The racism of Roger Cohen: a new low for the New York Times on Arabs

Just a few days ago I wrote that Roger Cohen is the least unreasonable among those who write on the Middle East in the New York Times. How wrong I was.  Look at this utter racist trash by someone who stopped for a few days in Beirut (and visited Al-Akhbar's offices and received a good lecture about Zionist media).  Look at his words:  "This mocking “analysis” is often deployed deadpan by my colleague, Robert Worth, the New York Times correspondent in Beirut. After three years living in Lebanon and crisscrossing the Arab world, he uses this “theory” to express his frustration with the epidemic of cui bono thinking in the region.   I say “thinking,” but that’s generous. What we are dealing with here is the paltry harvest of captive minds."  Can you imagine if this was said about Jewish people or Africans?  Can you imagine the uproar?  All those who write in the New York Times should write under the headline: Proud to be Racist (and ignorant).   In fact, you can easily dissect his words: you can easily see that what is referring to as irrational thinking among Lebanese is very rational indeed: that the US exploits the Hariri tribunal and all UN agencies; that Israel has penetrated all communications systems in Lebanon, and now even Mubarak regime (a friend of Israel) has accused Israel of recruiting spies in Syria and Lebanon to penetrate the telecommunications systems; that Hariri himself was a tool of Syrian mukhabrat and not a foe of the Syrian regime.  In fact, the stupidity is in the analysis of Cohen and not in the thinking of those Lebanese he thought he was mocking.  Spare me your few days visits to the Middle East and your chats with cab drivers.  I would rather read the phone book and get more insights on the Middle East. (thanks Farrah)

Faruq Qaddumi

For a fee, Qaddumi is willing to accept Oslo, or to oppose it.  For a fee, he would be willing to accuse Abu Mazsen of killing Arafat, or to absolve him of the crime.  All for a fee.

Between Abu Mazen and Dahlan i would choose a dead Abu Iyad

"Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is cracking down on one of his main political rivals, former security chief Mohammed Dahlan, amid signs of a growing rift in the Palestinian leadership as U.S. efforts to revive the moribund peace process founder."

All that you have done to our people is registered in notebooks

"Despite recent moves by Israel to ease construction in the Gaza Strip, restrictions on building materials are hampering international humanitarian efforts while doing little to impede the Hamas-led government they are designed to weaken, aid and nongovernmental groups say."

Los Angeles Times

Politics aside, the Los Angeles Times section on the Middle East on the web provides probably the best coverage of the Middle East of any US newspaper.  For dumb stuff, visit the New York Times--especially if you enjoy Israeli terrorist army propaganda.

And now the Egyptian police is beating the Mossad

"An Egyptian businessman and two Israelis have been ordered to appear in court to face espionage charges that include spying for Israel, Egypt's state security attorney announced this week. "  I can now imagine a therapy session for a typical Mossad agent: Hi.  My name is Shimon Himar and I am a dumb Mossad agent. Please help me.

Palestinian refugees in Lebanon

"Palestinian refugees in Lebanon are two times more likely to live in poverty than other Lebanese people, preliminary report findings released Tuesday have shown." (thanks Farah)

Leadership

Lebanon is on the brink of a civil war, and mini-Hariri (Lebanon's prime minister, believe it or not) flies to Saudi Arabia to attend the wedding of Prince `Azzuz (for whom he served for years as advisor on pleasure affairs).  That is what I call leadership.

Wise words about the Middle East, at long last

"Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Monday that there will be no peace in the Middle East while the United States acts as a mediator.  "I am convinced that there will be no peace in the Middle East as long as the United States is the tutor of peace there," he said."  (thanks Olivia)

Those dangerous Muslims in our midst: Israel's dirty hands (Shoebat)

Look who is lecturing to local police:  "Like Montijo, Walid Shoebat, a onetime Muslim who converted to Christianity, also lectures to local police. He too believes that most Muslims seek to impose sharia law in the United States. To prevent this, he said in an interview, he warns officers that "you need to look at the entire pool of Muslims in a community."   When Shoebat spoke to the first annual South Dakota Fusion Center Conference in Sioux Falls this June, he told them to monitor Muslim student groups and local mosques and, if possible, tap their phones. "You can find out a lot of information that way," he said.  A book expanding on what Shoebat and Montijo believe has just been published by the Center for Security Policy, a Washington-based neoconservative think tank. "Shariah: The Threat to America" describes what its authors call a "stealth jihad" that must be thwarted before it's too late.  The book's co-authors include such notables as former CIA director R. James Woolsey and former deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin, along with the center's director, a longtime activist. They write that most mosques in the United States already have been radicalized, that most Muslim social organizations are fronts for violent jihadists and that Muslims who practice sharia law seek to impose it in this country.  Frank Gaffney Jr., director of the center, said his team has spoken widely, including to many law enforcement forums." (thanks Khelil)

the Oman-UAE crisis

This story sheds light on the UAE intelligence network that penetrated deep into Oman's government structure.  (thanks anonymous)

