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[ Presenting plain-text part of multi-format email ] Jordan Times. Jordanian Perspective 'A Trojan horse in Iraq' Musa Keilani AS FAR AS the US is concerned, it is only a matter of fighting off charges that Washington had resorted to deception in waging war against Iraq to topple Saddam Hussein and trying to make sure that the charges do not pose threats to the chances of reelection next year of President George W. Bush. The same scenario is enacted in London by the Labour government of Prime Minister Tony Blair. Regardless of all protestations, a majority in the world today believe that both Bush and Blair misled the international community in their anxiety to wage war against Iraq and start nothing else but an era of neo-colonialism. No matter what anyone in the world has to say about the issue, neither Bush nor Blair would ever concede that they had actually set the goal of war against Iraq a fait accompli and worked backwards, thus making sure that the way would not end up anywhere but in war. Blair now says it doesn't matter that Iraq has/had no weapons of mass destruction, but that the country needed to be liberated from Saddam Hussein's reign and, if anything, the world should thank him and Bush for having accomplished this goal. It is an insult to us, in the Middle East, to hear Bush and Blair coming up with all kinds of lame arguments and thumping their chests to reiterate, albeit implicitly, that it did not matter whether Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, had links with Al Qaeda and posed a threat to the region, and indeed the world, and that what mattered was his dictatorial and oppressive reign over his people. In all fairness, it might have been a blessing for the people of Iraq to see the last of the Saddam regime. Or at least that is the impression one gets from Western media reports from postwar Iraq. However, few in the Arab world could watch silently and do nothing about the way the occupation forces are going about ruling Iraq. They are subjecting the people of Iraq to a treatment similar to that of Israel versus the Palestinians. It is safe to conclude that the occupation forces would become increasingly brutal in their approach to Iraq, as Iraqi guerrillas, controlled by Saddam or otherwise, step up their attacks against foreign soldiers occupying their country. It is laughable to hear Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz saying that the US could not have foreseen the collapse of law and order in postwar Iraq and blaming remnants of the Saddam regime for the mounting sense of insecurity among Iraqis. Such comments are adding insult to injury to the Arab masses at large, who are agonising over what they see as nothing but indifference on the part of the occupation authorities to the mounting problems of the Iraqi people. How could any Arab watch without comment scenes from Iraq which show foreign soldiers treating Iraqis with nothing but contempt and suspicion? Who gave the Americans and their allies the right to invade a country, topple its regime and occupy it, trying, in the bargain, to change the very identity of that country? Our frustration grows all the more when we consider the rich history, culture and heritage of Iraq that are ignored by the occupation forces. Iraq is a source of pride for all Arabs and it is painful to see its people being kicked around by a bunch of ³burger-culture² soldiers. We know that many things are being cooked behind the scenes in Iraq to reshape the country to suit Israeli interests. Had it not been for American fears of Arab outcry, we would have seen Israel making no effort at concealing the dispatch of its soldiers and experts to help the Americans in Iraq. After all, aren't the Israelis the world's best experts in occupation and in means to deal with local resistance? If we don't see and hear of the Israeli presence in Iraq today, it is only because the US and Israel have taken extreme pains to conceal the presence away from the media. It would at best be naive for us to imagine the US keeping Israelis away from Iraq as a matter of principle. The Arab world knows that one of the main motivations for the illegal war against Iraq was to serve Israeli interests. What we now have in Iraq is a Trojan horse, but its belly is transparent. It will be systematically used by the occupation forces and their Israeli allies to strike deep at the core of the Arab world with a view to undermining Arab interests and whatever the Arabs believe in. Sunday, July 20, 2003 _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk