliband is expected to give the green light to most of the 11 potential sites unveiled earlier this year - and could even back all of them.

And under changes to the planning laws, the Infrastructure Planning Commission (IPC) will be able to speed through the proposals for new schemes.

Mr Miliband acknowledged anxieties about nuclear power but said it had a 'relatively good' safety record in this country.

Sellafield nuclear plant in Cumbria

'The basic message here is, we can't say no to all of the nuclear or all of the low carbon fuels that are out there,' he told GMTV.

'We need nuclear, we need renewables, we need clean coal, we need all of those things if we are going to make that transition to cleaner energy.'

Although a backlash against the regulations is expected from Labour MPs, he will insist that energy firms need to know they will not fall foul of planning chiefs if they invest in new sites.

Nine of the 11 on the shortlist are next to existing reactors, including two at Sellafield in Cumbria, Sizewell in Suffolk, Wylfa in North Wales and Dungeness in Kent.

In each instance the communities concerned are believed to support expansion because it will create jobs.

Ed Miliband is expected to approve the next generation of nuclear power plants

Indicating that most or all of the sites will be given the green light, an insider said: 'The companies have been pretty good at coming up with locations.

'Ed will make it clear that we can't tackle climate change without nuclear power. We need an energy infrastructure that's fit for the future.'

It came as the Government was expected to announce that radioactive waste will be buried underground in a new storage facility that could cost up to £18billion to build.

The 'deep geological repository' would permanently dispose of Britain's annual 200 tonnes of high-level waste.

Each of the new reactors will produce about 20 tonnes of highly radioactive waste that will remain lethal for 100,000 years.

It is also expected to store 5,000 canisters of nuclear waster from the country's past military programme that is currently kept in West Cumbria.

A source close to Mr Miliband denied reports that he will give the go-ahead to further plants on green-field sites.

Britain gets 15 per cent of its electricity from nuclear power. Ministers want to increase this to 25 per cent by 2025. Demand is set to rise 55 per cent by 2050.

Mr Miliband hopes the first new plants can open by 2018. He admitted people were concerned about nuclear power but insisted it had a 'relatively good' safety record.

'The basic message here is, we can't say no to all of the nuclear or all of the low carbon fuels that are out there. We need nuclear, we need renewables, we need clean coal, we need all of those things if we are going to make that transition to cleaner energy,' he said.

Shadow energy secretary Greg Clark condemned the fact the plans were being unveiled in a ministerial statement, arguing they needed more 'democratic legitimacy'.

'It is a national emergency and it's been left far too late - we've known for the last 10 years that most of our nuclear power fleet would come to the end of its planned life,' he said.

'So whatever happens with these statements we've got a black hole, but actually we do need a different planning system, we need a fast track for major items of infrastructure.

'The trouble with the way the Government's doing it is, it has no democratic component. The statements will just be read out to MPs without a vote and the decisions will be taken by an unelected, unaccountable official.'

Enlarge

Mr Miliband said an independent commission would decide whether power stations were built in certain areas and insisted the plans are crucial to shaping Britain's future energy supply.

'We know the low-carbon transition is a huge challenge. We now need to move on to getting the actions in place to make it happen.

'That is why the national policy statements and Infrastructure Planning Commission are important, because the truth is that we are not going to be able to deliver a 21st century energy system with a 20th century planning system,' he said.

Green groups criticised the plans. Robin Oakley, of Greenpeace, said: 'Nuclear is a dangerous and expensive irrelevance.

'We don't need coal or nuclear, because proven green technologies can secure Britain's energy needs, create green jobs and slash our emissions.'

Friends of the Earth executive director Andy Atkins said: 'Nuclear power leaves a deadly legacy of radioactive waste that remains highly dangerous for tens of thousands of years and costs tens of billions of pounds to manage.'

Source

Mullen: ‘Nuclear Iran’ an Existential Threat to Israel

Admiral Open to US Attack, Concedes War Would Be Incredibly Destabilizing

by Jason Ditz, November 08, 2009

Speaking today at the National Press Club, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Michael Mullen declared that “it’s very clear to me that a nuclear weapon in Iran is an existential threat to Israel.”

Adm. Mullen has repeatedly met with Israel’s military chief Gen. Ashkenazi, and says foiling Iran’s nuclear program is “the number one priority for Israel.” This has been underscored in recent days as Israel has repeatedly threatened to attack Iran.

