This dispatch, the first of two on Iran, deals with human rights abuses and related matters in Iran and also in neighboring Arab countries. The second dispatch (tomorrow) will deal with military issues concerning Iran.

IRANIANS OUTRAGED AT GOOGLE

Iranian authorities are outraged that an entry on the Google Video website has located Tabriz, the ancient Azeri provincial capital, in Azerbaijan rather than Iran. Tabriz and southern Azerbaijan have been occupied by Iran for centuries. Many Azeris would like independence from Persian repression, and to link with other Azeris across the border in the now independent former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan.

The text of a tourist film on the Google Video site has drawn accusations that Google is deliberately trying to undermine Iranian sovereignty. Etemad, a reformist newspaper, accused Google of a “strange, suspicious and dubious act.”

Most residents of Tabriz speak an Azeri language, not Farsi. Tabriz and other cities in the province witnessed violent protests earlier this year after the publication of a cartoon in a Farsi-language newspaper depicting a cockroach speaking in the local Azeri tongue. Other repressed provinces of Iran, whose plights are completely ignored by the Palestinian-sympathizing western media, include Kurdistan and Khuzestan.

The Iranian regime has a track record of banning Western media. In 2005, it banned the sale of the “Zionist” National Geographic because the magazine listed the “Arabian Gulf” in parentheses after “Persian Gulf.” For more, see the dispatch Zionists “secretly control” both Al-Jazeera and the National Geographic (Dec. 15, 2004).

IRAN PURGES BESTSELLING BOOKS

Dozens of international bestsellers and literary masterpieces have been banned in Iran in the last few weeks in a cultural freeze instigated by the country’s extremist president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Newly banned books include Farsi translations of Tracy Chevalier’s bestseller “The Girl With a Pearl Earring” and Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code,” which allegedly upset clerics within Iran’s tiny Christian community. Chevalier’s novel had previously been selling well, having completed six print runs in Iran.

Another Iranian publishing house has been banned from selling a series of books featuring lyrics by the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Doors, Black Sabbath, Queen and Guns n’ Roses.

The clampdown has been led by hard-line culture minister, Mohammed Hossein Saffar Harandi, a former revolutionary guard and a close ally of Ahmadinejad. Saffar Harandi has said that a tougher line was needed to stop publishers from serving a “poisoned dish to the young generation.”

The crackdown also covers classics such as William Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying,” and hundreds of historic works by Iranian authors, including books on psychology, history, politics and folklore.

The rise in book censorship mirrors repression in other spheres. In September the reformist newspaper Shargh was closed after publishing a cartoon depicting President George Bush, disguised as a horse, debating with a donkey under a halo, widely seen as representing Ahmadinejad.

(For a report on interference with classical literature in Turkey, see the dispatch Pinocchio, Tom Sawyer and Heidi convert to Islam in Turkey (Sept. 7, 2006).)

UN CONDEMNS IRAN FOR HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES

Last week, the UN General Assembly condemned Iran for human rights abuses, as a new video emerged in the West of the public hanging of Alireza Gorji, 23, and his friend Hossein Makesh, 22. The two were hanged in July in Broudjerd, Iran.

In the video, a crowd can be seen held back by barriers, as the two young men, with their hands bound behind their backs, are hoisted with ropes around their necks onto two rusty cranes, and then left to hang to death. One of the men wriggles for about six minutes, before he is dead. The other dies more quickly.

Officially these two youngsters were put to death because they had acted “immorally,” but anti-government campaigners claim that they were political activists executed on trumped-up charges.

The video was filmed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and smuggled out by the National Council of Resistance of Iran, an exiled opposition group. The group says it has gathered documentation on the execution of more than 20,000 political opponents of the regime.

Amnesty International last year documented at least 94 public executions although a much greater number are suspected to have taken place in secret.

GAY IRANIAN MAN HANGED IN PUBLIC

Shahab Darvishi, a gay Iranian man, was publicly hanged on November 14 in the western city of Kermanshah. He was charged with “lavat” meaning a homosexual relationship, the official Iranian-government news agency IRNA reported.

Darvishi was hung in the so-called “Freedom Square” in Kermanshah in front of hundreds of cheering people. Under Iran’s Islamic Penal Code, homosexuality between consenting adults is a capital crime.

EGYPTIAN MAN BEHEADED FOR STABBING SAUDI TO DEATH

Saudi Arabia has beheaded an Egyptian who killed a Saudi man in an argument. Rajih bin Ahmed bin Mustafa Waziri was convicted of stabbing to death Majid bin Abdel-Karim bin Abdullah during a dispute. He was executed with a sword to the head in the southern town of Jizan, the Saudi Interior Ministry said yesterday.

Under a strict interpretation of Islam anyone convicted of murder, drug trafficking, rape and armed robbery can be executed. Officially, the kingdom beheaded 83 people in 2005 and 35 people in 2004.

SADDAM VICTIMS MADE TO WALK ON BROKEN GLASS

Saddam Hussein, already sentenced to death on November 5 for crimes against humanity, faces a dozen or more cases against him. This week he was made to listen to fresh evidence in his latest trial from Kurds who were, it is alleged, tortured on his orders.

As part of the 1988 Anfal “Spoils of War” campaign against ethnic Kurds, Yunis Haji, who was 20 at the time, said Iraqi soldiers tortured him for three days. “We were made to walk barefoot on broken glass,” Haji told the court. “We were tied on a table and they used to drop cold water, drop by drop on our forehead. Every drop used to be like a mountain crashing on my head.”

Taimor Abdallah Rokhzai, who now lives in Washington D.C., said he was 12 when he and other villagers were taken out into the desert and lined up in front of a trench and fired on by soldiers in a crime reminiscent of Nazi actions against Jews in World War Two.

Rokhzai’s mother and sister and dozens of others, including pregnant women, fell dead or dying into the trench. Shot in the shoulder, he also fell into the trench. “Suddenly it stopped and it was quiet. I was waiting to die and my whole body was covered with blood, and the soldiers went away,” he told the court (in a trial which – amazingly – the so-called human rights group Human Rights Watch, has condemned). He climbed out and fled across an area that was dotted with similar pits full of bodies.

Prosecutors say the Anfal campaign included widespread use of chemical weapons, killed more than 180,000 people and destroyed hundreds of villages. Saddam and his cousin Ali Hassan al-Majeed (known as “Chemical Ali”) face charges of genocide. The trial’s chief prosecutor Munqith al-Faroon said on Sunday that he had an audiotape and documents proving Saddam himself ordered the gassing in northern Iraq.

MOROCCAN WINS FIRST PLACE IN IRAN HOLOCAUST CARTOON CONTEST

Abdollah Derkaoui, a Moroccan “artist,” received the top prize in an Iranian Holocaust cartoon contest. Derkaoui received $12,000 for his “work” comparing Israel’s security fence (which at Islamic Jihad’s own admission has prevented them sending dozens of suicide bombers into Israel to murder Jews), with the Auschwitz concentration camp, where 1.5 million people were murdered.

Second place was awarded equally to Carlos Latuff from Brazil and A. Chard from France who shared $8,000. Iran’s Shahram Rezai came third and received $5,000. The entries on display came from nations including United States, Indonesia and Turkey.

Masoud Shojai, the creator of the exhibit, said the contest would be an annual event “until the destruction of Israel.”

