I have occasionally been irritated by the belligerence demonstrated by the Iranian governments in recent times, and more so when the rhetoric from the previous government under Mahmoud Ahmedinejad sometimes bordered on the confrontational with Iran’s Gulf neighbours. Thankfully it was more a public relations inspired commentary.
But there is another form of belligerence that continues right in front of our eyes and that is of the Israeli onslaught against rightful owners of the land and its Arab neighbours. This is not empty rhetoric but a systematic annihilation of lives and property that have been documented by global organisations, and sanctioned by successive Israeli governments over the past six decades.
The Israelis have successfully used their proxy moles in various western governments to carry out their aggressive campaigns. It was their Aipac (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) agents in the United States who steered the country into a meaningless war with Iraq, one that King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia clearly defined as illegitimate. Aipac, which heavily finances neo-conservative and like-minded groups within the US, often steers US foreign policy particularly in the Middle East contrary to the democratic principles for which the country stands for, much to the chagrin of the region’s inhabitants. In whose interest were Paul Wolfowitz or Dick Cheney acting then when they goaded the US into a senseless war which has resulted in untold human misery? It was certainly not in the interest of the United States!
Today, Israel under Benjamin Netanyahu is extremely worried as Iran, with a new government, is taking a positive approach to working out a solution in its nuclear talks with the West. Following President Hassan Rouhani’s conciliatory message in front of the UN General Assembly in September, Israel has been on a similar covert offensive to discredit and dismantle any steps that would lead to fruitful negations between the Iranians and the West.
Following the latest talks between Iran and the six major powers — the United States, Germany, Russia, China, United Kingdom and France last week, it was France that torpedoed the talks before they had a chance to fully materialise. As a matter of fact, the French surprised their counterparts attending the talks and according to reports, their Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius who said the talks brought up “several points that we’re not satisfied with compared to the initial text”, adding a damper to the proceedings. To drive home his point, he then went on public radio and said that France did not want to be part of a “con game”.
Fabius’ outburst unmistakably ran parallel to recent objections by Netanyahu who was masterminding behind-the-scenes efforts to ensure that no agreement be reached at the talks and that they would fail. Now why would France not give a chance for this window of opportunity to materialise? Why would it dismiss talks still in their early stages as a “con game”?
Surprised, anyone? Don’t be. It was Netanyahu who turned the heat on the French government to disembowel the talks before they had a chance to reach a significant stage. Israel’s Channel 2 reported that Netanyahu himself had called upon the French foreign minister and this was followed by another call by Meyer Habib, a right wing Jewish member of the French parliament. Habib, a deputy in the National Jewish Organisation in France, has a long association with the Likud Israeli government and is himself known as a full time Israeli Likud Party activist. He is also a close friend of Netanyahu and his personal representative in Paris according to Haaretz. In conveying a veiled threat, Meyer was reported to have said to the French foreign minister, “If you don’t toughen your positions, Netanyahu will attack Iran…I know this. I know him.”
According to a knowledgeable source in the French government who spoke to Truthout, a nonprofit organisation providing independent news and commentary, “there is, in the ministry of foreign affairs, a tightly knit team of advisers on strategic affairs and non-proliferation which has played a major role in shaping the French position on Iran over the years. The direction the group has taken French policy generally has coincided with that of the neoconservatives in the United States, according to close observers of that policy.”
Truthout elaborates, “At the centre of that tight-knit group is the former French ambassador to the United States during the George W. Bush administration, Jean-David Levitte. He was appointed diplomatic adviser to Sarkozy in 2007. Levitte, who has been called by some the “real foreign minister” of France, has family ties to Israel and Zionism. His uncle, Simon Levitt, was co-founder of the Zionist Youth Movement in France.
It is no surprise that just as Aipac and other covert agencies in the United States, there exists similar clandestine groups of Zionist sympathisers in the French government and in other western governments whose primary commitment is towards the nation of Israel. National interests come secondary. Such groups foster suspicion in the nations they reside in against a target country. In the last decade it was Iraq. Today, they have set their sights on Iran. What next? Turkey? Pakistan?
While the Israelis have proven time and again that they not only flout international laws and UN resolutions but defiantly break them, they mask their own quest for regional dominance by getting western powers to do their bidding, all courtesy of the many Zionist sympathisers embedded deep in the governments of these countries.
For the security of the region, the talks must not be torpedoed on the whims of such sinister manipulations.
Tariq A. Al Maeena is a Saudi socio-political commentator. He lives in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/@talmaeena
