DAHR JAMAIL: THE WORLD JUST SAT BY
"The World Just Sat By," An Interview with Dahr Jamail
By: Christopher Brown
Dahr Jamail's Weblog
August 24, 2006
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/weblog/archives/interviews/000458.php#more
August 23, 2006
Dahr Jamail is an award-winning, independent journalist who reported
live from Baghdad for eight months beginning in 2003. He is considered
one of the best sources on the War in Iraq. Recently, he returned to
The Middle East, to Syria. While in Damascus, the conflict between
Israel and Hizbollah began. Jamail left immediately for Beirut and
sent daily dispatches from his Iraq-dispatches website. I received the
chance to speak to Jamail about what he saw during this 34-day
conflict in the middle East.
Christopher Brown: Dahr Jamail, it seems that in the media, this whole
conflict's narrative started when Hizbollah captured two Israeli
soldiers and killed several others, when in fact this was not the
case. Can you speak about this?
Dahr Jamail: Yes it's very clear and it's quite well documented that
there were meetings between Cheney and Netenyahu out in California
over a year in advance of this. Also, other documented truth we could
look to would be The Project for the New American Century (PNAC).
Anyone can get online, go to that website and read their plans for the
Middle East and it states very clearly there as well as in another
document called a clean break, a similar document to the PNAC where
they talk about redrawing the lines in the Middle East and how they
are going to go about it. Iraq is the first step, the next step will
be Lebanon; and then the next step Iran, and then after that Syria. It
is mentioned and well documented in those sources that Israel would be
going into Lebanon.
Now also other things we could look at is this is simply what occurred
by the Hizbollah's operation in early July, as the pretext is simply a
fabrication. Because in reality these types of skirmishes on the
border between Israel and Hizbollah, were a regular occurrence.
Hizbollah had fired rockets into Israel; they had attacked Israeli
troops before. So why did they wait for this particular time to launch
this massive collective punishment war of aggression against Lebanon?
There are several factors that all point really clearly that this was
a policy that they were waiting to enact and simply waiting for the
right pretext to justify what they did.
CB: As the conflict mounted in the region, we here in the West
received information in regards to Israeli suffering by rockets fired
by Hizbollah and interviews with many innocent Israelis who had to
hide out in bomb shelters. But only rarely did we get any first hand
accounts about innocent Lebanese victims and they're troubles. Could
you speak more on the corporate media's lack of fairness and accuracy
regarding this conflict?
DJ: Yes that is a really good point. The media coverage of this war of
aggression by Israel against Lebanon, I would say, is almost as bad as
the media coverage that is happening in Palestine, in Gaza, and the
West Bank. Where it's so incredibly biased. I would go so far as to
say that the coverage of this war was even worse than the corporate
media coverage that I'd seen of the US invasion of Iraq. It is off the
charts in terms of its bias and omissions in things along those lines
and we can cite example after example. For example, all the
assumptions, the heavily biased assumptions, Western corporate media
makes that Hizbollah is a terrorist organization. Well, they're only
referred to as a terrorist organization by the US, Israel, and the UK.
Whereas in all of the Middle East, including in Lebanon, a country
where they have their base, they are seen as a legitimate political
party, a grassroots organization that employs over a quarter of a
million people fully engaged in infrastructure projects like
hospitals, schools and social welfare programs.
And now after the Israeli aggression against Lebanon, Hizbollah enjoys
over 90% support from the people of Lebanon, which is really off the
charts compared to the number prior to this invasion, which was around
40 or 50%. That means that now, and this of course is not being
broadcast in the corporate media, Hizbollah is enjoying the majority
support of the Christians, The Druze, and Sunni Arabs. Whereas prior
to this there was only a minority support from these groups.
Then we can just look at the coverage of the casualties; I bring up
Hizbollah being referred to as a terrorist organization over and over
in the corporate media. When we simply look at the statistics. We have
over 1,300 Lebanese killed by the Israeli war of aggression, over 90%
of those civilians. And then we look at the other side where roughly
150 Israelis died over 50% of those were soldiers. So just looking at
that statistic alone, whose is the terrorist organization, or more
specifically who is the terrorist state?
And now, throughout the Middle East, Israel is being seen as the
terrorist state rather than Hizbollah being in any way as a terrorist
organization. And now, even in Lebanon, Hizbollah is being seen as the
rightful defenders of Lebanon against Israeli aggression. And this is
being underscored again with Israel breaking the ceasefire agreement
by the UN when they launched a commando raid into the Bekka Valley,
which was fought off by Hizbollah. Israel lost at least one soldier.