The Holocaust cartoon contest made little impression within Iran. Not a single private Iranian newspaper published the winning entries. The cartoons have been on display since August at the Museum of Contemporary Arts for Palestine (which was the Israeli diplomatic mission before the 1979 Islamic Revolution) but aside from the visit of state schools did not draw large crowds. UN chief Kofi Annan is among those to condemn the exhibition and prize.

AYATOLLAH WHO BACKS SUICIDE BOMBERS AIMS TO BE NEW IRANIAN SPIRITUAL LEADER

Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi, 71, an ultra-conservative Iranian cleric who opposes all dialogue with the West, is campaigning to succeed Grand Ayatollah Ali Khameini, 67, as the next supreme spiritual leader of the Islamic state.

Mesbah-Yazdi is standing in elections for the Assembly of Experts, an 86-member panel of theologians that is responsible for nominating a replacement for Khameini should he step down.

Mesbah-Yazdi backs the use of suicide bombers against Israel and is thought to support the acquisition of an Iranian nuclear bomb. He is considered to be an extremist even by his fellow mullahs. He was a fringe figure in Iran’s theocracy until last year’s election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a fellow fundamentalist who views him as his ideological mentor.

He is known to many as “Professor Crocodile” because of a notorious cartoon that showed him weeping false tears over the jailing of a reformist journalist. The cartoonist was subsequently sent to jail too.

The run-up to the vote has been marred by complaints of rigging in favor of hardliners. Around half of nearly 500 applicants have been banned from standing.

ARGENTINA ISSUES WARRANT FOR ARREST OF FORMER IRANIAN PRESIDENT

Argentinean Judge Rodolfo Canicoba Corral has asked the government of Iran as well as Interpol to hand over the former Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani and seven others who are wanted for murder in connection with the 1994 bombing of a Jewish cultural and charity center that killed 85 people and injured almost 300. It was the worst terrorist attack ever on Argentine soil.

Prosecutor Alberto Nisman said that the decision to attack the cultural center “was undertaken in 1993 by the highest authorities of the then-government of Iran.”

The attack which was carried out by Hizbullah came, according to the prosecutors, “under orders directly emanating from the regime in Teheran.”

Besides Rafsanjani, who was Iran’s president between 1989 and 1997, warrants were also issued for former Iranian intelligence and security minister Ali Fallahijan and former foreign minister Ali Akbar Velayati, and for the former Hizbullah security chief for external affairs.

In response, Iran’s Attorney General Abdel Samad said the accusations were “empty” and issued an international arrest warrant for the case’s lead prosecutor Alberto Nisman, as well as a former judge in the case, Juan Jose Galeano.

The Argentine government has stepped up security at the U.S. and Israeli embassies as well as at Jewish community centers and synagogues.

SHIAS WIN ELECTION IN BAHRAIN

Bahrain, separated from Shia-dominated Iran by the Persian Gulf, is now also controlled by a Shia majority, after a historic election this past weekend.

The polls followed a bitter campaign that appeared to heighten sectarian divisions between the Sunni and Shia populations in Bahrain. Preliminary results suggest the main opposition al-Wifaq party will gain a majority in the 40-member lower chamber.

In Bahrain, citizens vote for a lower chamber that cannot form a government but may initiate legislation. An equally powerful upper house is appointed by King Hamad.

A PROCESS OF GRADUALLY SILENCING OPPOSITION

I attach three articles below. The first, which has the writer’s name withheld due to his fear of government persecution, reports on the closing of newspapers in Iran as well as “intellectuals arrested, satellite dishes confiscated and Internet traffic disrupted in what is seen as a delayed crackdown more than a year after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became Iran’s president.”

The writer says it is “part of a process of gradually silencing opposition to a government that has yet to deliver on promises of economic reforms.” As a result some reformers and traditionalists are coming together in an unlikely alliance.

The second article, from the Wall Street Journal, written by “Farouz Farzami,” the pseudonym of a journalist who is forbidden to publish in Iran, claims that “the well-to-do Iranian drinks and reads and watches what he wishes. He does as he pleases behind the walls of his private mansions and villas. In return for his private comforts, the affluent Iranian is happy to sacrifice freedom of speech, most of his civil rights, and his freedom of association. The upper-middle class has been bought off by this pact, which makes a virtue of hypocrisy.”

According to the writer, “In this world, it is only the principled intellectuals of moderate means who suffer.”

“IRANIAN CLEANSING OF 1.5 MILLION AHWAZI ARABS”

The final article reports on the plight of Ahwazi Arabs in Iran. Whilst this list/website has featured articles on the Ahwazis before, the subject is so under-reported in the mainstream media that I include another piece below. The San Francisco Chronicle should be commended for running it.

An estimated 1.5 million people have been forced from their land, resulting in an “occupation of an Arab homeland in the heart of the Middle East that almost nobody knows about.”

Ahwazis are banned from speaking Arabic, and as a result many students drop out of school early rather than receive an education in Farsi. Their land is riddled with mines left over from the Iran-Iraq war, which continue to kill or maim Ahwazi farmers.

-- Tom Gross

PROMINENT BRITISH MUSLIM SENT FUNDS TO DAVID IRVING

Asghar Bukhari, a founding member of the influential British Muslim Public Affairs Committee (MPAC), has been exposed by The Observer newspaper as a supporter of David Irving, the British “historian” currently serving a three-year prison sentence in an Austrian jail for Holocaust denial.

Bukhari, who is one of Britain’s most prominent speakers on Muslim issues, contacted Irving after reading his website. Bukhari wrote to him “You may feel like you are on your own but rest assured many people are with you in your fight for the Truth.” Bukhari urged Islamic websites to ask visitors to make donations to Irving’s cause, and also donated some of his own money to the Holocaust denier. In a follow-up letter obtained by The Observer Bukhari wrote: “If there is any other way I can help please don’t hesitate to call me. I have also asked many Muslim websites to create links to your own and ask for donations.”

He headed his mail to Irving with a quotation attributed to the philosopher John Locke: “All that is needed for evil to triumph is for good people to stand idle.”

MPAC, which describes itself as Britain’s largest Muslim civil rights group, and claims to be “merely anti-Zionist,” has a history of anti-Semitism. It was banned by the British National Union of Students from all British university campuses in 2004 for “anti-Semitic” activities, but continues to operate unofficially on campuses.

At the last election MPAC drew up a list of Labour party candidates with links to Israel, whom it urged Muslims to vote out. One MP, Lorna Fitzsimons (who is a subscriber to this email list), lost her seat to the (more anti-Israeli) Liberal Democrats by 400 votes.

* For more on Irving, please see David Irving says from prison: “The Jews will see a second Holocaust in 20 to 30 years” (Feb. 27, 2006). Irving was also mentioned in my article “The barbarians of Europe”.

GERMAN POLICE FOIL PLANE TERROR PLOT

German police have foiled a plot to smuggle a bomb onto a passenger plane. Speaking on condition of anonymity, German security sources said on Monday that the bomb was due to be placed on a plane at Frankfurt International Airport, one of the world’s busiest airports. The German newspaper Die Welt claimed the target was Israel’s El Al airline.

The Berlin daily “Tagesspiegel” reports that the terror cell were from Jordan and other Arab countries, but lived in nine apartments in the German states of Rheinland-Pfalz and Hessen. Die Welt reported on Tuesday they had paid to enlist the help of a male employee of Frankfurt airport who had access to the security department.

German police uncovered a failed plot by two young Lebanese men to detonate suitcase bombs on trains in Germany in July.

