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Bibliography of analysis
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Bend it like Mahmoud? Ahmedinajad warms up with Iran's national team

Iran Heading for World Cup Showdown?
Unable to make much headway on the drive for sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program, some Western politicians are looking for innovative ways to punish Tehran. And with Iran due to join 31 other countries at the sporting world's premier event next month -- soccer's World Cup -- some European politicians, backed by Israel, want the host nation, Germany, to ban President Mahmoud Ahmedinajad from attending. Ahmedinajad is known to be a soccer fan, and he also demonstrated a keen sense of the populist appeal of the sport when he recently challenged the Mullahs by attempting to reverse a decree banning women from attending matches. Some politicians even hoped to have the whole Iran team banned, but FIFA, soccer's governing body, has ruled out that option. Still, with German law making a crime of Holocaust denial, Israel and some European politicians are hoping that Germany will prevent the Iranian president from attending. German officials have also said they have no indication that Ahmedinajad plans to attend any of his country's matches and note that the fact that he would have to answer criticism for his stance on Israel and the Holocaust might deter him. Then again, his track record suggests that prospect may actually encourage him. His attendance would certainly put Germany on the spot, and if sensitive negotiations are underway between the West and Tehran, the abrasive President may see showing up at the World Cup as just the ticket to creating a new furor and sabotaging efforts at rapprochement. (Sunday Times, May 7, 2006)

Different Paths: Brazil's Lula and Venezuela's Chavez

Left vs. Left in Latin America
It has long been self-evident that the Left has turned back the tide in Latin America since the triumph of U.S. geopolitical and economic perspectives at the end of the 1980s. A decade of neo-liberal economics has done little to lift much of the region out of poverty, and has only deepened the divide between rich and poor. And Latin American nations have seen countries such as Argentina prove that the sky does not fall in when even deeply troubled nations buck the IMF.

"Starting with Hugo Chávez's victory in Venezuela eight years ago and poised to culminate in the possible election of Andrés Manuel López Obrador in Mexico's July 2 presidential contest, a wave of leaders, parties, and movements generically labeled "leftist" have swept into power in one Latin American country after another," writes Jorge G. Castañeda. "After Chávez, it was Lula and the Workers' Party in Brazil, then Néstor Kirchner in Argentina and Tabaré Vázquez in Uruguay, and then, earlier this year, Evo Morales in Bolivia. If the long shot Ollanta Humala wins the April presidential election in Peru and López Obrador wins in Mexico, it will seem as if a veritable left-wing tsunami has hit the region. Colombia and Central America are the only exceptions, but even in Nicaragua, the possibility of a win by Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega cannot be dismissed."

Indeed, as the furor over the announcement by Bolivia's new populist leader Evo Morales that the country's hydrocarbons would be nationalized demonstrates, today the major political contest in Latin America is no longer between Left and Right, but between two contending outlooks on the Left. "One is modern, open-minded, reformist, and internationalist, and it springs, paradoxically, from the hard-core left of the past," he writes. "The other, born of the great tradition of Latin American populism, is nationalist, strident, and close-minded. The first is well aware of its past mistakes (as well as those of its erstwhile role models in Cuba and the Soviet Union) and has changed accordingly. The second, unfortunately, has not."

He offers a thoughtful history of the Left in Latin America, establishing the factors that have driven the emergence of what he terms the "right Left" (as opposed to the "wrong Left" personified by Chavez). Much more European and Centrist in outlook, it remains the region's best hope for democratic development. Castañeda warns against a knee-jerk Cold War type response to the provocations of Chavez, suggesting that the more aggressive the response from Washington, the more damaging the outcome will be to both U.S. and Latin American interests. The more centrist Left of Mexico, Chile, Argentina and Brazil ultimately have the policies that negate the Venezuelan leader's posturing, but if he becomes the object of a renewed push into the region by the politically discredited administration in Washington, Chavez will emerge the winner. (Foreign Affairs, May-June 2006)

