War on Terror an Economic Stronghold

Seattle Times

Jon Talton

Osama bin Laden is the face of terrorism to Americans, but we ignore terror's economic roots and branches at our peril. They won't wither away because of bin Laden's demise.

This is not to reduce every force of history to mere human action in the market. Bin Laden may have hoped to bankrupt the United States by causing it to overreact to the 9/11 attacks, as The Washington Post's Ezra Klein has written. But he saw himself as a holy warrior, as well as a rebel against his wealthy Saudi family's business empire.

His key grudge, however, leads back to economics. U.S. troops were and remain in the Middle East primarily to protect the free flow of the largest oil reserves in the world. To help ensure cheap oil, America has closely allied itself with repressive regimes, particularly in Saudi Arabia.

During the decade of the so-called War on Terror, the United States has done nothing to wean itself off imported oil or extreme car dependency. In 2006, President George W. Bush acknowledged this issue, saying, "Problem is, we get oil from some parts of the world and they simply don't like us."

Nor has much progress been made in addressing the dire poverty, lack of opportunity and armies of unemployed young men that help fuel resentment against America and the West; these men become potent recruitment tools for terror groups. An Arab spring may or may not bring democracy to some of these nations, but the harsher and more dangerous reality remains operative for now.

(Speaking of terrorism, some 35,000 people have died in drug-related killings in Mexico during the four years of President Felipe Calderón's battle with the cartels. As with oil, a root cause is uncomfortable but true: American appetites.)

The failed states and dictatorships, and even large, barely governed chunks of other developing nations, are chaotically separated from the globalized economy that most Americans take for granted.
At the same time, globalization is both a conduit for terror and at grave risk from it. Terror groups amass and move money internationally; they cross borders and operate networks and subsidiaries like malign corporations. Authorities in the U.S. and elsewhere still struggle to cut off their funding sources.
The 9/11 attacks challenged globalization but didn't stop it. Increasing security, for example, added costs and delays to the maritime industry. The Port of Seattle spent $41.4 million on additional seaport security after the attacks, much of it from federal sources. But trade quickly rebounded.
That shouldn't make us complacent about the vulnerabilities of our 10,000-mile-supply chain or interconnected financial systems. The first round of modern economic globalization came crashing down with World War I. What happens if terrorists close the world's oil chokepoint at the Strait of Hormuz or detonate a bio-weapon on Wall Street or in the money centers of London or Shanghai?

Some economic modeling suggests it could cause much larger consequences, for example, in capital flight, market uncertainty and depression of investment, than the immediate physical damage of a terror strike. The damage would be magnified further in an America where millions are struggling to recover from the Great Recession.

The event of Sept. 11, 2001, smaller by comparison, pushed the United States into a recession (admittedly with help from the dot-com bust) and briefly shut down the financial markets. The airline, tourism and insurance industries were especially hard hit, with airlines taking years to recover.
To be sure, winners also emerged in defense, security and counterterrorism sectors. Over the decade, the Department of Homeland Security has spent nearly $425 billion (Amtrak gets about $1.5 billion a year). The Obama administration projects spending of $71.6 billion in 2012.

Much heavier costs have come from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, sparked directly and indirectly by 9/11. Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz has estimated the Iraq war alone will cost $3 trillion. The tab for Afghanistan has topped $400 billion with projections of $1 trillion or $2 trillion.

While security may be priceless, it's debatable whether much of this money, most of it borrowed and adding to global imbalances, has actually made America safer. Instead, bin Laden succeeded in making it appear to many people overseas that America was at war with Islam, a costly problem in itself.
Also, spending for war, especially, doesn't add to future productivity or competitiveness, such as spending on education, research and infrastructure. Nor is it sustainable with federal debt and deficits hitting levels not seen since World War II.

So Americans naturally celebrate a murderer of innocent civilians being run to ground. It might also be time to take stock of some of the economic and geopolitical choices we're making that help the would-be Osama bin Ladens of the world operate profitably.

Poll: Over half of Egyptians want to cancel peace treaty with Israel

Haaretz

Only 36 percent of Egyptians are in favor of maintaining the treaty, according to U.S.-based polling company.

By The Associated Press Tags: Israel news Egypt protests

Egyptian leader Sadat raises a toast
with U.S. President Carter and IsraeliPrime
Minister Menachem Begin, March 26, 1979

More than half of all Egyptians would like to see the 1979 peace treaty with Israel annulled, according to results of a poll conducted by the U.S.-based Pew Research Center released Monday.
According to the poll results, only 36 percent of Egyptians are in favor of maintaining the treaty, compared with 54 percent who would like to see it scrapped.

The poll highlights the deep unpopularity of the three-decade-old treaty, which was scrupulously adhered to by former President Hosni Mubarak, who was ousted February 11.

The poll, based on interviews with 1,000 Egyptians around the country, was conducted between March 24 and April 7 as part of the Spring 2011 Pew Global. Attitudes survey that was conducted in 22 countries. The poll has a sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Opinions varied according to income, with 60 percent of lower income Egyptians supporting the treaty's cancellation while only 45 percent of the wealthier classes thinking it should be done away with.

Only 40 percent of Egyptians with a college education thought the treaty should be scrapped, as well.
The poll also revealed that most Egyptians are optimistic about where the country is headed following the 18-day popular uprising, and they look forward to greater democracy in their country.
The country's youth-led pro-democracy movement, which rocked Egypt and reworked the political environment, had a dramatic effect on people's attitudes. The polls show a major rise in optimism and changing of national priorities.

In 2007, Egyptian were evenly split over which was more important, a strong leader or democracy, but in the recent poll 64 percent rated democracy higher.

Egyptians remained quite split on just who they wanted to lead them as new political forces emerge after the decades of repression. In September, elections will be held for a new parliament after the one overwhelmingly dominated by Mubarak's ruling party was dissolved.

The conservative Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and the largely secular April 6 movement - two groups closely involved in the uprising, had the highest approval ratings in society, with over 70 percent seeing them in a very or somewhat favorable light.

People also overwhelmingly approved of the army, which forced out Mubarak and is currently in the control of the country.

Of those whose names have been put forward as possible candidates for the upcoming November presidential elections, former Arab League head Amr Moussa was the most popular, with 89 percent giving him a very or somewhat favorable rating.

Former presidential candidate Ayman Nour trailed with a 70 percent rating while Nobel Prize Laureate and reform leader Mohamed ElBaradei only had 57 percent rating.

The United States continued to garner low approval ratings, with only 20 percent of Egyptians seeing it in a positive light, up from 17 percent in 2010.

Only 15 percent of those interviewed thought Egypt should have closer relations with the U.S. - as opposed to 43 percent who though the two countries could use some distance.

US committed to support Israeli crimes

PressTV

The United States continues to increase its
military aid to Israel. Washington is now
providing Tel Aviv with at least eight point
two million dollars every day.

Interview with Hani al-Bassous, Islamic University of Gaza, The Gaza Strip 

The US House of Representatives has approved millions of dollars in military aid to Israel, as it is witnessing crimes committed by Tel Aviv against people in the Palestinian territories.  

 
In an interview with Hani al-Bassous, from Islamic University of Gaza, Press TV has discussed the US double standard policies towards different countries.

PressTV: Gaza has definitely seen crimes committed by Israel on its people. Meanwhile, the US continues to increase its aid to Israel. It is now providing Israel with at least eight point two million dollars every day. How Israel would be survived without the support of the United States?

Al-Bassous: Well, I believe the committee which is made by the Unites States to Israel by sending them money on an annual basis and the commitment which was made just today by the Congress, all is paid to Israel to commit more crimes against the Palestinian people.

We have witnessed for the past two or three years that how many times the Gaza Strip has been attacked and the money that has been allocated by the Congress -- over two hundred million dollars -- will be given to the Israeli side to buy more arms and weapons to launch more attacks on people in the Gaza Strip. This money was given to the Israeli side specifically to by batteries of missiles to launch more attacks against the Palestinian people in Gaza.

People in Gaza believe that the American side has given more money to the Israeli side to commit more crimes against the Palestinian people. Such commitment from the American side to the Zionist entity gives Israel a free hand to commit more crimes against the people of the Gaza Strip and to buy more tanks and warplanes to launch more attacks against civilians in Gaza.

This comes amid the warnings by the Israeli military leaders and politicians, who were saying that they are going to launch more attacks against the Gaza Strip if the Palestinians do not stop launching home-made rockets against Israel.

