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The
Syrian civil war, insurrection, rebellion, revolt, uprising, call it what you
will, was not home grown in Syria by Syrians with differing outlooks as to how
their nation should be governed—as the mainstream media would have you
believe—it was part of a strategy preplanned by vicious, sociopathic foreigners
called "Neocons" and they began their planning in 1991, following the
first invasion of Iraq, code-named: Dessert Storm. To date, the major
beneficiary of their diabolical planning has been Zionist Apartheid Israel, but
that maybe coming to an end.
Important links. Note: Some links may not work in some locations.
Boycott Divestment Sanctions http://www.bdsmovement.net/ Article: Boycott would-be MPs who are Friends of Israel
US President Barack Obama has threatened that he will step up
pressure on the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Obama’s threat came after he hosted King Abdullah II of Jordan at the
Sunnylands retreat in Palm Springs, California, where the two discussed, among
other things, the unrest in Syria.
The US president said on Friday that he and his royal guest had decided they
should take steps “to apply more pressure to the Assad regime.”
“We are going to need a political transition in that region,” Obama said in
what sounded like a veiled reference to the announced goal of removing
President Assad.
"There will be some intermediate steps that we can take to apply more
pressure to the Assad regime, and we’re going to be continuing to work with all
the parties concerned to try to move forward on a diplomatic solution,” he
said, without specifying what those steps might be.
Several reports have shown over the past year that the US has been covertly
training insurgents in Jordan to fight against the Syrian government.
Reports have also revealed that the US shipped weapons to Jordan in order to
arm the foreign-backed militant groups.
During the meeting with Jordan’s king, Obama also pledged $1 billion in loan
guarantees to Jordan and a renewal of a five-year aid package, which is worth
$660 million a year and expires in September.
Shortly after the Geneva II talks between representatives of the Syrian
government and the foreign-backed opposition ended with no deals on February 1,
insurgents said that Washington had increased direct funding to their
commanders in Jordan in order to ramp up pressure on Assad’s government before
the next round of talks.
“From now until the next round of talks in Geneva, Assad will be under real
pressure — he will feel more pressure from opposition forces,” a militant
commander cited a US official as saying.
The “next round of talks in Geneva,” to which the US official had referred,
broke off without any results on Saturday as both the Syrian opposition and
government officials confirmed that they have been unable to make any progress,
with each side sticking to its own position.
Iranian ambassador to Lebanon has renewed call for an end to foreign
arms and financial aid to foreign-sponsored militants fighting against the
Syrian government.
“If there is really a political will in the UN and the international
community for the settlement of the Syria crisis, the flow of money and arms to
terrorists in Syria from outside must be stopped so that there will be a
possibility for an end to violence and the start of true negotiations,”
Ghazanfar Roknabadi said in a meeting with UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon
Derek Plumbly.
The UN official, for his part, underlined the need for addressing issues
related to the Syrian refugees, urging that practical measures should be taken
to find a political solution to Syria crisis.
Syria has been plagued by deadly crisis since March 2011.
Saudi Arabia has been the main supplier of weapons and funds to
foreign-backed militants inside Syria. The United States is also said to have
stepped up its financial support for the militants.
This comes as the second round of negotiations between the Syrian government
and the foreign-backed opposition in the Swiss city of Geneva hit a deadlock
due to sharp differences between the two sides.
UN-Arab League Special Envoy to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi said on Saturday that
talks to resolve the Syrian crisis broke off without any result and no date has
been yet set for another round.
The Syrian delegation says fighting terrorism should be the top priority.
But the opposition insists that formation of a transitional government and
resignation of President Bashar al-Assad must come first.
Hawkish US Senator John McCain has called on the Obama
administration to employ its already-devised plan of military intervention
against the Syrian government.
“The only way to achieve success at Geneva is to change the balance of power
on the ground,” McCain said in a statement on Saturday, referring to the
failure of the so-called Syria peace talks in Geneva.
“There are options far short of an Iraq-style invasion that can, and should,
be employed to change the calculation of the Syrian regime, stem the violence,
and ultimately achieve a negotiated political solution,” he added.
The second round of negotiations ended on Saturday without any concrete
results about the unrest in Syria.
“The second round of Syria peace talks ended today with no progress toward a
negotiated political settlement to the conflict and UN Special Envoy Lakhdar
Brahimi recognizing that failure is looming,” McCain said.
“After three weeks of talks, we are moving further and further away from a
peaceful political solution,” he argued.
The Arizona Republican senator also criticized President Barack Obama for
allowing Russia to put pressure on him.
“Russia has recently prevented the passage of a much-needed UN resolution on
bringing aid to desperate Syrian civilians,” he said. “Such actions indicate
that the Russian government is simply not a partner for peace in Syria and
cannot be relied on to help secure a successful outcome.”
During a press conference on Friday, White House press secretary Jay Carney
said there is no military solution for the crisis in Syria.
“The crisis in Syria is a crisis. The circumstances on
the ground are horrific that is why we have to bring the parties together to
try to compel them towards a negotiated political settlement because there
isn’t a military solution here,” Carney said.
