ALEXANDER KUZNETSOV |
15.10.2016 | WORLD
United
States Must Answer for War Crimes in the Middle East
The
West is feverishly seeking someone to blame for the catastrophic situation in
the Middle East. Following on from John Kerry, French Foreign Minister
Jean-Marc Ayrault has announced his intention to request that the International
Criminal Court investigate Russian «war crimes» in Syria. Hillary Clinton, a
contender for the post of US president, is also known for her attempts to put
Russia in the dock. During the second presidential TV debate with Donald Trump
on 9 October, she stated she
supported efforts to probe «war crimes committed by the Syrians and the Russians
and try to hold them accountable».
So
do we need to clarify, once again, who is to blame? Let’s try.
America’s
‘Greater Middle East’ strategy, which involves violently redrawing the
political map of a vast region, has destroyed the states of Syria, Libya, Iraq
and Yemen, and has led to an unprecedented surge in terrorism, a tremendous
loss of human life, and a large influx of refugees to Europe.
But
America does not want to take the blame for what it has done.
Ahead
of the change of administration in America, US legislators have been trying to
make Saudi Arabia primarily responsible for the spread of terrorism. On 28
September, the US Senate and the House of Representatives passed the Justice
Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA), which entitles the relatives of US
citizens killed in the 9/11 attacks to file lawsuits against Saudi Arabia and
receive compensation.
Five
days later, on 3 October, an article appeared in the Arab language
newspaper Rai Al-Youm (published in London), written by its
editor-in-chief Abdel Bari Atwan, that sheds light on which way the Arab world
is leaning on the issue of who’s to blame.
A
few words about the article’s author. Abdel Bari Atwan is the most prominent of
today’s Arab journalists. The son of a refugee from Gaza, he was involved in
the struggles of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) for a long time
and was close to Yasser Arafat until they parted ways in 1993, when he
disagreed with the hasty conclusion of peace with Israel. In the 1990s, he
opposed UN sanctions against Iraq; not in defence of Saddam Hussein, however,
but in defence of the rights and interests of the Iraqi people. In recent
years, Atwan has written a great deal on the importance of establishing
friendly relations between Sunni Arab states and Shi’ite Iran.
In
his article, entitled «US law firms sharpening their knives for Saudi Arabia»,
Abdel Bari Atwan suggests how
the Saudi authorities can oppose American blackmail. Here are his recommendations
to Riyadh.
-
Stop the senseless and bloody war in Yemen.
-
Wind down its support of jihadist organisations in Syria.
-
Take steps to normalise relations with Iran and Iraq.
-
Seriously address the creation of an Arab lobby in the US (a pressing issue,
since the Israel lobby in America is multilayered, works closely with the media
and funds major research centres, while the Saudi lobbying effort is limited to
banal bribery).
-
Withdraw most of Saudi Arabia’s assets and investments from the US as soon as
possible.
-
Suspend all negotiations with Washington on an oil price agreement.
-
Adopt measures allowing oil from the Persian gulf to be quoted in currencies
other than US dollars (i.e. euro, yuan and roubles).
-
File countersuits against the US through Muslim human rights organisations for
war crimes committed in the Middle East between 2003 and the present day.
Abdel
Bari Atwan says it is unlikely that the Saudi authorities will listen to him,
but it seems as if the initiative has already struck a chord in other Arab
countries. A group of Iraqi parliamentarians headed by Najeh al-Mizan has put forward a
bill allowing Iraqi citizens to demand compensation from the US government for
war crimes committed during the years of occupation (2003-2011) not just by the
regular American army, but also contract soldiers from private military
companies and ‘death squads’ set up using CIA money.
The
outcome of America’s ‘presence’ in Iraq (or rather ‘the
American genocide’) is truly horrifying.
Even according to official (underestimated) data from the John Hopkins
Institute, Americans and their accomplices killed 250,000 people (civilians) in
Iraq during the occupation. According to Professor Juan Cole from the
University of Michigan, this figure (direct losses) is as much as 450,000
people. Added to the victims of US sanctions in the 1990s, the number of deaths
is close to one million. Most of these were children. Nobody can accuse US
academic Juan Cole of incompetence or lobbying – he is a world-renowned expert
on the modern Middle East and South Asia, a specialist in the history of Iran
and Arab countries, and the author of 14 academic monographs.
But
that is only the direct losses. There is also the destruction of Iraq’s state
institutions and its law enforcement, health and education systems as a result
of the American occupation, and the disintegration of relations between
ethnicities and faiths.
The
repercussions of the ‘Iraqi holocaust’ carried out by the Americans will be
felt for many years to come. Here are some figures from
the Australian scientist Dr. Gideon Polya. During the years of the crisis,
there were 7.7 million refugees in Iraq. Of these, 5 million were internally
displaced persons and 2.7 million fled the country. These included the cream of
Iraqi society: doctors, teachers, engineers, university professors and
businessmen. During the first few years of the occupation, 2,200 doctors and
nursers were killed in Iraq. As a consequence of America’s use of bombs with
low-enriched uranium, the number of cancer patients in the country increased
from 40 per 100,000 people (1990) to 1,500 per 100,000 people (2005). And as a
result of the actions of the occupation forces and sectarian fighting, there
are currently three million widows and five million orphans in the country. 1.5
million Iraqi children are undernourished.
The
world has not forgotten about the war crimes committed by America in the Middle
East. Sooner or later, the US will have to answer for these crimes, no matter
what Hillary Clinton says.
Deputy Head of the Institute of forecasting and settlement of political conflicts (Moscow)
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