I think these threats against the Palestinian community and the Palestinian factions were mainly supported by the United States Administration.

PressTV: There has been condemnation by the international community of what the US says are the use of cluster bombs in Libya by Moammar Gaddafi. However, when Israel had used cluster bombs, phosphorous bombs and depleted uranium weapons, nothing was said. Why is that? And will this expose the hypocritical nature of the United States foreign policy?

Al-Bassous: Well, this is what is called double standard policy which has been adopted by the United States for several decades to support Israel.

What is happening in Libya and other places, in which the United States is criticizing the regimes and supporting the people, was expected to happen in the Gaza Strip during the Israeli war in December 2008.

While Israel was using all its military power against civilians in the Gaza Strip, we did not witness any position by the US against Israel.

This is what is called hypocrisy and double standard policy. We believe here in the Gaza Strip that the American administration has a commitment to support the Israeli regime. They believe that this would help the process of peace in the region but we think that this will jeopardize any chance for peace in the Middle East. 

US senators unveil resolution against Libya conflict

AFP

WASHINGTON — US military strikes on Libya are "not in the vital interests of the United States" and further action should require congressional approval, under a symbolic senate resolution unveiled Thursday.

President Barack Obama "should obtain authorization from Congress before providing further military and financial support to operations in Libya," says the measure crafted by Republican Senators John Ensign and Kay Bailey Hutchison.

The non-binding resolution says NATO members and other nations supportive of enforcing a UN mandate to protect Libyan civilians from strongman Moamer Kadhafi's forces "should agree to provide a substantial portion of the military and financial burdens" before any more US involvement.
And members of the Arab League "should ensure that all of their military resources are available" to enforce UN resolutions on Libya,.."

Leading senators including Democrats John Kerry and Carl Levin as well as Republican John McCain have been working behind the scenes on a possible measure expressing support for the military operations.

"We've pretty well got the resolution nailed down and now we're discussing with the leaders as to whether we need to vote and if so when," McCain told reporters Thursday.

But a senior senate aide played down the prospects for action, saying there was as yet no clear consensus on whether there would need to be a vote.

The US Constitution reserves to Congress the right to declare war, though US presidents have often deployed forces without first getting lawmakers' explicit say-so, despite a 1973 law that aimed to curtail their ability to do so.

The War Powers Act allows the president to use force in response to an attack on the United States, its territories, or its armed forces, but calls for notifying Congress within 48 hours and says US troops must start to withdraw 60 days later unless specifically authorized to remain by lawmakers.
Kerry said in late March that Obama had notified congressional leaders March 21, meaning the 60-day mark would fall May 20, and said senators had begun drafting a measure approving the US role in Libya.

"Whether we will need it or not, we don't know," said Kerry, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman.

Why is the Federal Reserve Propping Up the Bank of Libya?

John Nichols
The Nation

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has for months been leading the charge to expose the sweetheart deals the Federal Reserve has worked out for multinational banks and corporations at the same time that working Americans, small businesses, local governments and schools boards struggle to stay afloat financially.

Sanders has tried to make the point that it is simply absurd for the Fed to bail out foreign firms and bad banks and to provide them with low-interest loans at the same time that they are reaping massive profits – and at the same time that federal, state and local governments are supposedly broke.

The Obama White House and other members of Congress grudgingly went along with a proposal Sanders made, as part of last year’s Wall Street reform legislation, to force the Fed to reveal its previously secret bailouts and backroom deals. But, for the most part, official Washington has been slow to share the Vermont senator’s outrage.

They may change now that Sanders is exposing what may be the most unsettling Fed deal yet.
On Thursday, the senator asked Federal Reserve officials to explain why they provided more than $26 billion in credit to an Arab intermediary for the Central Bank of Libya. According to a review by Sanders’ office, the Fed made at least 46 emergency, low-interest loans to the Arab Banking Corp., in which the Central Bank of Libya owns a 59 percent stake.

Sanders is particularly interested in learning why the Libyan-owned bank and two of its branches in New York City were exempted from sanctions that the United States imposed several weeks ago on Libyan businesses controlled by Colonel Moammar Gaddafi and the dictator’s associates.

 At the time the sanctions were imposed, President Obama said: “The Libyan government's continued violation of human rights, brutalization of its people, and outrageous threats have rightly drawn the strong and broad condemnation of the international community. These sanctions therefore target the Gaddafi government, while protecting the assets that belong to the people of Libya.”

But what’s the point of sanctions if they don’t crack down on the dictator’s bank?

“It is incomprehensible to me that while creditworthy small businesses in Vermont and throughout the country could not receive affordable loans, the Federal Reserve was providing tens of billions of dollars in credit to a bank that is substantially owned by the Central Bank of Libya,” says Sanders.

The senator is also asking Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner – a long-time Fed retainer -- to explain the Arab Banking Corp. was borrowing money at almost zero interest from one arm of the government, the Fed, at the same time the Treasury Department was borrowing money at a higher interest rate.
Good questions these. And Bernie Sanders ought not be the only one asking them. Congress should be grilling Geithner and Fed Ben Bernanke on the Fed's Libyan connection and why sanctions don't seem to apply to bankers with friends on Wall Street -- and in Washington.

'S Arabia instrument of US rule'

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, left, meets with
Bahrain's King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa at Sakhir Palace in
Manama Saturday, March 12, 2011

PressTV

Human Rights Watch and the Geneva-based Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies said on Wednesday that they are worried about the growing abuses by the Bahraini regime against its citizens who are seeking political reforms and a voice in the government.

Dozens of Bahraini people have been killed and thousands of others injured since February 14, when the public started a popular revolution against the royal family that has been ruling the island for more than 200 years.

In an interview with Press TV, political commentator and the author of Hidden History of Zionism, Ralph Schoenman, discusses the events taking place in Bahrain and the role of the US and Saudi Arabia in the repression of the peaceful protesters demanding the ouster of King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa.

Press TV: We want to look at the international reaction in particular the United States and Europe's. It is interesting that first of all, we have a senior advisor to Catherine Ashton who has basically publicly defended Bahrain's crackdown and has chucked up the deaths as just accidents. And then we have, on the other side, the US reaction that, aside from really not backing the protesters, has urged reforms; but then you have this big news in terms of “you invade Bahrain, we take out Muammar Gaddafi in Libya.” I am referring to that deal that reportedly has been struck between Barack Obama and Saudi Arabia. Can you explain what is going on?

Ralph Schoenman: Well, the Saudis are the instrument of the US rule in the region and have been a vehicle both in Yemen and of course they are instrumental in Libya, as you indicated, with funds and with special forces conjoining the roles of the SAS and the Central intelligence Agency to capture and abort the uprising that is initiated with the response to the general uprising in Tunisia and in Egypt. With respect to Bahrain, the repressive apparatus of the Al Khalifas has been of course superseded by the invasion by the Saudis although I should say more complemented and intensified but always under the direction of the United States. Robert Gates was in Manama on the eve of the invasion by the Saudis. He met not only with the King, but then with the prime minister of Great Britain and with the head of security. All that was co-ordinated.

What is happening on a daily basis and we have been reporting and constantly bringing before the widest audience in the United States is that people have been targeted for unbridled repression. That means that anybody who is injured, and there are not hundreds but thousands who have been injured, cannot go to a hospital. When they are taken to the hospitals, the ambulances are intercepted and the ambulance drivers and the medical staff are detained themselves, are killed on the spot in many instances. In one hospital, the doctors and nurses were rounded up on the second floor by military and police. Some were taken and disappeared, others were beaten. Those who were not taken down, beaten or dispatched were subjected to having their coordinates remain registered: where they live, where their families are and then rage takes place in those villages.

No day goes by when I did not receive a communication from doctors and from people who are reporting as follows: “This is N. I am sending you an email with a fake name. The situation in Bahrain changes from bad to worse. Yesterday my clinic patients with serious illnesses were taken away. They cannot even go to secondary care hospitals here. They are frightened to go to Salmaniya. The ambulances are controlled by the Bahrain defense forces and accompanied by special police. One of my patients, an 11-month-old child, with severe bronchial asthma, has been unable to get medical attention and the father cannot get him to Salmaniya. Patients with cardiac and respiratory disease are prevented from going in hospitals and when they are in there they are taken out. At this moment, a 19-year-old girl Ayad Alkhamoosi was taken for three days. She was tortured and is in critical condition for the crime of writing a poem at school against Khalifa bin Salman.”

