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Published on 31st
March, 2003
Behind
The Scenes Of The Iraq War
By
Harun Yahya
The
plan for the Iraq war, which has erupted in the face of
opposition from the entire world, was drawn up at least decades
ago, by Israeli strategists. In its attempt to realize its
strategy of destabilizing or dividing the Middle
Eastern Arab states, Israel has Egypt, Syria, Iran and Saudi
Arabia on its list of subsequent targets.
As
these lines are being written, the United States of America has
begun striking at Iraq. Despite the fact that most countries of
the world, and even the majority of the USA’s allies, opposed
it, the US administration was determined for the strike to go
ahead. When we look behind the scenes of this insistence, it is
Israel, solely responsible for the bloodshed and suffering in
the Middle East since the beginning of the twentieth century,
which emerges. The state of Israel’s policy aimed at the
fragmentation of Iraq has lengthy historical roots.
.
The
report titled "A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen
Eighties," by the Department of Information’s
Hebrew-language magazine Kivunim (Directions), aimed at making
the whole of the Middle East a living space for Israel. The
report, drawn up by Oded Yinon, an Israeli journalist and
formerly attached to the Foreign Ministry of Israel, set out the
scenario of the “division of Iraq” in these terms:
Iraq,
rich in oil on the one hand and internally torn on the other, is
guaranteed as a candidate for Israel's targets. Its dissolution
is even more important for us than that of Syria. Iraq is,
once again, no different in essence from its neighbours,
although its majority is Shi'ite and the ruling minority is
Sunni. Sixty-five percent of the population has no say in
politics, in which an elite of 20 percent holds the power. In
addition, there is a large Kurdish minority in the north, and if
it weren't for the strength of the ruling regime, the army and
the oil revenues, Iraq's future state would be no different than
that of Lebanon in the past. In Iraq, a division into
provinces along ethnic/religious lines as in Syria during
Ottoman times is possible. So, three (or more) states will exist
around the three major cities: Basra, Baghdad and Mosul, and
Shi'ite areas in the south will separate from the Sunni and
Kurdish north.
We
believe there is little need to recall how this scenario was
partially implemented after the 1991 Gulf War, with Iraq being
effectively, if not officially, divided into three parts. The
fact that the U.S. plan for the occupation of Iraq, which is on
the agenda at the time of writing, could again spark off such a
division, is a concrete threat.
.
The
implementation of the Israeli strategy goes back to 1990. Saddam
Hussein invaded Kuwait in a sudden attack on August 1, 1990,
giving rise to an international crisis. Israel headed the list
of those forces which encouraged that crisis. Israel was the
fiercest supporter of the attitude adopted by the United States
in the wake of the invasion of Kuwait. The Israelis even
regarded the United States as moderate, and wanted a harsher
policy. To such an extent in fact that the President of Israel
Chaim Herzog recommended that the American use nuclear weapons.
On the other hand, the Israeli lobby in the United States was
working to bring about a wide-ranging attack on Iraq.
This
whole situation encouraged the idea in the United States that
the attack against Iraq under consideration was actually planned
in Israel’s interests. The well-known commentator Pat Buchanan
summarised this idea in the words “There are only two
groups that are beating the drums for war in the Middle East –
the Israeli Defence Ministry and its amen corner in the United
State.” (http://www.infoplease.com/spot/patbuchanan1.html)
Israel
had also initiated a serious propaganda campaign on the issue.
Since this campaign was largely waged in secret, Mossad also
entered the equation. Former Mossad agent Victor Ostrovsky
provides important information on this subject. According to
Ostrovsky, Israel had wanted to wage war with the United States
against Saddam long before the Gulf crisis. So much so in fact,
that Israel began to implement the plan immediately after the
Iran-Iraq war. Ostrovsky reports that Mossad’s Psychological
Warfare department (LAP – LohAma Psicologit) set about an
effective campaign using disinformation techniques. This
campaign was aimed at representing Saddam as a bloody dictator
and a threat to world peace. (Victor Ostrovsky, The Other Side
of Deception, pp. 252-254).