DUTCH GOVERNMENT BACKS BURQA BAN

The Dutch immigration minister, Rita Verdonk, who is known for her tough policies, has proposed a ban on Muslim women wearing the burqa in public places. The Dutch cabinet has backed the proposal. The burqa is a full body covering that also obscures the face. The Dutch proposal would ban it being worn on public streets, trains, schools, buses and in law courts.

Verdonk said: “The Cabinet finds it undesirable that face-covering clothing – including the burqa – is worn in public places for reasons of public order, security and protection of citizens.”

The decision came just before elections were due to be held in the Netherlands today, which the ruling center-right coalition is expected to win.

France has passed a law banning religious symbols, including Muslim headscarves, from high schools. Some German states ban teachers in public schools from wearing headscarves, but there is no blanket rule against burqas. Italy has banned face-coverings, resurrecting old laws passed to combat domestic terrorism, while citing new security fears.

UK LEGAL STAFF CAN WEAR THE VEIL IN COURT

The head of the UK immigration tribunals has also given legal staff permission to wear the Islamic veil in court, including those that fully cover a woman’s face. Mr Justice Hodge, president of the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal, ruled that legal representatives should be allowed to wear the veil because “it is important to be sensitive in such cases.”

The veil row began after Judge George Glossop objected to Shabnam Mughal, a Muslim, wearing a veil when she appeared at a tribunal in the town of Stoke-on-Trent last week.

England’s most senior judge, Lord Chief Justice Lord Phillips, was consulted by Mr Justice Hodge (who is the husband of Tony Blair’s Industry minister, Margaret Hodge) before he made his decision.

Former British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw provoked a fierce debate last month when he called the veil a “visible statement of separation and difference” and “bound to make better, positive relations between the two communities more difficult.”

HIZB UT-TAHRIR INFILTRATES THE BRITISH HOME OFFICE

A senior member of the militant group Hizb ut-Tahrir – which Tony Blair had pledged to ban following last year’s multiple suicide attacks on the London transport system – has infiltrated the British Government Home Office. The activist, Abid Javaid, has been employed as an information technology worker at one of the Home Office’s most sensitive branches and has even been given a grant to organize an event for the radical group. Inflammatory videos encouraging Muslims to attack “infidels” were shown at the event.

Hizb ut-Tahrir has a Trotskyite-style policy of “infiltration” in order to create an Islamic state throughout Europe. As noted in the dispatch Dilpazier Aslam, extremist member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, sacked by The Guardian (July 26, 2005), Hizb ut-Tahrir is already banned as a terrorist group in several European countries. In Germany it is also banned under German laws outlawing organizations which propagate Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism, but it remains legal in Britain.

This email list/website also reported on Hizb ut-Tahrir in the dispatch Islamic militant Hizb ut-Tahrir infiltrates Reuters (& Prince Harry apologizes) (Sept. 15, 2005).

The HuT infiltration at the British Home Office was discovered by Vigil, a group campaigning against religious extremism. In a mocked-up video shown to new recruits, an actor playing a woman interrogator at Guantanamo Bay was shown wiping blood over the face of a prisoner to make him confess. A student in his twenties working for Vigil, who posed as a recruit to HuT, said: “The reaction was shocking. The group were clenching their fists and shouting, ‘We’ll kill her, how can you do this to our brothers? F****** kuffars [non-believers].’”

The young man, who is known as Jay – not his real name – was forced to rob three people to show his loyalty to the group. Many of the HuT groups were Black and White converts to Islam. “They were thugs,” said Jay, who spent six months with them.

Although the group claims it is non-violent, its website advocates the introduction of shariah law and adds: “We begin fighting the enemy even if he did not start fighting us.”

Separately, the British Government warned last Friday that “Britain faces a sustained threat from extremist Islamic groups recruiting in British universities.” Bill Rammell, the UK higher education minister, said there was evidence that undergraduates were being “groomed” by groups infiltrating campuses disguised as ordinary students.

The British Muslim Forum, a moderate umbrella group affiliated to almost 300 mosques, welcomed the statement and said that the “radicalism of Muslim youths” on campuses needed to be tackled.

TURKS MARCH AGAINST RADICAL ISLAM

Thousands of Turks marched in Ankara on November 4 “in order to defend secular life against radical Islamic influences.” Around 12,000 people marched to the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, chanting “Turkey is secular and will remain secular.” Many Turks fear that if left unchecked, Islamic fundamentalism could lead to a theocracy similar to Iran.

The current Turkish government led by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has stoked secularist concerns. Edrogan has spoken out against restrictions on wearing Islamic-style headscarfs in government offices and schools and supporting religious schools. He also tried to criminalize adultery before being forced to back down under intense EU pressure, and some party-run municipalities have taken steps to ban alcohol.

CANADA REJECTS “FAMILY HONOR” AS A MURDER DEFENSE

The Supreme Court of Canada has refused to consider that Muslim cultural and religious beliefs in “family honor” should be taken into account as justification for receiving a lighter sentence for killing an unfaithful wife.

The court this month declined to consider the appeal of Adi Abdul Humaid, a devout Muslim from the United Arab Emirates, who admitted to stabbing Aysar Abbas, then aged 46, to death with a steak knife on a visit to Ottawa in 1999. He stabbed her 23 times in the throat and neck.

Humaid’s lawyer, Richard Bosada, had argued Humaid was provoked by his wife’s claim she cheated on him, an insult so severe in the Muslim faith it deprived him of self-control, and therefore he should receive a lighter sentence. The application claimed that the concept of “family honor” in the Muslim culture means a man is disgraced if his wife has an affair.

The Ontario Court of Appeal concluded Humaid’s defense lacked an “air of reality.” The prosecution said it was “irreconcilable with the principal of gender equality” enshrined in the Charter of Rights. Humaid and Abbas were Canadian citizens who lived in Dubai in 1999.

PRESIDENT OF PENN UNIVERSITY PICTURED WITH SUICIDE BOMBER

Amy Gutmann, the President of the University of Pennsylvania, was pictured at a Halloween party with a student dressed as a suicide bomber. The pictures can be seen here.

Saad Saadi, the student who came dressed as a suicide bomber had plastic dynamite strapped to his chest and a toy automatic rifle. Both Gutmann and Saadi have apologized for the incident.

“POLITICAL CORRECTNESS GONE MAD”

I attach three articles below. The first, from the (British) Daily Mail, reports on “Samaritan’s Purse” a Christian charity bringing Christmas cheer to needy children abroad, that this year has banned “Jesus, God and anything else connected with its own faith” in case Muslims are offended. As the paper notes, the charity has been accused of “political correctness gone mad”.

The second article reports on Christian populations in Muslim lands, which are in decline, largely as a result of intimidation by radical Islamists. The Associated Press cites Palestinian Christians as a prime example of this phenomenon.

The final article below is an opinion piece by Daniel Pipes who uses a document from 210 years ago to prove “an extraordinary statement of peaceful intent toward Islam” by the United States. Pipes writes: “Has the United States ever engaged in a crusade against Islam? No, never. And, what’s more, one of the country’s earliest diplomatic documents rejects this very idea.”

-- Tom Gross

UPDATES: 100 ARRESTED FOR WATCHING A MOVIE

* Updating the item on Azerbaijan in yesterday’s dispatch, the Azerbaijani journalist who criticized Islam along with his editor has been jailed for two months. In addition, an Iranian cleric has offered his house as a reward to anyone who kills the Azeri writer. On Sunday, 50 people gathered in front of the Azeri embassy in Tehran chanting slogans against the author forcing police to cordon off the area.