What is wrong with the President sitting in a room, looking at lists and portraits of people-a Somali man, a seventeen-year-old girl, an American citizen-and deciding whom to kill? That, according to long and troubling articles in both the Times and Newsweek, is a job Barack Obama has assigned himself. His aides, notably John Brennan, his counter-terrorism adviser, portray it as a matter of taking responsibility-if we are going to assassinate someone, or call in a drone strike to take out a camp in Yemen, the President should make the call-as if our only alternative were some sort of rogue operation, with generals or C.I.A. agents shooting at will. But responsibility involves accountability, which is something, in this case, that appears to be badly lacking. Obama has not taken on a burden, but instead has given the Presidency a novel power.
The "kill list" story is a reminder of how much language matters, and how dangerous it is when the plain meaning of a word is ignored. Each might include a mini-glossary: "baseball cards," for the PowerPoint slides with the biographies and faces of targets; "Terror Tuesday," meetings where targets are sorted out; "nominations" for death-marked finalists; "personality strikes" that aimed to kill a person, and "signature strikes" that went after a group of people whose names one didn't know because of the way they seemed, from pictures in the sky, to be acting. (From the Times piece, written by Jo Becker and Scott Shane: "The joke was that when the C.I.A. sees 'three guys doing jumping jacks,' the agency thinks it is a terrorist training camp, said one senior official.") Signature strikes were also known as TADS, for terrorist-attack-disruption strikes, or just as "crowd kills." Both articles explore Obama's halting efforts to confine signature strikes to Pakistan, rather than Yemen and Somalia, and how he ultimately didn't, really. This is the kind of attack that, in one incident mentioned by Daniel Klaidman in his Newsweek piece, led to "persuasive" reports of dozens of women and children dying. A lawyer who saw that on "Kill TV," the feed that let the military and lawyers watch strikes, said later, "If I were Catholic, I’d have to go to confession."
More disturbing than childish names for brutal things are the absurd meanings ascribed to more sober terms. The key ones are "civilians and combatants," and "due process."
How do you minimize civilian casualties in a conflict? Ask a military planner or human-rights organization or just a sensible person and each might come up with a list of tactics, plans, litmus tests. And there were apparently elements of that in the White House's conversations. But ask a sophist or, as it happens, the C.I.A., and you might get this suggestion: change the definition. As the Times described it, Obama embraced a disputed method for counting civilian casualties that did little to box him in. It in effect counts all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants, according to several administration officials, unless there is explicit intelligence posthumously proving them innocent.
In other words, if we thought that you were someone we should kill, and we did kill you, and you look to be the right age to be cast as an extra in a spy movie, you were guilty. Does that mean that, if a house is hit and the bodies of a father, mother, teen-age boy, and middle-school-aged girl are found entangled with each other, two are combatants and two are civilians?
These words are important because of the argument that we have to act to protect ourselves: there is a terrorist on a screen; hit him now. But how are we deciding who a terrorist is? In some cases, we don’t even know the names of people we're killing, in countries where we are not actually at war. In others, we do know their names, and don't care who dies with them. (In one strike, in which the identity of the man was known, according to the Times, Obama made a deliberate decision to kill his wife and in-laws along with him).
The method we have built, over a couple of hundred years, for sorting out questions of guilt and innocence and probable cause, is due process. And that may be the most degraded phrase of all.
The Obama Administration has sought and killed American citizens, notably Anwar al-Awlaki. As the Times noted, "The Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel prepared a lengthy memo justifying that extraordinary step, asserting that while the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee of due process applied, it could be satisfied by internal deliberations in the executive branch." In other words, it's due process if the President thinks about it. One wonders how low the standard for "internal deliberations" are-if it might be enough if Obama mulled it over while walking his dog. And if an American whom the President decides is a threat can be assassinated in Yemen, where Awlaki was hit, why not in London, or Toronto, or Los Angeles? (Awlaki's teen-age son, an American citizen who had not been accused of anything, died in a separate strike).
These are not far-fetched concerns. The Times quoted Michael Hayden, who served as the director of the C.I.A. under George Bush:
"This program rests on the personal legitimacy of the president, and that's not sustainable," Mr. Hayden said. "I have lived the life of someone taking action on the basis of secret O.L.C. memos, and it ain't a good life. Democracies do not make war on the basis of legal memos locked in a D.O.J. safe."
As Jane Mayer has written in The New Yorker, drone strikes, as opposed to ground troops, bring with them a comforting illusion of distance. Picturing Obama going through the lists in a bright office in Washington shows where that daydream leads, and how deceptive it can be. A drone-based conflict may, in the short run, keep some troops from harm, but it may also take the debate about war and peace out of the public sphere and into what is, in political terms, a much darker space.
Brennan and other officials interviewed by the Times and Newsweek said that Obama had enormous faith in himself. It would be more responsible, though, if he had less-if he thought that he was no better than any other President we've had or ever will. The point isn't just the task, or burden, he takes on, but the machine he has built for his successors to use.