This is every day. As to the workers, you know there is a general strike organized by the general federation of workers trade unions in Bahrain which shut down Alba, the Aluminum Company, and BABCO, the Petroleum Company, associated with Occidental Petroleum and Bahrain Air. That general strike was maintained for nearly two weeks. Since then, the union federation reports that 1300 people have been removed from Alba Aluminum and in fact there is a repression brought against all those who participated in the strike and particularly Shia who are singled out. The [Bahraini] minister of interior and the Saudi officials have overseen this purging operation which is under the control and operation of the Saudi army and security intelligence.

Press TV: Let us talk about the role of the Persian Gulf countries in term of the council that they have called the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council. It appears that maybe the United States has given a free hand to its members in particular Saudi Arabia and of course all these countries that possess military bases, not to mention the aid that they get. Is that how you see it in terms of them having a free hand in this case Saudi Arabia leading the pack?

Ralph Schoenman: The structure of power in the United States is not a mystery. It is extremely clear. One percent of the population owns more that 95 percent of the rest of the population combined. Approximately 5000 people control the commanding heights of the US economy through banking and corporate capital, it is a ruling class and they have an imperium, they have hegemony over 75 percent of the world's resources. In the Arab east and in the region at large, they maintain these country-selling regimes. The more brutal, the better, because of the alienation of the entire population whose patrimony has been stoned, whose self-determination is destroyed, and whose resources are basically plundered.

Those are the basic dynamics. Bahrain is the cockpit of the US power because the Fleet is based there but in particular the Saudi apparatus has been the linchpin because of the relationship of Saudis to the oil not only in Saudi Arabia but also in adjacent counties. They Israeli invaders stock troops for American imperialism; they do not call the shots; you give the imperialists and the ruling class a pass if you say they do this, simply because the Jews make them do it; that is not the case. The Zionists are funded and armed by them, they stock troops, they create every kind of atrocities to undermine the peoples in the country of the region, without doubt; but they do that as the instrument of US imperialism. Within the context of Bahrain itself, the role of Saudis and the [Persian] Gulf Emirates are the role of counties whose governments are utterly under the control of imperialism. They are country-selling regimes, from Mubarak to the king of Saudi Arabia, to the regime in Yemen, to the regime in Bahrain.

I want to return to the fact that the repression is an all-out assault on the population as such, without any restraint, not even the pretence of allowing the formal protections of entitlement to medical care are allowed. You have the random and continuous seizure of people in their homes and the streets; wherever they are found, they are shot, they are wounded. Every day I am getting dozens of reports which we convert into articles and appeals that have gone around the country; the unions here have taken up the call. I sent you the information about the person who was stabbed with a knife and tortured. He was not given a fair chance. God bless his soul, he was treated like an animal and thrown into plastic bag for garbage. These are among the daily reports that we are receiving.

U.S. Military Document Reveals Libyan Rebellion's Link to Islamic Militancy

Asia Tribune

Well known to the United States policymakers in Obama White House and Clinton State Department along with the National Security Council but not widely known to American mainstream media, the U.S. West Point Military Academy’s Combating Terrorism Center document reveals that Libya sent more fighters to Iraq’s Islamic militancy on a per-capita basis than any other Muslim country, including Saudi Arabia.

Perhaps more alarmingly for Western policymakers, most of the fighters came from eastern Libya, the center of the current uprising against Muammar el-Qaddafi.

The analysis of the Combating Terrorism Center of West Point was based on the records captured by coalition forces in October 2007 in a raid near Sinjar, along Iraq’s Syrian border.

The eastern Libyan city of Darnah sent more fighters to Iraq than any other single city or town, according to the West Point report. It noted that 52 militants came to Iraq from Darnah, a city of just 80,000 people (the second-largest source of fighters was Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, which has a population of more than 4 million).

Benghazi, the capital of Libya’s provisional government declared by the anti-Qaddafi rebels, sent in 21 fighters, again a disproportionate number of the whole.

If the 2007 captured records revealed the Eastern Libyan participation in the anti-coalition forces militancy in Iraq one could imagine the Banghazi-Darnah export of Islamists since then.

“Libyans were more fired up to travel to Iraq to kill Americans than anyone else in the Arabic-speaking world,” Andrew Exum, a counterinsurgency specialist and former Army Ranger noted in a blog posting recently. “This might explain why those rebels from Libya's eastern provinces are not too excited about U.S. military intervention. It might also give some pause to those in the United States so eager to arm Libya's rebels.”

Despite this data and information available to the United Stated government Secretary of State Hilary Clinton met late Monday 14 with a leader of the Libyan rebel movement in Paris privately and without a public statement. Mrs. Clinton met the opposition rebel leader Mahmoud Jibril at her hotel in Paris after attending a dinner with foreign ministers of the countries of the Group 8 who discussed ways to increase pressure on Colonel Qaddafi’s Libyan regime.

The West Point report said “Both Darnah and Benghazi have long been associated with Islamic militancy in Libya.

A significant progress was made by the Libyan rebels when the French President Nicolas Sarkozy welcomed a pair of envoys from the Libyan National Council, the rebel leadership, early this month. France indicated that it would recognize the rebel proclaimed provisional government based in Benghazi. Britain also signaled that it may also recognize the rebel authority.

Despite those developments the Obama administration seems to be vacillating having no firm Libyan policy since the rebellion.
If the rebellion succeeds in toppling the Qaddafi regime it will have direct access to the tens of billions of dollars that Qaddafi is believed to have squirreled away in overseas accounts during his four-decade rule.

The once-secret Iraqi “Sinjar documents” which is the basis of the West Point analytical document provide an additional reason for the Obama administration to take a cautious approach in its dealings with the rebels from both Darnah and Benghazi. The document noted that Islamist organizations in both cities led an earlier uprising against Qaddafi in the mid-1990s that was brutally put down by the Libyan dictator.

Colonel Qaddafi renounced terrorism, paid billions of dollars to Lockerby-victim families, allowed the U.S. to remove nuclear facilities and established diplomatic relations with the United States. Qaddafi has continuously opposed the al-Qaeda operations in the Middle East and Northern Africa.

The Asian Tribune provides here the data and information from an analytical document of the U.S. Defense Department.

Al-Qaeda’s Foreign Fighters in Iraq: A First Look at the Sinjar Records is the latest in a series of reports from the Combating Terrorism Center drawing on newly released information from captured al-Qaeda documents maintained in the Defense Department’s Harmony Data Base.
The introduction of the report says:

(Quote) On December 4, 2007 Abu Umar al?Baghdadi, the reputed Emir of al-Qaeda’s Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), claimed that his organization was almost purely Iraqi, containing only 200 foreign fighters.1 Twelve days later, on December 16, 2007, Ayman al?Zawahiri urged Sunnis in Iraq to unite behind the ISI. Both statements are part of al-Qaeda’s ongoing struggle to appeal to Iraqis, many of whom resent the ISI’s foreign leadership and its desire to impose strict Islamic law.

In November 2007, the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point received nearly 700 records of foreign nationals that entered Iraq between August 2006 and August 2007. The data compiled and analyzed in this report is drawn from these personnel records, which was collected by al-Qaeda’s Iraqi affiliates, first the Mujahidin Shura Council (MSC) and then the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI). The records contain varying levels of information on each fighter, but often include the fighter’s country of origin, hometown, age, occupation, the name of the fighter’s recruiter, and even the route the fighter took to Iraq. The records were captured by coalition forces in October 2007 in a raid near Sinjar, along Iraq’s Syrian border.

Although there is some ambiguity in the data, it is likely that all of the fighters listed in the Sinjar Records crossed into Iraq from Syria. (Un-Quote)

The Asian Tribune presents here the salient data, information and observations of the Combating Terrorism Center of West Point maintained in the U.S. Defense Department’s Harmony Data Base. The analysis gives an alarming picture of the political shade of the Libyan rebels of Benghazi and Darnah, the eastern stronghold of anti-Qaddafi movement. The observation in this Defense Department document is very revealing.

Saudi Arabia was by far the most common nationality of the fighters’ in this sample; 41% (244) of the 595 records that included the fighter’s nationality indicated they were of Saudi Arabian origin.

Libya was the next most common country of origin, with 18.8% (112) of the fighters listing their nationality stating they hailed from Libya. Syria, Yemen, and Algeria were the next most common origin countries with 8.2% (49), 8.1% (48), and 7.2% (43), respectively. Moroccans accounted for 6.1% (36) of the records and Jordanians 1.9% (11).