* Updating the items on Somalia in yesterday’s dispatch, Islamist officials yesterday arrested at least 100 people in Lower Shabelle province in Somalia because they were watching a movie. The new Islamic regime has banned movies. Those arrested included women and children, who were watching an Indian film. The young people taken into custody had their heads shaved, according to news reports (reports which were not carried prominently by liberal-left media in the West).

* The Red Cross today suspended its activities in the Gaza Strip until further notice after Palestinian gunmen kidnapped two of its Italian aid workers yesterday. The two workers were released this morning, Palestinian security officials said. Over the past two years, there has been a rash of kidnappings of foreign aid workers and journalists in Gaza. Officers of Palestinian Authority security services were said to play a major role in many of the abductions. Separately, on Tuesday, Palestinian Islamic gunmen opened fore on the car of Ramallah’s new mayor, who is a Roman Catholic.

As a follow-up to last week’s dispatch titled Al-Jazeera launches in English today, using an Israeli satellite provider (Nov. 15, 2006) for those interested, the first six minutes broadcast on the new channel can be seen here.

WAR ON WHAT?

This is the first of three dispatches this week highlighting recent news items about radical Islam which have been underreported, or not reported at all, in the mainstream media. Today’s dispatch concerns radical Islam in Africa and Asia, and tomorrow’s concerns radical Islam in Europe and North America. A third dispatch will highlight a very important new TV documentary about radical Islam.

I send these items as a counterbalance to the incessant anti-Israeli propaganda being broadcast in mainstream western media. For example, the main headlines this morning on BBC world service radio spoke first of “the indiscriminate and disproportionate attacks on civilians by Israel in Lebanon” (perhaps the BBC hasn’t noticed that the conflict ended months ago and that the indiscriminate attacks were made on Israelis not by them) and the next news item was about supposed Israeli “crimes” in Gaza. No mention, of course, of the dozens of rockets falling daily into Israel from Gaza; this morning’s rockets again seriously injured Israelis in Sderot.

It is not only western media that seems to think there is no other news in the world other than to attack Israel and America. So do NGOs. Here, for example, is the mass email sent out yesterday by War on Want, a major British charity with considerable funding which it is meant to use to fight poverty. To judge from their “Upcoming Events” it seems the source of global poverty and hardship are those evil Israeli Jews.

WAR ON WANT: UPCOMING EVENTS

From: “WaronWant”
To: “Friends (Friends)”
Sent: Monday, November 20, 2006 6:15 PM
Subject: War on Want: Upcoming Events

We thought you might like to get involved in the following upcoming events that War on Want will be participating in. Be sure to visit War on Want’s website regularly to stay on top of all our activities.

PROTEST AT CATERPILLAR’S COMPLICITY IN
ISRAELI WAR CRIMES 5.30 pm,
WEDNESDAY 22 NOVEMBER

Mike Baunton CBE, the Vice President of Caterpillar will attend a function organised by the Institute of Mechanical Engineers at the Grosvenor House Hotel in Park Lane (Marble Arch/Bond Street tube, see map) London on 22 November.

Meet at 17.30 at the Park Lane entrance to the Grosvenor House Hotel.

For further details on the protest and to find learn more about Caterpillar’s complicity in crimes against the Palestinian People go to www.bigcampaign.org.uk

LOBBY OF PARLIAMENT - MEET YOUR MP
3.00 pm, WEDNESDAY 29 NOVEMBER

Join campaigners on the UN International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People as they lobby Parliament on behalf of Palestine.

To lobby your MP, contact your MP as soon as possible and arrange a meeting with them on Wednesday 29 November. If you don’t know who your MP is, go to www.faxyourmp.com or phone 020 7219 3000. Briefly explain to your MP what you would like to speak to them about.

The lobby will focus on the following issues:

• Stop Starving the Palestinians - Stop Arming Israel
• Restore Aid to the Palestinian Authority
• Release Palestinian Parliamentarians
• Respect Palestinian Democracy

Meet up in briefing room W1 from 3 to 6pm at the House of Commons, London SW1. The lobby of Parliament will be followed by a meeting in Committee room 12 at 7pm.

For more information on the lobby go to www.palestinecampaign.org/events.asp?d=y&id=1955

STOP ARMING ISRAEL LAUNCH MEETING
6.30 pm, TUESDAY 5 DECEMBER

Come to the launch of the Stop Arming Israel Campaign, featuring speakers Jeff Halper (Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions), Husam Zomlot (Palestinian National Delegation), and others.

The event starts at 6.30 at Room U8, Tower One, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London WC2 and is hosted by LSESU Palestine Society supported by War on Want, Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Campaign Against Arms Trade.

To learn more about the Stop Arming Israel coalition go here www.stoparmingisrael.org

WORLD FAIR
12.00 - 7.00 pm FRIDAY 1 DECEMBER
11.00 am - 5.00 pm SATURDAY 2 DECEMBER

And finally, be sure to drop by London’s liveliest and best-loved trade fair as it celebrates its 20th anniversary.

This two day festival has live world music, surprise guests, over 50 stalls run by ethical traders and charities featuring Womad’s Madras Café, arts, crafts, clothes, cards, books, toys, creche (Saturday only), with disabled access.

This year’s fair will be at the Camden Centre, Bidborough Street, London WC1. Download the flier to find out more -
www.waronwant.org/download.php?id=486

To unsubscribe from future War on Want emails, email unsubscribe@waronwant.org

Tom Gross writes:

And here is what War on Want, the BBC, and many others, ignore:

PAKISTANI SCHOOL TEACHER BEHEADED

A school teacher in Pakistan was beheaded last Sunday by Islamic terrorists. Maulana Hashim Khan’s decapitated body was found along with a note that claimed that Khan and Maulana Salahuddin, a cleric also murdered last month, might have been spying for America.

The note proclaimed “for this reason, we punished him under Islamic laws.” Both Khan and Salahuddin were teachers at an Islamic seminary located near the Afghan border. Scores of others have been “executed according to Islamic justice” in recent years in Waziristan after they were accused of being informants. (This story was covered by the Associated Press wires but few newspapers mentioned it.)

RAPE VICTIM SENTENCED TO 90 LASHES IN SAUDI ARABIA

A Saudi court has sentenced the victim of a gang rape to 90 lashes of the whip because she was alone in a car with a man to whom she was not married at the time she was raped. The male friend of the rape victim was also sentenced to 90 lashes for being alone with her in the car. The four Saudis convicted of rape were sentenced to prison terms. A fifth man who watched while he filmed the rape on his mobile phone still faces investigation. (This story was reported by the German news agency DPA).

In another case in Saudi Arabia, a woman has been punished for driving a car. Women are banned from driving in Saudi Arabia. Her passport has also been temporarily suspended.

INDONESIA SETS FREE BALI BOMB TERRORISTS

Almost 60 jailed Islamic extremists linked to atrocities such as the two Bali bombings and the attacks on the Australian Embassy and Marriott Hotel in Jakarta, have been set free, reports the Australian newspaper, the Herald Sun on November 17. They include 14 terrorists who have been quietly released in the past two months.

The latest releases, and that in June of Jemaah Islamiah’s spiritual leader Abu Bakar Bashir, have outraged families who lost loved ones in the 2002 and 2005 Bali terrorist strikes. Some survivors feared those set free could be plotting more terrorist attacks. In the 2002 Bali bombing alone, 202 people were murdered, including 88 Australians. Those responsible for the Indonesian Christmas Eve church bombings were also freed.

