Book sales and orders for the soft cover are approaching 100. Half the proceeds from the sale of my modestly priced book goes to The Wounded Warrior Project!
Dick Berkowitz, has written a booklet entitled:"A Conservative Capitalist Offers: Eleven Lessons and a Bonus Lesson for Raising America's Youth Born and Yet To Be Born."
By Dick Berkowitz - Non Expert
Dick wrote this booklet because he believes a strong country must rest on a solid family unit and that Brokaw's "Greatest Generation" has morphed into "A Confused, Dependent and Compromised Generation."
He hopes this booklet will provide a guide to alter this trend.
You can now order a .pdf version from www.brokerberko.com/book that you can download and read on your computer, or print out if you want. Cost is $5.99
In several weeks the book will be available in soft cover format at a cost of $10.99.
Booklet illustrations were by his oldest granddaughter, Emma Darvick, who lives and works in New York.
Testimonials:
Dick, I read your book this weekend. I hardly know where to start. You did an excellent job of putting into one short book a compendium of the virtues which only a relatively short time ago all Americans believed. It’s a measure of how far we have fallen that many Americans, perhaps a majority of Americans, no longer believe in what we once considered truisms. I think your father would have agreed with every word, but the party he supported no longer has such beliefs.
I would like to buy multiple copies of your booklet..
You did a great job. I know your parents would have been proud and that your family today is proud.
Mike
You wrote a great book. The brevity is one of its strong points and I know it was hard to include that in and still keep it brief. Your father in haste once wrote an overly long letter to our client, then said in the last sentence, “I’m sorry I wrote such a long letter, but I didn’t have time to write a short one.”
"Dick, I indeed marvel at how much wisdom you have been able to share with so few words. Not too unlike the experience in reading the Bible. I feel that with each read of "A Conservative Capitalist Offers:…." one will gain additional knowledge and new insights…
Regards, Larry"
Dick ,
Your book is outstanding! Due to illness, I've been unable to read it in entirety until today .Your background is often very similar to mine (e.g. Halliburton's influence was very important in my life), and your thoughts reflect very closely the the teachings that I received from my parents and granddad. I will write a more detailed statement in the near future!
All the best, Bob
Your book is outstanding! Due to illness, I've been unable to read it in entirety until today .Your background is often very similar to mine (e.g. Halliburton's influence was very important in my life), and your thoughts reflect very closely the the teachings that I received from my parents and granddad. I will write a more detailed statement in the near future!
All the best, Bob
Regarding your booklet, I have begun to read it and look forward to finishing it this weekend. Congrats on getting it published and on the great reviews. I know how much this booklet means to you and how important getting this message out to the public is.
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Frances Twitty - a vote is too precious to waste! (See 1 below.)
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Iran will not be deterred by a feckless president. (See 2 and 2a below.)
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In a recent memo I mentioned that a staff analyst of Daniel Pipe's was researching and writing extensively to prove why UNRWA has outlived its raison detre. (See 3 below.)
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Whether you realize it or not Obama has had to October surprises and failed both.
AS for Obama and Biden they have lied so much they can't seems to return to the truth.
But then,virtually everything Obama has said and/or promised regarding health care, deficits, entitlements has also been a lie.
Facts just don't matter to this Chicago community organizer and the press and media have continued to protect him from the truth so they too have lied to us. No wonder the public holds hem in contempt.(See 4 below.)
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Dick
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1)My Vote Will Not Be Wasted
By Frances Twitty
I am not one of those independent voters who have yet to decide.
I already know that my vote will not go to someone who divides the country economically, racially, sexually, and spiritually.
I will not support someone who applies the "rule of law" only when it is convenient or in his best interest, who protects his radical administration against possible criminal probes, such as Fast and Furious, by inexplicably calling "executive privilege."
I will not vote for someone who puts our national security and the security of our allies at risk; someone who supports the Muslim Brotherhood over our ally, the true democracy in the middle east, Israel; someone whose foreign policy allows the tragedy in Benghazi, Libya to occur and then attempts to lie about it to the world for weeks.
I will not waste my vote on someone who allows Iran, a terrorist nation, to develop nuclear weapons -- while declaring a fictitious "war on women" and incredibly directing the national conversation to free birth control rather than national security, the economy, unemployment, or any such infinitely more worthy topic. As a female, if I didn't consider the source, I would no doubt be insulted!
I will not vote for someone who will not secure our borders, who will let untold numbers of illegal aliens onto our soil to infiltrate and devour governmental resources including health care, education, and general welfare, which leaves us far less for our own struggling citizens.
I cannot champion one who would force charity from others to satisfy his personal Weltanschauung, regardless of other citizens' wants, needs, and desires. I will not support a socialist agenda, including cradle-to-grave entitlements, at the expense of the hardworking citizens of this country. "A wise and frugal government which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government." That's from Thomas Jefferson.
I would never vote for someone who does not comprehend individual freedom and, above all else, who fails to understand that charity comes from the heart, not from taxation or government mandate. As Madison said, "[c]harity is no part of the legislative role of government." I will not vote for someone who forgets our founding principles!
I could never support someone who has hindered us with a 2,000-plus-page health care bill, passed under stealth tactics with no bipartisan support, not understood by those who wrote or passed it, that has already begun to cost citizens by way of increased premiums, co-pays, co-insurance, etc. even as its "good parts" have mostly yet to kick in. A bill that will increase taxes on working citizens while lowering the amount of qualified providers and establishing an unqualified medical board that will opine on life and death and interfere in the discussion between provider and patient will not get my support.
I would not endorse someone who has gone to court to block military absentee votes or the simple requirement of having to prove that you are who you say you are to vote, particularly in light of the voter fraud problems that have permeated our elections.
I would not champion someone who, knowing millions of capable people are unemployed and that the real U6 rate of unemployment is hovering around 15%, give or take, according to the BLS, chooses instead to golf, fundraise, vacation, appear on fluff celebrity TV shows, and give interviews to soft magazines -- someone who meets with Beyoncé and Jay-Z, part of the 1% he excoriates, rather than with the Israeli prime minister. I would not vote for someone whose priorities are completely upside-down.
I would not support someone who cannot ensure that we are working, as a nation, under a reasonable budget that will allow us to pay down our debt. Someone whose proposed budget received zero affirmative votes from both sides of the aisle (just about the only thing that happened in a bipartisan fashion in Congress!) will not get my vote.
I would not support someone who conveniently "evolves" into his view of gay marriage, but was noticeably absent from the national discussion when he had a majority in Congress who could actually do something about it.
It would be impossible to support someone who lies so often, so well, and so purposefully for gain (see Thomas Sowell's recent piece, "Phony in Chief") that I seriously doubt whether or not he even knows the truth anymore, or that he could be believed by anyone other than his ardent, head-in-the-sand supporters no matter what he says.
Why would I vote for someone who preaches transparency, but whose personal life is the most secretive of any POTUS -- someone who pays to have his records sealed, someone whose birth certificate has been verifiably forged, whose autobiography has been proven to be factually incorrect?
To get my vote, you need to do more than give a good teleprompted speech; make jokes about Big Bird; tacitly approve of inaccurate ads created by your supporters; crease your pants just right; buy votes with food stamps, cell phones, and amnesty paid for with my tax dollars; throw a good party; shoot hoops; act cool; and lower your golf handicap. To get my vote, you need to be someone with integrity, someone who is qualified to help turn this country around, someone who puts individual freedom above all things government, who sees the role of government as first and foremost national security and in all other ways limited.