But while Admiral Mullen said he still wanted President Obama to continue with diplomacy, he was fully prepared to see the US attack Iran to prevent a nuclear Iran from “undermining the stability” of the Middle East. At the same time, Mullen admitted that attacking Iran itself “would also be incredibly destabilizing.”

Though Western officials have repeatedly issued warnings about Iran’s nuclear program, the IAEA has repeatedly certified that none of Iran’s uranium has been enriched to anywhere near weapons-grade level and that none of it is being diverted to anything but civilian use.

Source

New Iraq going 'soft on Israel'

By Ahmed Janabi - November 9, 2009 - Al-Jazeera

The Baghdad International Fair first opened its doors in 1964 [EPA]

The ten-day Baghdad International Fair opened its doors for the 36th time on November 1.

Featuring exhibits from major international companies, the trade fair was held annually from 1964 until the 2003 US-led invasion. It resumed in 2007.

However, a change to the fair's charter this year has angered many Iraqis.

The Iraqi government has dropped an article from the charter which obliges participating companies to prove they do not have trade links with Israel.

A memo from the Iraqi ministry of foreign affairs on October 7, alerted foreign embassies to the decision to drop article 45.

Sources within the Iraqi ministry of foreign affairs who spoke on the condition of anonymity told Al Jazeera that the EU had warned Iraqi officials that if article 45 was not removed, European companies would not participate in this year's event.

An EU source, who cannot be named because she is not authorised to speak to the media, said the first invitations to the fair, which were received by the embassies of EU countries in April, included the clause. However, EU missions in Baghdad later received an amendment suggesting that participating companies would not be required to boycott Israel.

Officials from the Iraqi ministry of foreign affairs were unavailable for comment.

'Destroying national spirit'

Members of the Iraqi parliament told Al Jazeera that they were unaware of the decision to remove the clause.

Nasar al-Rubei, a spokesperson for the al-Sadr parliamentary bloc, vowed to launch a campaign to restore article 45.

"It is not up to the government to take any action when it comes to Israel," he said.

"We live in a society that looks at Israel as an entity built on stolen land. We know that Iraq's foreign policy has not been defined yet, we know Iraq's foreign policy is the government's responsibility, but the relation with Israel is a special case. They must not touch it without people's approval.

"From our side, we will fight to restore article 45, we will launch a campaign to collect signatures for a petition asking the government to review its decision and to promise not to change anything related to Israel without the parliament's approval."

Laila al-Khafaji, a member of parliament from the Unified Iraqi Coalition, said: "We were completely unaware of that issue. I hold the ministry of foreign affairs and [the] foreign relations committee in the parliament [responsible] for making the parliament the last to know."

Dhafir al-Ani, a member of parliament from al-Tawafuq bloc, sees the move as part of a long-term plan to condition Iraqis to accept Israel.

"When you see Iraqi political parties racing to win blessing from US officials, what do you expect? We said it from the beginning, we in Iraq can clearly see an organised plan to destroy Iraqis' national spirit," he said.

"Every Iraqi grew up on the idea that Israel is a criminal and illegitimate entity. Examples that Iraqis truly believed that are plenty in history. For instance, Iraq does not share borders with Israel, yet it participated in all Arab-Israeli wars.

"We think one of the main targets of the war on Iraq was to remove Iraq from Israel's security threat list."

'More royal than the king'

In 2004, Mithal al-Alusi became the first Iraqi politician to visit Israel [EPA]

But not all Iraqi politicians share this perspective.

Mithal al-Alusi, a former member of the Iraqi National Congress, has publicly called for an Iraq-Israel peace treaty.

In 2004 he became the first Iraqi politician to visit Israel.

Upon his return he was immediately fired from the Iraqi parliament and his party, the Democratic Party of the Iraqi Nation, was expelled from the Iraqi National Congress.

He also survived an attempt on his life in which two of his sons were killed.

He visited Israel again in 2008, saying: "I want to negotiate with Israel for the sake of Iraq. There are several Arab countries talking to Israel.

"The Palestinians themselves sit with the Israelis, should we be royalists more than the king himself?"

But al-Ani opposes this perspective, saying: "It is true some Palestinian politicians sat with the Israelis and started a political process with them, but why should we not look at the other part of the Palestinians, who still up to now oppose what their politicians have done. They are the majority.