Dozens more had been arrested by Indonesian police, often with the help of Australian authorities, and held for just days or weeks before being freed, reports the newspaper. (This kind of tactic will be familiar to Israelis who throughout the 1990s saw Yasser Arafat free terrorists days after they had been arrested with Israeli help.)

LIBERAL-LEFT MEDIA IGNORE TORTURED BANGLADESHI JOURNALIST

Uddin Shoaib Choudhury, a Bangladeshi journalist, who said that Bangladesh should have peaceful relations with Jews, is currently on trial in the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka on multiple counts of sedition, treason and blasphemy. Choudhury the former editor of “The Weekly Blitz” an English language newspaper published in Dhaka, angered authorities after he published articles saying Israel should be allowed to exist and after he criticized radical Islam.

Choudhury was arrested in November 2003, prior to boarding a flight to Israel. He was due to deliver an address on understanding between Muslims and Jews. His visit to Israel would have been the first by a Bangladeshi journalist.

He was kept in prison for seventeen months where he was tortured by the authorities and the Bangladeshi authorities, ruled by a coalition including two extremist Islamic parties, have pursued charges against him. Campaigners for him say they believe it is a foregone conclusion that he will be found guilty, and the penalty will be death by hanging.

No liberal-left media has covered this story. Virtually the only newspapers to cover it have been the Jerusalem Post, the New York Sun, the Wall Street Journal and the Australian, which a few days ago had an opinion piece on Choudhury, this can be read here. (The Chicago Tribune and the New York Times have mentioned the trial, but only very briefly.)

BEHEADED CHRISTIAN SCHOOLGIRLS WERE “RAMADAN TROPHIES”

“The Australian” newspaper reports that an Indonesian court was told last week that the three Christian high school girls who were beheaded last October were killed as a Ramadan “trophy” by Indonesian terrorists who conceived the idea after a visit to Philippine Jihadists.

The Islamic ringleader decided that beheading Christians could qualify as “an act of Muslim charity,” the court was told.

The girls’ severed heads were dumped in plastic bags in their village in Indonesia’s strife-torn Central Sulawesi province, along with a handwritten note saying: “Wanted: 100 more Christian heads, teenaged or adult, male or female; blood shall be answered with blood, soul with soul, head with head.”

The bodies, still dressed in school uniform, were left by the roadside near the execution site.

The three men who are accused have been charged under Indonesia’s anti-terrorism law. To judge by the item above in this dispatch, even if convicted, they may soon be freed.

ISLAMIC LEADER URGES A “GREATER SOMALIA”

Sheik Hassan Dahir Aweys, chairman of the Council of Islamic Courts which now controls much of southern Somalia, told a radio station last weekend that he would work towards uniting ethnic Somali peoples to achieve a “Greater Islamic Somalia”. This would incorporate regions of both Kenya and Ethiopia, he said.

Aweys vowed to “leave no stone unturned to integrate our Somali brothers in Kenya and Ethiopia and restore their freedom to live with their ancestors in Somalia.”

This is the first time Aweys has spoken of expanding the influence of the Islamic courts outside Somalia since his group seized control of the capital, Mogadishu, in June and then consolidated its control over most of southern Somalia.

UN: SOMALIS HELPED HIZBULLAH ATTACK ISRAEL

A recent UN report said that more than 700 Islamic militants from Somalia traveled to Lebanon in July to fight alongside Hizbullah. In return, according to the report, Iran and Syria sent weapons to the Islamic alliance aiming to seize full control of Somalia.

The 86-page UN report was issued by four experts monitoring violations of a 1992 United Nations arms embargo on Somalia, which was put in place after the country fell into civil war and remains in effect.

The report states that in mid-July, Aden Hashi Farah, a leader of the Somali Islamist alliance, personally selected about 720 combat-hardened fighters to travel to Lebanon in order to help Hizbullah launch attacks on Israel.

This report also claims that Iran sought to trade arms for uranium from Somalia to further its nuclear ambitions, though it does not say whether Iran succeeded.

The Somali “fighters” were paid a minimum of $2,000 for their services, the report says, and as much as $30,000 was to be given to the families of those killed, with money donated by “a number of supporting countries.”

The report also accuses Djibouti, Egypt, Libya and Saudi Arabia of supplying the Somali Islamists with arms, advisers and fighters.

(This story was covered by Reuters but few newspapers or TV stations mentioned it.)

BBC SOMALIA DECIDES NOT TO REPORT ON MASSACRE

Melanie Phillips writes: “The extent and implications of the BBC’s bias towards the enemies of western civilization is still not properly understood, even by many of those who are constantly appalled by what they hear in Britain from its domestic services. The lethal damage it may be doing in parts of the world where such an ideological bent turns it into an active supporter of tyranny is something else again.

On his website, Bill Roggio describes how the Islamic Courts Union is progressively spreading jihad through Somalia. But as he also notes, and according to this report, the BBC has been actively supporting this Somali wing of the Islamic jihad.

‘A motion against the BBC Somali Service radio was introduced in the Puntland Parliament on Monday in Garowe, the Puntland capital. Some 8 Puntland legislators introduced the bill to ban the BBC Somali Service from operating in Puntland regions. Sources said another 22 lawmakers supported the motion and a debate opened.

‘The Puntland MPs voted after the debate, with more than 35 lawmakers voting to have the BBC radio banned from operating inside Puntland. Lawmakers who proposed the motion accused the BBC Somali Service – the radio with the largest reach inside Somalia – of being partisan and pro-Islamic Courts, to the detriment of Puntland and other political factions.’

Why is the British taxpayer, who pays for the BBC World Service, expected to subsidize support for the jihad in Somalia?”

BBC SOMALIA DECIDES NOT TO COVER RECENT MASSACRE

Separately, the democratic opposition in Somalia says it is shocked after the BBC Somali-language Service failed to report on the murder of men in their hospital beds by the Islamic Courts’ militia in southern Somalia. So far the BBC Somalia Service, the farthest-reaching Somali language and publicly funded radio, has not even mentioned these killings.

Under the headline “Why is BBC silent about Buale’s massacre?” SomaliNet wrote earlier this month: “The families of the victims have contacted the highest level of BBC Somalia. Whilst BBC Somalia claims to be impartial and accurate many have questioned why they remained silent over these murders now known as ‘Buale’s massacre.’”

AZERBAIJANI PAPER: “ISLAM IS BLOCKING HUMANITY’S DEVELOPMENT”

Azerbaijani prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation into an Azerbaijani newspaper, after it published an article that said Islam was blocking humanity’s development. The article also argued that the Prophet Muhammad had created nothing but problems for Eastern countries.

The small-circulation newspaper “Senet” published an article this month that compared European and Muslim values and asserted that Islam was a sham religion that suffocated people, pulled them away from freedom, and hindered humanity’s development.

As of yet there have been no protests throughout the Muslim world against this newspaper.

(On a separate note, I would like to mention that in Azerbaijan, as in Turkey and Kazakhstan – unfairly the subject of “Borat’s” ridicules – there are many moderate secularist, and indeed pro-America and pro-Semitic Muslims.)

AND THE GENOCIDE GOES ON

I attach two articles below about Sudan. These are rare examples of news organizations actually mentioning that the ongoing ethnic cleansing and massacres of black African non-Arabs in the Sudan, is being carried out on racial grounds by Arabs, a fact most of the anti-Israel and anti-U.S. European media strenuously try to avoid when they do occasionally report on this ongoing attempted genocide.

