Significant discussion surrounding Stepped up U.S. aggression
in Middle East Today on Democracy Now
Excerpt, minor editing, commentary by
Carolyn Bennett
Vijay Prashad
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| Sovereign land and people |
Indian historian, journalist and commentator Vijay Prashad is George
and Martha Kellner Chair in South Asian History and Professor of International
Studies at Trinity College (Hartford, Connecticut); author of Arab Spring, Libyan Winter; Uncle Swami:
South Asians in America Today; The
Poorer Nations: A Possible History of the Global South; The Darker Nations: A People's History of
the Third World.
Medea Benjamin
United States political activist and writer Medea Benjamin is
best known for co-founding and activism representing Code Pink and Global
Exchange; author of Drone Warfare:
Killing by Remote Control and editor with Jodie Evans of How to Stop the Next War Now: Effective
Responses to Violence and Terrorism.
Lethal governance
Medea Benjamin on Democracy Now
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| Wounds of perpetual War Displaced People |
“The Obama administration is supposed to have been working
for a binding resolution that we should be hearing about by the United Nations Security
Council talking about cutting off the funding, cutting off the equipping of
these extremist groups. That’s a positive thing.”
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| Sovereign land and people |
However, showing its true face, the Obama administration at
the same time has given only one week to Iraq’s new government “to show that it
is no longer a sectarian Shiite government that is suppressing Sunnis but is
actually going to be a government for all the people of Iraq…That takes time. One
week is not enough to show that, and to have the Sunnis peel away from ISIS.”
The charge that ISIS threatens the United States “is a lie,”
Benjamin said. “There is no imminent
threat to the United States right now.”
Considering the timing of U.S. officials’ saying, the Iraqis
had “better get on with this” together with the U.S. choice of “partners” further
proves that “political solutions have been put aside now for the military ones.”
The coalition brought together by the United States is
composed of governments that are “among the most repressive governments in the
Middle East.” The government of “Bahrain has been repressing its nonviolent,
democratic uprising. The Saudis have provided the financing and the recruits
for so many of the extremists.”
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| Sovereign lands and peoples |
This is U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry’s “diplomatic
success,” Benjamin said. “… Instead of coming to the United Nations to say that we have the
world coming together to stop the recruiting and the financing and buying of
the oil that ISIS has – we have the accomplishment of having repressive Arab
regimes joining us in bombing another Arab state.”
Vijay Prashad on Democracy Now
“The United States government has decided to strike in Syria”
and currently a major city called Kobane situated on the Turkish border and
refuge to half a million people “is under siege” and “on the verge of falling.”
Wikipedia Note: Ayn al-Arab (Arabic: ‘Spring
of the Arabs’) or Kobane (Kurdish: Kobanê): a city in Aleppo Governorate in
northern Syria inhabited by Kurds, Arabs, Turkmen, and Armenians. Its population
44,821 in the 2004 census (ref. Syria Central Bureau of Statistics) has been since 2012 under the control of Kurdish YPG (The
People’s Protection Units commonly known as the YPG, the official armed wing of
the Kurdish Supreme Committee of Syrian Kurdistan); and in 2014 was declared the
administrative center of the Kobanê Canton of Syrian Kurdistan.
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| Syria for Syrians Syria's people protest foreign interference |
“Tens of thousands of people from Kobane have crossed into
Turkey,” Vijay Prashad said. “And these are Kurds so it is quite something that
Kurdish refugees have been allowed into Turkey.
“…ISIS fighters have surrounded Kobane using heavy artillery
they stole in Mosul.” And United States has attacked “symbolic targets inside
Raqqa,” made to appear “like a major attack against ISIS [but in reality] is a
demonstration of American strength” that is unlikely to “change the situation
on the ground in northern Syria directly.”
Vijay Prashad posed a genuine solution to the violence and
foreign aggression.