The obvious discrepancy between previous studies of Iraqi foreign fighters and the Sinjar Records is the percentage of Libyan fighters. (See Appendix 1 for a brief summary of previous foreign fighter studies.) No previous study has indicated that more than 4 percent of fighters were Libyan. Indeed, a June 2005 report by NBC quoted a U.S. government source indicating that Libya did not make a top ten list of origin nationalities for foreign fighters in Iraq.9 As late as July 15, 2007, the Los Angeles Times cited a U.S. Army source reporting that only 10 percent of all foreign fighters in Iraq hailed from North Africa.10 The Sinjar Records suggest that number is much higher. Almost 19 percent of the fighters in the Sinjar Records came from Libya alone. Furthermore, Libya contributed far more fighters per capita than any other nationality in the Sinjar Records, including Saudi Arabia.

The previous reports may have collectively understated the Libyan contribution to the fight in Iraq, but the relative synchronization of earlier analyses suggests that the pattern of immigration to Iraq has simply shifted over time. In an admittedly small sample, 76.9% (30) of the 39 Libyans that listed their arrival date in Iraq entered the country between May and July 2007, which may indicate a spring “surge” of Libyan recruits to Iraq. If the numbers cited by the Los Angeles Times in July 2007 are any indication, even the U.S. Army may have underestimated the Libyan contingent in Iraq.

The apparent surge in Libyan recruits traveling to Iraq may be linked the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group’s (LIFG) increasingly cooperative relationship with al-Qaeda, which culminated in the LIFG officially joining al-Qaeda on November 3, 2007.

City/Town of Origin

Of 591 records that included the country of origin of the fighters, 440 also contained information on the home city/town the fighters hailed from. The most common cities that the fighters called home were Darnah, Libya and Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, with 52 and 51 fighters respectively. Darnah, with a population just over 80,000 compared to Riaydh’s 4.3 million, has far and away the largest per capita number of fighters in the Sinjar records. The next most common hometowns? in real terms? listed in the Sinjar records were Mecca (43), Beghazi (21), and Casablanca (17). City/town of origin for Saudi Arabia, Libya, Morocco, Algeria, and Syria are broken out in greater detail below.

Libyan Hometowns

The vast majority of Libyan fighters that included their hometown in the Sinjar Records resided in the country’s Northeast, particularly the coastal cities of Darnah 60.2% (53) and Benghazi 23.9% (21).

Both Darnah and Benghazi have long been associated with Islamic militancy in Libya, in particular for an uprising by Islamist organizations in the mid?1990s. The Libyan government blamed the uprising on “infiltrators from the Sudan and Egypt” and one group—the Libyan Fighting Group (jama?ah al?libiyah al?muqatilah)—claimed to have Afghan veterans in its ranks.14 The Libyan uprisings became extraordinarily violent. Qaddafi used helicopter gunships in Benghazi, cut telephone, electricity, and water supplies to Darnah and famously claimed that the militants “deserve to die without trial, like dogs.”

Abu Layth al?Libi, LIFG’s Emir, reinforced Benghazi and Darnah’s importance to Libyan jihadis in his announcement that LIFG had joined al?Qa’ida, saying:

‘It is with the grace of God that we were hoisting the banner of jihad against this apostate regime under the leadership of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, which sacrificed the elite of its sons and commanders in combating this regime whose blood was spilled on the mountains of Darnah, the streets of Benghazi, the outskirts of Tripoli, the desert of Sabha, and the sands of the beach.’

Like other governments in the region, Libya appears concerned about the possibility of jihadi violence within its borders. In May 2007, the Libyan government arrested several Libyans on the grounds that they were planning a car bomb attack similar to an April attack in Algeria.17 And in July 2007, a group calling itself al-Qaeda in Eastern Libya announced a suicide attack in Darnah.  18 Libya’s leader Muammar Qaddafi has taken measures to mitigate the threat from such groups, and has reportedly released over 80 Muslim Brotherhood activists in the hope that they will moderate the views of more violent Islamist activists.

If LIFG is funneling Libyans into Iraq, it may exacerbate rumored tensions between LIFG elements over whether or not to concentrate on militant activity within Libya’s borders.20 Such debates are common among national jihadi movements shifting focus to global issues.  This sort of debate disrupted both Egyptian Islamic Jihad and the Egyptian Islamic Group in the 1990s.  21 Reports suggesting that LIFG’s decision to join al-Qaeda was controversial may be exaggerated, but they probably reflect a contentious debate over LIFG’s future.22 LIFG’s support for al-Qaeda’s Iraqi affiliate has probably increased its stature in al-Qaeda’s leadership, but complicated its internal dynamics.

Recent political developments in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the prevalence of Libyan fighters in Iraq, and evidence of a well?  Established smuggling route for Libyans through Egypt, suggests that Libyan factions (primarily the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group) are increasingly important in al-Qaeda.  The Sinjar Records offer some evidence that Libyans began surging into Iraq in larger numbers beginning in May 2007.  Most of the Libyan recruits came from cities in North?  East Libya, an area long known for jihadi?linked militancy. Libyan fighters were much more likely than other nationalities to be listed as suicide bombers (85% for Libyans, 56% for all others).

The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group’s unification with al-Qaeda and its apparent decision to prioritize providing logistical support to the Islamic State of Iraq is likely controversial within the organization. It is likely that some LIFG factions still want to prioritize the fight against the Libyan regime, rather than the fight in Iraq. It may be possible to exacerbate schisms within LIFG, and between LIFG’s leaders and al-Qaeda’s traditional Egyptian and Saudi power?base.

"Our Man in Tripoli": US-NATO Sponsored Islamic Terrorists Integrate Libya's Pro-Democracy Opposition

Global Research
by Prof. Michel Chossudovsky

Concepts are Turned Upside Down: The US-NATO military alliance is supporting a rebellion integrated by Islamic terrorists, in the name of the "War on Terrorism"...

There are various factions within the Libyan opposition: Royalists, defectors from the Qadhafi regime including the Minister of Justice and more recently the Foreign Minister, Moussa Koussa, members of the Libyan Armed Forces, the National Front for the Salvation of Libya (NFSL) and the National Conference for the Libyan Opposition (NCLO) which acts as an umbrella organization.  

Rarely acknowledged by the Western media, Al-Jamaa al-Islamiyyah al-Muqatilah bi Libya, the Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), is an integral part of the Libyan Opposition.

The Libyan Interim Council does not constitute a clearly defined entity. It is based on the representation from newly created local councils established to "manage daily life in the liberated cities and villages". (The Libyan Interim National Council » The Council’s statement)

Opposition forces are in large part made up of an untrained civilian militia, former members of the Libyan armed forces, together with the trained paramilitary Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG).
The Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which is aligned with Al Qaeda, is in the frontline of the armed insurrection. 


The Al Qaeda Network as an Instrument of US-NATO Intervention

Both the LIFG as an entity as well as its individual members are categorized by the UN Security Council as terrorists. According to the US Treasury: "The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group threatens global safety and stability through the use of violence and its ideological alliance with al Qaida and other brutal terrorist organizations" (Treasury Designates UK-Based Individuals, Entities Financing Al Qaida -Affiliated Libyan Islamic Fighting Group - US Fed News Service, February 8, 2006).

Concepts are turned upside down. Both Washington and NATO, which claim to be waging a "War on Terrorism", are supporting a "pro-democracy movement" integrated by members of a terrorist organization.

In a cruel irony, Washington and the Atlantic Alliance are acting in defiance of their own anti-terrorist laws and regulations.

Moreover, support under "Responsibility to Protect" (R2P) to opposition forces integrated by terrorists is implemented pursuant to UN Security Council Resolution 1973, which is blatant violation of UNSC resolution 1267. The latter identifies the Al-Jama’a al-Islamiyyah al-Muqatilah bi-Libya, the Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), as a terrorist organization.

In other words, the UN Security Council is in clear violation not only of the UN Charter but of its own resolutions. (The Al-Qaida and Taliban Sanctions Committee - 1267).

Historical Origins of The Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG)

Amply documented, the "Islamic jihad" has been covertly supported by the CIA since the onslaught of the Soviet-Afghan war. (See Michel Chossudovsky, America's "War on Terrorism", Global Research, Montreal, 2005).