Abraham Lincoln said: "America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves." That destruction begins with a single vote for the wrong candidate.
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2)Spreading Iranian cyber attacks hit Israeli military, US financial and Gulf oil targets
A week ago, on Oct. 6, an unmanned Iranian aerial vehicle with stealth attributes breached Israeli air space. By eluding Israel’s radar, the UAV exposed serious gaps in its air defenses. Thursday, Oct. 11, Hizballah’s Hassan Nasrallah admitting the drone had come from Lebanon, promised it would not be the last. He seemed to be mocking Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his reliance on strong border fences to keep Israel safe.
A week went by and Saturday, Oct. 13, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) website quoted its chief, Lt. Gen. Ali Jabari as stating that his naval and missile forces are on “strategic deterrent readiness” – a novel term just invented by the Islamic Republic. He spoke Friday at an army base in Khorrasan, during a tour with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The Iranian general hinted that the Iranian-Hizballah drone had been able to come close to Israel’s nuclear reactor in Dimona.
Both admissions that Iran and Hizballah were conducting military cyber warfare on Israel were tinged with contempt, arising from the certainty that Israel would not retaliate for the UAV’s invasion any more than it had responded to the posting of thousands of Iranian elite Al Qods troops just across its Syrian and Lebanese borders.
Shortly after Nasrallah spoke, the US Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan managed to break through VP Joe Biden’s interruptions to reveal the stark fact that Iran already possesses enough fissile material to make five nuclear bombs. The cat was finally out of the bag after years in which American and Israeli leaders contrived to keep this secret dark by verbal acrobatics and blinding showers of impenetrable “facts and figures.”
It was no slip of the tongue: Mitt Romney’s running mate was briefed by the team which is preparing the candidate himself for his second debate against President Barack Obama next Tuesday, Oct. 16.
Washington sources disclose that the team is headed by the former US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, who is slated for the job of National Security Adviser if Romney wins the Nov. 6 election.
Ryan’s revelation implied that a Romney administration’s Iran policy would take off from the point of its possession of sufficient fissile material for a nuclear arsenal.
Not that this guarantees US military action against Iran’s nuclear program under a new president - or even backing for an Israeli strike - only that now we all know that it is not necessary to destroy the 20 or more Iranian nuclear sites to demolish its program, only to home in on the stockpile of fissile material which took Tehran 20 years to enrich and accumulate.
The Iranians, realizing their secret was out, are certainly not hiding their precious fissile stockpile of approximately one ton at the Fordo nuclear enrichment plant which continues to turn out more enriched uranium. This stock encased in a lead container no bigger than a large kitchen table could be concealed anywhere in the vast 1.6 million-square-kilometer area of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
So a fleet of bombers and array of bunker buster bombs have become dispensable for pre-empting Iran’s nuclear bomb aspirations. All that is needed is one missile – provided of course that the vital core stock can be located.
Also on Thursday, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta unveiled his “pre-9/11 moment” speech which revealed that for two weeks, hackers had been hammering the websites of big American banks, the Saudi national oil company Aramco and Qatar’s Rasgas.
In a strong comment, he said the US would strike back and consider a preemptive strike against cyber terrorism, without saying how or actually naming Iran.
However in leaks to the American media, former U.S. government officials and cyber-security experts reported that the administration believes Iranian-based hackers were responsible for what Panetta warned could be the first “cyber Pearl Harbor” against America.
The Wall Street Journal pointed to a team of 100 Iranian experts as the perpetrators of the cyber attacks on America and the Gulf oil states.
Tehran appears to be sending a message that if US-led sanctions continue to cut down its oil exports and restrict its banking business, Gulf oil producers and American banks would pay the price.
Panetta’s words may therefore be read as Washington’s final warning to Iran to desist from cyber warfare.
In the days leading up to his speech on cyber-terror, the defense secretary was tireless in cautioning against the menace of the Syrian civil war spreading to neighboring countries and evoking Bashar Assad’s threat to bring out and use his chemical weapons.
Before he turned to the cyber threat, the Syrian war had indeed tipped over into an escalating Turkish-Syrian showdown.
Both these developments mean that the waves of Middle East violence are lapping ever farther afield. All the parties with an interest in stirring up trouble are keeping a weather eye on the Obama-Romney debate next Tuesday to see if the president recovers the momentum he lost to his Republican challenger in the first debate.
Before or after the debate, each of them - Al Qaeda, Iran, Syria or Hizballah - is capable of taking direct action to show it is a player to be reckoned with. Such action may explicitly target an American interest or stir the pot by going for Israel, Turkey, Jordan, or a Gulf oil nation.
It can no longer be denied that Tehran is already on a cyber offensive against them all. In the absence of any response, Iran may decide to push further against its targets.
2a)
| The Ostrich Syndrome: Understanding the Worlds Reluctance to Take Action Against Iran By Prof. Efraim Inbar | |
Ahmadinejad claims that he spoke to G-d and even received direct answers…and yet we are told that he is rational “just like us.”...nothing will stop the Iranian nuclear program except for the use of force... [ EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: The international community appears unlikely to take military action against the Iranian nuclear weapons program because of the “Ostrich Syndrome” – a reluctance to deal with difficult problems and a preference to ignore them. The historical record shows that failure to respond to Iranian actions only leads to more aggression from Iran, and inaction in the current situation will lead to dangerous global repercussions. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s September 27 speech to the UN General Assembly in which he delineated a red line for the Iranian nuclear program was widely reported. But its impact will soon dissipate, because the international community suffers from what might be called the “Ostrich Syndrome.” Most global leaders prefer to ignore the bad news of nuclear proliferation and stick their heads in the sand, as was the case with the way they dealt with (or failed to seriously deal with) North Korea’s nuclear program. Members of the international community are similarly reluctant to acknowledge the current reality in Iran because doing so would require action – probably military action – which they are far from ready to take. Indeed, most states continue to downplay the extreme revolutionary nature of the Iranian regime, which seeks to export its radical jihadist version of Shiite Islam. When Israel seeks to warn of this, Israel is reassured by Western leaders that the Iranians are rational actors “just like us.” Is this really so? Are Iranian leaders rational actors “just like us”? The Iranian leadership is responsible for killing Westerners in Lebanon and Saudi Arabia…and yet Israel is supposed to believe that Iran is rational “just like us.” The Iranian leadership entertains the idea of bringing Andalusia (Spain) back into the Islamic fold…and still we are told that they are rational “just like us.” Iran plotted to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in the US…and again we are told that Teheran is rational “just like us.” Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad expressed his desire to wipe Israel off of the map…and we are told that he is rational “just like us.” Ahmadinejad claims that he spoke to G-d and even received direct answers…and yet we are told that he is rational “just like us.” Similarly, the international community has for over a decade ignored the progress in Iran’s nuclear program and adheres to the illusion that talks will eventually dissuade it from building a nuclear bomb. Iran was caught repeatedly lying to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) regarding its nuclear program, yet Israel was told to relax because “there is still plenty of time to conduct negotiations.” Iran built and expanded an enrichment facility at Natanz… yet Israel was still told to calm down, because “there is still plenty of time” to do something about it. Iran built a new enrichment plant at Fordow…and Israel was told that “there is still time.” Iran achieved a five percent enrichment level, which increased to 10 percent, and eventually 20 percent…and Israel was told each time that the window for a Western response was still very wide. The latest IAEA report indicates that Iran is only a few months away from having enough fissionable material for a nuclear bomb, and maybe a year from having 10 bombs…and yet Israel is still told that there is “plenty of time” to take action. The inevitable conclusion from the behavior of the international community is that it consistently opts for an easy transition from “there is still time to do something” to “it is too late to do something.” A large part of the international community belittles the wide-range repercussions of a nuclear Iran. Concerns about Iran “Finlandizing” the oil producing nations in the Gulf and the Caspian Basin, nuclear proliferation in the Middle East, Iranian nuclear terrorism, a security threat for states within a radius of 2500 kilometers, and the loss Western credibility after repeated declarations that “a nuclear Iran is unacceptable” – are all dismissed as Israeli exaggerations or unfounded alarmism. Western rationalist experts point out that Iran is “rational” and can be deterred. This is wishful thinking and reflects the prevalent ostrich mentality. There are numerous examples of the fact that Iran is an undeterred actor even before it owns a nuclear bomb. The US did not deter Iranian influence in Lebanon, and Hizballah took over that country. The US did not curtail Iranian influence in Palestinian politics, and Hamas took over Gaza in 2007. The US failed to prevent Iran from turning Iraq into its satellite, and was unable to dissuade Iran from meddling in Bahrain. In addition, the US has failed to prevent Iran from helping Assad stay in power in Syria or establishing a presence in its own backyard in South America. All of this inconvenient evidence is ignored by Ostrich Syndrome-stricken strategists and statesmen. Deterrence works only if threats to use force are credible. Iran paused its nuclear program when the US attacked Iraq in 2003. Unfortunately President Obama is not feared by the Iranians. He is viewed in the Middle East by friends and foes of the US as a lightweight who is afraid to take action. Obviously the Europeans hardly instill any fear in Tehran. In addition, deterrence works only if there is reasonable sensitivity to costs. Unfortunately, the theological outlook of the Iranian leadership prepares it for paying heavy costs in the pursuit of its jihadist agenda. Indeed, Iranian leaders have declared their willingness to pay with millions of lives in order to destroy the Jewish state. As such, the current suffering caused by economic sanctions has not changed the regime’s nuclear policy. At this late stage, and after so many years, nothing will stop the Iranian nuclear program except for the use of force. The Iranians are smart enough to diagnose the international community as suffering from the Ostrich Syndrome, and their prognosis is that they can get away with building a bomb. In the absence of a quick recovery from the Ostrich Syndrome, we may be destined to live in a more brutish world. Prof. Efraim Inbar is a professor of political studies at Bar-Ilan University, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, and a fellow at the Middle East Forum. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 3)-UNRWA Betrays Its Mission
By Nitza Nachmias
The twentieth century experienced some of the worst instances of population displacement in history: the 15 million ethnic Germans forced out of their homes in Eastern Europe after World War II; the millions of Muslims and Hindus fleeing the newly established states of India and Pakistan during the partition of the Indian subcontinent in 1948; the millions of Armenians, Greeks, Turks, Finns, Bulgarians, Jews, and Kurds, among others, driven from their lands and resettled elsewhere.
By contrast, the 600,000 Arabs who fled their homes in mandatory Palestine and the nascent state of Israel during the 1947-48 war[1] have been kept in squalid camps for decades by their Arab hosts as a means of derogating Israel in the eyes of the West and arousing pan-Arab sentiments. And as if to add insult to injury, the U.N. Relief and Work Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), established in December 1949 as a temporary means for relieving the plight of the newly-displaced refugees,[2] has transformed into a permanent organization that has substantially exacerbated the problem whose resolution it was supposed to facilitate.
Between Repatriation and Resettlement
The idea underlying the establishment of UNRWA was that "assistance for the relief of the Palestine refugees is necessary to prevent conditions of starvation and distress among them and to further conditions of peace and stability." Yet it was clear from the outset that these "constructive measures" were of a temporary nature and that "direct relief should be terminated not later than 31 December 1950 unless otherwise determined by the General Assembly at its fifth regular session."[3]
Within a year, however, it had become evident that UNRWA had no intention of folding up. Based on its operational report, on December 2, 1950, the General Assembly passed resolution 393 (V), which asserted "that direct relief cannot be terminated as provided in paragraph 6 of resolution 302 (IV)" and recommended that UNRWA's activities be continued "in preparation for the time when international assistance is no longer available, and for the realization of conditions of peace and stability in the area."[4]
The solution to the refugee problem that UNRWA's establishment was supposed to facilitate had been outlined by General Assembly resolution 194 of December 11, 1948, which envisaged the repatriation of the refugees and/or their resettlement in their host countries as part of a comprehensive peace settlement to be mediated by a soon-to-be-established three-member Conciliation Committee for Palestine (UNCCP).[5] In line with this outlook, resolution 393 instructed the establishment of a $30 million "reintegration fund which shall be utilized for projects requested by any government in the Near East and approved by the Agency for the permanent re-establishment of refugees and their removal from relief."[6] This sum was increased in January 26, 1952, to $100 million for the fiscal year July 1, 1952-July 1, 1953 (compared to a mere $18 million assigned to relief operations)—thus indicating the U.N.'s continued emphasis on resolving the refugee problem.
Tasked by resolution 194 with facilitating "the repatriation, resettlement, and economic and social rehabilitation of the refugees and the payment of compensation," UNCCP suggested shifting funds assigned for compensation to resettlement because "the majority of the refugees can only hope to receive as compensation a much smaller sum than will be required to resettle them in the Arab countries." Moreover, "when the time comes to pay compensation, it is to be hoped that a large number of the refugees will already have been resettled by UNRWA."[7] This was also the hope of U.N. secretary-general Trygve Lie, who said: "The refugees will lead an independent life in countries which have given them shelter … the refugees will no longer be maintained by an international organization … They will … provide for their own needs and those of their families."[8]
In a Jerusalem meeting on February 6, 1951, Sir Henry Knight, a member of UNRWA's advisory commission, reported some good news: "The prospects in regards to reintegration were not bad," he said. "Jordan seemed ready to accept a certain number of refugees; Egypt had already proposed a programme of public works, which more or less constituted a commitment on her part, and Mr. Tacla had implied that Lebanon would accept for resettlement 20,000 to 25,000 refugees of Lebanese origin."[9]
The overall plan was to offer the Arab governments vast resources and engage international experts in initiating sustainable agricultural projects that would change the economies of these countries while simultaneously absorbing the refugees. Because Syria, Jordan, and Egypt were in dire economic straits, UNCCP and UNRWA believed that they would ultimately accept the U.N. money that came with the programs and resettle the refugees.[10]
From the Israeli side, there was also promising news. As early as the Lausanne peace conference (April-September 1949), Israeli negotiators had "declared that if the Gaza area were incorporated in the state of Israel, its government would be prepared to accept as citizens of Israel the entire Arab population of the area, both inhabitants and refugees, on the understanding that resettlement of the refugees in Israeli territory would be subject to such international aid as would be available to refugee resettlement in general."[11] Israel's offer was motivated by security concerns: to prevent Gaza from becoming a launching pad for attacks against the fledgling Jewish state.[12] (This fear materialized in the mid-1950s when Arabfedayeen began to cross the border and launch violent raids against Israel's southern villages.)