American success stories in Iraq and Afghanistan

"The Americans actually killed three times as many civilians during the surge as before, even if they also killed many more militiamen too." (thanks Nir)

Neither Fath nor Hamas: the Palestinians deserve better

"A Palestinian public opinion poll published Monday in the West Bank city of Ramallah found out that only a quarter of the Palestinians in the West Bank believe they can criticize the Palestinian Authority. In the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, the record was even worse as less than a fifth of the Palestinians there believed it is possible to criticize Hamas rule of the coastal enclave." 

Hardly human

"'I didn't think of Iraqis as humans,' says U.S. soldier who raped 14-year-old girl before killing her and her family." (thanks Ali)

Is that not nice? They are ensuring the safety of Yemenis

"The C.I.A. has begun patrolling the skies above Yemen with armed drones..."

Drink, George. Drink

"Although Bush is admirable for stopping, he probably was more fun when he drank."  But then again, if with sober Bush we got all those wars, destruction and invasions, what would have drunken George done?

Saudi king very dead: Prince `Azzuz celebrates

So Saudi Minister of Health yesterday "assured" the public that the health of Saudi king is good, which means that he is dead--very very dead.  To celebrate his death, Prince `Azzuz--having giving up on his multi-million dollar pursuit of Yasmeen Bleeth who rebuffed him repeatedly (true story, it happened after he saw her on Baywatch)--is celebrating his wedding this weekend.

Time's Person of the Year

Of course, from a news perspective, Assange should have been chosen as the Time's Person of the Year--regardless of the value of that dubious distinction which in years passed went to Hitler and other characters not loved in the US.  But US press has become so cowardly--in the era of Fox News--and so keen in avoiding public criticisms that they shy away from any coverage or choice that offend conservative public sentiments.  I argue that the public in the US is as bad as media censor as the government itself. Time magazine was too cowardly to choose Assange and to deal with public criticisms of the choice because Assange is a loathed public figure by the government and by supporters of US empire.  I mean, do you have doubt that the use of Interpol by the US government to harass Assange was not motivated by feminist concerns?

They don't mind foreign occupation but don't you dare ban their alcohol

Some of those protesting--not all of course--are writers who are servants of the occupation and the puppet regime but they can't stand a ban on alcohol.  Of course, I am against a ban on alcohol and am in favor of legalization of drugs--all drugs--and even making some drugs mandatory for puppets of occupation, like Grand (not really) Ayatullah Sistani and Nuri Maliki--among many others.  "Dozens of Iraqi writers and poets took to the streets of Baghdad Friday to protest at the closure of social clubs that serve alcohol in the capital, arguing that it harkened back to Saddam-era repression.  Holding up placards with the phrases "Freedom first" and "Baghdad will not be Kandahar," they staged a demonstration near the Iraqi Writers' Union (IWU) building in al-Wattanabi in the city centre.  "We don't need a Khomeini state or a Taliban state in Iraq," said IWU chief Fadhel Samer, referring to Iranian revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and the Afghan Islamist group respectively.  "What is happening to personal freedoms in this country is akin to what happened during the dictatorship. ... It reminds us of the practices of the old regime.""  As Iraqi poet Sa`di Yusuf pointed out, some of those writers did not speak out against the assassination of Iraqi writers and intellectuals and scientists.

Unreported crimes by Israel

"Since March 2010, 97 people have been shot in Gaza for collecting stones. This is one of the few ways a person can actually make money here at all.  Beit Hanoun, Gaza is a dangerous place to spend time. 22 days before this report was filed, our party was shot at by Israeli soldiers in towers, here, in this same place.

Over the last three weeks the same number; 22, describes the number of people shot by Israeli military here in this part of Gaza for either farming their crops, or the simple act of collecting stones, which in turn bring a person twenty sheckles a barrel.  In the video you meet 15-year old Mukhless Jawad El Massri, who was shot twice by the Israeli soldiers in the leg. Today he is on crutches and unable to work." (thanks Sus)

Mapping sexual harassment in Egypt through SMS reporting

This is a great service: Mapping sexual harassment in Egypt through SMS reporting (thanks Farah)

US diplomats collecting "bad news" about Cuban health care

"NEWS: USINT is always looking for human interest stories and other news that shatters the myth of Cuban medical prowess, which has become a key feature of the regime's foreign policy and its self-congratulatory propaganda. Two articles appeared this week in our roundup of news about Cuba that we collect and disseminate daily:" (thanks Emma)

Of course she is not a suspect: since when are oil princes suspects in Western countries?