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), using Pakistan's military Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), played a key role in training the Mujahideen. In turn, the CIA-sponsored guerrilla training was integrated with the teachings of Islam:

"In March 1985, President Reagan signed National Security Decision Directive 166,...[which] authorize[d] stepped-up covert military aid to the Mujahideen, and it made clear that the secret Afghan war had a new goal: to defeat Soviet troops in Afghanistan through covert action and encourage a Soviet withdrawal. The new covert U.S. assistance began with a dramatic increase in arms supplies -- a steady rise to 65,000 tons annually by 1987... as well as a "ceaseless stream" of CIA and Pentagon specialists who traveled to the secret headquarters of Pakistan's ISI on the main road near Rawalpindi, Pakistan. There the CIA specialists met with Pakistani intelligence officers to help plan operations for the Afghan rebels." (Steve Coll, Washington Post, July 19, 1992)

The Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), Al-Jama’a al-Islamiyyah al-Muqatilah bi-Libya, was founded in Afghanistan by Veteran Libyan Mujahideens of the Soviet-Afghan war.
From the outset in  the early to mid-1990s, the Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) performed the role of an "intelligence asset" on behalf of the CIA and Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, MI6. Starting in 1995, the LIFG was actively involved in waging an Islamic Jihad directed against the secular Libyan regime, including a 1996 attempted assassination of Muamar Qadhafi. 

"Former MI5 operative, David Shayler, revealed that while he was working on the Libya desk in the mid-1990s, British secret service personnel collaborated with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which is connected to one of Osama bin Laden’s trusted lieutenants. LIFG is now considered a terrorist group in the United Kingdom." (Gerald A. Perreira, British Intelligence Worked with Al Qaeda to Kill Qaddafi, Global Research, March 25, 2011, emphasis added)

Guerrilla-style terrorist attacks, allegedly with the support of MI6, were routinely conducted against Libyan government security forces, police and military personnel:

"Fierce clashes between [Qadhafi's] security forces and Islamist guerrillas erupted in Benghazi in September 1995, leaving dozens killed on both sides. After weeks of intense fighting, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) formally declared its existence in a communiqué calling Qadhafi's government "an apostate regime that has blasphemed against the faith of God Almighty" and declaring its overthrow to be "the foremost duty after faith in God." This and future LIFG communiqués were issued by Libyan Afghans who had been granted political asylum in Britain... The involvement of the British government in the LIFG campaign against Qadhafi remains the subject of immense controversy. LIFG's next big operation, a failed attempt to assassinate Qadhafi in February 1996 that killed several of his bodyguards, was later said to have been financed by British intelligence to the tune of $160,000, according to ex-MI5 officer David Shayler. While Shayler's allegations have not been independently confirmed, it is clear that Britain allowed LIFG to develop a base of logistical support and fundraising on its soil. At any rate, financing by bin Laden appears to have been much more important. According to one report, LIFG received up to $50,000 from the Saudi terrorist mastermind for each of its militants killed on the battlefield." [2005] (Quoted in Peter Dale Scott, Who are the Libyan Freedom Fighters and Their Patrons? Global Research, March 2011, emphasis added) 

There are contradictory reports as to whether the LIFG is part of Al Qaeda or is acting as an independent jihadist entity. One report suggests that in 2007 the LIFG became "a subsidiary of al Qaeda, later assuming the name of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).(See Webster Tarpley, The CIA’s Libya Rebels: The Same Terrorists who Killed US, NATO Troops in Iraq, Global Research, March 2011)

Continuity in US and Allied Intelligence Operations: Al Qaeda Operatives in Yugoslavia

Since the Soviet-Afghan war, the Al Qaeda network has served as an "intelligence asset" for the CIA. Confirmed by a 1997 US Senate document, Al Qaeda operatives were used by the Clinton administration to channel support to the Bosnian Muslim Army in the early 1990s. (See US Senate, Republican Party Committee, Clinton-Approved Iranian Arms Transfers Help Turn Bosnia into Militant Islamic Base, http://rpc.senate.gov/releases/1997/iran.htm, 1998)

Amply documented, The Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which was supported by NATO, had developed extensive ties to the Islamic terror network. (US Senate, Republican Party Committee, The Clinton Administration Sets Course for NATO Intervention in Kosovo, 1998, http://rpc.senate.gov/releases/1998/kosovo.htm, See also Michel Chossudovsky, America's "War on Terrorism", Global Research, Montreal, 2005).

Al Qaeda in Yugoslavia served as an intelligence asset in the context of NATO's "humanitarian war". Terrorist organizations were covertly supported and funded. In 1999, the NATO intervention came to the rescue of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) which was integrated by Al Qaeda operatives. (US Republican Party Committee documents on Kosovo, op cit):   

"One of the most disturbing aspects of the present [terrorism] crisis [1998 in Kosovo] is that it may have been triggered by our own inept foreign policy in Bosnia and Kosovo. There, beyond all common sense, we find ourselves championing Muslim factions who draw support from the very Islamic fundamentalist terrorist groups who are our mortal enemies elsewhere" (Col. Harry G. Summers, "Bringing terrorists to justice," Washington Times, December 8, 1998, emphasis added. The late Col. Harry G. Summers (USA-Ret.) (1932-1999) was a Distinguished Fellow at the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College, Carlisle, PA.)

Is Libya's Operation Odyssey Dawn part of a US-NATO pattern? Support an insurgency integrated by terrorists with a view to justifying intervention on humanitarian grounds to "save the lives of civilians"?

This was NATO's justification for intervening in Bosnia and Kosovo. What lessons for Libya?
Former Head of Libyan Intelligence "Double Agent" Moussa Koussa Defects to the UK
The LIFG was supported not only by the CIA and The British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) but also by factions within Libya's intelligence agency, led by former intelligence head and Foreign Minister Moussa Koussa, who defected to the United Kingdom in late March 2011.

Assistant U.S. Secretary
of State William J. Burns

In October 2001, the head of Libyan Intelligence, Moussa Koussa, met Assistant U.S. Secretary of State William J. Burns. The Koussa-Burns encounter was of crucial importance. Present at the meetings were senior CIA and MI6 officials, including Sir John Scarlett, who at the time (October 2001) was head of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) of the Cabinet, reporting directly to Prime Minister Tony Blair. The JIC oversees, on behalf of the British government, the setting of intelligence priorities for MI6, MI5 and Defense Intelligence.

"Our Man in Tripoli" Moussa Koussa was to perform the role of a double agent. In secret meetings with Sir John Scarlett, it was "agreed that a British agent could operate in Tripoli". (Libya defector Moussa Koussa was an MI6 double agent, Sunday Express, April 3, 2011)

The development of the LIFG as a paramilitary jihadist movement as well its integration into anti-Qadhafi opposition forces bears a direct relationship to the central role played by double agent Moussa Koussa, who was instrumental in crafting close bilateral ties with the CIA and MI6.  

Sir John Scarlett, former
head of Britain's MI6

In this regard, Moussa Koussa's defection in late March has all the appearances of a carefully staged operation. In an unusual twist, the deal was negotiated with the British government through the intermediation of a former leader of the Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) who is now working with a London-based human rights foundation:

Noman Benotman, a friend of Libyan foreign minister Moussa Koussa, has told the BBC how he helped organise his defection from the Gaddafi regime.

Mr Benotman used to be a leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group but now works for the counter-extremism think tank the Quilliam Foundation.

He said he believed Mr Koussa would be negotiating with the British government and was very co-operative regarding intelligence.

The BBC's Gordon Corera added that the British government was in a dilemma over how to treat Mr Koussa because of his background as head of Libyan intelligence.
Mr Benotman told BBC Breakfast how he helped Koussa defect and how they used to be rivals. (BBC Breakfast April 1, 2011, emphasis added)

Ironically, Benotman was recruited as a Mujahideen to fight in the Soviet-Afghan war. He was one of the founders of the LIFG in Afghanistan. Focussing on issues of "counter-extremism", Benotman is currently a Senior Analyst at the Quilliam Foundation. His present responsibilities include reaching out "to current and former extremists and using Quilliam as a platform from which to share his inside knowledge of al-Qaeda and other Jihadist groups with a wider audience."
 
The CIA "Counterterrorism Program" in Libya

The bilateral ties established between the CIA-MI6 and Libyan intelligence in October 2001 provided Western intelligence agencies direct access and oversight within Libya, through its pro-US counterparts in Libya's intelligence agency led by Moussa Koussa. This agreement enabled Western intelligence to effectively infiltrate the Libyan Intelligence Agency which was under the helm of an MI6 Double Agent.

According to the US State Department in a 2008 report, the Libyan government “has continued to cooperate with the United States and the international community to combat terrorism and terrorist financing... U.S. officials hope to extend counterterrorism assistance to Libya during FY2010 and FY2011..." (See Christopher M. Blanchard, Libya: Background and U.S. Relations, US Congress Research Service, July 16, 2010).