.
Ostrovsky
describes how Mossad used agents or sympathisers in various
parts of the world in this campaign and how, for example,
Amnesty International or “volunteer Jewish helpers (sayanim)”
in the U.S. Congress were brought in. Among the tools employed
in the campaign were the missiles launched against civilian
targets in Iran during the Iran-Iraq war. As Ostrovsky makes
clear, Mossad’s later use of these missiles as a propaganda
tool was quite peculiar, since those missiles had actually been
directed towards their targets by Mossad, with the help of
information from U.S. satellites. Having supported Saddam
throughout his war with Iran, Israel was now trying to portray
him as a monster. Ostrovsky writes:
The
Mossad leaders know that if they could make Saddam appear bad
enough and a threat to the Gulf oil supply, of which he'd been
the protector up to that point, then the United States and its
allies would not let him get away with anything, but would take
measures that would all but eliminate his army and his weapons
potential, especially if they were led to believe that this
might just be their last chance before he went nuclear. (Victor
Ostrovsky, The Other Side of Deception, p. 254)
The
Israelis were so determined on this matter, and with regard to
the United States, that on August 4, 1990, Israeli Foreign
Minister David Levy issued a diplomatically worded threat to
William Brown, the American ambassador to Israel, stating that
Israel "expects the U.S. will fulfil all of the goals it
set for itself at the beginning of the gulf crisis," in
other words that it attack Iraq. According to Levy, if the
United States failed to do so, Israel would act unilaterally.
(Andrew and Leslie Cockburn, Dangerous Liaison, p. 356.)
It
would be of enormous benefit to Israel to have the United States
engage in the war and for Israel to remain entirely uninvolved:
and that is indeed what happened.
However,
the Israelis were actively involved in the United States’ war
plans. Some U.S. staff officers involved in planning Operation
Desert Storm received fine tactical advice from the Israelis
that “the best way of wounding Saddam was to strike at his
family.”
The
Mossad-inspired propaganda campaign reported by Ostrovsky set up
the necessary public backing for the Gulf War. It was again
Mossad local assistants who lit the touchpaper for the war. The
Hill and Knowlton lobbying firm, run by Tom Lantos of the
Israeli lobby, prepared a dramatic scenario to convince members
of Congress on the subject of war against Saddam. Turan Yavuz, a
noted Turkish journalist, describes the incident:
October
9, 1990. The Hill and Knowlton lobbying firm organises a sitting
in Congress on the subject of “Iraq’s Barbarities.”
A number of “eye witnesses” brought to the session
by the lobbying firm maintain that Iraqi troops killed new-born
babies in the hospital wards. One “eye witness”
describes the savagery in enormous detail, saying that Iraqi
soldiers killed 300 new-born babies in one hospital alone. This
information deeply disturbs the members of Congress. This works
to President Bush’s advantage. However, it later emerges that
the eye witness brought by Hill and Knowlton to Congress is in
fact the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to Washington.
Nevertheless, the daughter’s account is sufficient for members
of Congress to give Saddam the nickname “Hitler”. (Turan
Yavuz, ABD’nin Kürt Kartı (The US’ Kurdish Card), p.
307)
This
leads to just one conclusion: that Israel played an important
role in the United States’ to wage its first war on Iraq. The
second one is not much different.
.
Contrary
to popular belief, the plan to attack Iraq and overthrow Saddam
Hussein’s regime by force was prepared and placed on
Washington’s agenda long before the environment of the “fight
against terror,” which emerged in the wake of September
11th, 2001. The first indication of this plan emerged in 1997.
A group of pro-Israeli strategists in Washington began to put
forward the scenario of the invasion of Iraq by manipulating the
"neo-con" think-tank, called PNAC (Project for
The New American Century). The most notable names in the PNAC
were those of Donald Rumsfield and Dick Cheney, who as defence
secretary and Vice-President would be the most influential
figures in the George W. Bush administration.
