Your Voice in a World where Zionism, Steel, and Fire, have Turned Justice Mute

 

 

Trouble on the Western Front

 

The *FREE ARAB VOICE*
December 31'st, 1997

Merry X-mas, Happy New Year, and a blessed Ramadan everyone :)

In this issue of the Free Arab Voice we present:

1) Netanyahu's Statement on West Bank IS in the Spirit of Oslo: an
   article by Yasser Zaatrah

2) Tunisian Regime to Upgrade Ties with 'Israel', Violating Consensus,
    by the Free Arab Voice

3) Targeting Egypt via Sudan: On Albright's African Tour
    by Munir Shafeeq

4) Spain Annexes Moroccan Territories by Khaled Issa

5) Action Alert: Let's Publicize and Condemn the Criminal
   Consequences of Sanctions against Libya- Lift the Sanctions Now.
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For back issues of the Free Arab Voice and relevant articles,
please go to:
*AL-MOHARER AL-AUSTRALI* (Arabic/English)
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1) Netanyahu's Statement on West Bank IS in the Spirit of Oslo: an
article by Yasser Zaatreh

We really need to ask the fellow Palestinians who signed or supported
the Oslo Agreement, many of whom were enraged over Netanyahu's
pre-emptive proclamation that the West Bank is an integral part of
'Israel', since when self-autonomy as a concept began to imply the
independence of the self-autonomous territory from the state which
granted it!!  Doesn't self-autonomy by definition merely involve the
management of inhabitants, not the land they inhabit?

We should ask those who signed or supported Oslo exactly where in the
Agreement does it say 'withdrawal'? Isn't the exact term used
'redeployment'?

If the text of the Oslo Agreement grants no sovereignty on land but
refers rather to the administration of the locals, what's so odd about
Netanyahu handing over to the so-called Palestinian National Authority
(PNA) only heavily populated Palestinian areas leaving for his Jewish
settlers all else?!

Let's face it: when the researcher Israel Shahak commented four years
ago that Oslo is not in substance any different from the formula of the
collaborationist Village Associations (Rawabitt Al-Qurra) that 'Israel'
tried to impose on Palestinians in the seventies, he wasn't too far off
the mark.

That's why Netanyahu's stonewalling doesn't really top off that of
Shimon Perez.  Both stalled for time to build or expand settlements.

The same thing goes for the proportion of lands in which the Israeli
Army will be redeployed. As long as it's not heavily populated with
Palestinians, its size will increase or decrease depending on Israeli
mood, which is in turn allegedly determined by security considerations
which the Oslo Agreement gave priority to.

But then the supporters of Oslo might object that the questions of
sovereignty, settlements, borders, Jerusalem, and refugees were all
left to the negotiations on final status. In fact that is not even
denied by Netanyahu. The real question though is whether leaving the
door open for further negotiations will necessarily mean that their
outcome will be dictated by Arafat, not the physical balance of forces
on the ground which tends to favor the Israeli leadership.

Why won't those who signed that vague and loose agreement on our
behalf ask themselves what guarantees they got for attaining
sovereignty, Jerusalem, or other demands in the negotiations
for final status?

What are the actual pressures that will come to bear on the Israeli
leadership to cause it to respond to those demands, especially that
the Palestinian demands at stake are more or less the locus of a
consensus among different Israeli political shades, where the
differences among those shades have to do not with principle, but the
format of the self-autonomy that will alleviate the burden of
managing the Palestinians.

Finally we should question the current PLO leadership about what it
has now that can guarantee even the implementation of Oslo, or lesser
still, an effective response to Netanyahu's program.

If the answer is 'nothing', then perhaps it's time for the PLO
leadership to heed the advice of its Political Officer, Farouq
Al-Qadoumi, to head right back to Tunisia...
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2) Tunisian Regime to Upgrade Ties with 'Israel'

Not even three days had passed since the Islamic Conference in Tehran
came to an end when Tunisian authorities submitted a sudden REQUEST to
the Israeli Foreign Ministry to upgrade the level of diplomatic
representation between the two regimes.