The Israeli proposal was rejected by the Egyptian government, which demanded that all the refugees in Gaza be allowed to return to their villages in southern Israel. Confronted with this rebuff, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion dismissed the Egyptian demand out of hand and insisted that the Arab states resettle the refugees in their own countries.[13]
A Drawing Board for Resettlement Plans
By the early 1950s, it became increasingly clear that repatriation was no longer an option. John B. Blandford, chairman of UNRWA's advisory commission, acknowledged this in a confidential memo: "There is probably common agreement that there is no gain for either of our efforts in fanning anew the fires and hopes of repatriation … It would seem desirable that the refugees be fully and promptly informed."[14] This left resettlement as the only possible solution.
On January 26, 1952, the General Assembly passed resolution 513 (VI) allocating "the expenditure of US
$50 million for relief and $200 million for reintegration … to be carried over the period of approximately three years starting as of 1 July 1951." The resolution asked UNRWA to "explore with the governments concerned the desirability and practicability of transferring administration of relief to those governments at the earliest possible date …[and] considers that relief expenditures should be reduced in suitable proportion to reintegration expenditures."[15] Later that year, Blandford asked for an additional $30 million for reintegration projects as a means to reduce UNRWA's budget for relief.
To a limited extent, the constructive aims of the resolution were accepted. Egypt offered area in the Sinai for 10,000 refugee families if water could be found and if there was no prejudice to refugee interests with regards to repatriation or compensation. Jordan also agreed to the use of the fund for small projects with similar political qualifications. Soon, the first constructive steps were taken; out of these initial operations came knowledge of the area, surveys, irrigation plans, economic planning experience, and some progress on the ground.
U.N. secretary-general Lie maintained his optimism: "The Arab States would have a change of opinion, and they would recognize the inevitability of reintegration of refugees elsewhere than in Israel."[16] Resettlement seemed most logical and natural in Jordan, which in 1950, annexed the territories of Judea and Samaria (which subsequently became the West Bank of the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan) where most of the refugees were based. In 1952, the Jordanian constitution stipulated that the refugees were Jordanian citizens by law,[17] and in 1954, a new law was enacted (6/1954)[18] confirming the status of those who had acquired Jordanian citizenship under the previous law (56/1949).[19] In stark contrast, the rest of the Arab states refused to grant citizenship to refugees on the pretext of preserving their "right of return" to Palestine.
Resolution 513 of January 1952 also instructed UNRWA "to explore with the governments concerned arrangements looking towards their assuming administration of reintegration projects at the earliest possible date."[20] But the charge was spurned by the Arab regimes and prevented the creation of a unified working coalition needed to achieve economic development for the region as a whole. But optimism did not wane due to the lack of real progress. Reporting to the eighth session of the General Assembly on October 26, 1953, the acting director of UNRWA, Leslie J. Carver, argued that "it was practically impossible to bring about the rehabilitation of all Arab refugees in the existing economic and political circumstances. There was, however, a prospect that, by their early employment on projects under consideration by the host governments and UNRWA, many refugees would be able to become self-supporting."[21]
The U.S. government was also involved in the resettlement plans. President Truman's International Development Advisory Board worked on resettlement options and concluded that "under proper development, Iraq alone could absorb an Arab refugee population of 750,000 people."[22] Encouraged by this general spirit of optimism, the General Assembly increased the resettlement fund from $250 million to $293 million.
With this impressive budget in hand, UNRWA drafted resettlement plans based on the principle that the projects would be carried out by the refugees, and this would, in addition, solve the problem of unemployment. UNRWA also prepared training programs for them. The reintegration fund would also give loans and grants to refugees to enable them to establish small enterprises, would build houses near their employment, establish rural farms where land was available for cultivation, and construct irrigation works and access roads.[23] The plan promised the refugees economic, social, and political independence while the host countries would gain economic development and prosperity.
With the July 1952 Free Officers' putsch in Egypt and the Soviet Union's assertive moves into the Middle East, Washington began to take more of an interest in greater progress on this front. Eisenhower's secretary of state John Foster Dulles felt his first priority was to convince the Arab world of Washington's evenhandedness and suggested resettlement of the refugees should be divided between Israel and the Arab states: Israel would repatriate a fixed number of refugees while the Arab states would absorb the remainder. It was hoped that Israel and its neighbors would "share water resources on an equitable basis and agree to border adjustments."[24]
Eisenhower appointed a team of experts, headed by U.S. ambassador Eric Johnston, which developed the "Jordan Valley Unified Water Plan" (the "Johnston Plan") for the resettlement of thousands of refugee families. Though the plan was rejected by the Arab League, both Israel and Jordan were eager to implement their respective components, resulting in the establishment of Israel's National Water Carrier[25] and Jordan's East Ghor Main Canal (today the "King Abdullah Canal") project—but not in a durable solution to the Palestinian refugee problem.
Dashed Dreams
Before long, UNCCP and UNRWA reports lamented the slow progress of resettlement plans on the one hand and the waning prospects of repatriation on the other. "The refugees should be made to understand that previous U.N. resolutions and Arab League pledges guaranteeing their right of return were hopeless," noted an internal U.S. diplomatic memorandum. "It would be near impossible for them to dream of returning to Palestine in large numbers. The refugees would then be made more receptive to the principle of resettlement."[26]
A 1953 UNRWA commissioner report summarized the dilemma in similarly stark terms:
For the most part, resettlement options in the Arab host countries went from poor to nonexistent. Keeping the 200,000-250,000 Palestinian refugees in harsh conditions in the Gaza Strip, the Egyptian government refused to grant them citizenship or to settle them elsewhere in the country on the pretext that "Egypt was densely populated and unable to extend substantially the area of its arable land … it would be difficult to resettle a number of refugees on its existing territory."[28] Similarly, the Lebanese government refused to integrate the 100,000 refugees into Lebanese society because it did "not feel that there are opportunities for refugees to become self-supporting … there are therefore no new programme projects in Lebanon at present."[29]
Syria was another disappointment. In 1950-52 there were hopes for a successful resettlement of some 80,000 refugees in the country, and UNRWA initiated the construction of housing projects in Damascus.[30]However, the Syrian government rejected UNRWA's pilot project proposals and refused to make state domain land available for the permanent resettlement of refugees.[31]
The only exception to this rejectionist pattern was Jordan where the government took legal and social steps to integrate the refugees into society. King Abdullah's goals were less than altruistic; he wished to expand his kingdom through annexation of what would come to be known as the West Bank as well as to reap a windfall of financial and technical assistance. As early as July 1949, the Jordanians informed UNCCP and Israel of their intention to resettle 200,000 refugees in return for substantial financial support,[32] and two years later, Jordan and UNRWA signed an agreement "for Palestinian refugees in the Near East," and the Hashemite kingdom was promised generous loans and grants "with a view to raising the general standard of living of all inhabitants including refugees."[33] In cooperation with UNRWA, the Jordanian government completed a 200-unit housing project for refugees, a large undertaking by a development bank with approved capital of 400,000 Jordanian dinars provided by UNRWA; some small training projects were also expanded into a $1 million vocational program.[34] Despite U.S. satisfaction with these modest beginnings, the assassination of King Abdullah (on July 20, 1951) made his more ambitious plans to resettle all the refugees who had fled to the West Bank and Jordan quite difficult to achieve.