"The flat belongs to Princess Norah Bint Abdulaziz, a Saudi Arabian Princess, who is said to have known nothing about what was going on and visits the flats for no more than two weeks a year.

Police have said she is not a suspect." (thanks ls)

UAE-Oman crisis

There has not been anything in the press about the serious crisis in the relations between Oman and UAE after Oman secret service discovered a plot by UAE to infiltrate its security agency.  One article mentioned something in Al-Akhbar (but the link won't work for a few days). (thanks anonymous)

On the stupidity of Mossad (again, and again)

"And he minces no words in stating baldly (through his sources) that Stuxnet has been a disaster both for the Mossad (he coyly refuses to explicitly name the agency as the source) and western intelligence agencies monitoring and containing Iran’s nuclear efforts.  What’s especially critical about this is that few journalists (except me and several others) until now have specified the price that Stuxnet will exact from both its maker and all intelligence agencies working on this issue.
After noting German security reports on the damage the malware caused to Iran, the reporter also notes:

Concurrently, it [Stuxnet] caused tremendous damage to he who created it [i.e. Israel].  There are those already calling it the “Al-Mabouh of [All] Worms…”
…There can be no doubt that the organization standing behind Stuxnet brought nearer, in a way that can never be undone, the ability to launch similar such attacks [by others] in the future.

Bergman notes an uproar among western intelligence agencies trading accusations and recriminations back and forth about who is the author of the worm:

German intelligence (the BND) warns that if the Mossad planted this unripened worm, it caused great damage to the efforts against Iran.

According to the intelligence correspondent, Stuxnet delayed Iran’s nuclear program by “a few months,” which seems an extraordinary expense to go to for such a small payoff.  Further, Bergman states:" (thanks Victor)

The spies will be appointed as advisers to Jamal Mubarak

"Egyptian authorities have charged a local businessman and two Israelis for recruiting agents in Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon to spy for Israeli intelligence, a State Security prosecutor said Monday.  Prosecutor Hisham Badawi told reporters that a businessman named Tarek Hassan was arrested in August and has now been charged with harming the country's national interests. Two other Israelis have been charged in absentia.  Hassan allegedly received $7,500 dollars to search for potential agents working for telecommunication companies in the three countries that could spy for Israel."

US-Israeli relations

"A sizable number of U.S. voters continue to believe that relations between Israel and the United States will worsen in the year ahead." Personally, I think that they will only get better and closer.  (thanks FLC)

Servitor of Israeli interests: the cheapest puppet of any foreign occupation (Abu Mazen)

"Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas wanted unprecedented help from Israel in attacking Hamas during the clashes just prior to the militant group's bloody coup of the Gaza Strip, according to a classified cable just released by WikiLeaks.   In the June 2007 cable, U.S. Ambassador to Israel Richard Jones wrote that Shin Bet security chief Yuval Diskin had told him in a meeting that Abbas' Fatah movement was in complete despair over the situation in the Gaza Strip.  Israel has "established a very good working relationship" with Abbas' forces, Diskin told Jones in their meeting. As Hamas was overrunning Gaza, Diskin said, some desperate Fatah leaders even wanted Israel to attack Hamas.   According to the cable, Diskin assumed in the early days of the clashes that Hamas was not yet strong enough to destroy Fatah's presence in the Gaza Strip. Hamas may be able to win the battles, Diskin said, but Fatah's response would be damaging.   Diskin told the American envoy that Hamas had managed to penetrate the echelons of Fatah's security forces, emphasized that Abbas' faction was suffering a leadership crisis and had put senior official Mahmoud Dahlan in charge of overseeing the situation in the coastal territory.   He told Jones that Fatah had thus turned to Israel for help in attack Hamas, which he termed a new and unprecedented development in Jerusalem's relations with the Palestinian Authority.   Diskin went on to share with Jones sensitive details relating to the cooperation between the Shin Bet and the Palestinian security and intelligence forces in the West Bank.  Palestinian security was sharing "almost all [its] intelligence with Israel," Diskin tolf Jones."