An
article titled “Invading Iraq Not a New Idea for Bush
Clique: 4 Years Before 9/11 Plan Was Set” written by
William Brunch and published in the Philadelphia Daily News,
sets out the following facts:
But
in reality, Rumsfield, American Vice President Dick Cheney, and
a small band of conservative ideologues had begun making the
case for an American invasion of Iraq as early as 1997 –
nearly four years before the September 11th attacks and three
years before President Bush took office.
An
obscure, ominous-sounding right-wing policy group called Project
for the New American Century, or PNAC – affiliated with
Cheney, Rumsfield, Rumsfield's top deputy Paul Wolfowitz and
Bush's brother Jeb – even urged then-President Clinton to
invade Iraq back in January 1998. (William Bunch, Philadelphia
Daily News, Jan. 27, 2003)
.
Why
were the PNAC members so determined to overthrow Saddam? The
same article continues:
While
oil is a backdrop to PNAC's policy pronouncements on Iraq, it
doesn't seem to be the driving force. [Ian] Lustick, [a
University of Pennsylvania political science professor and
Middle East expert,] while a critic of the Bush policy, says oil
is viewed by the war's proponents primarily as a way to pay for
the costly military operation.
"I'm
from Texas, and every oil man that I know is against military
action in Iraq," said PNAC's Schmitt. "The oil market
doesn't need disruption."
Lustick
believes that a more powerful hidden motivator may be Israel. He
said Bush administration hawks believe that a show of force in
Iraq would somehow convince Palestinians to accept a peace plan
on terms favourable to Israel… (William Bunch, "Invading
Iraq not a new idea for Bush clique" Philadelphia Daily
News, Jan. 27, 2003)
This,
therefore, is the principal motivation behind the plan to attack
Iraq: to serve Israel’s Middle East strategy.
This
fact has also been identified by other Middle East experts.
Cengiz Çandar, a Turkish Middle East expert, for instance,
describes the real power behind the plan to attack Iraq thus:
Who is directing the attack on Iraq? Vice-President Dick Cheney,
Defence Secretary Rumsfeld, National Security Adviser Condoleeza
Rice. These are the “senior level” backers of the
attack. Yet the rest of the iceberg is even richer and more
interesting. There are a number of “lobbies.”
Heading
these lobbies are the Jewish Institute for Security Affairs
team, pro-Likud and Israeli-right and known for their close
relations with US arms manufacturers. These have close relations
with the “arms lobby,” Lockheed, Northrop, General
Dynamics and Israeli military industries . JINSA’s
fundamental principle is this: America’s and Israel’s
security are inseparable. In other words, they are the same
thing.
JINSA’s
objective is not solely the overthrow of the Saddam regime in
Iraq: it also supports the overthrow of the Saudi Arabian,
Syrian, Egyptian and Iranian regimes with a logic of “total
war,” and the subsequent importation of “democracy.” . In other words, a number of American Jews on the same
wavelength as the most extreme factions in Israel at the moment
comprise the hawks in Washington. (Cengiz Çandar, “Iraq and
the ‘Friends of Turkey’ American Hawks”, Yeni Şafak,
September 3, 2002.)
.
In
short, there are those in Washington who are encouraging a war
aimed first at Iraq and then at Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iran and
Egypt. The most distinguishing feature of these is that they are
lined up alongside, and even equivalent to, the “Israeli
lobby.”
No
matter how much they speak of “American interests,”
these people are actually supporting Israeli interests. A
strategy of waging war against the whole of the Middle East and
turning all the peoples of the region against it cannot be to
the United States’ advantage. The adoption of such a strategy
can only be possible if the United States is bound to Israel, by
means of the Israeli lobby, which is unbelievably influential in
the country’s foreign policy.