Orla Guerin live from Jerusalem

BBC Reviews Its Mideast Coverage
Like any other news organization covering the Middle East, the BBC is consistently under pressure from partisans of both the Israelis and the Palestinians over its coverage. In response, the board of governors of the publicly-funded British broadcaster conducted an extensive internal review of its coverage, and reached some remarkable conclusions -- conclusions likely to irritate the pro-Israel lobby, although they will be welcomed teachers of journalism everywhere whose greatest fear is the loss of context in reporting a dramatic story, whether in the Middle East or elsewhere. While it commended the BBC's excellent record under very trying circumstances, it faulted the network's coverage for failing to take adequate account of the disparity in power between the two sides, and the historical context that frames that disparity. Israelis and Palestinians clash not as equals across some national boundary, but as an occupying and occupied people. The BBC's governors warn that too often, the network is tempted to rely on the dramatic, available imagery to the exclusion of background and context that explains the events. And they accuse it of being too reactive and not doing enough to proactively set out the story that has shaped and driven the conflict. For partisans of the Web as the primary vehicle in the future of journalism, the report also has some reassuring news: the way to address the problem and provide the necessary background and context often missing from a dramatic news story, the governors conclude, is to make the additional material available in linked packages on its web site. And that's a prescription for doing in-depth journalism today that makes sense no matter what your point of view. (BBC Board of Governors, April 2006)

Ahmedinajad: Scary, perhaps, but he's not in charge

Iran's President Rattles Sabers, But He Doesn't Call the Shots
Memo to the editors of America: Mahmoud Ahmedinajad does not, repeat NOT, rule Iran. Executive power in the Islamic Republic, and particularly control over foreign policy and security issues, is ultimately in the hands of unelected clerics -- and Ahmedinajad is not one of them. While the U.S. news media seemed well apprised of this fact during the presidency of the reformist Mohammed Khatami, for some reason it has been forgotten now that Iran is ruled by a conservative populist who loves making wild threats, particularly where Israel is concerned. That may be grist to the mill for those seeking to make the case that Iran represents a global menace -- and the Iranians have themselves to blame for not speaking with one voice -- but Ahmedinajad's rants do not represent Iran's positions. So, when the U.S. media reports that Iran has called off talks with the U.S. over Iraq because Ahmedinajad has said they're no longer necessary, it behooves editors to dig a little deeper, for the simple reason that Ahmedinajad does not make foreign policy.

Executive authority over all matters of foreign policy and national security remains in the hands of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameini, who, incidentally, backed the candidacy of former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani against Ahmedinajad's. The Supreme Leader, of course, tends to consult on these matters and follow the consensus on the National Security Council, a body of about a dozen figures, including representatives of the Expediency Council, chaired by Rafsanjani, and the heads of the security forces, as well as President Ahmedinajad. But his voice is simply one of many, and he has to lobby for his positions -- which is one reason he spends so much time making demagogic speeches designed to rally popular support for his uncompromising positions.

The National Security Council is chaired by Ali Larijani, who also ran for president against Ahmedinajad. And Larijani, who is in charge of Iran's negotiations over the nuclear issue, as well as the proposed talks with Washington over Iraq, reports not to the president, but to the Supreme Leader. And the message projected by Larijani is quite different from that of Ahmedinajad. For example, the U.S. press reported Ahmedinajad's threat that Iran might withdraw from the Non Proliferation Treaty, but Larijani explains why this is not necessary. Still, Iran's ambiguous communication with the world works to the advantage of hard-liners in the West, while Iranian pragmatists are increasingly worried about the damage being wrought by Ahmedinajad's reckless rhetoric. Iran's nuclear policy is increasingly the focus of an escalating power struggle within the Tehran regime, but that in itself should alert Western journalists and editors to the fact that as juicy as his quotes may be, Ahmedinajad's bluster can hardly be construed as Iran's policy. (Time, April 20, 2006)

Long time, no see

What if They Gave a Global Jihad and Nobody Came?
The most striking thing about Osama bin Laden's latest taped missive is how quickly the two entities he was claiming to "protect" against a Western "crusade" -- the Hamas-led Palestinian government and the government of Sudan -- distanced themselves from his attentions. Rather than play eternal victims in somebody else's ideology, the Palestinians and their elected leaders are taking their national fate into their own hands, and addressing their own, extensive domestic and international crises. And even a leadership committed to an Islamist world view and which has been ready in the past to use suicide-terror as a means of advancing its cause instantly recognizes that Bin Laden offers them nothing. Indeed, this is hardly the first such public spat: Hamas publicly slapped down Bin Laden's deputy, Ayman Zawahiri, last month after the Qaeda leader released a statement warning Hamas against compromise. And the Washington Post reports that Zawahiri has also tangled repeatedly with the leadership of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, further evidence of a split between al Qaeda's self-styled "Comintern" of global jihad and the nationally-based Islamist movements that are entering the political mainstream in the Arab world.