Two weeks ago, in an extremely unusual move, The Associated Press even mentioned in a headline that Arabs were the perpetrators (“Chad Says Arab Tribe Kills 128 Africans in Large-Scale Organized Attack,” The Associated Press, Tuesday, November 7, 2006; 5:34 PM). Of course, Western media never fail to mention that Israelis are the perpetrators in any story involving Israel. Or that settlers in the West Bank are Jewish.

-- Tom Gross

[Dispatches will be less frequent than usual for the time being as work continues to be done to restructure the website.]

For those interested in the spectacular lies told by the western media about Israel, which are (as pointed out in the fourth section of the note below) often worse than the lies Al-Jazeera tells about Israel, please see this latest post from Little Green Footballs.

AL-JAZEERA USES AN ISRAELI COMPANY AS ITS SATELLITE PROVIDER

This email list/website can reveal that R.R. Satellite Communications, an Israeli-based satellite provider, which provides global distribution via satellites for television, radio and data channels, includes al-Jazeera among its clients.

Al-Jazeera is launching its English-language news and current affairs channel today.

R.R. Satellite Communications also provides services to CNN, NBC, Fox News, ABC, CBS, ESPN, Sky News, Reuters and MSNBC. The partial list can be seen here.

Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, one of the regular “star guests” on the Arabic-language al-Jazeera, has praised Palestinian suicide bombers on air and said Israeli Jews should die. It is unknown whether he is aware of the business arrangement between al-Jazeera and an Israeli satellite provider.

AL-JAZEERA LAUNCHES ITS ENGLISH LANGUAGE NEWS CHANNEL TODAY

Al-Jazeera launches its English-language news and current affairs channel today. It will start broadcasting from its Doha (Qatar) headquarters at 12.00 GMT. The al-Jazeera English website is also being re-launched at the same time.

The new channel will employ 250 journalists of 47 nationalities and will be one of the few channels to broadcast in high definition. It will broadcast from one of four studios around the world throughout the day, in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), Doha, London and Washington.

The English-language news channel has struggled to break into American cable television markets; most Americans will only be able to watch it on a streamed broadcast over the internet. In Europe and elsewhere, tens of millions of people will receive it as part of their cable TV package. They have hired some well-known British journalists (see the article below) as well as some American ones, such as Dave Marash, a former ABC Nightline correspondent who’ll co-anchor a daily newscast.

By the end of the year, al-Jazeera hopes to have news channels in Arabic and English, a pan-Arab newspaper, web sites and blogs, sports and children’s outlets, as well as a channel modelled on C-Span, the American channel dedicated to airing non-stop coverage of government proceedings and public affairs programming.

(This list/website originally reported that al-Jazeera would launch in English in the dispatch Al-Jazeera to be launched in English in America (March 23, 2005). Examples of the lies and conspiracy theories broadcast on air and on line by al-Jazeera were also contained in that dispatch.)

MORE THAN AN “ARAB VOICE TO THE WEST”

According to research conducted for this list/website, the Arabic-language press has thus far made little of the new English-language channel. It is expected that coverage will become more widespread in the coming days.

The Qatari daily al-Sharq reports that the English channel will not be a translated version of the Arabic channel:
www.al-sharq.com/DisplayArticle.aspx?xf=2006,November,article_20061106_155&id=local&sid=localnews

Faysal Abbas, writing in the Saudi-owned, London-based international daily al-Sharq al-Awsat, in an article titled “What does it take to break the language barrier?” commented that he hoped any Arab channels broadcasting in English would be able to compete in the international arena, gain their independence and become more than an “Arab voice to the west.” (His full article (in Arabic) can be read here: www.asharqalawsat.com/details.asp?sectionfiltered=37&article=385318&issue=10169)

On November 1, 2006, al-Jazeera celebrated its tenth anniversary. At a function held in Doha, the chairman of the board of al-Jazeera, Sheikh Hamed bin Thamer al-Thani revealed that the decision to establish al-Jazeera was strategic and the station had proved its importance. Other speakers at the event praised al-Jazeera’s contribution to promoting “freedom of journalism” and “truth” and expressed their “thanks to the Qatari government and people”.

“THEY’RE MUCH BETTER THAN CNN OR BBC”

Reaction to the launch of al-Jazeera in English has been mixed in Israel. Daniel Seaman, head of the Israel Government Press Office (and a longtime subscriber to this list), told the Jerusalem Post that he had, “only the utmost respect for al-Jazeera in Israel. They’ve tried their best to be fair, and even if I disagreed with their coverage at times, it was not one-sided. Given their audience, they show the Arab side, the Palestinian side of the conflict, but they also present Israel’s side.”

When asked if al-Jazeera was fairer to Israel than CNN or the BBC, he replied, “Absolutely, they’re much better than CNN or BBC.” (The BBC plans to launch its Arab TV channel next year.)

Seaman did say, however, that the station often gives too little time to Israeli spokespeople, and sometimes translates their remarks imprecisely. But he applauded the station for “giving Israel a stage [on Arab TV] that it didn’t have in the past.”

“LIKE THE BBC, THE STATION INTENDS TO BE SPARING IN ITS USE OF THE WORD TERRORISM”

In the second of three articles attached below, the Times of London reports that the new English-language channel “will also have to overcome the reputation of its ten-year-old Arabic sister network, best known for broadcasting tapes from al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden and which has had bureaux in Kabul and Baghdad targeted in military action since September 11.”

The Times of London reports that Nigel Parsons, the managing director, “has helped to put together a style guide which is intended to emphasize a studied neutrality. Like the BBC, the station intends to be sparing in its use of the word terrorism. The channel also promises to be circumspect about transmitting any tapes purporting to be from bin Laden and about use of the term ‘suicide bomber’. In Arabic, the word shaheed is used, which in English carries connotations of martyrdom.”

Another British paper, the Guardian, reports that “a battle has been raging for the editorial direction of the new channel between executives in the Middle East, protective of the Arabic channel’s brand and values, and the new international team.”

GAY JEWISH JOURNALISTS NEED NOT APPLY

Both the Guardian and Times articles report on the star names that have been attracted to the new channel. It is thought that Tony Blair will be one of Sir David Frost’s first guests on the al-Jazeera sofa.

The Guardian notes that “With little or no ratings or commercial pressures thanks to the Emir of Qatar’s fortune and with a remit to challenge the status quo, the new channel is a challenge that appeals to risk-taking journalists.” Rageh Omar, the former BBC presenter nicknamed the “Scud stud” during the second Gulf War, said “It has a freedom to perform a public service role and I think that’s what’s drawn people here.”

The Guardian also mentions Richard Quest of CNN, who said he turned down an offer from the new channel on the grounds that being gay and Jewish he might not be suitable.

I attach three articles below.

-- Tom Gross

TESTS FOR AN OLD FRIENDSHIP

Anatomy of an alliance
In new Middle East, tests for an old friendship
By Steven Erlanger
The New York Times
November 13, 2006

www.nytimes.com/2006/11/13/world/middleeast/13israel.html

Even before the American elections, a certain wariness had crept into the intimate friendship between Israel and the United States. The summer war in Lebanon produced questions in Washington about the competence of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. In Jerusalem, there were worries about the American approach to Iran and the Palestinians.