Perhaps, just to suggest a range, he could picture each of the Republican contenders from this past season being walked through the process, told how it works, shown some of those video clips with tiny people and big explosions, and taking it for a test drive. Never mind whether Obama, in particular, sighs or loses sleep or tosses a coin when he chooses a target: What would it mean for a bad, or craven, or simply carelessly accommodating President to do so? In the end we are not really being asked to trust Obama, or his niceness, but the office of the Presidency. Do we?
UK Foreign Secretary William Hague says that Iraq war has made it "a better place," as the British troops finally departed from Iraq.
"It is a much better place than we found it. Remember it was a ruthless dictatorship, and a menace and a danger to the peace of that region and the wider world,” Hague said regarding the end of British army's eight-year presence in Iraq.
"It has been worth doing what we've done," he added.
Britain has played a key role in the US-led invasion of Iraq which began in 2003, in which 46,000 British personnel were engaged.
The large number of British combat troops left Iraq in July 2009, but scores of the Royal Navy officers stayed at the port of Umm Qasr in order to train the Iraqi navy.
The remaining 81 sailors left Iraq on Sunday and formally put an end to the operation.
Former British prime minister Tony Blair had also said at his second appearance at Iraq Inquiry that the war had made the world safer, saying he had no regrets about the war that removed the Iraqi “monster.”
Britain's decision to join the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq was made 18 months before the invasion in exchange for an oil “prize”, newly revealed documents say.
The secret documents - now released - shed more light on the UK government's motives behind joining the intervention.
British foreign intelligence service MI6 had said nearly 18 months before the invasion that the "prize" for removing the executed Iraqi dictator Saddam was "new security to oil supplies," said the newly declassified documents published by The Daily Mail on Friday.
According to the papers, master spies at the MI6 had talked out the issue with the then cabinet ministers, to which they openly supported “regime change” in Iraq. The plan included a coup to topple Saddam's regime, the secret papers said.
The documents, which Sir Richard Dearlove, the then head of the MI6 had discussed with then Prime Minister Tony Blair's top foreign policy adviser Sir David Manning on December 2001, even included plans, which could “head off” the US government from pursuing regime change in Iraq.
These documents add credibility to critics arguments that the real motive of the United States and Britain to go to war with the Iraqi regime was to control the country's vast oil deposits.
A Middle East expert at MI6 identified only as 'SIS4' had written one of the reports.
"At our meeting on 30 November we discussed how we could combine an objective of regime change in Baghdad with the need to protect important regional interests which would be at grave risk," Dearlove wrote to David.
The MI6 report also admitted three months after the 9/11 attacks on the United States that there was “no convincing intelligence (or common sense) case” that Iraq supported extremists, The Telegraph reported.
Without UN authorization, Britain joined the US in March 2003 in invading Iraq to topple the Saddam regime based on claims of stockpiling weapons of mass destruction.
More than eight years after the invasion, no trace of WMDs has been found, with hundreds of thousands of civilians killed and millions more got sick or dislocated from their place of birth.
The new-documents released by the Iraq war Inquiry has confirmed that Tony Blair and his communications advisor Alistair Campbell made up a pack of lies to involve Britain in an illegal war.
Following the revelation of the top military intelligence official, Michael Laurie, that Iraq dossier was written to make case of war, analysts said that the Iraq Inquiry is aimed at finding errors which have been made by the UK officials in invading to Iraq, has been leading depressing affair.
They believed that the Chilcot Inquiry into Iraq war has already cost millions of pounds, and lasted for two years and exactly when the key witnesses stood at the Inquiry to give evidence on the disastrous Iraq War, the inquiry officials started asking imprecise and inadequate questions.
The devastating evidence by Major General Michael Laurie proves that Tony Blair and Alastair Campbell were slippery, unashamed and able to mislead not only the Inquiry but the families of about 200 British soldiers who laid down their lives in this illegal bloody war.
In a statement published on Iraq Inquiry website, General Michael Laurie who was in charge of commanding and delivering raw and analyzed intelligence, said, "I am writing to comment on the position taken by Alastair Campbell during his evidence to you … when he stated that the purpose of the dossier was not to make a case for war; I and those involved in its production saw it exactly as that, and that was the direction we were given."
The evidence openly contradicted the claims of the former government about the dossier and perhaps more considerably, what the former Prime Minister Tony Blair and Campbell said at the time it was published right seven months before the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Laurie said he could remember that the chief of defense intelligence, Air Marshal Sir Joe French, was "frequently inquiring whether we were missing something" and was under pressure.
"We could find no evidence of planes, missiles or equipment that related to WMD [weapons of mass destruction], generally concluding that they must have been dismantled, buried or taken abroad. There has probably never been a greater detailed scrutiny of every piece of ground in any country."
Despite the uncovered lies, the treachery and corruption, the increasing violence of the state, the broken promises, breaking the law and order, collapse of the economy, there still remains a group of loyalists who have closed their eyes and speak sweetly of the so-called warmonger.