It
is for these reasons that behind the strategy which began to be
set in motion after September 11th, 2001 and is aimed at
re-arranging the entire Islamic world, lies Israel’s secret
plan for “world domination.” Ever since its
foundation, Israel has aimed at restructuring the Middle East,
making it manageable and no threat to itself. It has been using
its influence in the United States for that purpose in recent
years, and to a large extent directs Washington’s Middle East
policy. The post-September 11 climate gave Israel the
opportunity it had been seeking. Pro-Israeli ideologues who for
years had been propounding the falsehood that Islam itself - not some militant radicals who use Islam as a shelter
- posed
a threat to the West and the United States, and who encouraged
the mistaken concept of a “clash of civilisations,”
have been trying to incite the United States against the Islamic
world in the wake of September 11. As early as 1995,
Israel Shahak of the Jerusalem Hebrew University wrote former
Israeli Prime Minister Rabin’s obsession with “the idea
of an Israeli-led anti-Islamic crusade”. Nahum Barnea, a
commentator from the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot, stated
that same year that Israel was making progress “[to]
become the Western vanguard in the war against the Islamic
enemy." (Israel Shahak, “Downturn in Rabin’s
Popularity Has Several Causes”, Washington Report on Middle
East Affairs, March 1995.)
All
that has happened in the years which have followed is that
Israel has made its intentions even clearer. The political
climate in the wake of September 11th 2001 prepared the ground
for this intention to be made a reality. The world is now
witnessing the step by step implementation of Israel’s policy
of the fragmentation of Iraq, planned decades ago.
.
The
situation may be summarised as follows: Israel’s aim is to
restructure the Middle East in line with its own strategic
interests. In order to do this, in order to rule the Middle
East, one of the most sensitive regions in the world, it needs a
“world power.” That power is the United States; and
Israel, thanks to its influence there, is trying to place a
mortgage on that country’s Middle East policy. Although Israel
is a small state with a population of only 4.5 million, the
plans drawn up by Israel and its backers in the West are
directing the whole world.
.
1) “Counter lobby activities”
need to be adopted in the face of the Israeli lobby’s
influence in the United States in order to develop dialogue
between the United States and the Islamic world and to invite it
to seek peaceful solutions to Iraq and similar problems. A wide
section of the United States wish to see their country adopt a
fairer Middle East policy. Many statesmen, strategists,
journalists and intellectuals have expressed this, and a “peace
between civilisations” movement must be carried forward in
cooperation with them.
2) The approach inviting the U.S.
administration to peaceful solutions must be carried forward at
governmental and civil society organisation level.
Alongside
all this, a deeper rooted solution lies in a project which can
resolve all the problems between the Islamic world and the West
and deal with the fragmentation, suffering and poverty in the
Islamic world and totally alter it: An Islamic Union.
Recent
developments have shown that the whole world, not just Islamic
regions, stands in need of an “Islamic Union.” This
Union should heal the radical elements in the Islamic World, and
establish good relations between Muslim countries and the West,
especially the United States. It should also help to find a
solution to the mother of all problems: The Arab-Israeli
conflict. With Israel retreating to its pre-67 borders and Arabs
recognizing its right to exist, there can be real peace in the
Middle East. And Jews and Muslims — both Children of Abraham
and believers in one true God - may peacefully co-exist in the
Holy Land, as they have done during the past centuries. Then,
Israel would need no strategy to destabilize or divide the Arab
States. And it will not have to face the results of occupation
in forms of terrorism and constant fear of annihilation. Then,
both the Israeli and Iraqi (and Palestinian) children may grow
up in peace and security. That is a Middle East that any sane
person should work to see.
Andrew
and Leslie Cockburn, Dangerous Liaison, p. 356.
Cengiz
Çandar, “Iraq and the ‘Friends of Turkey’ American Hawks”,
Yeni Şafak, September 3, 2002.
Department
of Information’s Hebrew-language magazine Kivunim (Directions)
"“A Strategy for Israel in the Nineteen Eighties,”
Israel
Shahak, “Downturn in Rabin’s Popularity Has Several Causes”,
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, March 1995
Turan
Yavuz, ABD’nin Kürt Kartı (The US’ Kurdish Card), p.
307
Victor
Ostrovsky, The Other Side of Deception, pp. 252-254
Victor
Ostrovsky, The Other Side of Deception, p. 254
William
Bunch, "Invading Iraq not a new idea for Bush clique"
Philadelphia Daily News, Jan. 27, 2003
http://www.infoplease.com/spot/patbuchanan1.html
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