In theory, the two countries share a vision for a modern Middle East in which a thriving Israel would be accepted by its neighbors. But the Israelis balk at President Bush’s embrace of regional change through promotion of Arab democracy. They view his effort as naïve and counterproductive, because it brings Islamists and Iranian clients to power.

Although Israel was grateful to see Saddam Hussein overthrown, officials here have long focused on what they consider a much bigger concern: preventing Iran from gaining nuclear weapons. They say the American policies that have empowered Iranian-backed militias in Iraq have been counterproductive to Israel’s interests.

That concern is bound to be the subtext when Mr. Olmert goes to the White House on Monday. And now the Democratic sweep has created fresh concerns that the administration, whose muscular approach to Islamist terrorism and Iran has brought comfort here, will turn more to accommodation and compromise. President Bush has chosen as his next secretary of defense Robert M. Gates, who in the past has been highly critical of the administration’s refusal to engage in dialogue with Iran.

The defeat for the party of Mr. Bush, “possibly the friendliest president we’ve ever had,” said Zalman Shoval, a former Israeli ambassador to Washington, “raises question marks regarding the administration’s ability to promote its diplomatic and security objectives.”

In war or peace, most Israelis say they believe they have only one true ally in the world, the United States. The relationship is extraordinarily tight, especially since 9/11 and the beginning of the campaign against terrorism.

But Israel is haunted by the specter of a nuclear-armed Iran, despite Israel’s own nuclear deterrent. Iran has called for Israel’s destruction, flouted the United Nations by continuing to enrich uranium and has just announced that it has a new longer-range missile.

“Many Israelis feel that the free world under the leadership of the U.S. is facing a similar situation to Europe in the 1930s, when they watched the rearming of the Nazi Reich,” said Yuval Steinitz, a senior member of Parliament’s foreign and defense committee. “No one could predict the global catastrophe 10 years later, and Iran may be the same.”

Mr. Bush says his stance on Iran is unchanged: he will never accept a nuclear-armed Iran. Yet Israelis have been increasingly anxious about the Bush approach, seeing recently a tendency to delay confrontation through further negotiations. They worry that because of Iran’s ability to further inflame Iraq, Mr. Bush is hesitant to take any steps that could lead to confrontation. And Israelis are worried about what concessions an administration seeking to build an anti-Iran alliance in the Arab world might ask of them on the Palestinian question in order to bolster that alliance.

Both Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Palestinian territories are armed, radical, Iranian-backed Islamic groups sworn to Israel’s destruction. And each has been empowered and legitimized by elections that Mr. Bush demanded, and Israel’s summer war involved fighting both of them.

LEBANON: THE PRESSURES OF WAR

All these strains were heightened by the war against Hezbollah, set off by the capture of two Israeli soldiers, and the global criticism of Israeli tactics in Lebanon.

Halfway into the war, on July 30, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was in Jerusalem, telling the Israeli defense minister, Amir Peretz, of her concern about killing civilians. Mr. Peretz listened but did not reveal what he knew: eight hours earlier Israel had killed more than two dozen of them in the village of Qana.

When a senior aide told her of wrenching television coverage of the deaths, Ms. Rice cut the meeting short and accepted a Lebanese request that she not travel next to Beirut, as planned, with a draft cease-fire resolution. She got Israel to accept a 48-hour cessation of most airstrikes which, in her view, was broken within hours.

Still, it was two more weeks before Ms. Rice, President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney suggested to the Israelis that the war was starting to undermine Israel’s long-term interests. Even then, Mr. Bush and his aides did not demand a cessation of hostilities, waiting instead for the Israelis to reach the same conclusion.

Asked in a recent interview with The New York Times whether the administration had to get the Israelis to stop their attacks, Ms. Rice said no. “I wasn’t going to give the Israelis military advice,” she said, adding that she “had a lot of sympathy for what the Israelis were dealing with.”

It was another example of Washington’s intimate relationship and patience with Israel.

The reluctance to confront is mutual, said Yossi Alpher, a former negotiator who runs a Web site promoting Israeli-Palestinian Internet dialogue, www.bitterlemons.org. “I’d love Israeli leaders to sit down with Bush for a mutual soul-searching, and say, ‘We’re concerned, dear Mr. President, that your plans are hurting us, that part of the audacity of the radical Islamists we fight comes from your decision to enfranchise them,’” he said. “But we don’t dare to.”

Israel, he noted, has been highly skeptical of the idea of pushing democracy among Arab nations where the only organized opposition parties are linked to militants. It is a lot safer from Israel’s perspective to deal with stable, if autocratic, states like Jordan and Egypt.

When Ms. Rice “looked at the damage in Beirut and said these are ‘the birth pangs of the new Middle East,’ I cringed, because I thought the Bush people had learned their lesson after the election of Hamas,” Mr. Alpher said. “For Israel to manage, we need more of the old Middle East, not the new Middle East.”

Those anxieties persist despite Mr. Bush’s fidelity. As the Lebanon war showed, Mr. Bush has been reluctant to impose the kinds of restraints on Israel that his father employed, to press talks with the Palestinians in the style of Bill Clinton or even to push Israel to ease up on Palestinian travel.

That has pleased many of Israel’s supporters, including those among an increasingly vocal, fiercely pro-Israel community of evangelicals, who visited the White House at least once during the Lebanon war to voice support for allowing the air attacks on Hezbollah to continue unabated.

As President Bush prepares to meet Prime Minister Olmert, the man the White House backed while privately coming to doubt his political and military judgment, there are questions in Israel and Washington about how the two will deal with potential disagreements over Iran and the Palestinians.

THE THREAT OF A NUCLEAR IRAN

Mr. Bush’s aides say the fighting in Lebanon in July and August was more important than it appeared because of Hezbollah’s relationship with Iran.

“We saw the conflict this summer as much more than just a border war between Israel and Hezbollah,” said R. Nicholas Burns, under secretary of state for political affairs. “It was clear from the very beginning of this conflict that Iran was behind Hezbollah, providing the financing and the long-range rockets that held the Israelis hostage.”

“Israel and the United States, as well as many of the Arab states, see the same threat we do,” he continued, “an Iran that is expanding its influence and fundamentally trying to destabilize the Middle East through its proxies.”

But Israelis worry that Mr. Bush may dither over Iran. “Our big worry is that they will wait too long to act, after it is too late to stop the Iranians from gaining the knowledge to build a bomb,” said one senior Israeli official, who was not authorized to speak publicly, after long, recent discussions with top Bush administration officials. “Are they committed to keeping the Iranians from actually building a weapon? I think so. Are they committed to keeping them from putting together all the parts they need? I’m not sure.”

The Israelis say Washington was disappointed in their performance against Hezbollah. They are right: inside the White House, said one senior official there, who agreed to speak about internal deliberations on condition of anonymity, “Bush and Cheney believed that this would be another Six-Day War, or on the outside, two weeks.”

“They believed it because that’s what the Israelis said,” the official said.

For Israelis, this failure to deliver poses a risk that cannot be ignored, especially when Iran is on the table.

“Most people in Israel are not satisfied by our performance in Lebanon,” said Moshe Arens, a former defense minister, foreign minister and ambassador to Washington. “So if Israel enjoys this preferred position as an ally of the U.S. and a valuable ally in the fight against terrorism and now is shown to be not that effective and maybe not even that valuable, and to some extent even disappointing, that could put something of a damper on what’s happening. My guess is that’s probably temporary, but I think we’re going through the phase.”