"In the rest of the Arab world, the majority of the population is against establishing contacts with Israel."

A history of boycotts

In 1951 the Arab League established the Bureau for Boycotting Israel. Based in Damascus, Syria, the bureau has lost much of its authority since Egypt, Jordan and the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) signed peace treaties with Israel.

It still holds bi-annual meetings with representatives from Arab countries which have not signed peace treaties with Israel.

Before the US-led invasion, Iraq adhered closely to the instructions of the bureau. Israeli companies, those with Israeli shareholders and companies with dealings with Israel were banned in Iraq.

Iraqi ties with the US were cut after the US supported Israel in the 1967 war, and although they were restored in 1984, commercial deals with the US were kept to a minimum.

Before the 2003 invasion, Iraq endured 13 years of UN sanctions. During this time speculation was rife that one of the aims of the sanctions was to force Iraq into a peace process with Israel.

Al Jazeera has obtained a document written by Saddam Hussein's secretary, which conveys Hussein's rejection of an offer to partake in a peace process with Israel in exchange for the lifting of sanctions.

In April 2002, Iraq stopped its oil exporting operations for a month in protest at Israeli aggression in the Palestinian territories.

'Fruit of US strategy'

This document conveys Hussein's rejection of an offer to ease sanctions in exchange for peace talks with Israel

Arab countries are essentially divided into two groups; those, such as Egypt and Jordan, who have signed peace treaties with Israel, and those who still do not have diplomatic ties or any sort of contact with Israel.

For many Arab countries, the US-led invasion of Iraq signalled the loss of a strategic asset in their conflict with Israel.

Bahrain closed its offices of the Bureau for Boycotting Israel in 2006 after signing a free trade agreement with the US. Shortly thereafter, some Bahraini officials began urging the establishment of contacts with Israel.

However, Bahrain's parliament - ignoring government objections - has just passed a bill outlawing any contact with Israel and introducing prison sentences for anybody found to be breaking this law.

Badi Rafaia, a spokesman for the Federation of Anti-Normalisation with Israel Unions Committee in Jordan, said the US-led invasion of Iraq removed one of the last remaining obstacles to Israel's denial of Palestinian rights.

"[Before the war] Iraq was the main obstacle to Israel's plan to establish ties with Arab countries and subsequently swallow Palestinians' rights and demands," he said.

"We believe that Iraq's decision to allow companies with ties to Israel to work in the country is the fruit of American strategy in the region.

"Most Arab countries in the region, including my country Jordan, signed peace treaties with Israel. Jordan-Israeli peace stipulates that Jordan would no longer boycott Israeli goods; moreover it stipulates that Jordan should help to carry other Arab countries to end boycotting Israeli goods.

"I assure you, it is not something Arab public opinion is proud of."

Israel is well-known for its advanced technology and industry and some observers may find it hard to imagine an effective boycott by the Arabs, who are still far behind Israel and the West in these fields.

However, Rafaia argues that the boycott strategy has proved successful in many parts of the world and that there are plenty of examples of underdeveloped nations achieving their goals via these means.

"Economic boycott is a successful strategy if it was well planned. The Indian leader Gandhi used this strategy against Britain, when his country was occupied ... And it worked," he said.

"In [the case of] Arabs boycotting Israel, all I can tell you is if the boycott was not effective, Israel would not try to use every opportunity to break or at least ease the boycott by Arabs of its products and services."

UK MoD: Afghan war no matter of public view

Press TV - November 8, 2009 17:33:43 GMT

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II prepares to lay a wreath during the Remembrance Sunday service in Whitehall, London.

British Defense Minister Bob Ainsworth has downplayed mounting public skepticism of the Afghan war, saying the mission was not a matter of public opinion.

The comments came as the Queen paid her respect to Britain's war dead on Remembrance Sunday, when the Ministry of Defense confirmed the death of another trooper in Afghanistan.

Ainsworth was referring to a BBC poll which found 64 percent of Britons regarded the war as 'unwinnable' — a rise of six percent since July — seemingly corresponding to the country's death toll in Afghanistan that has passed the 230 milestone.

“This campaign is directly connected to our safety back here in the United Kingdom and people need to recognize that. Failure will be a disaster for us," he told Sky News.