The Poor Man's Air Force
Mike Davis provides a fascinating history of the car-bomb and its evolution as a weapon in contemporary conflict, from its roots among anarchists in New York through its uses by both sides in Israel-Palestine in the mid 1940s, through internecine Mafia wars in Sicily in the early 1960s via Algeria, to more contemporary incarnations in Beirut, Ireland and Sri Lanka. Davis explores the emergence of the technology that levels the playing field in destructive power between conventional armies and terror outfits. Summarizing their advantages, he notes the following:

"First, vehicle bombs are stealth weapons of surprising power and destructive efficiency. Trucks, vans, or even SUVs can easily transport the equivalent of several conventional 1,000-pound bombs to the doorstep of a prime target. Moreover, their destructive power is still evolving, thanks to the constant tinkering of ingenious bomb-makers. We have yet to face the full horror of semi-trailer-sized explosions with a lethal blast range of 200 yards or of dirty bombs sheathed in enough nuclear waste to render mid-Manhattan radioactive for generations.

"Second, they are extraordinarily cheap: 40 or 50 people can be massacred with a stolen car and maybe $400 of fertilizer and bootlegged electronics. Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, bragged that his most expensive outlay was in long-distance phone calls. The explosive itself (one half ton of urea) cost $3,615 plus the $59 per day rental for a ten-foot-long Ryder van. In contrast, the cruise missiles that have become the classic American riposte to overseas terrorist attacks cost $1.1 million each.

"Third, car bombings are operationally simple to organize. Although some still refuse to believe that Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols didn't have secret assistance from a government or dark entity, two men in the proverbial phone booth -- a security-guard and a farmer -- successfully planned and executed the horrendous Oklahoma City bombing with instructional books and information acquired from the gun-show circuit.

"Fourth, like even the 'smartest' of aerial bombs, car bombs are inherently indiscriminate: "Collateral damage" is virtually inevitable. If the logic of an attack is to slaughter innocents and sow panic in the widest circle, to operate a "strategy of tension," or just demoralize a society, car bombs are ideal. But they are equally effective at destroying the moral credibility of a cause and alienating its mass base of support, as both the IRA and the ETA in Spain have independently discovered. The car bomb is an inherently fascist weapon.

"Fifth, car bombs are highly anonymous and leave minimal forensic evidence. Buda quietly went home to Italy, leaving William Burns, J. Edgar Hoover, and the Bureau of Investigation (later, to be renamed the FBI) to make fools of themselves as they chased one false lead after another for a decade. Most of Buda's descendants have also escaped identification and arrest. Anonymity, in addition, greatly recommends car bombs to those who like to disguise their handiwork, including the CIA, the Israeli Mossad, the Syrian GSD, the Iranian Pasdaran, and the Pakistani ISI -- all of whom have caused unspeakable carnage with such devices.

In his followup piece, he examines the politics of some of the groups using car bombs and how the weapon interacts with those. He also notes that car bombing and IEDs in Iraq have forced an occupation authority to retreat into the tiny quadrant of the capital known at "The Green Zone." (TomDispatch, April , 2006)

Beirut Takes a Time Out From the 'Clash of Cultures'
In the not too distant past, the observation that Beirut "has a lot of secret stuff going on" would have referred to clandestine political and military operations of radical factions, espionage duels, kidnappings and the plotting of a bloody civil war. Today, it's the raison d'etre offered by the publishers of Time Out Beirut, the local edition of the London-based magazine franchise that showcase hedonistic delights of all the world's great metropolises for a weekly readership. The idea that Beirut will have its own edition, starting as a monthly, may be the surest sign that the city has put the scars of civil war behind it, and epitomizes a new optimism in the wake of the Syrian withdrawal. And it also blows something of a raspberry in the direction of those who insist that we're in the throes of a clash of cultures. (Daily Star, April 7, 2006)