The data, released by the bureau on Saturday, indicates that the Israeli regime started over 114 settlement units during the 10-month construction freeze Tel Aviv announced in November 2009, Ha'aretz newspaper reported.
The 114 units, the construction of which began during the so-called freeze have now been completed, as well as over 1,175 other units that started constructing before the partial moratorium, which excluded al-Quds (Jerusalem).
The data also reveals that construction of over 427 housing units has begun since the expiration of the freeze in late September.
The figures released by the Central Bureau of Statistics are, however, based on partial information and do not cover a reportedly dramatic rise in illegal construction in West Bank outposts, which are not officially documented.
It does not include caravans and tents that are often placed in illegal outposts in order to settle in the land, either.
Israel's insistence to resume its West Bank settlement construction projects -- deemed by the international community as illegal -- prompted Palestinian Authority negotiators to walk out a new round of US-sponsored direct talks.
Palestinians have repeatedly voiced concern about Israel's efforts to wipe out the Islamic and Palestinian identity of the occupied territories, East al-Quds in particular, to effectively render the establishment of a future Palestinian state unfeasible.
The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) has slammed the US for vetoing a UN Security Council resolution condemning illegal settlement activities by Israel on occupied Palestinian territories.
"It is a devastating blow to the credibility of international efforts to resume the peace process," OIC said in a statement on Saturday.
The Islamic organization with 57 member states said that the US move “will only encourage Israel to continue its violations.”
The group also urged the Israeli regime to end its settlement activities in the West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem).
Despite the support of the Security Council's 14 other members of the Arab-backed resolution, the United States used its veto power to block the resolution.
Iran also joined other states to condemn the US for blocking the resolution.
“The resolution was approved by the permanent members of the Security Council (except the US), the member states of the Organization of the Islamic Conference and other UN members,” said Iran's ambassador to the UN Mohammad Khazaei late Friday after the council wrapped up voting on the resolution.
However, the single “no” vote by the US could annul the unanimous “yes” vote by the other fourteen members, the Iranian official added.
“The fact that a single vote can revoke the vote of the majority shows the Security Council is structurally weak,” Khazaei noted.
“This US move once again undermined the credibility of the Security Council,” the top Iranian diplomat went on to say.
Fourteen countries on Friday voted in favor of a resolution condemning Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank and East al-Quds, but US Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice vetoed it.
“Such cases show the Security Council cannot guarantee to safeguard people's lives and possessions,” he noted.
The United Nation has repeatedly condemned Israel for defying international calls to halt its settlement construction activities.
Palestinians view Israel's unrelenting settlement construction activities as a major hurdle smothering their efforts to establish an independent state on the territories Israel captured in the 1967 Six-Day War.
According to data from the Palestinian Information Center, Israel has demolished 995 Palestinian homes and displaced 5,783 individuals -- among them 3,109 children -- in the occupied al-Quds since the start of 2000.
The US has vetoed a UN Security Council resolution that would have condemned Israeli settlements as "illegal" and called for an immediate halt to all settlement building.
All 14 other Security Council members voted in favour of the resolution, which was backed by the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), on Friday.
Mark Lyall Grant, the British ambassador to the UN, speaking on behalf of his country, France and Germany, condemned Israeli settlements in the West Bank. "They are illegal under international law," he said.
He added that the European Union's three biggest nations hope that an independent state of Palestine will join the UN as a new member state by September 2011.
The veto by the administration of Barack Obama, the US president, is certain to anger Arab countries and Palestinian supporters around the world.
An abstention would have angered the Israelis, the closest ally of Washington in the region, as well as Democratic and Republican supporters of Israel in the US Congress.
The UN says it opposes settlements in principal, but says that the UN Security Council is not the appropriate venue for resolving the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Susan Rice, the US ambassador to the UN, told council members that the veto "should not be misunderstood to mean we support settlement activity".
"While we agree with our fellow council members and indeed with the wider world about the folly and illegitimacy of continued Israeli settlement activity, we think it unwise for this council to attempt to resolve the core issues that divide Israelis and Palestinians," she said.
Palestinians said the veto is counterproductive to the peace process and will help Israel maintain illegal buildings.
"The American veto does not serve the peace process and encourages Israel to continue settlements, and to escape the
obligations of the peace process," said Nabil Abu Rdainah, a close aide to Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president.
Al Jazeera's Cal Perry in Ramallah, West Bank, said the decision is "not going down well in the occupied West Bank".
"People are really wondering when some action is going to be taken," he said.
"People here are tired of a lack of a peace process; they are tired that the two sides are not talking; they are tired that they continue to hear, especially the US president Barack Obama continue to say that human dignity cannot be denied.
"He's been saying it all throughout the protests in Eqypt; he's been saying it all through the protests that continue to sweep across the region and the Palestinian people are saying: 'What about us?'"
PA pressured
Earlier, the Obama administration had tried to exert pressure on the Palestinian Authority to drop the UN resolution in exchange for other measures, but this was rejected by the authoirty.