While MoD only acknowledged a 'dent' in the support for the campaign, the head of the country's armed forces, Sir Jock Stirrup, told BBC One's Andrew Marr show that it was 'incredibly important' to improve ways for 'explaining the successes we are having'.
He said despite the progress being 'painful, slow and halting', the troops based in the war-torn country believed that they were gaining ground.

Stirrup went on to question the current 'optimistic' US estimate of a possible pull out from Afghanistan by 2013, saying the Afghan army could not be entrusted with the full task of maintaining security until a year later.

Meanwhile, a report by the Sunday Times daily said army chiefs were considering a retreat in the face of growing Taliban insurgency and planned to withdraw British troops from outlying bases in Afghanistan.

The strategy, dubbed 'retrenchment', would see several bases, including deadly Musa Qala, abandoned for larger towns in volatile Helmand province — a move expected to spark reaction from the families of soldiers who died there.

This would not be the first time British troops have quitted the Musa Qala, which quickly fell into the Taliban's hands in 2007, only to be reclaimed by NATO forces in a costly operation later that year, the paper noted.

The New Yorker Mucks Up Gaza

by Bruce Wolman on November 7, 2009

The New Yorker sent Lawrence Wright, its Pulitzer Prize winning staff writer, over to Israel and Gaza to report on "What really happened during the Israeli attacks?" I’m not sure what the reason was for the question mark, unless it was a hint not to take what’s written as what really happened. Wright’s letter from Gaza is disappointing, but then it could have been worse. Had Jeffrey Goldberg remained on The New Yorker’s staff, he would most certainly have been the one David Remnick sent over for this assignment. We can all imagine how Jeffrey’s piece would have read.

After giving a second read to Wright’s letter, I couldn’t quite understand my deep initial antipathy. But then I noticed that the first seventy paragraphs or so are only a preamble to the last twenty in which Wright finally addresses the actual Gaza invasion. By the time this reader reached the supposed subject of the piece, he was already zoned out from Wright’s jaded history and observations. Perhaps this is the only way a New York-based weekly magazine can get away with discussing possible Israeli war crimes – by first providing a great deal of background information in conformance with the basic Hasbara narratives of the conflict.

Wright attempts to present a timeline of what happened leading up to the Gaza invasion. He starts back in June 2006, six months after Hamas had won the Palestinian parliamentary elections. According to Wright, a "moment of promise" in the "opportunity for peace" culminated in bloodshed June 24, 2006, when Hamas commandos killed two Israeli soldiers and captured a third from a Merkava tank–teenaged Gilad Shalit. In retaliation, the Israelis over the next months arrested 64 senior Palestinian officials and killed over 400 Gazans, including 88 children, and turned Gaza upside down looking for their missing soldier.

Left unexplained is why Wright believes that on June 24th peace still had a moment of promise. He suggests that Hamas’ goal in capturing Shalit was to put a halt to the peace initiatives. Apparently Hamas’ stated goal – to negotiate for some of the 7,000 Palestinian prisoners – is not sufficient to explain the Hamas attack. Wright also refers to Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza settlements as if it was an Israeli peace overture. He writes,

"From the Israeli perspective, at least, the Gaza problem was supposed to have been solved in August, 2005, when Ariel Sharon, then the Prime Minister, closed down the Jewish settlements on the Strip and withdrew Israeli forces. The international community and the Israeli left wing applauded the move. But, almost immediately, mortar and rocket attacks from the Strip multiplied."

As Shlomo Ben-Ami and others have noted, Ariel Sharon conceived of the unilateral withdrawal of the settlers and Israeli forces from Gaza as a means to avoid further peace initiatives and demands for Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank, not as a stimulus to the peace process. Wright is correct about the international community’s approval–if by "international community" he follows the US State Department meaning, i.e., any ad-hoc collection of countries expressing (either willingly or by pressure) public agreement with a United States position. The Israeli left wing did applaud, if by left-wing one includes Israelis such as Ari Shavit, Ha’aretz’s own version of Tom Friedman and one of Wright’s sources. But moderate leftists and peace negotiators such as Shlomo Ben-Ami and Yosi Beilin warned from the time of Sharon’s announcement that a unilateral, as opposed to a negotiated, withdrawal would lead to negative consequences for the peace process and quite likely an acceleration of violence. Ben-Ami in his 2006 book, Scars of War, Wounds of Peace predicted rather accurately what has happened in the aftermath.