Hamas's cabinet is sworn in

Should the West Engage With Radical Islamists?
Mark Perry and Alastair Crooke are former Western intelligence officials who have, along with a number of their colleagues, been holding talks with officials from Hamas, Hezbollah and Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. These officials, who worked at the highest levels of British and U.S. intelligence, have recognized that the political momentum in the Arab world is with the Islamists, but in the course of their discussions they have recognized a profoundly important distinction between the interests and agendas of nationally-based groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah and the transnational jihadists of al-Qaeda. (Indeed, the same distinction was clearly on view recently when Hamas firmly rejected Al Qaeda's demand that it fight on and reject compromise -- the premise of the brusque rebuff by Prime Minister Ismail Haniya was that the Palestinians don't need Al-Qaeda's advice. Crooke and Perry believe that the West is making a tragic mistake if it continues to conflate these two groups, rather than recognizing the considerable basis for dialogue and even common interests (particularly in democracy) with some of the nationally-based Islamist groups. They sought to brief the U.S. government on their discussions but were rebuffed, on the grounds that such a briefing would be seen to be legitimizing talks with terrorists. They write:

"The question of legitimacy is important because for democracies, legitimacy is not conferred, but earned at the ballot box. Hamas and Hezbollah would welcome a dialogue with the West not because it would confer 'legitimacy' - they already have that - but because such a dialogue would acknowledge the differences between Islamist movements that represent actual constituencies from those (such as al-Qaeda and its allied movements) that represent no one....

"There is no question that two of the groups with whom we spoke - Hamas and Hezbollah - have adopted violent tactics to forward their political goals. They are not alone: Fatah (whose candidates for election the US supported with US$2 million in campaign funds) continues to use violence (and kidnap Westerners), so do the Tamil Tigers, so did the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the African National Congress. So too does the United States. America's insistence that Hamas and Hezbollah 'renounce violence' and 'disarm' is dismissed by these groups as not only an invitation to surrender but, in light of the continuing and increasingly indefensible use of alarmingly disproportionate US and British firepower in Iraq, the rankest hypocrisy.

"The West's seeming abhorrence of violence is derived from its deeply rooted belief that political change is possible without it. But defending this proposition requires an extraordinary exercise in historical amnesia....

"The leaders of major Islamist organizations view the issue of violence in the same way Americans do - as a legitimate option that is applied to establish deterrence and stability and to defend and promote their interests. For Hamas and Hezbollah, 'armed resistance' is a way of balancing the asymmetry of force available to Israel. Both groups place their use of violence in a political context.

" 'Armed resistance is not simply a tool that we use to respond to Israeli aggression,' a Hamas leader averred. 'It gives our people confidence that they are being defended, that they have an identity, that someone is trying to balance the scales.

"Hezbollah puts this idea in the same political context: 'It may be that some day we will have to sit down across from our enemies and talk to them about a political settlement. That could happen,' reflected Nawaf Mousawi, the chief of the Hezbollah's foreign relations department. 'But no political agreement will be possible until they respect us. I want them to know that when they're sitting there across from us that if they decide to get up and walk away, they'll have to pay a price.'

"The West's insistence that opening a political dialogue be preceded by and conditioned on disarmament is simply unrealistic: it suggests that we believe that 'our' violence is benevolent while 'theirs' is unreasoning and random - that a 19-year-old rifle-toting American in Fallujah is somehow less dangerous than a 19-year-old Shi'ite in southern Lebanon.

"In fact, political agreements have rarely been preceded by disarmament. United Nations demands for the disarmament of the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) in 1978 unraveled a conflict-ending political agreement (a situation put right when the rebels were allowed to keep their weapons), and Northern Ireland's 'Good Friday Agreement' allowed the IRA to keep its weapons until a political process (leading to 'decommissioning') reflecting their concerns was put in place.

"The West often views Islamic violence as random and unreasoning, but Hamas and Hezbollah believe that violence can shift practical political considerations to create a psychology in which armed groups can use the tool of de-escalation as a way of forwarding a political process. That is to say, absent a political agreement, Hamas and Hezbollah will not voluntarily abandon what they view as their only defense against the overwhelming weight of Israeli military power.

"Disarmament (or 'demilitarization') is possible: it worked in Northern Ireland and South Africa. When coupled with substantive political talks, the unification of armed elements into a single security or military force - demilitarization - provides the best hope for increased stability and security in Lebanon, the West Bank and Gaza."
(Asia Times, March 30, 2006)