Confrontation with Iran

This week the Iranian nuclear enrichment program was once again front and center on the world stage. On Monday Iranian officials notified the IAEA that they had begun construction of a second nuclear enrichment facility outside the city of Qom. This announcement prompted a flurry of diplomatic activities by the US and its European allies which culminated in a hastily called press conference featuring President Obama, French President Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Each in turn roundly condemned Iran for their “direct challenge” to the NPT regime, “serial deception” and challenge to the entire international community. The western media flashed headlines such as “US and allies warn Iran over nuclear deception” and British “Foreign Secretary David Miliband refuses to rule out military action against Iran nuclear plant”.
Iranian President Ahmadinejad responded that the plant was never a secret and that Iran had lived up to its NPT obligations.
The reality of all this is much more nuanced. The US has been aware of this facility for some time and has elected ignore it. The plant, therefore, is hardly a secret. Iran’s case that has lived up to its obligations has some validity. The treaty as ratified by Iran requires that the IAEA be notified 180 days before the introduction of nuclear material. The 2003 protocol, which Iran never ratified, introduced the requirement to notify the IAEA immediately upon the decision to construct a nuclear facility.
The Iranians may have felt that they were doing something positive ahead of the 5+1 talks scheduled for Oct. 1, since they are probably a year away from introducing nuclear material and may have been surprised by the reaction. They did not, however, count American domestic politics.
Having been stonewalled by Israel and the Arab countries on his Israel/Palestine policy, Obama could not afford to appear weak on another Middle East issue. This allowed the administration hardliners on Iran, such as Hilary Clinton and Dennis Ross, to carry the day and raise the specter of “crippling sanctions” and military action.
With their harsh aggressive rhetoric, the western leaders may have put themselves in a corner from which there may be no easy exit. Since any sanctions regime is not likely to be either effective or “crippling” and the unstable hard-line government in Tehran may welcome the conflict as a way of uniting their divided country, the western leaders may, once again, have to choose between backing down in the face of intransigence or taking military action. Will the Iranians sit idly by awaiting an attack which could destroy their retaliatory capability or will they chose a preemptive first strike?
It seems to me that that I have seen this movie before in Iraq. I didn’t like the ending.

War crimes in Gaza

This week the investigative report on the Gaza War requested by the United Nations Human Rights Council was released. The investigating commission, chaired by South African judge and prosecutor Richard Goldstone, found that there were violations of Human Rights Law and war crimes perpetrated by both Israel and Hamas. The report recommended that the case be submitted to the International Criminal Court for possible prosecution.
Since neither Hamas nor Israel are signatories to the ICC treaty, the referral would need to be made by the UN Security Council. Israel is counting on the US with its veto power to prevent this from happening. With this in mind, Israel has begun a diplomatic and public relations blitz.
They have accused Goldstone of being biased against Israel and complained that the commission only interviewed Palestinians and selected Israelis. This is a little disingenuous as Goldstone is a Jew and Israel refused to neither cooperate with the investigation nor allow the commission to interview Israeli officials.
Israel has also complained that the report contains more criticism of Israel than of Hamas. This might be expected on the ground of proportionality. During the three week war 1450 Palestinians, mostly civilians were killed while 13 Israelis, including 3 civilians, were killed. The claim that Hamas rocket fire threatened Israeli civilians and thus justified the war raises the larger question, unaddressed in any forum, of what rights to resist are available to a weak people faced with a brutal occupation and overwhelming military capability.
Israel’s diplomatic case with the US is raising two issues. One is that if Israel is held to account for its behavior is Gaza, the US might be held to account for its behavior in Iraq and Afghanistan. The other issue is that any limitations on military action would adversely affect the so called “war on terror”. Both of these issues might have resonated more with the Bush administration that the Obama administration.
If the report ends up in the Security Council, a likely outcome, the US will face a difficult dilemma. Do they support Israel and veto any referral to the ICC and send the message that it is business as usual? Does international law only apply to weak third world countries in Africa and the Middle East such as Sudan? Do western, first world, colonial powers get a pass? Or do they allow the complaint to go forward and risk a further split with Israel and the anger of the Israel lobby in Washington?.

Freezing a Conflict in August

Once the uprising in Iran, following the disputed elections, was brutally repressed by the conservative regime, the situation in the Middle East has become reasonably quiet. With respect to the efforts to resolve the intractable Israeli/Arab conflict over Palestine not much seems to be happening. Given Special Envoy George Mitchell’s penchant for quiet diplomacy, something may be happening behind the scenes. More likely nothing seems to be happening because nothing is happening.
Senator Mitchell has met numerous times with Israelis regarding the US demand for a settlement freeze and with Palestinian and other Arab leaders regarding possible steps toward a normalization of relations with Israel. Neither of these tracks is going anywhere. Israel has no interest in stopping its colonization of the West Bank and East Jerusalem and doesn’t particularly care about normalized relations as they don’t see themselves as part of the Middle East. The Arabs feel as though they bought the settlement freeze in Oslo and have no interest in buying it again.
In my opinion the Obama administration has finally realized that there is no room for a two state solution in which Israeli Jews and Palestinians live alongside each other in peace. The maximum that Israel will give is less than the minimum than the Palestinians can accept.
Israel has no incentive to compromise further. Their overwhelming military power supported by the US and their demonstrated willingness to use it to crush resistance has consolidated the occupation and made Israel largely secure. Netanyahu’s vision of a “Palestinian state” that consists of isolated self governing enclaves in which the PA manages day to day issues and Israel controls borders, air space, security, water, infrastructure and access is largely in place. As Netanyahu says “Call it a state if you will.”
This situation not only serves Israel’s desire for space for settlement growth, but also the need for the Fatah led PA for a continued flow of US/European aid flowing through the PA that can be skimmed for personnel gain.
The inability of the Obama administration to get Israel to accede to their demand for a settlement freeze has demonstrated that there is no political will in the US to constrain Netanyahu from implementing his vision. We are moving into a “frozen conflict” mode. The danger of frozen conflicts is that they have a tendency to thaw periodically.