For me, a key litmus test in truth telling on the situation in Gaza is how a report handles the takeover of the Strip by Hamas. If the narrative doesn’t refer to the Bush-Rice-Abrams backing (most likely even initiating) of Mohammed Dahlan’s Gaza coup attempt, which preceded the Hamas preemptive counter-coup, then it is seriously remiss. It is amazing to what extent the mainstream media continues to ignore David Rose’s well-sourced report on the US role in Dahlan’s power play, which appeared in Vanity Fair.

Wright does state that "Fatah refused to step aside and let Hamas govern." He mentions the "large demonstrations by both factions in the West Bank and Gaza, along with kidnappings, gun battles, and assassinations." And he even refers to the peace accord between Fatah and Hamas arranged by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. But he fails to inform that the United States opposed the Saudi accord, and subverted it by conspiring with Dahlan in his attempt to organize a putsch. Unfortunately, for the United States, Israel, Fatah and Dahlan, Hamas routed Dahlan’s forces.

Wright’s treatment of Gaza is mostly nasty (quite a contrast with this site’s reporting from Gaza last spring). Here is the tenor: The Israelis would like to ignore Gaza and forget it even exists (after 36 years of insisting they had to place settlers there). The West Bankers want to distance themselves from their poor relatives. Egypt’s only goal is to make sure Gaza remains Israel’s problem. A Saudi with a drink in his hand tells Israel to get the bombing right this time.

We are informed Gaza ran out of allies before the invasion. While this may be mostly true if one considers only the corrupt rulers and elites of the Arab countries, and the GWOT leaders of Europe and the United States [Global War on Terror], for the Arab and Muslim populations across the globe empathy with Gaza is one of the few political stances they all hold in common. Gaza can only be kept friendless by the application of authoritarian repression and Western interference.

According to Wright, "the territory has long had the highest concentration of poverty, extremism, and hopelessness in the region." There is nothing there for the children to do, yet the Gazans love nothing more than to fuck and have more kids. (One man tells Wright that Gazans love to procreate.)The movie theaters are shut down. Little music can be heard. Sports facilities have been destroyed. Sharia law is being introduced.

Wright goes through a litany of Hamas social policies of which he obviously disapproves. This is a subject worthy of discussion, and I share some of his concerns, but what do these policies have to do with what really happened in the Israeli attacks? Many of the same criticisms can be made of the social practices in the ultra-orthodox towns of Israel, but would that help to explain the Gaza invasion? Saudi Arabian society is far more repressive than Hamas’ Gaza. Still this hardly provokes New Yorker writers to suggest we invade Saudi Arabia.

Apparently Wright didn’t find any Gazans with something positive to say about Hamas. Gazans not in Hamas are worried. "The whole place is becoming a mosque," complains one female reporter. A native Gazan businessman says he feels like "a refugee in my own country" since the Hamas takeover. An economist tells Wright that "Secular people are punished. The future is frightening."

He devotes six paragraphs to a visit with a cell sympathetic to Al-Qaeda, a faction which Hamas has acted against. The complaints from these Jihadists are the opposite of the previous quoted Gazans. “We thought Hamas was going to apply Islamic law here, but they are not.” He [the leader of the Jihadi coalition] spoke of the “fancy restaurants on the beach” and said that Hamas tolerated uncovered women there. “They have a much more moderate way of life, and we cannot deal with that.” Well, which is it in Gaza?

Wright provides the obligational presentation of the more outrageous clauses in the Hamas Charter, and says that the charter "has come to embody the fear that many Israelis hold about the Palestinians." Yet, he fails to report that Israel was not very fearful of the Charter at the time of Hamas’ founding in 1987. In fact, the Israeli government initially aided Hamas and supported its growth, calculating that the Islamists would be a useful tool to reduce the strengths of the more secular Fatah and PLO.

Ari Shavit is given space to recall 2002 and his experience visiting a bombed cafe in Jerusalem. Since Gaza and Hamas are the current evil-doers, we only hear about Hamas attacks and Gazan celebrations of the Moment Cafe bombing. The fact that all the Palestinian factions were involved in suicide bombings at that time is no longer relevant, as Fatah and the West Bankers are currently the good Palestinians.