Itamar Rabinovich, a former Israeli ambassador to the United States who is president of Tel Aviv University, said that Israelis, no matter their appreciation for American support, could not hand over the problem of Iran to Washington. He said: “Can we rely on the United States alone and say we abdicate our responsibility for dealing with the matter, and let the United States do what it wants? No, by no means.”

In an indication of Israel’s concern, in late October Mr. Olmert brought a far-right party dominated by Russian immigrants into his weakened coalition, and picked its controversial leader, Avigdor Lieberman, as a deputy prime minister and strategic threats minister, with the task of “strategizing” on Iran.

Earlier in October, in Moscow, Mr. Olmert said that “Israel can never abide this type of situation” where “a country like Iran has nonconventional potential.” He added, “When the head of a country says he wants to destroy us, it does not sound like an empty declaration, but something we must prepare to prevent through all acceptable and possible ways.”

DIVERGING INTERESTS?

Senior Israeli officials know that Mr. Bush has a lot on his plate: a nuclear North Korea, a Democratic Congress, a weak approval rating and the bleeding of American power in Iraq. To win sanctions against Iran, he needs the support of Europe, Russia and China, all very critical of Israeli policies toward the Palestinians.

To enforce sanctions, particularly those blocking shipments of nuclear- or missile-related technology, he would need the cooperation of Iran’s Arab neighbors. So Israel has another worry: that Mr. Bush will try to build an anti-Iran coalition by pressuring Israel to make concessions to the Palestinians.

In September, Israel was abuzz over a speech by an American official that got little coverage in the American news media. Philip D. Zelikow, counselor to Ms. Rice, had addressed the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, considered sympathetic to Israel’s interests, on “Building Security in the Broader Middle East.”

Mr. Zelikow, in the last of 10 points, suggested that to build a coalition to deal with Iran, the United States needed to make progress on solving the Arab-Israeli dispute.

“For the Arab moderates and for the Europeans, some sense of progress and momentum on the Arab-Israeli dispute is just a sine qua non for their ability to cooperate actively with the United States on a lot of other things that we care about,” he said.

The message seemed perfectly clear to Israelis: the Bush administration would demand Israeli concessions on the Palestinian issue to hold together an American-led coalition on Iran. American officials were quick to insist that there was no change in American policy, and that Mr. Zelikow was speaking on his own.

But Mr. Zelikow’s close ties to Ms. Rice are well known, and the furor over his comments was amplified because they appeared to some to echo criticisms published in March in The London Review of Books by two American scholars, John J. Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen M. Walt of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.

They suggested that from the White House to Capitol Hill, Israel’s interests have been confused with America’s, that Israel is more of a security burden than an asset and that the “Israel lobby” in America, including Jewish policy makers, have an undue influence over American foreign policy. In late August, appearing in front of an Islamic group in Washington, Mr. Mearsheimer extended the argument to say that American support of the war in Lebanon had been another example of Israeli interests trumping American ones.

The essay argued that without the Israel lobby the United States would not have gone to war in Iraq and implied that the same forces could drag the United States into another military confrontation on Israel’s behalf, with Iran. It urged more American pressure to solve the Palestinian question as the best cure for regional instability.

Some Israelis worried that the implicit charge of dual loyalty would be underlined by the trial of two former officials of the prominent pro-Israel lobbying group, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, on charges of receiving classified information about Iran and other issues from a Defense Department official and passing it on to a journalist and an Israeli diplomat. The trial is scheduled to begin early next year.

Mr. Walt, in an interview, argued that the first President Bush had worked to restrain Israel, and that Mr. Clinton worked to attain diplomatic concessions to achieve a peace. But when this Bush administration took office, “they first had no use for the Mideast, then took a more balanced position, calling for a two-state solution, and then were completely won over by Israel’s argument that it is simply fighting terrorism.”

Former Israeli ambassadors to Washington like Mr. Rabinovich, Mr. Arens and Mr. Shoval all scoff at the Walt-Mearsheimer thesis, which echoes criticisms of Jewish influence as far back as the presidency of Harry S. Truman.

But given the intensifying debate in Washington about Iran, Mr. Rabinovich said, the essay is “disturbing,” as are the echoes of part of the argument in Mr. Zelikow’s speech. Mr. Arens said that 9/11 created “an objective reality” of an antiterrorism coalition, led by President Bush, in which Israel is a crucial member. Mr. Bush is seen here as less interested in being an honest broker than in supporting Israel as a crucial strategic partner in the region.

The Iran confrontation, Mr. Arens said, will bolster that partnership. “The president said that he sees a clear and present danger with Iran arming itself with nuclear weapons and it’s obvious that this is a clear and present danger for the state of Israel,” he said. “Although a small country, we are not a minor party. When people talk about the possibility of a military option, what are they talking about? The U.S. or maybe Israel to take that move, not the U.S. or Germany or France.”

He acknowledged, however, “That inevitably will lead people who are critical of the position of the president to be critical of Israel, because we are seen as a partner in this campaign, and it is not a very big step to say that Israel is leading the U.S., or misleading the U.S., by the nose in this thing.”

THE POST-BUSH WORLD

No Israeli knows if the next American president will be as tough on Iran or as loyal to Israel as Mr. Bush. If Mr. Bush does not act, Israelis say, by the time the next president takes office, in January 2009, Iran will be well on its way to a bomb, and Washington may not back Israeli responses.

Gidi Grinstein, a former Israeli negotiator who runs an independent policy center, the Reut Institute, says Israel and the United States share a larger goal on Iran but have “tension among their different objectives,” as indicated by Mr. Zelikow.

The Iran debate in Washington is serious but unfinished, Mr. Grinstein said, noting the divisions between those who argue that a nuclear-armed Iran can be contained and those who believe that Iran must not get the technology to build a bomb, much less the weapon itself.

Mr. Alpher, the former Israeli negotiator, is concerned that if Mr. Bush ultimately negotiates with Iran, “we need to ensure that the United States doesn’t sell us down the river.” It is fine for Israel to say that Iran is the world’s problem, he said. “But if the world solves it diplomatically,” he added, “will it be at our expense?”

The world looks different to nearly all Israelis across the political spectrum than it does to people in most other countries. “Unlike Bush, an Israeli leader looks at Iran through the prism of the Holocaust and his responsibility to the ongoing existence of the Jewish people,” Mr. Alpher said. “It may sound pompous, but at the end of the day it matters, and so we may be willing to do the strangest things.”

Gadi Baltiansky, a former Israeli diplomat in Washington and director of the Geneva Initiative, which promotes Israeli-Palestinian peace, argues that, given the stakes, Israel also pays a price for American policy, which can go against Israeli interests.

“The dilemma is that even this president, a true friend of Israel, after 9/11 divided the world into good guys and bad guys, and we’re one of the good guys, so fine,” he said. “Syria is a bad guy. But what serves Israel’s interests? Talking to them may be bad for the U.S., but not necessarily bad for us. But whether it’s Hamas participating in elections or Syria, it’s hard for us to say no to the United States.”

What matters most to Israel, officials here in Jerusalem say, is the level of support it receives from ordinary Americans, no matter their political party or religion. Despite the anxieties here over Lebanon, Iran and academic essays, opinion polls show that Americans are solidly in support of Israel, with new support coming from evangelical Christians.

Mr. Arens, the former defense minister, said of the Europeans: “They don’t like us – what can we do? What else is new? We would like to be liked by everyone, of course, but it’s the relationship with the United States that really matters.”

(David E. Sanger contributed reporting from Washington.)