The lousy and reactionary Fath Movement: I have always hated that movement, since my teens years

"However, he expressed concerns over what he characterized as "a crisis of leadership in Fatah, with PA President Abbas already focusing on his retirement, and his possible successors incapable of leading the Palestinians in both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip."" (thanks Olivia)

Faruq Qaddumi

I can state without any hesitation that there is no decent leader or cadre left in the Fath Movement.  It is fair to say that the decent and the competent have all left the movement or have been killed by Israelis.  Look at the chief charlatan, Faruq Qaddumi, the so-called head of the Political Department of the PLO.  Qaddumi seasonably makes strong denunciations of the Oslo process and the Ramallah gang.  Earlier this year, he even accused (justifiably) the Abu Mazen gang of collusion in the plot to kill Arafat.  And seasonably, Qaddumi shuts his big mouth and return to silence. Why? Because he receives the funding that he wants for his offices in Hammam Ash-Shatt in Tunisia.  So after accusing Abu Mazen of responsibility for killing Arafat, Qaddumi has been secretly negotiating with Abu Mazen to resume funding for his offices.  Stay tuned. This is common in this most corrupt of "liberation movements".  You sometimes hear a Fath leader criticizing negotiations and the US: hell, Dahlan has been recently criticizing negotiations with the Israelis. Usually, it is a sign that they have been sidestepped or marginalized.  I thought of that when I read yesterday a statement by the lousy Nabil Sha`th.

Michael Kinsley is my favorite American writer although he is the typical US liberal with a Zionist lapse

"Speaking of blood, on 9/11: “My blood was boiling. We were going to find out who did this, and kick their ass.” He was in Florida at the time, you will recall, and wanted to return to Washington. The Secret Service wanted him to go to an Air Force base in Louisiana. “I told them I was not going to let terrorists scare me away. ‘I’m the president,’ I said firmly. ‘And we’re going to Washington.’ ” So Air Force One went to Louisiana. There, Bush insisted once again that “the American people needed to see their president in Washington.” So they went to Nebraska. There, “I put my foot down.” And they went to Washington."  It is such a delicious review.  Read it NOW.

Exclusive sources my...potato

"DEBKAfile reports that the king assigned his son Prince Abdul Aziz bin Abdullah to carry this initiative forward in Damascus."  This (alleged) Israeli intelligence website thinks that they are reporting exclusive information when this has been reporting in every Lebanese newspaper for the last five weeks, damn it.

Zionism is racism, always

"After a rabbis' letter instructing Jews to not sell or rent apartments to Arabs, racist behavior reaches new low: An organization called Jews for a Jewish Bat Yam is expected"   to protest on Monday against the "assimilation of young Jewish women with Arabs living in the city or in nearby Jaffa.The protest will be held around 7:30 pm near the Bat Yam mall, not far from the police station. The organizers are also expected to show support for the controversial rabbis' letter.   "It's a local organization of Bat Yam residents, because the public is tired of so many Arabs going out with Jewish girls," explained one of the organizers, Bentzi Gufstein. "In addition to the protest, we will hand out pamphlets explain the situation.""

Assange and Wikileaks

""In fact, it is totally possible to support the WikiLeaks project and to think that the international response to Assange and the project is thoroughly fucked up and to think we should withhold judgment on whether or not Assange is actually a rapist and also to think that we should withhold judgment on whether the women are lying, and to not discredit the women involved, and to not create a hostile climate for rape survivors, and to not play into every tired old stereotype about women and rape.  Seriously, we can chew gum and walk at the same time." (thanks Emily)

PS I should indicate that I am not fan of Wolf and I think that, aside from her first book, The Beauty Myth, she has written some sexist and silly things on gender.

For sophisticated analysis of foreign affairs, who can beat Thomas Friedman?

Look how deep his ideas and expressions are:  "God bless them: “The Few. The Proud. The Green.” Semper Fi."

How Salam Fayyad cuts costs

"Palestinian official in charge of the settlement file in the northern West Bank Ghassan Daghlas said Friday that a government decision would see his official vehicle confiscated.  Daghlas, who monitors and reports on settler violence, settlement expansions and related tensions, said the decision followed a cabinet decision pushed through by Prime Minister Salam Fayyad in an effort to cut government costs."