But, nevertheless, Israel, once again, broke the truce agreement; the
UN resolution that they initially had been quite happy with; a
resolution that even prompted Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to
call President Bush, after the UN resolution was penned up and backed
by the US, and thank him for keeping Israeli interests in mind.
But that clearly wasn't good enough for Israel. We've seen time and
time again Israel doesn't have any regard for international law. And
how is this being portrayed in the coverage? Where is the talk of war
crimes? Where is the talk of the Geneva Conventions being broken time
and time again by Israel when they've hit civilians; they've hit
medical infrastructure, they've hit the ambulances and really don't
even try to hide this. Where is that in the coverage of this conflict?
CB: You mentioned the casualties of the Lebanese people. Although
Hizbollah controls the South, Israel's bombing campaign extended far
into the North of the country as well. Could you talk about what you
saw on the ground while covering this conflict?
DJ: Yes. There are two really important points. The first is; this
wasn't just an attack on Southern Lebanon and Southern Beirut where
Hizbollah is known to have the majority of its support, but it was the
collective punishment of the entire country. Really, something that
just amazed me in Lebanon watching the entire country being bombed
into pre-industry while the World just sat by and the UN and European
countries just sat and watched and really didn't do anything to stop
them from carrying out this war crime.
We're talking about the Northern Border being hit; the city of Byblos
being hit which is a predominately Christian city; the cities up in
the mountains, which are the Christian and Druze areas of Lebanon
being hit repeatedly; over 70 bridges being bombed; over 80 roads
being bombed; milk factories, pharmaceutical plants, paper factories
all being bombed; total collective punishment. Where all of Lebanon's
ports as well as airports were bombed, electrical structure all of
this being bombed. Every one of these a violation of the Geneva
Convention, and every one of these fits the definition of collective
punishment.
And then if we look at the targeting, the deliberate targeting, of
civilians I was really horrified to see pretty quickly, from reporting
from Lebanon, that this deliberate targeting of civilians and medical
infrastructure, it wasn't something that was happening here and there.
I quickly saw that this was a pattern: The pattern was that people
would try to huddle in their homes from Israeli bombs, and if they
were lucky enough not to have their homes bombed, Israeli warplanes
were leafleting villages telling people to leave. Then when they got
in they're cars to leave; while flying white surrender flags, holding
pillowcases or sheets out the windows so as not too be bombed, they
were being hit.
And then when the Lebanese red cross or the Lebanese Civil Defense
ambulances tried to reach these people, they were being bombed. And
then often times, secondary ambulances were sent help the first
ambulances that were hit, they to were being bombed, this is something
that I can speak to after interviewing people in Qana the day after
the massacre there that killed 37 children and 24 other adults, who
were very much elderly people.
That attack occurred at 1am, and the Lebanese Red Cross, from the
nearby city of Tyre, who tried to reach them, got the first call at
5am and dispatched two ambulances, they were nearly bombed and had to
turn back. So they waited until about 7am and tried again, and they
were nearly bombed again and were kept away from Qana and had to turn
back.
And they weren't allowed to reach Qana until 9am. So because of them
being kept away, which were the exact words used by the Red Cross
people that I interviewed; people who were in those ambulances who
said; 'We were kept away by the Israeli military. And if we had been
allowed to reach there when we first received the call, maybe we could
have saved the lives of a few more people.'
And this was the type of story I ran into repeatedly from those
civilians and Red Cross workers. They felt they were being attacked
deliberately, civilians home were being destroyed; they were outraged;
'Why are they hitting civilians? If they want to attack Hizbollah,
okay. But why are they hitting civilians?' and this is what I was
hearing the entire time I was there.
CB: The US and Israel constantly stated that Syria and Iran needed to
stop sending weapons to Hizbollah. And the corporate media picked up
this refrain. But there was no mention from any Western country, or
Middle Eastern country for the US to stop sending munitions to Israel.
What are your thoughts on this?
DJ: This double standard and this bias, and I would go so far as to
call it this hypocritical racism, I think this falls under the
"coverage" of this war; why weren't media outlets asking the question;
'Well if Israel and the US are accusing Iran and Syria of supplying
Hizbollah, then what position are they in to do so?'
They are the ones who are supplying Israel with their fighter jets.
Israel has the second largest fleet of F-16s on the planet second only
behind the US. Israel has been the single largest recipient of US
foreign aid since the early 1970s every single year. Right now, they
are receiving over 2 billion dollars, and possible over 3 billion
dollars every single year, either in grants, direct aid, or military
hardware in the form of: F-16s, cluster bombs, jet fuel, tanks, laser
guided weapons, white phosphorus weapons, all this was used very
extensively in Southern Lebanon, and sometimes even in Southern Beirut.