In Tehran, Arab leaders seemed to have reached, after protracted
chaos, a minimum level of understanding on how to handle Israeli
intransigence, and total disregard for Arab and Muslim feelings by
continuing to confiscate Arab lands and to Judaize Islamic holy sites
for example.

Then the Zionist penetration played out from Tunisia with the
purpose of breaking the consensus that emerged in the Islamic
Conference in Iran.

To add insult to injury the Tunisian authorities resolved to settle
the Israeli delegation in Tunisia in permanent premises after letting
it operate out of temporary headquarters from a hotel in the capital
Tunis.

Thus instead of moving towards freezing all trade and economic ties,
and halting the circus of normalization with 'Israel', the Tunisian
regime selected the opportunistic low road in the hope of cashing in
on the new general Arab and Islamic resolve to withstand pro-Zionist
U.S. pressure for unconditional capitulation before Netanyahu.

However the gamble will backfire, and the Tunisian regime will be
weakened as it exposes itself to the possible risk of at least some
Arab and Islamic isolation. But then again it might be counting on
the political support of Nato troops, but that is an entirely different
ball game (which we tackle in a related article below).
        The Free Arab Voice

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3) Targeting Egypt via Sudan: On Albright's African Tour
   by Munir Shafeeq

Albright's bold statements after her meeting with Jon Garang and four
of his entourage at the helm of the movement to secede the Sudanese
south, pulled aside that fake cloak with which the U.S. Administration
used to sheath its policies in the region of the African Great Lakes,
towards rebellion in southern Sudan, and in the way of inciting
neighboring states to war against the state of Sudan.

Albright exposed it all this time: her cards as well as those of many
regional co-conspirators hellbent with the U.S. Administration and the
Mosaad upon breaking up Sudan, controlling the lifeline of the Nile,
and setting up in the capital Khartoum a pro-western puppet regime.

Unashamedly Albright voiced support for the separatist rebellion in
southern Sudan while calling out to the Sudanese opposition to pull
its ranks together- behind Zionist and U.S. strategy -of course-
to launch a military offensive and resort to all available means
to clinch power in Khartoum.

That is of course an overt interference in Sudan's internal
affairs, a blunt call to resort to violence and terrorism, and
an undisputable effort to divide up the sovereign state of Sudan.

But these policies and practices contradict sharply the principles
of international law and the codes of international relations.
Yet their active adoption by the U.S. government leaves no room for
any doubt that the justifications it furnished for its pro-Zionist
Mideast policies, especially those ostensibly based on protecting
human rights, defending international legitimacy, or stopping Mideast
violence, are nothing but a fine collection of quintessential lies.

Here the question arises as to the particular timing Albright chose
to drop the fig leaf instead of going on with the traditional game of
conducting U.S. policy from behind ornate charades.

Interestingly enough, Albright's tour occurred right after the
government in Khartoum almost concluded a peace deal with Jon Garang,
which she had already thwarted while in the final phases.

More importantly however, her tour came on the heels of a drastic
improvement in Egyptian-Sudanese relations and Sudanese government
calls for a major and effective Egyptian role in the mediation to
resolve the south Sudanese problem.

This means that the nervous and outlandish moves Albright ventured
in her African tour may have been directed at Egyptian-Sudanese
relations.

More to the point, they targeted Egypt and its Arab, Sudanese, and
African roles as much as they targeted Sudan and its regime,
territorial integrity, identity, and future.

Predictably U.S.-Israeli strategy always moved to isolate Sudan from
Egypt, wreaking havoc between the two Arab and Islamic neighboring
states whenever possible. The same strategy consistently sought to
tear up Sudan to pieces and to place a client regime in Khartoum to
complete the process of suffocating and besieging Egypt as the
cornerstone of the colonial strategy to implode and subdue the whole
Arab landscape to total U.S.-Israeli control.