The Failure of Early Resettlement Plans
Several major obstacles hindered the execution of the resettlement plans. As noted above, the Arab League and the Arab governments adamantly objected to resettlement despite the offer of substantial economic incentives, showing total indifference to the suffering of the Palestinians. Instead, the Arab League demanded repatriation of all refugees to their original homes in Israel: "Arab countries are unable to take on full responsibility for the quest for international peace as long as the refugee problem exists, and they have done their best in order to solve this problem … [T]he international community must take on this burden, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations."[35]
To former UNRWA official Sir Alexander Galloway, this conduct proved that the "Arab States do not want to solve the refugee problem. They want to keep it as an open sore, as an affront to the United Nations and as a weapon against Israel. Arab leaders don't give a damn whether the refugees live or die."[36] Likewise, Palestinian academic Mohammad Khaled al-Aza'r argued that
Strikingly, a 1961 UNCCP report revealed that it was Israel that apparently made good faith efforts to ameliorate the refugee situation. After detailing the lost opportunities for resettlement resulting from failed negotiations with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon, the report testifies that alongside the previously mentioned offer vis-à-vis Gaza, "Ben-Gurion did not exclude the possibility of accepting for repatriation a limited number of Arab refugees, but he made it clear … that a real solution of the refugee problem lay in the resettlement of the refugees in Arab states."[38]
With prospects for resettlement frozen, UNRWA abandoned those efforts and became a giant service-providing bureaucracy. In 1952, its director stated that it was "the largest food purchasing organization in the entire Near East."[39] The organization's budget for relief increased from $27 million in 1952 to almost $80 million in just a few years. The major beneficiary of its operations was Jordan, which received additional aid from the United States and Britain. It is, therefore, not surprising that the Arab League saw in UNRWA not only an important asset that could be used against Israel (through the perpetuation of the refugee problem) but as a cash-cow to be milked by Arab regimes.
In particular, UNRWA helped the Arab League uphold its strategy of promoting Palestinian statelessness for its own purposes. "Whereas the Arab League did not adopt a resolution forbidding the granting of citizenship by member states to Palestinian refugees," wrote Aza'r, "it expressed, at the same time, its general desire to … preserve their Palestinian identity and their political rights."[40] UNRWA's continued distribution of refugee-ID cards to refugee descendants thus supported the Arab League's approach of barring citizenship for Palestinians in the Arab states.
Undoubtedly, UNRWA's misinterpretation of its original mandate as well as its unprecedented redefinition of "refugee" contributed to the failure of its early resettlement plans. In 1959, Dag Hammarskjöld, the second U.N. secretary-general, pointed out that the organization had adopted a definition of a Palestinian refugee with no legal basis: "UNRWA's working definition of a person eligible for its services ... is not contained in any resolution of the General Assembly but has been stated in annual reports of the director and tacitly approved by the assembly."[41] Yet it was not until 1982 that UNRWA requested the General Assembly to legalize its longtime misconduct and "to issue identification cards to all Palestine refugees and their descendants, irrespective of whether they are recipients or not of rations and services from the Agency."[42]
Conclusion
At the end of the 1948 Israeli-Arab war and throughout the 1950s, once it became clear that repatriation was not an option, UNRWA vigorously pursued and indeed succeeded in resettling hundreds of thousands of refugees in Jordan, Gaza, and the West Bank. However, large-scale plans that would have resolved the problem once and for all were not implemented.
Several factors contributed to this failure. To begin with, the $300 million budget approved in 1951 was insufficient for the extensive economic development schemes. The plans demanded vast investments in regional water and irrigation projects as well as in advanced agricultural systems. Moreover, the assumption that such complex projects, involving states still not at peace with each other, could be completed in three years was unrealistic as was the belief that supplementary funds would be coming from the host states and neighboring oil-producing countries. As a result, comprehensive resettlement plans based on vast economic development projects were abandoned in the late 1950s.
A misperception of the ultimate goals of key players played a determining role in this failure. Both UNCCP and UNRWA wrongly assumed that reintegration and resettlement were economic, not political processes. The Arab states thought otherwise and made it clear that resettlement of the refugees outside of Mandate Palestine was a political issue that could be exploited at will.[43] As one Arab U.N. representative put it, successful resettlement initiatives "would include the supposition that the Palestine problem is, at long last, solved—and this is far from being the case …[T]his solution … is no more than an effort to justify Jewish immigration into Palestine by another immigration of Palestine refugees into the Arab countries. This idea is profoundly shocking to us."[44]
Throughout the years, tens of thousands of Palestinian families—over two thirds of the population[45]—have left UNRWA-administered "refugee camps" and resettled in Jordan, the West Bank, and other countries outside of the Middle East with many becoming citizens of their host countries. Only a minority of the descendants of the original 1948 families still reside in the camps, mostly in Syria, Lebanon, and Gaza. Yet UNRWA continues to keep these resettled persons on its refugee rolls with its most recent 2010 records showing about five million "refugees" and ignoring the fact that close to three and a half million people are fully resettled.[46] The same reports indicate that less than a million-and-a-half people reside in areas designated as "refugee camps."[47]
Notwithstanding this fact, UNRWA has created, during its sixty-two years of operation, a vast bureaucratic network of some 30,000 Palestinian employees with full tenured benefits, who, in turn, provide social services to millions of Arabs regardless of their legal or economic eligibility. Consequently, UNRWA, the Arab host states, and especially the Palestinian Arab beneficiaries have a vested interest in perpetuating the organization's operation and keeping alive the fiction of millions of needy Palestinian refugees.
UNRWA's current operations are neither benevolent nor humanitarian. The agency functions as a "non-territorial government," perpetuating the false idea that five million Palestinians are still refugees and in need of humanitarian assistance. As such, UNRWA's existence is harmful to all players involved: Israel is criticized for not resettling the "refugees," the Palestinian Authority is denied governing its own citizens, and donors give billions to a nonexistent cause, money that should have been used to help genuine refugees in real distress.
UNRWA's operation has to be phased out gradually and carefully. Within this framework, Egypt, Syria, and Lebanon have to award full citizenship to all the Palestinians who have resided in their territories for generations (Jordan has already done it). UNRWA, with the help of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Labour Organization, and other international organizations, should transfer all its facilities (schools, medical clinics, etc.), as well as most of its employees to the local governments' educational and health systems while those donors wishing to continue their support of the Palestinians should negotiate their assistance procedures directly with the relevant Arab governments. The phasing out of UNRWA's operation is vital to the peace process and the stability of the region.
[1] Efraim Karsh, "How Many Palestinian Arab Refugees Were There?" Israel Affairs, Apr. 2011, pp. 224-46.