The hypocrisy is really hard to understand. No media outlets in the
West, none of the major ones that I know of, have ever criticized the
US for supplying this unbridled financial, political and economic
support for Israel. While certainly Hizbollah is using rockets from
Iran, and is probably getting other aid from Syria as well. But the
bottom line is that Israel is getting direct military aid unquestioned
from the US as well as helpful political and diplomatic aid from the
EU by their silence. And none of this is ever questioned.
CB: You speak about the silence that permeated World leaders and their
governments had about Israel's onslaught upon the Lebanese people. Why
was it that the folks in Congress here in the US condoned Israel's
right to defend itself but never spoke of Lebanon having the same
right after it became clear that this was not about rescuing two
soldiers, but more about bombing all of Lebanon?
Where was the outcry of the disproportionate use of force from
Congress concerning Israel actions?
DJ: Well I think this is when we have to look squarely at the fact
that the US government and most of the US media is so heavily
influenced by Jewish lobby groups like AIPAC. And it's long past time
that people in this country look squarely at this and see that their
politicians are essentially owned by these Jewish lobby groups. This
is not my opinion, this is fact.
Anyone can get online, do a little bit of research and pull up US
politicians and which lobby groups they're taking campaign
contributions from and I challenge anyone to find more than a handful
of politicians, and I mean single digits, who have not taken some aid
from Jewish lobby groups. And we are talking about Republicans and
Democrats alike. Everyone is being financed by them and therefore
everyone is beholden to them and the lobbyists pull the right strings
the politicians move in the right direction.
And those directions are in complete compliance with whatever the
wishes of the State of Israel might be at the time. And that's why,
during the first week of this war in Lebanon, that there was something
like a moment of silence in the US Congress. Where all the politicians
stood up and had a moment of silence for poor little Israel. Poor
little Israel, the only nuclear power in the Middle East; poor little
Israel, with the fourth most powerful army in the World, only second
to that technologically the United States it's supplier, its
Grandparent if you will, as far as military support.
And this is the problem: that we have a government that will not act
in the best interests of the United States. They act, instead in this
entangled relationship of: What are the best interests of the State of
Israel? And that trumps anything else, even following international
law; even following the best policy for the United States, as opposed
to what's the best policy for Israel. And if the United States gets
entangled in this mess and loses standing in the eyes of the World
powers by its unbridled alliance for Israel, then that's okay.
And that is what is going on and that is where light has to be shown
and has to be criticized heavily and we need massive reform there. And
of course the calls that will come out will be: 'well that's
anti-Semitic, that's anti-Israel.' Well, we just need to be prepared
for that, those will come.
And it's not anti-Semitic because in reality this alliance of violence
is detrimental to both the security of the US and Israel. This policy
we're watching is complete insanity and at the end of the day it is
really going to jeopardize the existence of the State of Israel, not
Iran, not Lebanon, not Hizbollah, not Hamas but this lunatic policy of
this unbridled, this complete disregard for international law, this in
the end is going to jeopardize the existence to the State of Israel
far more than any perceived threat that could exist. And any US
politician that doesn't agree with that, and act appropriately, and
make appropriate changes, they probably shouldn't be in office.
CB: At the beginning of the war, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and
Defense Minister Amir Peretz enjoyed approval ratings in the 90s from
the Israeli public. But since it's conclusion, those ratings have
dropped to below 50% for both men.
Reserve soldiers sent a letter to Olmert questioning the purpose of
this war. Other soldiers acknowledge that Hizbollah resistance
fighters fought bravely in the face of superior fire power.
Faced, with very low approval ratings and an upcoming mid term
election in November, President Bush claimed victory for the State of
Israel. Is the US public buying any of this, or is Bush and Co.,
merely grasping at straws?
DJ: Well, we have to look at the actions and what happens on the
ground as opposed to rhetoric and the propaganda coming out of the US
and Israeli governments, especially regarding this situation. And if
we simply look at the facts; Israel stated goals for this war against
Lebanon were:
1. To pressure the Lebanese people and the Lebanese government to turn
against Hizbollah. To disarm them and push them away from the border
with Israel. That was one stated goal. Clearly a dismal failure over
90% of the Lebanese and most of the Lebanese government support
Hizbollah now more than ever before. And certainly have no intention
of disarming them or moving them away from the border with Israel.
2. To disarm Hizbollah and that, of course, did not happen and the UN
appears unlikely to make strides in that direction and that of course
means that most people in Lebanon don't want Hizbollah to disarm
either. This is probably the only thing keeping Israel from occupying
Southern Lebanon at this point.