In 2009, Libyan Intelligence and the CIA established a joint counterterrorism program whereby Libyan intelligence officials would receive counterterrorism training by the CIA. This program was part of an agreement negotiated by Moussa Koussa with the CIA. It was also intended (in theory) to disband the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), with the support of  CIA intelligence operatives. Bear in mind the ambiguity of CIA "counterterrorism": the launching of the LIFG in Afghanistan in the early to mid 1990s was part of a CIA project to create a Libyan arm of its Al Qaeda network.

Also in 2009, the imprisoned leaders of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) allegedly renounced their armed struggle waged against the Qadhafi regime in an agreement reached with Libyan security officials. (New jihad code threatens al Qaeda, CNN, November 2009)
What was the role of the US-Libya counterterrorism program from Washington's perspective?
Officially, it was to identify the names of LIFG members and disband the LIFG as an organization. In practice, the US-led operation in Libya, including the training of Libyan intelligence officials under CIA auspices, provided the Agency with a convenient smokescreen for conducting intelligence operations inside Libya.

The training program enabled the CIA to infiltrate and acquire trusted counterparts within Libyan intelligence.
The 2009 Counterrorism program bears a direct relationship to the March 2011 Rebellion. It enabled the Agency, together with the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), to provide covert support to the LIFG in anticipation of the March 2011 armed insurrection. 

The media suggests that the LIFG was disbanded (following the implementation of the CIA-sponsored counterterrorism program). There is no evidence to that effect. The LIFG remains on the (updated March 24, 2011) United Nations Security Council terror list:

QE.L.11.01. Name: LIBYAN ISLAMIC FIGHTING GROUP
Name (original script):
A.k.a.: LIFG F.k.a.: na Address: na Listed on: 6 Oct. 2001 (amended on 5 Mar. 2009)

Other information: Review pursuant to Security Council resolution 1822 (2008) was concluded on 21 Jun. 2010  

(The LIFG Listing is on p. 70, http://www.un.org/sc/committees/1267/pdf/consolidatedlist.pdf, Under the UNSC rules disbanded terrorist organizations are removed from the list in conformity with a delisting procedure. The LIFG has not been removed from the list). United Nations Security Council: Consolidated List established and maintained by the 1267 Committee with respect to Al-Qaida, Usama bin Laden, and the Taliban and other individuals, groups, undertakings and entities associated with them (updated March 24, 2011).

Weapons and Covert Support to LIFG Rebels
There are indications that the CIA and MI6 continue to provide covert support to the Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), which now constitutes the frontline of  the armed insurrection against the Qadhafi regime. 

Hakim al-Hasidi, the Libyan rebel leader, has said jihadists who fought against allied troops in Iraq are on the front lines of the battle against Muammar Gaddafi’s regime...
Mr al-Hasidi insisted his fighters “are patriots and good Muslims, not terrorists,” but added that the “members of al-Qaeda are also good Muslims and are fighting against the invader”. (Libyan rebel commander admits his fighters have al-Qaeda links, Daily Telegraph, March 25, 2011, italics added)

Abdul Hakim Al-Hasadi, is a leader of the LIFG who received military training in a guerrilla camp in Afghanistan. He is head of security of the opposition forces in one of the rebel held territories with some 1,000 men under his command. (Libyan rebels at pains to distance themselves from extremists - The Globe and Mail, March 12, 2011)

The US-NATO coaltion is arming the Jihadists. Weapons are being channelled to the LIFG from Saudi Arabia, which historically, since the outset of the Soviet-Afghan war, has covertly supported Al Qaeda. The Saudis are now providing the rebels, in liaison with Washington and Brussels, with anti-tank rockets and ground-to-air missiles.

Media Disinformation: Islamic Terrorists Join the Pro-Democracy Movement "in a Personal Capacity"

Admiral James Stavridis, NATO Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, has tacitly acknowledged that "American intelligence had picked up "flickers" of terrorist activity among the rebel groups... Very alarming..." But we are not dealing with "flickers". LIFG fighters constitute the backbone of the armed insurgency.

The Western media has also expressed its concern, while insisting that the Jihadists are "former" members of the LIFG  who have joined the armed struggle "in a personal capacity" rather than as members of terrorist organization. According to Benotman in an interview with CNN:

"Dozens of former LIFG fighters have now joined rebel efforts to topple Gadhafi," but he stressed that they had done so in a personal capacity rather than organizing operations as a group.

"Some Western counter-terrorism officials fret that a prolonged civil war in Libya could open up space for al Qaeda. Governments and NGOs have to be quick," says Benotman, "in helping rebel-held areas develop education, health-care and the institutions of democracy." (Paul Cruickshank and Tim Lister, Libyan civil war: An opening for al Qaeda and jihad? CNN, March 23, 2011)

An Al Qaeda related terrorist organization integrates the Libya pro-democracy movement? Since when do terrorists act as individuals "in a personal capacity"?

Both the LIFG as an entity as well as its individual members are categorized by the UN Security Council as terrorists under UNSC resolution 1267. (The Al-Qaida and Taliban Sanctions Committee - 1267)
 
"Our Man in Tripoli"

Former head of Libyan
Intelligence Moussa Koussa

Moussa Koussa was "Our Man in Tripoli". The circumstances of his defection as well as the history of his collaboration with the CIA and MI6, suggest that for the last ten years, he has been serving US and Allied interests, including the planning of the "pro-democracy" armed insurrection in Eastern Libya.

Former head of Libyan intelligence Moussa Koussa played a central role in channelling covert support to the LIFG on behalf of his Western intelligence counterparts. Former CIA director George Tenet, while not explicitly referring to "Our Man in Tripoli", acknowledges in his 2007 autobiography that "the easing of tensions with Libya [was] one of the major successes of his tenure, as it led to cooperation between the two spy services against al-Qaeda." (quoted in Intelligence Partnership between Qadhafi and the CIA on counter-terrorism, op cit)

There should be no doubt: NATO and the LIFG are bed-fellows. The Western military alliance is supporting a rebellion integrated by Islamic terrorists, in the name of the "war on terrorism".

Who are the terrorists? In a bitter twist, while the Islamic jihad is featured by the US Administration as "a threat to Western civilization", these same Islamic organizations including the Libya Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) constitute a key instrument of US military-intelligence operations in Central Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, not to mention the Muslim republics of the former Soviet Union.

Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (Emeritus) at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal. He is the author of The Globalization of Poverty and The New World Order (2003) and America’s “War on Terrorism” (2005). He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His writings have been published in more than twenty languages.

Nigel Farage: EU has no legitimacy or consent to take military action

Why is US backing force in Libya but not Bahrain, Yemen?

BBC

By Andrew North
BBC News, Washington 

What's the difference between Libya and Yemen or Bahrain?

All three states have been using violence to crush pro-democracy protests.

But only against Libya are the US and its Western allies planning a military response.
 
Yemen and Bahrain's crackdowns have so far been met only with words, not action.
On one level the answer is obvious.

Bahrain and Yemen are US allies - especially Bahrain with its large US naval base. Libya is not.
The US response to Bahrain is further complicated by neighbouring Saudi Arabia, Washington's number one Arab ally.

Sunni 'red line'
 
The Saudis were not happy to see Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak go.

"Having watched Tunisia and Egypt go, other Arab leaders are following Libya's lead in drawing a line in the sand and opting for force rather than dialogue

Losing the Sunni monarchy in its neighbour is a red line - that's why it took the unprecedented step of sending 1,000 troops over the border into Bahrain, after which the crackdown began.

But what happened to the "universal values" US President Barack Obama cited when he eventually backed protesters in Egypt?

His decision to abandon an old US ally there - Mr Mubarak - gave some the impression he was preparing to apply those values universally and to break with the past US policy of cosying up to other Middle Eastern regimes.

Critics say it was a dangerous impression, raising protesters' expectations as well as Gulf monarchs' blood pressure.

'Interests come first'
 
"The US always preaches values that it cannot live up to," says Marina Ottaway, director of the Middle East programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.

"In the end, its interests come first."

As the uprisings have spread out of North Africa to Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, those interests have come to the fore again, with Washington taking a more cautious, country-by-country approach.
For the US, stability in those oil-rich states now appears to trump the hopes of their protest movements.

Its concerns about Iran play into this thinking. Most of the protesters are from Bahrain's Shia majority.
Both the Bahrainis and the Saudi authorities establishment have accused Tehran of helping to orchestrate the unrest. And some US officials fear the toppling of the Sunni monarchy would become a victory for Iran.