The current foreign aggression “is just Band-Aid … just a
lot of loud noise. It will not provide the kind of political solution needed in
the region for the long term.…
“…The real solution in the region,” Prashad said, “is going
to come from some kind of grand bargain between Iran and Saudi Arabia. These
two countries have been at each other’s throats since 1979. They have opened
the region to entry of outside forces.
“…When these two countries decide that it is in their
absolute self-interest to have some kind of grand bargain, we are going to see a
de-escalation [of conflict and violence] in the region.”
He concludes with the “hope that the forces of peace will
encourage more meetings with the Iranians, more meetings between the Iranians
and the Saudis” that will provide what all sane people are calling for -- “political
solutions.”
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| Wounds of perpetual War Displaced People |
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hat sets human beings apart from barbarians (even wild
animals have rules of society they abide by) is the capacity for reflection and
reason. What we are witnessing in U.S. foreign affairs is barbarism, a nuclear
armed, weapons-running reckless unconscionable cruelty rooted at the same time in
incompetence, cowardice, lawlessness, cronyism, and a belligerent amorality that
constitutes a lethal mixture abroad in the world. Americans must see it for
what is and put a stop to it.
No government or head of state should commit violent
aggression directly or indirectly against another sovereign nation, its land,
its region or its people – especially when that nation or region presents no
threat to or aggression against the attacking head of state or nation. The
American people must put a stop to the carnage by their government officials
and the cronies and “partners” of those partisans, ideologues and criminals.
I have said for a long time and this is still my view. The
American people must clean house – without regard for any political party,
partisan, or sect.
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ecall, deselect, vote out of office ALL members of the U.S.
House and Senate – public elective office should not offer lifelong endeavor or
permanent employment for anyone. And based on the high crimes committed against
humanity and gross negligence in purely domestic affairs; on a broader scale, the
constant breach of U.S. and international laws and human rights declarations
and conventions, the American people must push for a bill of impeachment
against the current U.S. Executive and Cabinet. In my view, there is no other
way to begin the hard work of recovering what is good about this nation and laying
the foundation for (and holding accountable) a new and essential competency; a
nonpartisan, law abiding, moral ethos in leadership and federal governance.
Sources and notes
Today on Democracy “Now Expanding U.S. Strikes to ISIS in
Syria, Has Obama Opened New Phase of ‘Perpetual War?’” September 23, 2014, http://www.democracynow.org/2014/9/23/expanding_us_strikes_to_isis_in
Wikipedia reference on definitions, clarifications,
biographical notes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vijay_Prashad
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medea_Benjamin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_al-Arab
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Protection_Units
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A lifelong American writer and writer/activist (former academic and staffer with the U.S. government in Washington), Dr. Carolyn LaDelle Bennett is credentialed in education and print journalism and public affairs (PhD, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan; MA, The American University, Washington, DC). Her work concerns itself with news and current affairs, historical contexts, and ideas particularly related to acts and consequences of U.S. foreign relations, geopolitics, human rights, war and peace, and violence and nonviolence. Dr. Bennett is an internationalist and nonpartisan progressive personally concerned with society and the common good. An educator at heart, her career began with the U.S. Peace Corps, teaching in Sierra Leone, West Africa. Since then, she has authored several books and numerous current-affairs articles; her latest book: UNCONSCIONABLE: How The World Sees Us: World News, Alternative Views, Commentary on U.S. Foreign Relations; most thoughts, articles, edited work are posted at Bennett’s Study: http://todaysinsightnews.blogspot.com/ and on her Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/carolynladelle.bennett. http://www.prweb.com/releases/2014/08UNCONSCIONABLE/prweb12131656.htm http://bookstore.xlibris.com/Products/SKU-000757788/UNCONSCIONABLE.aspx Her books are also available at independent books in New York State: Lift Bridge in Brockport; Sundance in Geneseo; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center in Buffalo; Burlingham Books in Perry; The Bookworm in East Aurora
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