3. To have they're prisoners released. And they are no closer to
having that happen then they were before they started dropping bombs
over Lebanon from North to South and East to West.
If anyone is stupid enough to look at those killed by each side as an
indication of who won, that is really going to be misleading. Because
clearly Israel killed over 1,000 civilians in Lebanon as if that is
some sort of a victory. But if we look at that statistic, over 50% of
the people that Hizbollah killed in South Lebanon were Israeli combat
soldiers, not civilians. I think that is the more important statistic.
And really the most important indicator we should probably look at is
perception in the Middle East and around the World as to who won this.
And I think that one of the solid indicators of who people think won
this is what was cited in the Israeli press; less than 50% of Israelis
approve of the job Olmert is doing where less than two weeks ago his
approval rating was around 90%.
That shows that even the people of Israel are very much aware of the
fact that Israel lost this war; they did not come close to achieving
their directive; and instead they have turned everyone in the Middle
East against them; they have shown the true face of Israel; that it's
a State that is willing to sponsor terrorism to kill civilians on a
massive scale, and still not achieve it's goals.
And in fact now, I feel that Israel and they're own security are in
much greater danger now than they were before conflict. This myth of
Israel having this all-powerful undefeatable military is gone. Just
like what happened to the US in Iraq. Where a few thousand people with
Kalishnakovs and RPGs can bog down the most powerful military on the
planet and are winning that war; well the same thing happened in Israel.
At the height of their ground invasion, the last 24 hours of their
ground invasion into Southern Lebanon, they lost 40 troops in 24
hours. And they did leave Lebanon with they're tail between their
legs. And it really just shows that this shock and awe air campaign is
really useless in a guerrilla war. They can drop tens of thousands of
bombs on Southern Lebanon and they still can't get in there and hold
one city, even six miles into the country.
So it's really shown they're military is not capable of protecting
their own civilians; they are not successful at waging an invasion
against another country; and now at the end of all of it, Israeli
citizens feel that less secure now then they did before this ever
occurred. And I think that that should be the strongest indicator,
especially when we look at the stated goals of Israel at the beginning
of this war.
CB: Currently there is a fragile cease-fire in place. Is it your
opinions that this will hold or what do you feel is in store for the
future?
DJ: I don't think this cease-fire will hold because of what we have
spoke of Israel encroaching into Lebanon again. At a time of they're
own choosing and completely unprovoked. We can talk about that present
tense. Already this cease-fire has failed and at any time Israel
might
maybe even as we speak
they could be breaking this cease-fire
agreement again. And I think that's why it will fail.
Because Israel has complete disregard for UN resolutions. We only have
to look them breeching, I'm not sure how many, UN resolutions
regarding what's going on in the occupied territories. We need to
remember that the first one to break this cease-fire was Israel and
they're may come a point when Hizbollah does respond and then the
corporate media will begin to place the blame squarely on Lebanon's
shoulders.
I'm going to use a crude analogy to get my point across; I use to play
basketball and I was always taught that if you ever get fouled, don't
foul you're opponent back.
Because the one who responds is usually the one who is going to get
caught. And I think it's kind of the same thing here. It is critical
that Hizbollah not respond if they can at all avoid it. Because the
media is so biased and the international community is so biased; if
they do respond we could have another repeat of what we just saw now
and probably something much worse and more sustained. Because I really
don't see Israel leaving this aside and not doing anything. They will
continue to provoke until Hizbollah responds and then we will again
see an all out war.
Posted by Dahr_Jamail at August 24, 2006 09:42 PM
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{Invite (mankind, O Muhammad ) to the Way of your Lord (i.e. Islam) with wisdom
(i.e. with the Divine Inspiration and the Qur'an) and fair preaching, and argue
with them in a way that is better. Truly, your Lord knows best who has gone
astray from His Path, and He is the Best Aware of those who are guided.} (Holy
Quran-16:125)
{And who is better in speech than he who [says: "My Lord is Allah (believes in
His Oneness)," and then stands straight (acts upon His Order), and] invites
(men) to Allah's (Islamic Monotheism), and does righteous deeds, and says: "I
am one of the Muslims."} (Holy Quran-41:33)
The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said: "By Allah, if
Allah guides one person by you, it is better for you than the best types of
camels." [al-Bukhaaree, Muslim]
The prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) also said, "Whoever
calls to guidance will have a reward similar to the reward of the one who
follows him, without the reward of either of them being lessened at all."
[Muslim, Ahmad, Aboo Daawood, an-Nasaa'ee, at-Tirmidhee, Ibn Maajah]
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