Yemen is crucial to Washington for its battle with al-Qaeda - which makes the Obama administration cautious in how hard it pushes Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
 
"The US is very afraid that if Saleh goes, Yemen will fall apart," Ms Ottaway says.
Mr Obama condemned the latest violence in Yemen, in which at least 40 protesters were killed.

Reluctance
 
But he would only call for "those responsible... to be held accountable", without directly laying it at Mr Saleh's door.

Washington has had a low-key response as well to violence used by Iraqi security forces against protesters there.

Even with Libya, the new caution is on display. The administration was reluctant for some time to back a no-fly zone, fearing it could lead to a third US war on a Muslim country, after Afghanistan and Iraq.

It only did so only after it got support from Arab states and European allies.

And it is still not clear how much the US will contribute militarily to the UN-backed no-fly zone or what will happen if Col Gaddafi succeeds in hanging onto power.

With recent history in mind and the tide of protest still sweeping through the region, caution arguably looks a sensible policy from a US point of view.

But it also risks giving conservative Arab leaders the breathing space they need to stall the push for reform and hang on.

Having watched Tunisia and Egypt go, other Arab leaders are following Libya's lead in drawing a line in the sand and opting for force rather than dialogue.

It's not clear if Mr Obama can do anything about it.

George Galloway on the Intervention of West Libya

Davis all set to walk free as US prez pulls strings

Times of India

WASHINGTON: Some muscular coercion, a muffled apology, and an additional few hundred million dollars in aid appears to have paved way for a momentary resolution between United States and Pakistan of the Raymond Davis affair that is even now threatening to derail ties between the mutually mistrustful allies.

The modalities of how Davis, the "Diplomat," will be freed are being worked out.

The big question haunting Washington and Islamabad is whether the outburst will assume the proportions of the upheaval in Tunisia and Egypt and consume the weak government in Islamabad, bringing to power Islamist forces and jeopardizing US operations in Afghanistan. The US is expected to argue its case for Davis' immunity and release at a hearing Thursday at Lahore HC after the Pakistani government formally indicated that it had determined he enjoyed immunity.

U.S. ships move toward Libya amid fears of chaos

(Reuters) - U.S. warships sailed toward Libya on Tuesday as Washington warned that the oil-producing North African country could descend into chaos unless embattled leader Muammar Gaddafi relinquished power.

The repositioning of U.S. ships and aircraft closer to Libya is widely seen as a symbolic show of force since neither the United States nor its NATO allies have shown any appetite for direct military intervention in the turmoil that has seen Gaddafi lose control of large swaths of his country.

The White House said the ships were being redeployed in preparation for possible humanitarian efforts. But it stressed it "was not taking any options off the table," diplomatic language that signals military action is still a possibility.

But beyond flexing military muscle and freezing a record $30 billion in Libyan assets, Washington has limited influence on events inside Libya. Republican lawmakers and others have pressed President Barack Obama to do more militarily, but they have focused mainly on imposing a "no-fly" zone.

The USS Barry, a destroyer, moved through the Suez Canal on Monday and is now in the southwestern Mediterranean. Two amphibious assault ships, the USS Kearsarge, which can carry 2,000 Marines, and the USS Ponce, are in the Red Sea and now heading to the canal.

"We are going to keep the pressure on Gaddafi until he steps down and allows the people of Libya to express themselves freely and determine their own future," Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, told ABC's "Good Morning America."

FEARS OVER OIL PRICES

At the same time, the United States would work to stabilize oil prices, which soared to a 2 1/2-year high last week over unrest in the oil-producing North African country and elsewhere in the region, she said.

"This is a situation that does have potential implications for oil supply, oil prices," she said.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned of civil strife if Gaddafi, whose forces are trying to regain control of areas now in rebel hands, refused to step down.

"In the years ahead, Libya could become a peaceful democracy or it could face protracted civil war, or it could descend into chaos" she told lawmakers in Washington.

Full Story

U.S. Military Reportedly Positioning Forces Around Libya, While U.K. Working on Plans for No-Fly Zone

FauxNews

GENEVA –  The U.S. military is "repositioning" U.S. forces to be ready should it be called to assist with the situation in Libya, a Pentagon spokesman said Monday.

Most likely U.S. forces would be asked to provide humanitarian relief, but that decision has not been made yet, Col. Dave Lapan said. 

In addition, no decision has been made on whether or not to set up a no-fly zone, an effort that would require NATO support, he said.

British Prime Minister David Cameron announced Monday that Britain would join allies in creating a no-fly zone to protect the Libyan people from Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi's military, Reuters reported.

"We do not in any way rule out the use of military assets," Cameron said."We must not tolerate this regime using military force against its own people. In that context I have asked the Ministry of Defense and the Chief of the Defense Staff to work with our allies on plans for a military no-fly zone."

The European Union slapped its own arms embargo, visa ban and other sanctions Monday on Qaddafi's regime, part of an escalating global effort to halt his bloody crackdown on critics in the North African nation.

In a series of fast-paced developments, France pledged to send two planes with humanitarian aid to Libya's opposition stronghold of Benghazi while Germany mulled a two-month cutoff of oil payments to Qaddafi's regime. The moves came after days of increasing protest against the hundreds, and potentially thousands, of deaths caused by Qaddafi's military resistance against the popular uprising in his country.

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said the European measures, including a freeze on assets, aimed to reinforce the U.N. Security Council-mandated sanctions against Libya approved over the weekend.

She said the EU also was putting "an embargo on equipment which might be used for internal repression" and urged coordinated action by nations to help people across North Africa and the Middle East.

A more complex set of negotiations, she added, were being held over the possibility of creating a no-fly zone over Libya.

Diplomats gathered in Geneva on Monday -- including U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Ashton, to coordinate action against Qaddafi's regime. Clinton was pressing European leaders to enact tough sanctions to force Qaddafi to stop his violent attacks and step down after 42 years in power.

In Paris, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said planes were taking off for the eastern city of Benghazi with doctors, nurses, medicines and medical equipment.

"It will be the beginning of a massive operation of humanitarian support for the populations of liberated territories," he said on RTL radio.

France's government is studying "all solutions to make it so that Colonel Qaddafi understands that he should go, that he should leave power," Fillon added.

Germany's foreign minister, Guido Westerwelle, proposed cutting off all oil and other payments to Libya for 60 days to make sure that Qaddafi's regime does not get more money to hire mercenaries to repress anti-government critics.

Westerwelle called Qaddafi's violent crackdown on protesters "a crime."  "We must do everything so this murder ends," he said after meeting with Clinton.

"We must do everything to ensure that no money is going into the hands of the Libyan dictator's family, that they don't have any opportunity to hire new foreign soldiers to repress their people with," Westerwelle added.

The German action is significant because 85 percent of Libya's oil goes to European customers. Last week, both Britain and Switzerland froze assets belonging to the Libyan leader and his family.

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, meanwhile, said he has personally urged Qaddafi to step down and set up a transitional government to prevent further violence. Blair told Monday's edition of The Times newspaper that he made two telephone calls to the embattled dictator last week, but that the message that he should resign was rebuffed. He described the Libyan leader as being in denial about his situation.

Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd called on the world's powers to impose a no-fly zone over Libya and compared Qaddafi's violent suppression of opposition forces to genocides in Rwanda, the Bosnian town of Srebrenica and Sudan's Darfur region.

"For the sake of humanity, go now," Rudd advised Qaddafi in a speech to the Human Rights Council in Geneva.

He later told The Associated Press his nation supported the creation of a U.N.-mandated no-fly zone over Libya aimed to prevent the type of aerial bombing unleashed on the Basque town of Guernica in 1937, killing hundreds in the Spanish Civil War. A no-fly zone would require the approval of the 15-member U.N. Security Council.

"Guernica is known throughout the world for the bombing of the civilian population. We have seen evidence of that in Libya. Let us not simply stand idly by while similar atrocities are committed again," Rudd told the AP.

Fillon said the prospect of a no-fly zone over Libya needed U.N. support, "which is far from being obtained today," and he questioned whether NATO should get involved in a civil war in a North African country. The NATO chief has already rejected intervening in Libya.

Lavrov, the Russian minister, said he and Clinton didn't talk about a possible no-fly zone over Libya in their meeting Monday.

