Commentary
Reading between more Netanyahu lines
By Jerry Mazza
Online Journal Associate Editor


Jun 23, 2009, 00:24

This time, according to Haaretz, Israel’s Prime Minister told a German newspaper that he could see peaceful relations between Israel and Iran if new leadership took power in Tehran. What comes to mind is that new leadership in Israel, i.e., a less militaristic, theocratic government, could bring peace to Palestine as well as Iran. Idiomatically, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander(s).

Unfortunately, Netanyahu’s nose began to grow (not an ethnic slur) when he said, “There is no conflict between the Iranian people and the people of Israel and under a different regime the friendly relations that prevailed in the past could be restored.” What past is he referring to? Bibi passed this wisdom on to the German Daily Bild.

On other fronts, Haaretz reported that hardliner Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad “who has called the Holocaust a ‘great deception’ and said Israel should be wiped from the map, was officially re-elected in a June 12 vote that the opposition has denounced as a fraud. Many reasons have been given for the election that provoked the most violent unrest in Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution ousted the US backed Shah.”

Iran, like a number of Western (Internet) writers, accused the West (CIA) of playing a role in fomenting today’s unrest as it did in the 1950s, unseating and imprisoning the duly elected President Mossadegh of Iran. Regarding Iran’s present government, two of the most detailed articles I’ve seen came from Iranian writer Reza Fiyouzat in Online Journal. The first article is titled The larger context of the 2009 Iranian elections.

In it, Fiyouzat wrote, “ . . . From its inception, therefore, the theocracy has divided the entire population into two major political groups: khodi (literally meaning, ‘of us,’ those who support the theocracy), and the gheyre-khodi (the others). This is the exact language used, and participation in the elections are reserved purely for the benefit of the khodi (those who believe in the system), who have been divided into different camps from the beginning of the theocracy . . . Within each camp, there are further divisions.

“Within this setup, I for one can state without qualifications that ‘elections’ cannot mean anything but a contest between candidates that are absolutely acceptable to a theocratic establishment. This, in turn, means that ALL elections, to varying degrees, are stolen elections, since the participation of a huge majority of Iranians as candidates, by the theocratic Constitution, have been preempted from way in advance. The right of participation in presidential elections in Iran, for the past three decades, has been stolen and securely put aside as the privilege of a tiny minority of men only.” Ergo this election is under the male thumbs of the theocracy.

In the latest article, Can’t keep a good people down, Fiyouzat states that the protests are a kind of populist movement of anti-government forces, which mean anti-theocracy forces, i.e., working and middle class elements, which constitute millions of people, whether or not they vote. These people are, as the author tells us, not orchestrated by the CIA, but spontaneously seeking an opportunity to register their dissatisfaction with the theocratic status quo. They are even willing to take bullets for their beliefs. This is quite a leap from the first article’s point of view.

Returning to Netanocchio, excuse me, Netanyahu, he claimed to have “no doubts” that Iran’s citizens would select a different government if they were allowed to vote freely. Probably, that’s true about the two stolen Bush terms. And it’s true that Israeli elections have been “stolen” in effect by the electorate’s fear of constant turmoil with Palestine, generated and promoted by Zionist governments under various leaders.

Netanyahu added, “What we have seen in Iran is a powerful desire on the part of the Iranian people to be free.” Fair enough. Most humans, whatever their country, seem to love and desire freedom, at least when it is not corrupted in some form by their government, through a desire for unbridled power, political greed, illegally appropriating borderlands, and/or ethnic, nationalist or religious reasons, which often end in genocide or ethnic cleansing.

Coincidentally, Netanyahu touched on ties with the Palestinians as well. He said that “Israel shared the view of other governments around world that the Palestinians should be allowed to live peacefully and freely alongside Israel.” At this point, he placed his right fist under his chin to support the weight of his growing proboscis.

Perhaps this statement came as his shock to his system as well as this reader’s. I noticed a large head-tick (double-take) as I read it. The statement seemed to totally contradict Israel and Palestine’s past 60 years of history.