[2] U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) res. 302 (IV), Dec. 8, 1949, para. 7. [3] UNGA res. 302 (IV), Dec. 8, 1949, para. 6. [4] UNGA res. 393 (V), Dec. 2, 1950, paras. 2, 4. [5] UNGA res. 194 (III), Dec. 11, 1948, paras 2, 11. [6] UNGA res. 393 (V), para. 5. [7] "Preliminary note concerning the financial relationship between compensation and resettlement," U.N. Conciliation Committee for Palestine (UNCCP), A/AC.25/W/64, Apr. 30, 1951. [8] "Memorandum by the Secretary-General to the Ad Hoc Committee on Statelessness and Related Problems," U.N. doc. E/AC, Jan. 3, 1950, pp. 6-7. [9] "Summary Record, a Meeting between the Conciliation Commission and the Relief and Works Agency," UNCCP, Feb. 6, 1951, A/AC.25/SR.204. [10] Alexander Joffe and Asaf Romirowsky, "A Tale of Two Galloways: Notes on the Early History of UNRWA and Zionist Historiography," Middle Eastern Studies, Sept. 2010, p. 661-2. [11] "Historical Survey of Efforts of the UNCCP to Secure the Implementation of Paragraph 11 of G-A Resolution 194(III)," A/AC.25/W.82/Rev.1, Oct. 2, 1961, p. 5; "Third Progress Report," U.N. Conciliation Commission for Palestine, June 21, 1949, A927. [12] David Ben-Gurion, Medinat Israel Hamehudeshet (Tel Aviv: Am Over Press, 1969), pp. 292-312. [13] "Historical Survey of Efforts of the UNCCP," Oct. 2, 1961, p. 5. [14] John B. Blandford, Jr., "Confidential Memorandum," no. 18, Jan. 30, 1951. [15] Report of the director, UNRWA, Jan. 26, 1952, UNGA res. A/Res/513 (VI), para. 2. [16] Quoted in Joffe and Romirowsky, "A Tale of Two Galloways," p. 661. [17] Jordanian constitution, Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, Jan. 1, 1952, art. 5. [18] Jordanian Nationality Law, 1954, Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, Jan. 1, 1954. [19] Mohamed Y. Olwan, "Migration Trends and Patterns in Jordan: The Human Rights Context," American University in Cairo, School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, Center for Migration and Refugee Studies, Oct. 10, 2011, pp. 2-3. [20] Report of the director, UNRWA, Jan. 26, 1952, para. 4. [21] "Political and Security Questions: J. The Palestine Question: Communications and Reports Received by the Security Council: a. Report of UNRWA," Yearbook of the United Nations 1953, Dec. 31, 1953. [22] International Development Advisory Board Report, Mar. 7, 1951, cited in "Palestinian refugees were denied resettlement opportunities," Eretz Yisrael.org, excerpted from Joan Peters, From Time Immemorial: The Origins of the Arab-Jewish Conflict over Palestine (Chicago: JKAP Publications, 2001). [23] Report of the director, UNRWA, July 1, 1951 to June 30, 1952, UNGA A/2171, part IV. [24] Peter L. Hahn, Crisis and Crossfire: The United States and the Middle East since 1945 (Washington D.C.: Potomac Books, 2005), p. 29. [25] Jeffrey Sosland, Cooperating Rivals: The Riparian Politics of the Jordan River Basin (New York: SUNY Press, 2007), p. 70. [26] Memorandum by the U.S. charge d'affairs in Jordan, quoted in Ghada Hashem Talhami. Palestinian Refugees: Pawns to Political Actors. (New York: Nova Science Publishing, 2003), p. 62. [27] Report of the director, UNRWA, July 1, 1952 to June 30, 1953, UNGA A2470, para. 11. [28] UNCCP report to the General Assembly, Dec. 11, 1949 to Oct. 23, 1950, UNGA A/1367/Rev.1. [29] Report of the director, UNRWA, July 1, 1951 to June 30, 1952, para. 62. [30] Report of the director, UNRWA, Sept. 28, 1951, UNGA A/1905, para. 79. [31] David Meir-Levi, "Syria and the Palestinian Refugee Problem," InFocus Quarterly, Spring 2009. [32] Jalal al-Husseini, "The Arab States and the Refugee Issue: A Retrospective View," Beiträge zum ausländischen öffentlichen Recht und Völkerrecht, vol. 189, part 8, 2007, p. 4. [33] Report of the director, UNRWA, Sept. 28, 1951. [34] Report of the director, UNRWA, July 1, 1951 to June 30, 1952, para 67-8. [35] Quoted in Mohammad Khaled al-Aza'r, "Arab Protection for Palestinian Refugees," BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights, Bethlehem, Nov. 2004, p. 5. [36] Mitchell Bard, "The Palestinian Refugees," The Jewish Virtual Library, accessed June 13, 2012. [37] Aza'r, "Arab Protection for Palestinian Refugees," p. 4. [38] "The Question of Reintegration by Repatriation or Resettlement," UNGA A/AC.25/W.82/Rev.1, Oct. 2, 1961, para. 8. [39] Report of the director, UNRWA, July 1, 1951 to June 30, 1952, para. 10. [40] Aza'r, "Arab Protection for Palestinian Refugees," p. 14. [41] "Proposals for the Continuation of the United Nations Assistance to the Palestine refugees," UNGA A/4121, June 15, 1959, part II, para. 4. [42] "Working Group on the Financing of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East: I. Special identification cards to all Palestine refugees," UNGA A/RES/37/120, Dec. 16, 1982. [43] F.M. Gottheil, "UNRWA and Moral Hazard," Middle Eastern Studies, May 2006, pp. 411-2. [44] "The Question of Reintegration by Repatriation or Resettlement," UNGA A/AC.25/W.82/Rev.1, Oct. 2, 1961, para. 118. [45] UNRWA Statistics 2010, Programme Coordination and Support Unit (Amman), UNRWA, Nov. 2011, p. 4. [46] Ibid., p. 5. [47] Ibid. |
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4)-Barack Obama's October Surprises
By Steve McCann
In October 1972, and twelve days before the presidential election, Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger made a surprise announcement of a peace agreement ending the war in Vietnam, thus giving birth to the term "October Surprise." In nearly every election cycle since, one party or the other has attempted to spring some last minute opposition research or policy announcement in the immediate weeks prior to an election. However the Democrats, with their near stranglehold on the mainstream media, have been overwhelmingly more successful in the use of this strategy. That is until this year.
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4)-Barack Obama's October Surprises
By Steve McCann
In October 1972, and twelve days before the presidential election, Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger made a surprise announcement of a peace agreement ending the war in Vietnam, thus giving birth to the term "October Surprise." In nearly every election cycle since, one party or the other has attempted to spring some last minute opposition research or policy announcement in the immediate weeks prior to an election. However the Democrats, with their near stranglehold on the mainstream media, have been overwhelmingly more successful in the use of this strategy. That is until this year.
Barack Obama and the Democrats have been blindsided by not one but two October surprises. The first actually occurred in September: the Al Qaeda-sponsored attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya, and the second: Obama's abysmal performance in the first presidential debate.
The Libyan consulate attack was the catalyst that prompted Obama and his sycophants to obfuscate the failures of the Obama foreign policy by incessant lying regarding the true nature of the Benghazi attack, choosing instead to blame it on some obscure internet video trailer. This deliberate cover-up is now rapidly unraveling making it a potential election game-changer and the epitome of a self-inflicted October surprise.