Clinton came to Geneva to make the administration's case for stronger action against Qaddafi.
"We want him to leave and we want him to end his regime and call off the mercenaries and those troops that remain loyal to him," Clinton told reporters a day after President Barack Obama branded Qaddafi an illegitimate ruler who must leave power immediately.

British and German military planes swooped into Libya's desert over the weekend, rescuing hundreds of oil workers and civilians stranded at remote sites. The secret military missions signaled the readiness of Western nations to disregard Libya's territorial integrity when it comes to the safety of their citizens.

"Right now, our attention is focused on Libya -- and rightly so," Ashton told the Human Rights Council. "The fact that so many colleagues from across the world have gathered here today tells us something big. That what is going on -- the massive violence against peaceful demonstrators -- shocks our conscience. It should also spring us into action."

Some 1.5 million foreigners were in Libya before the uprising began. Turkey said Monday it had evacuated 18,000 citizens. More than 20,000 Chinese workers and 10,000 EU citizens have also left Libya, and tens of thousands of others have fled into the neighboring countries of Tunisia and Egypt.

The U.N. Security Council has instructed International Criminal Court to look into possible crimes against humanity occurring in Libya, only the second such referral. The first was in 2005 when the U.N. asked the world's first permanent war crimes tribunal to probe mass killings in Darfur.

Raymond Davis: US blackmails Pak

Pakistan Observer
Sajjad Shaukat

US Senator John Kerry (D) Mass meets
Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani,

Controversial debate continues between Pakistan and the United States in connection with the arrest of American national, Raymond Davis who is an under-cover secret agent of American CIA, and has become a symbol of anti-American resentment in Pakistan because of the dreadful murder of two innocent Pakistanis in Lahore and subsequent suicide by the wife of one of his victims. Like other US high officials, even President Barack Obama urged Pakistan on February 15 this year to free Raymond as he has diplomatic immunity under the Geneva Convention. Meanwhile, the visiting Chairman of the US Foreign Relations Committee, John Kerry, while addressing a press conference in Lahore pointed out that issue of “Davis has nothing to do with local courts as diplomats enjoy immunity…we cannot allow that one incident can break the strong relationship between the two countries.”

On the other side, legal experts in Pakistan opine that Raymond Davis is a murderer who has no diplomatic immunity. Many Pakistanis are suspicious about Davis, who was arrested with loaded weapons, a GPS satellite tracking device, photographs of Pakistan’s defence installations and tribal areas, while American authorities are still silent about his role in Pakistan.

It is notable that the former Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has stated that he was dropped from the new cabinet owing to his principled position on the question of diplomatic immunity to the killer, and he adopted a stance, seen by majority of people. Some sources confirms that Raymond Davis has visited Pakistan twice under the cover of diplomatic status, and this time he came with changed name to conceal his identity. However, Davis is killer and is an agent of CIA, while Washington is blackmailing Islamabad by applying coercive diplomacy. In this respect, on the one hand, US high officials say that on the issue of Davis, America will not break relations with Pakistan; while on the other, they continue pressure on Islamabad for his immediate release.The issue of Raymond Davis is not new one as past history of Pak-US ties prove that America has always blackmailed Pakistan on various occasions. In this context, it is of particular attention that in the aftermath of the November 26 catastrophe of Mumbai, Washington, while tilting towards India had blackmailed Islamabad. Setting aside the ground realties that Pakistan, itself, has been the major victim of terrorism, which has been bearing multiple losses in combating this menace since 9/11, with the support of the US, Indian blame game against Islamabad, continued during exchange of information between the two neighbouring countries regarding Mumbai mayhem.

While, rejecting Pakistan’s stand that its government or any official agency was not involved in the Mumbai attacks, presenting one after another list of bogus evidence, New Delhi wanted to make Islamabad accept all other Indian demands since our rulers admitted on February 12, 2009 that Ajmal Kasab is Pakistani national and Mumbai terror-attacks were “partially planned in Pakistan.” In fact, being a responsible state actor, Islamabad’s admission which had emboldened New Delhi was forced by the US-led some western countries which have continuously been blackmailing Pakistan by insisting upon our government to “do more” against the militancy in the tribal areas by ignoring internal backlash and sacrifices of our security forces during war on terror—while paying no attention to the Lahore-terror attacks on the Sri Lankan cricket team including other similar terror-incidents. In that context, India wanted to avail the Mumbai tragedy in increasing further pressure on Pakistan with the help of America in order to force Islamabad to confess that all the terrorists responsible for Mumbai attacks came from Pakistan.

In that respect, US former Secretary of State, Condoleeza Rice and British Foreign Secretary Milliband who had visited India and Pakistan stressed upon Islamabad to take actions against the banned Jamaatud Dawa and the already banned Lashkar-i-Tayba. Speaking in Indian tune, they had also said that the terrorists involved in the Mumbai events came from Pakistan. In that connection, Ameria had played a key role in getting passed a resolution through the UN Security Council which added Pakistan-based Jamaatud Dawa and four of its leaders to the list of Al Qaeda-related terrorists. Without any doubt, this similar approach by the US and India show that these states are in collusion to destabilize and ‘denuclearise’ Pakistan through blackmailing diplomacy as demands on Pakistan to take action against the Jamaatud Dawa and its related welfare organistions including admission regarding the departure of the Mumbai culprits from our soil were forced. And Islamabad accepted these false allegations as our country was facing serious internal and external challenges of grave nature.

In the recent past, IMF decided to sanction loan to Pakistan after American green signal. Past experience proves that economic dependence on foreign countries always brings political dependence in its wake. While, at that critical juncture, our country had been facing precarious financial problem, US-led some western allies compelled Pakistan to accept some Indian false demands. Hollowness of New Delhi’s allegations and forced admission of Islamabad could be gauged from the fact that on February 27, 2009, Pakistan’s Naval Chief of Staff Admiral Nuaman Bashir remarked that he had no proof that Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving gunman of the Mumbai attacks used Pakistani waters to reach India. The statement of our naval chief coupled with American duress makes it quite clear that Mumbai mayhem was pre-planned by the Indian intelligence agency, RAW to further distort the image of Pakistan in the comity of nations.

Another example of blackmailing is that the US is emphasising Islamabad to to take action against the militants of North Waziristan. It also continuous drone attacks on Pakistan’s soil without bothering for the sovereignty of the country. Inaction of the US-led west over Hindu terrorism and such duplicity undoubtedly indicates that America and major European states have their common interest in India. Hence, they blindly support New Delhi’s shrewd diplomacy against Islamabad. These major countries only tolerate Pakistan owing to its role as a frontline state against terrorism, otherwise, they leave no stone unturned in blackmailing our country so as to harm our interests. In this respect, forced demands on Pakistan regarding Mumbai mayhem entailing accusation of cross-border terrorism either in Afghanistan or the Indian-held Kashmir are also part of this blackmailing practice. In fact, we are living in an unequal world order. The prevalent global system tends to give a greater political and economic leverage to the affluent developed nations who could safeguard their interests at the cost of the weaker countries. Whenever, any controversy arises on the controversial issues, the UN Security Council enforces the doctrine of collective security against the small states, while the five big powers protect their interests by using veto.

This shows discrimination between the powerful and the weaker. In this context, it is notable that in 2001, UN had permitted the United States to attack Afghanistan under the cover of right of self-defence. In case of the Indian occupied Kashmir, the issue still remains unresolved as UN resolutions regarding the plebiscite were never implemented because Washington and some western powers support the illegitimate stand of India due to their collective interests. Particularly, in economic context, the world order reflects greater disparities as the flow of capital and credit system is also dominated by the United States and other developed countries—the consequent result is an increase in the activities of the Multinationals which have shattered the economies of the poor developing states. Besides, international financial institutions like I.M.F and World Bank are under the control of the US and its partners who protect their interests by blackmailing the governments of the small states through financial pressure. In these terms, US-led countries especially blackmail Pakistan directly or indirectly.

In sense of Hobbes, Machiavelli and Morgenthau, a renowned strategic thinker, Thomas Schelling remarks about the US, “coercion to be an effective tool of foreign policy.” Kissinger also endorses politics of bargaining and pressure through threats, coercion and even violence as essential elements of the American diplomacy. In this regard, diplomacy itself becomes the real tool of blackmailing. Returning to our earlier discussion, Raymond Davis is a murderer, but the US blackmails Pakistan for his release as the latter depends upon Washington for military and economic aid in wake of multi-faceted problems. America should remember that it also depends upon Pakistan which is a frontline state of the US war on terror, and without Islamabad’s support the sole superpower cannot win this ‘different war’ against terrorism.