The decision to back the resolution was made unanimously by the PLO's executive and the central committee of Abbas's Fatah movement on Friday, at a meeting to discuss Obama's appeal to Abbas by telephone a day earlier.
"The Palestinian leadership has decided to proceed to the UN Security Council, to pressure Israel to halt settlement activities. The decision was taken despite American pressure," said Wasel Abu Yousef, a PLO executive member.
Obama, who had said Israeli settlements in territories it captured in a 1967 war are illegal and unhelpful to the peace process, has argued that the resolution could shatter hopes of reviving the stalled talks.
In a 50-minute phone call on Thursday, he asked Abbas to drop the resolution and settle for a non-binding statement condemning settlement expansion, Palestinian officials said.
'Goldstone 2'
"Caving in to American pressure and withdrawing the resolution will constitute Goldstone 2," said a Palestinian official, speaking on terms of anonymity before the meeting.
He was referring to the wave of protest in October 2009 accusing Abbas of caving in to US pressure by agreeing not to submit for adoption a UN report that accused Israel and Hamas of war crimes during the invasion of Gaza two years ago.
Abbas maintains he insisted on submitting the report.
The Palestinians say continued building flouts the internationally-backed peace plan that will permit them to create a viable, contiguous state on the 1967 land, after a treaty with Israel to end its occupation and 62 years of conflict.
Israel says this is an excuse for avoiding peace talks and a precondition never demanded before during 17 years of negotiations, which has so far produced no agreement.
The diplomatic standoff is complicated by the effects of Middle East turmoil on the Arab League, whose members backed the resolution.
Egypt, a dominant member, and Tunisia are preoccupied with their transitions from deposed autocracies, and protests are flaring in Libya, Yemen and Bahrain.
Washington is trying to revive peace talks stalled since September over Israel's refusal to extend a moratorium on settlement building and Abbas's refusal to negotiate further until the Israelis freeze the illegal buildings.
'Nothing to lose'
Obama initially pressured Israel to maintain the moratorium only to relent in the run-up to the 2010 US mid-term elections to avoid, some analysts said, alienating key voters.
Instead of the resolution, Obama told Abbas he would back a fact-finding visit by a delegation of the UN Security Council to the occupied territories.
One PLO official said the leadership was determined not to cave in "even if our decision leads to a diplomatic crisis with the Americans", adding: "Now we have nothing to lose."
Since 2000, 14 Security Council resolutions have been vetoed by one or more of the five permanent members - Britain, China, France, Russia and the US. Of those, 10 were US vetoes, nine of them related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon's spokesman -- Martin Nesirky -- has laid down the rules in regards to what the Secretary General did -- and did not -- want to talk about.
Secretary General Ban spoke on the latest developments in the Midle East - most notably in Bahrain -- calling for sincere dialogue between the people and their governments. He did not -- however -- touch upon the pending resolution in the Security Council condemning Israeli settlements.
At noon -- Press TV asked the spokesman -- Nesirky -- about the resolution -- which will be voted upon on Friday -- and got this response.
American UN Ambassador Susan Rice has reportedly offered Palestinian diplomats a deal where the U.S. would agree to a statement affirming the Security Council "does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlement activity."
The Palestinian Authrority has rejected the American offer -- and a vote on a stronger -- binding resolution could come soon.
American officals have said repeatedly that the Security Council is not the place to hash out the issue -- and an American veto on the stronger measure is likely.
Critics are having a field day with the American flip flop -- including former American U.N. Ambassador John Bolton -- who questions President Obama's handling of the Egyptian revolution and other developments in the Middle East.
By close of business at the UN on Friday -- compromise statements were reportedly delivered to Arab diplomats at the UN -- with Security Council President Maria Luiza Ribeiro Viotti of Brazil advocating a stronger "presidential statement."
It is not known how that statement was recieved -- or if it will be voted on in the Security Council.
If nothing changes overnight -- however -- most signs point to yet another American veto
Protected by Tel Aviv's US-equipped army, Israeli settlers terrorize, harass and murder Palestinians on a daily basis without fear of punishment. (File photo)
Thousands of US citizens, American groups and organizations have called on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to pass a resolution against Israeli war crimes in Palestine.
The move comes as the UNSC prepares to debate a resolution on illegal Israeli settlement activities in the West Bank and East al-Quds (Jerusalem).
The draft Security Council resolution reaffirms that Israel's settlements "are illegal and constitute a major obstacle to the achievement of a just, lasting and comprehensive peace" in the Middle East.
However, the administration of US President Barak Obama has threatened to use its veto power to once again protect Israel from abiding by international law.
"New York is not the place to resolve the longstanding conflict and outstanding issues between the Israelis and the Palestinians," US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had said in January, in a statement which almost certainly affirms Obama's plan to veto the vote.
On Wednesday, political activist Richard Grave, told IRNA that America's credibility in the world is threatened by its constant protection of Israel.
In a petition, launched by the US Campaign to End Israeli Occupation, the signatories warned that a veto would only damage Obama's reliability, as it would clearly contradict what the US president has been saying for the past 19 months.