Wright asserts, "The Hamas [suicide bombing] attacks derailed the peace process initiated by the Oslo accords and hardened many Israelis against the Palestinian cause." Which is to say: The failed negotiations, Sharon’s provocative march on the Temple Mount, the Israeli massive overuse of force to quell the initial outbreaks of the Second Intifada (before any suicide bombings I might add), and the election of right-wing tough guy Sharon evidently had no causal relationship to the Palestinian attacks or the derailment of the peace process. In fact, and it is hard to believe Wright doesn’t know this, the peace process died with the elections of Ariel Sharon and George Bush. The violence that followed was in response to the violence. It developed its own momentum divorced from the failed peace process. It was an escalating tit-for-tat.

Gaza is sui generis from Wright’s perspective, as if God instead of resting on the seventh day, fooled around for a few hours and built himself an anti-Eden and called it Gaza. I began to see Gaza as, I suspect, many Gazans do: a floating island, a dystopian Atlantis, drifting farther away from contact with any other society. Wright offers a very concise take on the origins of Gaza and mucks it up for some unrevealed reason. He correctly asserts that Gaza was part of Britain’s mandate over Palestine, but then goes on to say that the Brits "considered Gaza res nullius — nobody’s property." I spent quite some time Googling round to find out the source of Wright’s claim here without result. No reference to Britain specifically considering Gaza res nullius came up.

Curiously, the legal concept of res nullius is often introduced by certain Israeli supporters and legal experts, especially the Commentary and David Horowitz crowd, in order to claim that Israel is not illegally occupying the territories. But they claim that all the territories – the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem – not just Gaza are res nullius. The majority of international legal experts dispute that res nullius applies to the occupied territories.

During the 1948 war, Palestinian refugees did flee to the Gaza Strip. When the armistice lines were drawn, Gaza was under the control of the Egyptians. After the 1967 war, control switched to the Israelis. But Wright goes further and claims "Israel and Egypt agreed to try to set up a Palestinian entity that would rule Gaza, but it was clear that neither party wanted responsibility for the Strip, so it remained in limbo, little more than a notional part of a Palestinian entity that might never come into existence." The Egyptian-Israeli Peace Agreement called for a resolution of the Palestinian issue. From the time the Arab League recognized the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people, Gaza was considered an integral part of the Palestinian territories even by Egypt. This was reaffirmed in the Oslo accords. So it’s unclear to me why Wright would seek to portray Gaza as a "notional part of a Palestinian entity". Of course, for the Israelis a hived-off Gaza lessens the current demographic threat and it would like nothing better then to declare Gaza an orphan, and an unloved one at that.

There are other inaccuracies which leads one to wonder how familiar Wright is with his subject matter. For example, he has Salam Fayyad, the current Prime Minister as a Fatah loyalist, when in fact Fayyad is an independent. In the last Palestinian election he ran for the Legislature on the list of a small party he organized with Hanan Ashrawi.

He notes splits within Fatah’s leadership, but ignores the ‘radical’ Meshal’s recent statements indicating Hamas’ willingness to accept a state based on the 1967 borders.

Wright repeats an excuse Israel gives for the timing of the Gaza attack, that Hamas was introducing GRAD rockets into Gaza. Yet, he must know that Israel has not shut down the tunnel smuggling and, if Israeli’s claims about the GRADs are true, GRADs are obviously still being stockpiled.

More seriously, Wright wrongly interprets Israeli tactics:

The Israeli military adopted painstaking efforts to spare civilian lives in Gaza. Two and a half million leaflets were dropped into areas that were about to come under attack, urging noncombatants to “move to city centers.” But Gaza is essentially a cage, and the city centers also came under attack. Intelligence officers called residents whose houses were going to be targeted, urging them to flee. The Air Force dropped “roof knockers”—small, noisemaking shells—on top of some houses to warn the residents to escape before the next, real bomb fell on them.

Israel may claim it drops leaflets and makes calls to spare civilian lives, but obviously if that is the case, it never investigates how these tactics work in practice. With no safe place to go, with attacks on anything that moves, with bombings shifting from one locale to another, Israeli warnings only increase civilian panic. Why flee your home if you don’t know whether you will be safe out in the open, and there is no place to flee to? Or whether the school or refugee center you reach will be the next target. Had Israel been serious about protecting civilians, then it would have opened its borders and let the non-combatant Palestinians flee from the war zone as international law demands. But Israel would not countenance Palestinian refugees on its territory, so it could only urge that they even more tightly concentrate themselves in the Gaza urban areas, which the Israelis eventually ended up attacking anyway.

