American subterfuge
The second phase of the neo-con global strategy is upon us, writes Hassan Nafaa*
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There may not be a timeframe or a rigid set of priorities in the US plan. The Americans are keeping their options open and standing ready to intervene in one or more fronts as opportunity presents. They sprang into action after Arafat's death, providing just enough peace rhetoric to stabilise the Palestinian front. After Al-Hariri's assassination, feuds suddenly surfaced in Lebanon, with Syria being the target, the ground already paved through Security Council Resolution 1559.
The Americans are stirring things up and using the mix to their advantage. Sometimes they wait for the right opportunity, as was the case when Emile Lahoud's term was renewed. Sometimes they make things happen. For example, the US is said to be planning a military strike against Iranian nuclear facilities. Weapons inspector Scott Ritter has just revealed (Al-Jazeera, 30 March 2005) that the US Department of Defense is on standby for a possible strike in June. The date has been carefully selected. According to Israeli intelligence, June would be the point of no return in the Iranian nuclear programme, a date after which no one would be able to stop Iran from making a nuclear bomb. The Americans and Israelis are determined to stop Iran from pressing on with its nuclear programme. They want Iran to stop all uranium enrichment activities, a demand to which Tehran is unlikely to agree.
Interestingly, the proposed strike against Iran is timed to happen one month after the Lebanon parliamentary elections, scheduled for May. This may seem a coincidence, but think again. Having pushed the Syrians out of Lebanon, the US and France are likely to back the opposition in Lebanon's next elections in the hope that it will win with enough of a majority to form a government and proceed to disarm Hizbullah, or at least restrain it in the event Iran is attacked. The US is willing to create a crisis and let it fester while it pursues its twin objective: first, bringing down the Iranian and Syrian regimes, and second, disarming the resistance in both Lebanon and Palestine.
If the above turns out to be true, it would provide further evidence that the US agenda is identical with the Israeli agenda. During the first phase of the global strategy of the war on terror, Israel persuaded the US administration that the enemy who attacked it on 9/11 was the same enemy that has been attacking Israel for years. Israel may yet again persuade the US that the Islamic revolution in Iran is the origin of all ills in the region; that Tehran has spread hatred, venom and intolerance, and that the overthrow of the Iranian regime would pave the way to peace, stability and democracy region-wide. Israel prodded the US to invade Iraq, and may prod it yet again into a military showdown with Iran.
Had democracy and human rights been relevant to US policy, the rights of four million Palestinian refugees living abroad and four million others living at home would have been taken into consideration. But all patriotic people in this region know that democracy is of service to the US only inasmuch as it weakens the region and divides it into mini- states, ultimately for Israel's benefit. The region is not drawing towards the spring of democracy, as some argue. More likely, it is slipping into an American inferno.
* The writer is professor of political science at Cairo University.
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