Since his rise to power in 2009, Obama has made a settlement freeze the focus of his attempts to resurrect direct Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
The signatories also reminded the US president of his 2009 speech in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, where he said the United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements and urged Israel to stop its construction activity.
Tel Aviv's continued construction in the occupied West Bank and East al-Quds is seen as the main bone of contention between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, and is blamed for derailing several rounds of talks between the two sides.
Apart from that, according to rights groups, Israeli settlers terrorize, harass and kill Palestinians on a daily basis without fear of recrimination or legal ramifications.
For example, on January 27, an Israeli settler shot dead Odai Qadous, an 18-year-old shepherd tending his flock of sheep in the West Bank. And on the very next day, more than 100 Israeli settlers stormed the same region, fatally shooting 15-year-old Yousef Ekhlil.
The tragic deaths serve as a stark reminder that the half million Israeli settlers, protected by the US-equipped Israeli army, are responsible for some of the most egregious human rights abuses suffered by Palestinians every day, the petition read.
Despite international criticisms, the US, a staunch ally to Israel, has, so far, vetoed over 40 anti-Israeli resolutions sought by the council since 1972.
Since 2004, Washington has prevented the adoption of four other resolutions that called for Tel Aviv to halt its operations in the Gaza Strip.
Analysts believe that Washington's unwavering support for Tel Aviv has made the United States an accomplice in Israeli actions.
Iran's top security official Saeed Jalili has called for an international tribunal to put former British Prime Minister Tony Blair on trial for war crimes.
The Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council told a press conference in Istanbul, Turkey that Blair should be tried as a war criminal at an international court for his complicity in the killing of hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq.
In his second appearance at the Iraq War Inquiry in London on Friday, Blair unleashed an all-out attack on Iran, accusing the Islamic Republic of posing a “looming challenge” to the West by pursuing its nuclear activities.
The Iranian official reacted to the allegations, noting that “Blair should first save himself at the trial.”
“A dispute arises at this point over the fact that why some people allow themselves to violate the rights of other nations and kill hundreds of thousands of innocent people, but nobody neither issues a resolution against them nor questions them in this regard,” Jalili said.
Bringing up the question that why the UK government is the only nation that tries Blair, the top Iranian official stressed that “he attacked Iraq without United Nation's authorization, an act that contributed to the death of hundreds of thousands of people. But nobody questions him today.”
The former British Prime Minister and the then US president George W. Bush are complicit in the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Blair made all the crucial decisions that led Britain to become the second-biggest contributor of troops to the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
Dozens of anti-war protesters gathered outside the Chilcot Inquiry venue to demonstrate their mounting outrage over Blair's decision to take Britain into an illegal conflict.
British newspapers have unanimously blasted former Prime Minister Tony Blair for acting as a pawn in the hands of the former US President by invading Iraq on March 2003 under his command.
Blair was grilled, for the second time on Friday, by the official Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq war where he insisted he was deeply regretful for the loss of life in the conflict, sparking angry shouts of "too late" from dead troopers' families.
The Independent said Blair's "gung-ho" attitude showed the "folly" of his position on Iraq, adding that the "disastrous consequences remain clear for all to see."
The Guardian said "for the most part, the old stager belted out familiar tunes" in a display of "chutzpah".
"It is not a trial, but the inquiry must nonetheless settle whether the former prime minister swept three particular things away -- the truth, the law and proper decision-making. Of these three, Blair yesterday acquitted himself with least damage on the last," it added.
The Daily Mail said it was "a predictably polished, slippery" performance, full of "self-justifying claptrap".
"Mr Blair agreed in secret to wage the Iraq war -- then lied, cheated and manipulated to make it happen," the daily said.
"To this day, his actions stain the national conscience."
The Sun said "nothing divides Britain more than our part in the war against the evil regime of Saddam Hussein".
The Daily Telegraph said "so relentless is the chorus that the public has given up trying to listen to what he has to say, assuming that it is all glib self-justification".
The Times sketch writer Ann Treneman said "the whole place was a "virtual floatation tank of emotion".
According to the Times, Blair's expression of regret over the lives lost in front of bereaved relatives seemed "like some sort of reckoning. Imperfect and messy, yes. Dysfunctional, certainly. But a reckoning, nonetheless".
The Daily Mirror said nobody's mind would be changed by the inquiry.
"It is the process which was at fault rather than any preconceived mendacity on the part of Mr Blair, a politician motivated by good intentions who made a catastrophic error."
The Daily Express agreed, decribing the inquiry as "pointless".
"Everybody by now must have reached a settled view. Clearly Blair massively overstated the case for believing Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. Equally there was always a case for removing the monster on human rights grounds and for staying close to America."
"As it happens, the negatives heavily outweighed the positives," it said, adding "that is really all anyone needs to know."
During a fresh grilling at Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War, ex-UK Premier Tony Blair has claimed that Iran considered a democratic Iraq an “existential threat”.
In the recently-held session of the Inquiry, Blair claimed that some states in the Middle East region believe the US-led invasion of Iraq made Iran more powerful.