Several times Wright repeats the Israeli mantra that no country would accept the rocket firing on its citizens that Israel has experienced. He even quotes Obama in Israel last year, “No country would accept missiles landing on the heads of its citizens. If missiles were falling where my two daughters sleep, I would do everything in order to stop that.” The twelve thousand rockets and mortars fired into Israel between 2000 and 2008 are noted, but the context is missing. This is partially correct, but not very illuminating.

By hewing to the Israeli narrative, Wright is unable to see the truth, that both sides are locked into a strategic race for deterrence against the other. "Collective punishment" applied to civilians, aka terror when the other side is employing it, is the means by which Israel seeks to maintain deterrence, and hence control, of the Palestinians. In response Hamas has attempted to establish its own deterrence vis-a-vis Israel with guerrilla actions, terror attacks, suicide bombings (a tactic which turned out to be a failure and counterproductive), and more recently, inaccurate rocket attacks.

In military and think-tank circles Israel is fairly open about its application of collective punishment. Indeed, civilian death tolls have never led to Israeli second thoughts. Gaza worked, they will say. Less obvious and accepted is the notion that the Palestinians are also in their own way also seeking a deterrent capability. (During the Second Intifada the Palestinians overplayed their hand and went beyond deterrence in the way they accelerated the suicide bombings, deluding themselves for a brief period of time into thinking these tactics were so successful they could achieve parity with Israel by their use. Instead the carnage provoked a ferocious Israeli reaction and the Israelis crushed the Palestinian uprising. Hamas has since returned to searching for a way to establish a level of deterrence. Fatah has abandoned the armed route, but has gained nothing with the Israelis. Whether Fatah will remain passive remains to be seen.)

Being the far superior power, Israel has determined the rules of the conflict. Hamas and the Palestinians respond. Seen in the context of a mutual game of deterrence, Hamas’ strategy and tactical maneuverings are rational, even if the acts themselves are immoral. We are not simply seeing the bloodthirsty cravings of extremists or the primitive urges for revenge as Wright implies.

Basically Israel is satisfied with the status quo. The Palestinians want to upend that status quo – aiming for one state or two states – i.e., some end to the occupation. To deter Palestinian violence against the current order, Israel enforces a limited but still severe collective punishment on the Palestinian civilian population as the price for its militants’ activities. Moreover, the Israelis expect the Palestinian population to blame the militants for the Israeli punishment, and eventually to demand that the militants stop their attacks on the Israelis. Hamas knows it cannot defeat Israel militarily, but it also cannot let Israel pay no price for the continuation of the status quo.

Firing rockets is a signal to the Israelis that the Palestinians will not just passively (or non-violently) accept the current situation. The wild inaccuracy of Palestinian rockets is intentional. The rockets cause psychological angst for Israeli civilians and a political problem for the Israeli government, but they don’t kill many Israelis. If the rockets were more effective at killing, the Israelis would retaliate with overwhelming force. The intensity of the rocket firings is gauged to keep Israeli cost-benefit calculations for an escalated response or a full invasion below the threshold. Hence, it is inaccurate to say that Hamas wants to kill as many Israelis as possible. If that was the aim, they would choose other tactics.

Once Israel refused to lift the blockade on Gaza during the cease fire, Hamas had no choice but to up the ante. Their people were approaching destitution, just as Israel intended. Hamas needed to try and force Israel to negotiate an amelioration of the blockade, even if the odds of success were against them. To renew the ceasefire with the blockade still in full force would have irreparably eroded support for Hamas.

Armed with this analysis we can reject one of Wright’s conclusion. He writes,

"They also underscore the biases that had taken root in each camp: the Israeli belief that Hamas terrorists and the Gazan people were one and the same; the Gazan tendency to support any act of resistance against the Israelis, no matter how self-defeating it might be."

While the majority of Israelis probably do see Hamas and the Gazan people as one and the same, Gazans have been much more circumspect about supporting "any act of resistance." If one examines Palestinian polling since the Oslo accords, you will see that Palestinians’ approval of suicide bombings and other acts of violence have varied greatly over the period. As their situation has only worsened, Gazans in their desperation have been willing for all kinds of strategies to be tried, both violent and non-violent. All have been self-defeating. Until Wright and the Israelis can demonstrate to the Gazans an alternative other than surrender, Wright should be more careful in his judgements.

Wright’s letter from Gaza is not completely one-sided, but neither does it answer the question posed.