Obama's debate debacle was startling, as he could not live up to the well-crafted image of being one of the most adept, well-liked and intelligent politicians in American history. In fact that balloon was thoroughly deflated. His performance was indicative of an unprepared and unqualified president unable to defend his four years in office or present a cogent plan for the next four years. As he stands for reelection, the global and domestic landscape is one of turmoil, indecision and uncertainty stemming from his stubborn adherence to a failed ideology and personal narcissism.
Barack Obama assumed the office of President as a man brought-up and steeped in 1960's radicalism which advanced two distinct doctrines. The first, that America, as the lone Western super-power, represented the evil nature of colonialism and capitalism's exploitation of the masses -- whether there was any truth in this assertion or that the United States was guilty of these sins was irrelevant. The material and military success of America and the West could only have come about from expropriating the wealth and labor of the peoples of the world.
This manifests in the deference Obama has shown to the Muslim world and his willingness to travel around the globe apologizing for America. A by-product of this obeisance and philosophical bent has been the unchallenged and at times promoted ascendancy of radical Islamists either into the control of various Middle-East governments or openly operating in new safe havens. The premeditated Benghazi attack and the death of the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans is just the first harvest of this myopic doctrine. Unfortunately for Obama it came seven weeks before an election.
The second primary doctrine of the 1960's radicals is that by utilizing the vehicle of a massive central government, they could control the citizenry and create their concept of a "fair" society. It is the ideal philosophy for those who, so enamored with themselves, can wallow in their self-importance and rule with a heavy hand the same masses they claim to protect. Obama and his fellow-travelers can thus justify bankrupting the country as a necessary part of the transformation of the United States. However, this same approach tried in other nations has never accomplished its stated goals and has been an abysmal failure, leaving the people deeper in poverty and with a greatly diminished standard of living.
In a still open society and up against someone willing to contest this failure, the adherents cannot successfully defend and promote these tenets. Further, when combined with excessive narcissism, ineptitude and an inability to articulate their thinking without external aid, the results are what the people of the United State saw in the debate on October 3rd.
But more important than the context and reaction to these "October surprises" is what they portend for a second Obama term, were he to be re-elected.
During the Obama years, the international scene has been led by arguably the most incompetent and easily intimidated leaders of the past twenty plus years. At the front of the line has been Barack Obama. If he is re-elected, combined with a continuation of the deferential foreign policy pursued in his first term, the United States will no longer be the leader of the free world but will instead be just another moribund quasi-socialist member of the global community watching the global ascendancy of China and Russia.
If Barack Obama remains in office, the Middle East, as it is now constituted, will in due course experience a catastrophic regional conflict. There will also be increased terrorist attacks on America and its interests abroad, as there is absolute disdain for the United States and Obama's lack of leadership -- a reality fully exposed over the past two months.
Regardless of whether Obama is re-elected, the financial dilemma in Europe will continue on and will fester until the European Union and the Eurozone collapses, as the egocentrics in charge remain adamant in their failed strategy of bailouts, money creation and subsidies -- a collapse that will trigger another world-wide financial crisis and recession, if the United States is not able to mitigate its debt dilemma and foster substantial economic growth. If Obama does win on November 6th, the United States will be unable, because of what will be an avalanche of regulations, taxes and debased currency, to weather the storm, as the nation will be led by someone who has no idea of what to do except to stubbornly adhere to failed socialist doctrine.
However, and most important, are the overwhelming character flaws of Barack Obama: his inability to admit a mistake and a lack of integrity. As in the case of the Libyan debacle, where it appears the first impulse was to lie and obfuscate despite the fact that the White House knew within 24 hours the consulate attack was a terrorist act, Obama attempted to cover-up his failures for his own personal benefit. And as revealed numerous times during his presidency, Obama has demagogued countless issues and he has vehemently, and often falsely, denigrated whomever would stand in his way. He has shown himself to be untrustworthy and dishonest to achieve his goals. Further he has surrounded himself with the like-minded willing to be accomplices to this mindset. This is not the kind of person who should be in the White House, particularly at this time in the nation's history.
While the October surprises in this election cycle may have been unexpected, particularly to Barack Obama, they serve to reveal the man behind the well-crafted mask. Further they have allowed the American people to have, in no uncertain terms, a clear choice in November.
4a)Obama Hits Romney For 'Politicizing' White House Failure
By Mark Steyn
The entire reason that this has become the political topic it is is because of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan.”
Thus, Stephanie Cutter, President Obama’s deputy campaign manager, speaking on CNN about an armed attack on the 9/11 anniversary that left a U.S. consulate a smoking ruin and killed four diplomatic staff, including the first American ambassador to be murdered in a third of a century. To discuss this event is apparently to “politicize” it and to distract from the real issues the American people are concerned about. For example, Obama spokesperson Jen Psaki, speaking on board Air Force One on Thursday: “There’s only one candidate in this race who is going to continue to fight for Big Bird and Elmo, and he is riding on this plane.”
She’s right! The United States is the first nation in history whose democracy has evolved to the point where its leader is provided with a wide-body transatlantic jet in order to campaign on the vital issue of public funding for sock puppets. Sure, Caligula put his horse in the senate, but it was a real horse. At Ohio State University, the rapper will.i.am introduced the president by playing the Sesame Street theme tune, which oddly enough seems more apt presidential-walk-on music for the Obama era than “Hail to the Chief.”
Obviously, Miss Cutter is right: A healthy mature democracy should spend its quadrennial election on critical issues like the Republican party’s war on puppets rather than attempting to “politicize” the debate by dragging in stuff like foreign policy, national security, the economy, and other obscure peripheral subjects. But, alas, it was her boss who chose to “politicize” a security fiasco and national humiliation in Benghazi. At 8:30p.m., when Ambassador Stevens strolled outside the gate and bid his Turkish guest good night, the streets were calm and quiet. At 9:40 p.m., an armed assault on the compound began, well planned and executed by men not only armed with mortars but capable of firing them to lethal purpose — a rare combination among the excitable mobs of the Middle East. There was no demonstration against an Islamophobic movie that just got a little out of hand. Indeed, there was no movie protest at all. Instead, a U.S. consulate was destroyed and four of its personnel were murdered in one of the most sophisticated military attacks ever launched at a diplomatic facility.
This was confirmed by testimony to Congress a few days ago, although you could have read as much in my column of four weeks ago. Nevertheless, for most of those four weeks, the president of the United States, the secretary of state, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and others have persistently attributed the Benghazi debacle to an obscure YouTube video — even though they knew that the two events had nothing to do with each other by no later than the crack of dawn Eastern time on September 12, by which point the consulate’s survivors had landed safely in Tripoli.
To “politicize” means “to give a political character to.” It is a reductive term, capturing the peculiarly shrunken horizons of politics: “Gee, they nuked Israel. D’you think that will hurt us in Florida?” So media outlets fret that Benghazi could be “bad” for Obama — by which they mean he might be hitting the six-figure lecture circuit four years ahead of schedule. But for Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Glen Doherty, and Tyrone Woods, it’s real bad. They’re dead, over, gonesville. Given that Obama and Secretary Clinton refer to Stevens pneumatically as “Chris,” as if they’ve known him since third grade, why would they dishonor the sacrifice of their close personal friend by peddling an utterly false narrative as to why he died? You want “politicization”? Secretary Clinton linked the YouTube video to the murder of her colleagues even as the four caskets lay alongside her at Andrews Air Force Base — even though she had known for days that it had nothing to do with it. It’s weird enough that politicians now give campaign speeches to returning coffins. But to conscript your “friend”’s corpse as a straight man for some third-rate electoral opportunism is surely as shriveled and worthless as “politicization” gets.