The former British Prime Minister made the allegation irrespective of the fact that Iran owes its weight in the region to its support for democratically-elected governments of Muslim countries against those installed by foreign hands.
He said his response to such criticisms is that Iran needed to be dealt with differently than it was the policy in the 1980s, which was erecting a Saddam-style dictatorship to wage war on the country.
He did not name Britain, though, as one of those pursuing the 'policy' of provoking Saddam against Iran leading to an eight-year war, which began in 1980 early after the Islamic revolution there, and lasted until 1988.
However his comments did ring a bell with the audience as how can a country like Britain which backed a dictator like Saddam just years ago could probably now be the harbinger of democracy in Iraq and how can someone conceive a similarly swift change of position by Iran to opposing democracy.
Blair seemed to imply Iran did prefer the dictatorship under Saddam in Iraq despite the fact that the dictator had imposed a devastating war on the country, and supported and accommodated one of the most notorious terrorist groupings, behind assassinations of leading Iranian prominent figures and officials, the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO).
The MKO was blacklisted by the US government as a terrorist grouping for masterminding the assassination of former Iranian president Mohammad-Ali Rajaee, and several other officials, yet the British lawmakers wrote to US President Barrack Obama in 2009 to follow the EU example and remove the group from the US' terror list.
The MKO terrorist members are now freely living and working in the UK.
Blair did not stop at that in his accusations when be blamed Iran for acting like what the al-Qaeda extremists are doing in Iraq.
He acknowledged Iran's influence in the Middle East, but not as a major Muslim nation which is leading efforts to curb the influence of bullying powers including Britain in the predominantly Muslim region.
The former premier claimed Iran's influence 'he is seeing everywhere' in the Middle East is “negative and destabilizing” and opposed to the peace process.
This comes against the backdrop of remarks made earlier this month by Iranian parliament speaker Ali Larijani in which he who called for “vigilance and solidarity” among Iraqis to safeguard the sustenance of their unity government of Shiites and Sunnis against the divisive plots of the occupiers.
Larijani's point was echoed by Blair when he said they believed before the invasion that extremism was an “encrustment” in Iraq but later they came to know that the 'ideology' by which he meant Islam had “a far greater reach than we like to accept”.
That was the point where Blair let the cat out of the bag by equating extremism, which should be fought in Iraq, with Islam and by extension implying that the very faith is the source of his hostile remarks toward Iran.
He further strengthened such an impression when he said Iran is opposed to the western way of life, and not the do-called democracy in the western world.
In yet another blow to former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's credibility, the Chilcot Inquiry into the war on Iraq has released several declassified documents which open the door to quite serious evidence about the build-up to the US-led invasion of the country.
The Iraq War Inquiry has found out that the private secretary at No 10 routinely deleted any mention of Blair's correspondence with the US President Bush from the government minutes at the time.
Meanwhile, it was reported that after talks with Blair, Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O'Donnell has refused to declassify the letters, written in the run-up to the 2003 invasion between Bush and Blair.
One of the declassified documents and the most important one, maybe, was the transcript of the minutes of a private hearing attended by former chairman of Joint Intelligence Committee, Sir John Scarlett, and former chief of the assessment staff, Julian Miller.
Scarlet has admitted his team were 'bulldozed' into drawing conclusions about Saddam's weapons of mass destruction 'by the military time-table' which created a rush to war.
This document was immediately deleted from the list of the released declassified documents, but to our readers' fortune we managed to download a copy of the transcript which is attached to this article.
Tony Blair's remarks on his second appearance at Chilcot Inquiry have sparked different reactions across the political spectrum.
Followings are summarized version of his remarks.
On UN resolution
America and England had tried to obtain the second UN resolution. Chile and Mexico "caught between a rock and a hard place" since they wanted to give a support but France had warned a veto. French had informed that they would veto any resolution. Then American/French relationship had turned into "very scratchy" relation.
On complying with the UN resolutions
France asserted that Saddam Hussein had toed the line partly with weapons inspectors. However, it was not wise to permit the weapons inspectors the further time as Saddam was not straight about complying with the UN resolutions.
On Saddam Hussein
The Iraqi president Saddam had made the threats of killing the families of who complied with weapons inspectors. This is not considered as a logical compliance.
The Former Prime Minister said that Saddam Hussein would probably be the president of Iraq if America and England had stepped back from Iraq.
On Goldsmith legal advice
Regarding his ignorance to the legal advice of Lord Goldsmith, his top adviser, Tony Blair has admitted that he wished he had welcomed Goldsmith's warning and he had been more engaged with the UN Resolution 1441.
On assuring Bush
Tony Blair had convinced American president George Bush to close the eyes to his own government's guidance. Blair had pledged the American president that Britain would support US in the invasion. Blair told Bush “You can count on us, but here are the issues and difficulties” which he later sketched out privately to President Bush.
On changing the Iraqi regime
The fact of changing the Iraqi regime was not considered as the UK policy Iraq but to deal with the WMD issue. The US president desired a change in the Iraqi regime.