Israeli spy Ashraf Marwan

I believe this account about Israeli spy, Ashraf Marwan. (thanks Khaled)

Israel and Wikileaks

"Other observers offer an alternative explanation for the lack - so far - of many insightful cables out of Israel. For example, Ed Abington, a former U.S. consul general in Jerusalem (1993-1997 ) suggests, on facebook, that it might have something to do with the level of information being offered out of the country.  "The U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv has been so out of the loop for the last six years that their reporting is about what you read in the Israeli press (probably where they get most of their information ).  "There's a channel U.S. embassies use for very sensitive information and I don't think WikiLeaks has those cables. As for Tel Aviv, the last two ambassadors have not been risk-takers and have had a very low profile. I doubt they have been willing to rock the boat, and may not have had much, if any, inside information."  What would be more interesting, Abington persists, is the reporting from the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem. "Where is that reporting?" he asks." (thanks Mouin)

Routine Israeli practices

"Israeli forces stormed a hospital near Bethlehem on Sunday and demanded its admissions records for the past 48 hours, staff and witnesses said." (thanks Olivia)

Dershowitz argues that Israeli killing of Palestinian civilians is good

"Such a ratio, if true, would be far better than that achieved by any other nation in a comparable conflict." (thanks Christopher)

If this happened in an Arab country to a Jewish student, it would be featured on front page of NYT under the headline: Holocaust in Arab Lands

"PSYCHOLOGY student Osama Ghanaim was woken early one night last month by a mob of 60 ultra-Orthodox Jews chanting ''Kill the Arabs'' outside his flat. 'Then they stoned my house,'' Ghanaim said this week. ''Rocks broke through my front windows.''  After the crowd dispersed, Ganaim, who is one of 1400 Arab Israeli students enrolled at Safed Academic College, in northern Israel, found a poster on his front door warning him to move out." (thanks Luay)

Marks & Spencer billboards in Egypt vandalized

Here is a picture. (thanks Farah)

Mathew Lee of the AP and his courage in press briefings at the US State Department

Sarah sent me this:  "The journalist who asked PJ Crowley the questions about Abdallah Abu Rahma is William Lee and he's pretty consistent as this November 19, 2009 briefing shows:
video here:  (at 11:45)
You'll see Lee's question here:  - transcript
QUESTION: Well, what actions (inaudible) the Palestinians taken recently that would impede progress?
MR. KELLY: Well, as I say, we would discourage all unilateral actions, and I think --
QUESTION: Fair enough. But the Palestinians --
MR. KELLY: We talked yesterday --
QUESTION: -- don’t appear to be taking any unilateral actions. It seems to be (inaudible).
MR. KELLY: Well, we did talk yesterday about the – and I want to make sure I get my language right here – about the – discouraging any kind of unilateral appeal for United Nations Security Council recognition of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. That would fall in that category of unilateral actions.
QUESTION: Okay. So the Palestinian call for this, which was rejected by both the EU and yourself yesterday, you’re putting that on the same level as them building – as the Israelis building --
MR. KELLY: No, I’m not saying that. You just said that, Matt. I’m not saying that. I’m just saying that --
QUESTION: Well, you’re saying you’re calling on both sides to stop doing these things.
MR. KELLY: We are.
QUESTION: Yeah. But the rhetoric from the --
MR. KELLY: I’m not saying they’re equivalent.
QUESTION: -- Palestinians is not actually constructed in a --
MR. KELLY: I’m not saying they’re equivalent. I’m just saying that we – they – we have to treat these things as sensitive issues.
QUESTION: You said a little bit earlier that we understand the Israeli point of view on Jerusalem. Can you explain what you mean by that?
MR. KELLY: Well, you have to ask – I’m not going to stand up here and characterize the Israeli point of view on --
QUESTION: No. I’m just asking you, if you understand the Israeli point of view on Jerusalem, why are you saying that this is not a good thing?
MR. KELLY: I’m not saying we support the Israeli point of view. We understand it.
QUESTION: Right. And then, last one on this, you characterized this decision by the planning commission as dismaying.
MR. KELLY: Yes.
QUESTION: You can’t come up with anything stronger than “dismaying”? I mean, this flies in the face of everything you’ve been talking about for months and months and months.
MR. KELLY: It’s dismaying.
QUESTION: Yeah, you can’t offer a condemnation of it or anything like that? (Laughter.) I mean, who is in charge of the language here.
MR. KELLY: I have said what I have said, Mr. Lee."

The Arab guy on "Lost"

I have been watching the episodes of "Lost" in sequence.  At first, I was impressed that the Arab guy (named Sayid but for some reason called Sa`id by people on the show) was portrayed as a good person, until the second or third episode of the very first season when you discover that he was in fact a torturer for the Iraqi Republican Guard.  How many Arab guy you meet in the West had served in the Republican Guard?  Oh, of course: he walks everywhere with a picture of a veiled woman.

Documentation of Israeli racism

"Israeli policies in the West Bank harshly discriminate against Palestinian residents, depriving them of basic necessities while providing lavish amenities for Jewish settlements, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The report identifies discriminatory practices that have no legitimate security or other justification and calls on Israel, in addition to abiding by its international legal obligation to withdraw the settlements, to end these violations of Palestinians' rights." (thanks Shadi)