FP 2009 Update – Week 31 – The Cable

Week 31 at Laura Rozen’s blog at Foreign Policy witnessed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton heading to Africa for an 11 day romp around the volatile continent, while her husband, President Bill Clinton ate up the Cameras, assisting in helping to free the two journalists from Al Gore’s Current TV who were captured for espionage and sentenced to hard labor by the North Korean judiciary.  Similarly, 3 more American journalists go hiking in Northern Iraq only to wind up missing and captured on the Iranian side of the border.  Hillary Clinton puts Iran hands into motion on the final round of preparation before the Afghanistan elections, making sure everything is in place to work on denuclearizing the regime through engagement – somehow – even though the Ayatollah’s responses to Obama’s private correspondence have been anything but confidence inspiring for the young administration.  Apparently everyone patted themselves on the back for how smoothly Obama’s team handled the tumult in the Iranian post-election street clashes between Moussavi opposition supporters and Ayatollah loyalists, striking the right tone somehow amid the violence by brooking no condemnations and focusing instead on raising international opprobrium over the activity of the Islamic Establishment in the oppression of the opposition voices and freedom of speech.  After a month of chilling reaction from the American people over healthcare reform, the Senate junkets are set for the recess, with John Kerry, who leads the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, jetting to Jordan and Pakistan to observe the realities on the ground in the Central Region for himself.  Dennis Ross’ crew was rather quiet this week, heeding Trita Parsi’s advice of a strategic pause in activity on the Iranian front.  Daniel Feltman was finally confirmed…and Carlos Pascual is now officially the Ambassador to Mexico.  More or less, week 31 at the Cable was a lead up to,  the counterterrorism czar, John Brennan’s CSIS speech, announcing a new approach to safeguarding America…   But more importantly, Foreign Policy Magazine launched what it is referring to as  ”The AfPak Channel” in which guest bloggers are tearing into the situation in the regional fiasco that is known as “the right war”.

-Gary H. Johnson, Jr. 8/13/09, 10:20pmEST)

 

http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com

Clinton hosts video conference with State Iran hands worldwide
Mon, 08/03/2009 – 1:36pm
This morning, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hosted a secure video conference with 20 State Department officials worldwide, at about a half dozen locations.

Much of the substance of the 45-minute video conference is classified, but broad strokes were provided to Foreign Policy. Though the locations of the State Department officials participating in the call from abroad weren’t disclosed, the United States has in recent years opened Iran “watching” stations at U.S. embassies in Dubai, Azerbaijan, Berlin, Turkey, and London, among key foreign locations with large Iranian expatriate populations and traffic.

Jordan Trumps Israel – Mitchell’s Committee?

Happy Easter, everyone.  How does it feel to know that Obama is meeting with Jordan’s King before Israel’s Prime Minister?  How does it feel to know that Mitchell’s office is to be set up in EAST Jerusalem?  How does it feel to know that George Mitchell has a committee that, since last year, has been guiding Obama’s policies?  How does it feel to know that Mitchell will have 4 deputies, one of whom is Hof, a guy who has been steering the Mitchell train onto the rails of anti-settlement pro-Syria appeasement?  Well, here you go…all of this and more in one little article found in Haaretz.  You would think that this kind of information would be front page news in America.  Where are the headlines?

Gary H. Johnson, Jr. (Easter 09) 

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1077894.html

Last update – 16:56 12/04/2009     
 
Before talks with Netanyahu, Obama to meet Jordan king 
 
By Akiva Eldar, Haaretz Correspondent 

King Abdullah of Jordan is to visit the White House at the end of the month to urge U.S. President Barack Obama to move ahead with the Arab peace initiative. Abdullah would be the first Middle East leader to meet with Obama in Washington, ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

A Jordanian source told Haaretz that the king would assure Obama of Jordan’s commitment to a two-state solution, and would encourage him to support a united Palestinian government.

Abdullah has recently criticized the lack of progress in talks toward a final-status agreement, Israel’s settlement policy and the destruction of Arab homes in Jerusalem. He has sought international intervention on these matters.

Abdullah has also expressed disappointment that the Israeli cabinet has not discussed the Arab peace initiative, of which Jordan is a key supporter.

Muhammad Dahlan – The Jordanian Leak – The Unseen Civil War in Gaza & the WB

The following article found in Vanity Fair of April 2008 by David Rose is possibly the best work on the Hamas-Fatah civil war I have found.  It is an attempt to indict Condoleeza Rice and George W. Bush and the Neocon tactics in Gaza in 2007 and early 2008 before and after the historic election win by Hamas.  Rose notes that the moment Hamas won the elections, Bush’s Freedom/Democracy agenda died.  Regardless of the angle, regardless of the aim of the article, it is a work of brilliance.  The fact that Muhammad Dahlan is presented as the Fatah leader of the coup against Hezbollah, and the fact that Jordan and Egypt were up to their eyeballs in the coup process which was subsequently leaked to a Jordanian paper…and the fact that there are covert and congressional funds for the situation and leaders and armed forces in the West Bank and Gaza are elements that the average United States citizen is not only blind of, they have no idea how intricately woven the effort to create a two state solution is in the Palestinian regions.  No one seems to realize that all of the money in the region is donated.  Virtually zero money or industry is operable or noticeably profitable.  Therefore, the money that is fought for, with, through, and by…is the creation of the international community in one shape or another from differing avenues and for differing agendas.  To say more would detract from the power of the piece, especially considering that Obama will be, according to his testimony in Turkey today, attempting to force the creation of the Two-State Annapolis solution in the region, particularly since the piece ends with the prediction that engaging hamas was an inevitability and it notes that think tanks were consulted privately about that specific course of action, under the radar in the final year of the Bush Administration…   

Gary H. Johnson, Jr. (4/7/09, 1:23amEST)

The Gaza Bombshell
April 2008 | Vanity Fair

By DAVID ROSE

“A Dirty War”

The Al Deira Hotel, in Gaza City, is a haven of calm in a land beset by poverty, fear, and violence. In the middle of December 2007, I sit in the hotel’s airy restaurant, its windows open to the Mediterranean, and listen to a slight, bearded man named Mazen Asad abu Dan describe the suffering he endured 11 months before at the hands of his fellow Palestinians. Abu Dan, 28, is a member of Hamas, the Iranian-backed Islamist organization that has been designated a terrorist group by the United States, but I have a good reason for taking him at his word: I’ve seen the video.