On dealing with Iraq
The principal subject of the British cabinet had been the problems of Iraq. The Iraq threat had needed to be dealt with. The former Labour party leader has been proud of rooting out Saddam Hussein.
Tony Blair refuted the idea of preparing for the outcome of the Iraq war, saying that it was left to the American president.
On September 11
Tony Blair has argued that the Britain government had acted side by side with the American government after the terroristic attacks of September 11.
The draft resolution, sponsored by more than 120 countries, was put to the Security Council in order to place the issue of settlements before the UN group's jurisdiction. However, the draft resolution was not brought to a vote. Iran's ambassador to the U.N. says the draft provides a good way to measure the resolve of the Council -- especially the
Permanent 5.
More than 120 nations signed on in support of this draft resolution. Notably absent from that list -- however -- are Western countries such as the United States -- the United Kingdom -- France -- Germany and Canada. Diplomats from those countries -- however - condemned Israeli settlement building in their statements before the Security Council today.
U.S. Ambassador Rosemary DeCarlo called Israeli settlement construction "corrosive" to the peace-making process. She did -- however -- continue to voice her support for a two - state solution. The Lebanese ambassador says it shouldn't be that hard for the U.S. to agree to the statement -- since there's nothing in it that America hasn't agreed to before.
Security council members that have already signed on to the statement also include Brazil -- India and South Africa. The Brazilian ambassador says that the two state solution that the US is pushing might be impossible to implement -- considering the rate at which Israeli construction is progressing. The Palestinian Permanent Observer representative says he'd like to see a real resolution written up and voted on immediately -- but he's willing to work with Security Council members on the issue.
Many insiders say the real statement may be voted on later this month -- while others say the vote could be further away.
But some ambassadors tell Press TV that there are still adjustments to be made in the language of the statement before it can be voted on.
Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair had given false evidence to the parliament in the run-up to the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, says a top former official.
Lord Goldsmith, Tony Blair's top legal advisor at the time, told the Iraq War Inquiry that the prime minister misled parliament by claiming that Britain could legally attack Iraq even without a United Nation's approval, British media reported.
In evidence to the Chilcot Inquiry, the former attorney general said, he had told Blair two month before the invasion that an attack on Iraq would not be legal without a fresh UN mandate.
But, Goldsmith said, the former Labor prime minister told the MPs in a statement on 15 January 2003 that there were “circumstances” in which an attack could be legal without UN approval.
"There are circumstances in which a [UN] resolution is not necessary, because it is necessary to be able to say in circumstances where an unreasonable veto is put down that we would still act," Blair said during the speech.
Lord Goldsmith said he believed that UN resolution 1441, which was passed in November 2002 and declared Iraq in “material breach” of its obligations to disarm, was not sufficient to sanction war by the UK and United States.
In the new evidence to the inquiry, Lord Goldsmith said in his statement that the phrasing of resolution 1441 was "problematic".
He was not actively consulted on the final drafting of the resolution after telling Blair in October that the text as it stood did not authorize the use of force.
"I was not being sufficiently involved in the meetings and discussions about the resolution and the policy behind it that were taking place at ministerial level”, said Goldsmith.
"Much of the later difficulties could have been avoided if my view had been sought on the drafts that were developed during the later stages of the negotiations, particularly bearing in mind the fact that I had not been persuaded that the early drafts achieved our objectives", he said.
The revelations will mount criticism of Blair, who will appear before the inquiry on Friday.
The reasons for the invasion of Iraq, as claimed by former US president George W. Bush and Tony Blair, were “to disarm Iraq of Weapons of Mass Destructions (WMDs)”.
The claims were revealed afterwards to be empty slogans as the invading governments failed to discover any kinds of WMDs and the US government later confirmed that there were not the weapons for which the US mobilized its allies and went for war.
The war on Iraq killed thousands of people, including more than 4,400 US troops, and devastated the country infrastructure to the extent that its reconstruction would takes many years while the consequences of the invasion would plague the Iraqi people forever.
Arab nations are set to formally demand that the United Nations Security Council to condemn Israel over its illegal settlement constructions.
Arab envoys at the UN have decided to formally register a draft resolution against Tel Aviv at the Security Council before the end of Tuesday, Tunisia's UN envoy Ghazi Jomaa told reporters on Monday, AFP reported.
Jomaa, who also chairs the Arab group, said that the draft calls for a complete freeze on Israel's illegal construction activities on occupied Palestinian territories.
The Security Council is to discuss the Middle East and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on Wednesday.
Palestinian and other Arab negotiators are reportedly trying to persuade the United States not to veto the resolution.
The United States traditionally vetoes resolutions which condemn Israel.
Lebanon's envoy Nawaf Salam said more meetings would be held to decide when to press for a vote.
The Palestinians want the resolution passed to put pressure on Tel Aviv its illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank .
The 15-member Security Council has repeatedly condemned Israeli settlement activities in the past.
South Africa's Closing Argument Against Israel for Genocide at the ICJ
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