To this he added “We want to live peacefully next to the Palestinians and we don’t want to govern them. We want them to have all the powers to govern themselves -- except those handful of powers that could threaten Israel,” which I supposed were retaliations against military attacks. Living peacefully next to Palestinians apparently also means building a wall through their country, leveling homes, imprisoning and killing Palestinian men, women and children. I noticed that severe head-tick again as I read his words.

In fact, my tick recurred when the PM mentioned “a demilitarized Palestinian state that recognized Israel as a nation.” That sounded like a prescription for suicide. He added. “We don’t want to have another Iran next to our borders.” Ah yes, but it hasn’t worked too well with Palestine because Israel extended and extended and extended its borders like guess-who’s nose. Now there’s nothing left but a sprinkling of towns, refugee ghettos, views of decimation. What indeed would Israel do with a nation of 70 million plus Iranians next door? Annex them as the Palestinians were? Or leave a mutual desert of ashes.

On other fronts, Netanyahu said he wouldn’t second-guess President Obama’s approach on Iran, following the Tehran government’s political crackdown. I would imagine he wouldn’t, especially since it is common knowledge that the CIA has had a hand in fomenting trouble and providing the more visible media protesters, English-speaking and Western-looking. It would seem to be an irresistible opportunity for the Agency.

In another interview, this one with NBC’s Meet the Press, Netanyahu commented that “the world was sympathetic to the Iranian protest of the recent contested election, but added it was unclear whether the unrest would spur change in Tehran’s policies.” Change in Iran is at least as likely or unlikely as change in Israeli politics, seeing how Netanyahu has had a second PM life as a result of his militant view on Palestine. The hawks rise, the doves die.

But the PM’s nose stretched a bit more, when he added, “I have no doubt everybody in the world is sympathetic to the Iranians’ desire for freedom.” Weren’t these the people recently accused by Israel of developing nuclear power to build bombs to be used on Israel? And wasn’t it Israel that has repeatedly asked for the task of bombing them first, regardless of Iran not having “the bomb” yet. And wasn’t it Israel which construed Ahmadinejad’s statement, changing the map of the Mideast to wiping Israel off the map? Is it all about glitches in translation?

Netanyahu also told NBC “that he knows Obama wants the Iranian people to be free, adding that free people everywhere were amazed by the willingness of the Iranian people to stand up for their rights.” Gosh, all that “free” talk and admiration for Iranians when they seemed oppressed not only by their government, but by Israel and the United States, still lingering in status quo regarding new settlements in Palestine. It seems the cry of the pachyderm rules.

The PM got in another blast that Iran must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons, as if we never heard it before. Israeli President Shimon Peres chimed in to laud pro-reform protesters Sunday. He encouraged the young to raise their voice for freedom (as if it’s done any good for Palestinian youths). His nose too seemed to grow a bit as he advised how the protestors could bring down their leaders. As if he didn’t realize keeping Ahmadinejad in power provided a constant media punching bag for Israel.

Peres waxed poetic with “Let the people raise their voice for freedom, let the Iranian women . . . voice their thirst for equality [bikinis for all],” he told a gathering of Jewish leaders from around the world. In an arrogant sideswipe, he added, “I don’t know what will disappear first, their enriched uranium, or their poor government. Hopefully the poor government will disappear.” How far the usurpers have come!

In fact, the head of the Mossad, Meir Dagan, pulled a number from his hat, saying that Iran may have the technology to build an atomic weapon by 2014. He forgot his own country was outed for nuclear weapons’ possession with the US government in the mid-60s. It came as a surprise again to the world in 1986 when Mordechai Vananu, a technician at their Dimona nuclear facility, blew the whistle on them in words and pictures in the London Times. He paid for it with an 18-prison sentence in solitary, followed by house arrest after talking to a reporter. So many long pointy noses it almost seems like a Pinocchio convention.