Swallowing up Sudan thus becomes the natural complement to the military
siege from the side of the Gulf, the Turkish-Israeli pact from the side
of the Syrian north, in addition to the military presence borne out by
the Jewish state in Palestine.

On the western front, the Spanish Al Mondo revealed in December a
secret document in which the U.S-led Nato alliance endorsed the
formation of a force of 50-thousand strong, to be headquartered in
Spain, for speedy military intervention in the western states of the
Arab Maghreb likeMorocco, Algeria, and Tunisia.

Then after all that we still manage to find some Arabs among us whose
feelings actually get hurt upon hearing any criticism of the U.S.
government!!
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4) Spain Annexes Moroccan Territories by Khaled Issa

Nato's recently unveiled plans to interfere militarily if need be in
Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia, with a force of 50-thousand to be
headquartered in Spain prepared especially for that purpose, coincided
with a Spanish declaration formally announcing the annexation to
Spain of the Spanish-occupied Moroccan cities of Sabtah and Mlilah,
as well as the [British] colony of Gibraltar and the Khaldat Islands.

In what might sound like an Arabian broken record, this reflects
Spain's total disregard for the agreements for cooperation and good
neighborly relations signed between Madrid and Rabat in 1991.

But that should make us all wonder how come 'Israel' and the west
find it so easy to habitually violate our rights and sovereignty
in spite of our willingness to sign treaties giving away plenty
of concessions and to abandon rights by the dozen..

Hasn't the time come for us to try a different approach?
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5) Action Alert: Let's Publicize and Condemn the Criminal
Consequences of Sanctions against Libya- Lift the Sanctions NOW

Libyan financial losses from sanctions imposed since 1992 have reached
$24 billion according to an official report published by the Popular
Committee for Abroad Communications (the equivalent of the Libyan
Foreign Ministry).

The report points out that the energy, manufacturing and agricultural
sectors were especially hard-hit due to lack of spare parts or raw
materials.

The resulting economic suffering of the Libyan people has been enormous.
For example, as a result of the sanctions regime, Libyan Airlines have
been grounded with hundreds of related jobs lost, in addition to
isolation from the outside world.

More importantly, the report indicates death rates have increased due
to the deterioration in the health sector. And because no flights are
allowed into or out of Libya, most of the seventeen thousand medical
cases that required some kind of treatment abroad simply DIED.

Hence in spite of resolutions to lift the sanctions on Libya by the
Arab League, most recently by the Islamic Conference, they remain
in place as an inhumane tool of collective punishment and a ruthless
weapon of mass-destruction.

Let's give this issue its fair share of activist attention in
Letters to editors, articles, petitions, and speeches, even
daily conversation..

Let's not join in the criminal silence shrouding the use of this
weapon of death and destruction against the Libyan people.

Lift the sanctions against Libya NOW.
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Correction: On Tuesday, 16 December 1997, David McLau wrote us
concerning the article on the Jewish Khazars by Tawfic Abdul-Fattah
in the last issue of the Free Arab Voice :

That was good but just to be academically correct, you should have
added the following phrase :

The Story of the non-Semitic Jews by Tawfic Abdul-Fattah, as based
upon the book review by Grace Halsell, as appeared in The Washington
Report For Middle East Affairs, June 1991 of the book,The Thirteenth
Tribe -The Khazar Empire and Its Heritage, by Arthur Koestler. Random
House, 1976. 256 pp.  List: $9.95; AET: $7.95 for one, $9.95 for two.

For more info on Khazars.
The Khazar Heritage!

The Khazaria Info Center
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FAV Editor: Ibrahim Alloush Editor@freearabvoice.org
Co-editors: Nabila Harb Harb@freearabvoice.org
  Muhammad Abu Nasr Nasr@freearabvoice.org
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