In the vice-presidential debate, asked why the White House spent weeks falsely blaming it on the video, Joe Biden took time off between big toothy smirks to reply: “Because that was exactly what we were told by the intelligence community.” That too is false. He also denied that the government of which he is nominally second-in-command had ever received a request for additional security. At the risk of “politicizing” things, this statement would appear also to be untrue.
Instead, the State Department outsourced security for the Benghazi consulate to Blue Mountain, a Welsh firm that hires ex-British and -Commonwealth special forces, among the toughest hombres on the planet. The company’s very name comes from the poem “The Golden Journey to Samarkand,” whose words famously adorn the regimental headquarters of Britain’s Special Air Service in Hereford. Unfortunately, the one-year contract for consulate security was only $387,413 — or less than the cost of deploying a single U.S. soldier overseas. On that budget, you can’t really afford to fly in a lot of crack SAS killing machines, and have to make do with the neighborhood talent pool. So who’s available? Blue Mountain hired five members of the Benghazi branch of the February 17 Martyrs’ Brigade and equipped them with handcuffs and batons. A baton is very useful when someone is firing an RPG at you, at least if you play a little baseball. There were supposed to be four men heavily armed with handcuffs on duty that night, but, the date of September 11 having no particular significance in the Muslim world, only two guards were actually on shift.
Let’s pause right there, and “politicize” a little more. Liberals are always going on about the evils of “outsourcing” and “offshoring” — selfish vulture capitalists like Mitt shipping jobs to cheap labor overseas just to save a few bucks. How unpatriotic can you get! So now the United States government is outsourcing embassy security to cheap Welshmen who in turn outsource it to cheaper Libyans. Diplomatic facilities are U.S. sovereign territory — no different de jure from Fifth Avenue or Mount Rushmore. So defending them is one of the core responsibilities of the state. But that’s the funny thing about Big Government: The bigger it gets, the more of life it swallows up, the worse it gets at those very few things it’s supposed to be doing. So, on the first anniversary of 9/11 in a post-revolutionary city in which Western diplomats had been steadily targeted over the previous six months, the government of the supposedly most powerful nation on earth entrusted its security to Abdulaziz Majbari, 29, and his pal, who report to some bloke back in Carmarthen, Wales.
In the days before the attack Joe Biden had been peddling his Obama campaign slogan that “bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive.” The first successful terrorist attack on U.S. sovereign territory since 9/11, and on the very anniversary and by al-Qaeda-linked killers, was not helpful to the Obama team. And so the nature of the event had to be “politicized”: Look, over there — an Islamophobic movie! “Greater love hath no man than this,” quoth the president at Chris Stevens’ coffin, “that a man lay down his life for his friends.” Smaller love hath no man than Obama’s, than to lay down his “friend” for a couple of points in Ohio.
4b)The lies pile up on Benghazi
ByJoseph Curl
The killing of a U.S. ambassador and three other Americans in Libya on the anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks has turned into a massive scandal that threatens to unravel in the final three weeks of the 2012 presidential campaign.
Even the mainstream media, after falling for and parroting the administration’s absurd lie that the Benghazi consulate was attacked after a protest over a short video posted on YouTube in June, seems to be taking notice. The question is whether reporters will follow the trail of lies and deceit or leave off just as the whole mess is imploding.
Last week brought shocking developments. On the eve of a House oversight committee hearing, the State Department called a briefing for the media. For an hour, over the telephone, top department officials spun a new tale that bore almost no resemblance to the official story they’d been telling for weeks.
There was no protest, the officials said, no protest that grew out of hand until a spontaneous mob — whipped into a rage over a video — poured into the consulate. In fact, “nothing was out of the ordinary” on the night of the attack, one official said.
At least until a massive mob of heavily armed terrorists flooded the compound, sweeping over the nine-foot-tall fences topped with three feet of barbed wire. “The lethality and number of armed people is unprecedented,” one of the officials said in detailing the horrifying last hours of the Americans.
With only five guards, Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and other Americans fled to another building when the “unbelievable amount of bad guys,” as one State official called them, poured in. The mob followed and set it on fire. Chaos ensued; the Americans were separated. Some guards barricaded themselves in other buildings, but finally, a group gathered and decided to flee. They sped through the gates in an armored vehicle and ended up at an annex building. But the fighting wasn’t over: The annex took “precise” mortar fire with rounds landing on the roof, immediately killing two Americans.
No one knew where the ambassador was then, and to this day, no one knows how he got to the hospital. In a shocking admission, the officials said they only found out he was there after doctors found his cellphone and began calling people on his recent-call list. And State Department officials never did explain those disturbing photos, including the one with a Libyan holding a cellphone in his mouth dragging the ambassador’s body.
The FBI wouldn’t reach Benghazi for 17 days. When bureau agents finally did, they took tapes from the closed-circuit security cameras. More, reports emerged that an unmanned drone also captured the attack on video. The story was changing fast, and just before administration officials were to testify officially before Congress. The sudden respinning was reminiscent of the evolving story on the raid to get Osama bin Laden — first he had a gun, there was a firefight, he hid behind one of his wives; then, no gun, no firefight, no wife.
In a House hearing last week, lawmakers were furious, especially at the brazen testimony by administration officials that there was enough security at the Libyan outpost.
“To start off by saying you had the correct number, and our ambassador and three other individuals are dead, and people are in the hospital recovering because it only took moments to breach that facility, somehow doesn’t seem to ring true to the American people,” said Rep. Darrell E. Issa, California Republican.
Cornered, the Obama administration and its political campaign went on the attack. “The entire reason that this has become the political topic it is, is because of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan,” said Obama deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter. The New York Times took the directive, saying the hearings did not bring out “anything significantly new” and were clearly politicized.
Even more shocking, Vice President Joseph R. Biden said in his debate with Rep. Paul Ryan that “we weren’t told they wanted more security there. We did not know they wanted more security there.” The outrageous claim came the day after State Department officials cataloged the repeated requests for more security after numerous attacks. (Maybe the president should stop skipping all those intelligence hearings.)
Jay Carney, the strikingly inept White House spokesman, sought to spin the vice president’s bizarre assertion. “He wasn’t talking about the administration writ large. He was speaking about himself, and the president and the White House.” Oh, well that’s reassuring.
So, Fox News reporter Ed Henry said, “the buck stops with the State Department on security then — it doesn’t stop at the White House?”
“Well, that’s an unartful, made-for-television phrasing, Ed,” Mr. Carney whined.
Finally, on Friday, in a remarkably brazen move, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, thrown under the bus, simply refused to answer questions about the attack. “That’s the very way that I’m answering your question today,” she said after not answering.
“And I think I’ll leave it at that.”
“Mrs. Secretary, if you could, the question was ,” the reporter said.
“I know, but I’m going to leave it at that.”
And that is precisely what the president and his minions hope reporters do. Perhaps this time, though, they’ll surprise Americans, stop cheerleading for a failed president, and simply do what they’re supposed to do: Get to the bottom of a spectacular scandal that keeps growing more outrageous every day.
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