usa is out of the loop
What have been the American accomplishments in the middle east and Muslim world under president Shrub?
- dragged out civil war in Iraq
- dragged out civil war in Afghanistan
- turning Afghanistan into a narco-state
- turning Iraq into a terrorism-stewing cauldron
- replacing corrupt Baathists in Iraq with corrupt Parlimentarians
- stimulating sectarian violence by legalizing and financing sectarian politics in Iraq
- looting Baghdad's art, culture, archaeology, universities, museums, libraries and banks
- support for the invasion of and destruction of most of Lebanon by the Israelis
- a re-stimulated civil war in Lebanon
- repression of free and secular political activity
- ignoring east Africa (esp Kenya) allowing thugs to throttle several political systems
- political support for crooks and thugs from North Africa to India
- economic support for most of the dictatorships in the region
- validating torture by mideast dictators by practicing torture
- validating lawless detention by mideast dictators by showing how it is done by the west
- murdering thousands in conflicted Iraqi neighborhoods in the name of 'security'
- taking the bold step of calling the Darfur crisis 'genocide' and then following up with absolutely nothing
- setting up expectations for Palestinian-Israeli talks and then dashing them
- rejecting the results of elections in Pakistan by insisting on supporting the ousted Musharraf
- making enemies of Pakistanis by crossing the Pak-Afghan border and killing Pakistani troops
- supporting nukes in India and Israel while sabre-rattling over nuclear development in Iran
- doing nothing to halt illegal settlement expansion in Palestine
- doing nothing to prevent the building of the apartheid wall in the West Bank
- doing nothing to prevent Israel from turning Gaza into a huge collective prison
- working with Israel to stimulate conflict between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority
- incompetently watching Hamas establish a strong Islamic foundation for future power
- turning most Arabs against the US role in the mideast
- blaming the Saudis for the recent spike in oil prices
- blaming Arabs for totalitarianism when US dollars support the dictators
- propping up extemist reactionaries in Iran by threatening war with the Iranian people
- alienated most of our European allies on various mideast issues
- allowing Syria, Egypt and the Gulf States to emerge as effective negotiators on a variety of issues
- allying with Ethiopia to invade and terrorize Somalia
- clumsily trying to make friends with crazy Ghadafi at the behest of oil companies
Mostly, and with greatest impact on the future, what the USA has accomplished in the Arab world is its own peripheralization. In the mideast of the past, the USA mattered. In the mideast of the future, the USA matters less and less.
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Here is a position expressed cogently last month in the op-ed pages of the NY Times.
In the last few weeks, three long-frozen conflicts in the Middle East have displayed early signs of thawing. Israel and Hamas may be inching toward a cease-fire that would end attacks by both sides and, perhaps, loosen the siege imposed on the impoverished Gaza Strip. The factions in Lebanon, after a long period of institutional paralysis and a near civil war, have reached a tentative political agreement. And eight years after their last negotiations, Israel and Syria have announced the resumption of indirect peace talks.
That so many parties are moving at the same time in so many arenas is noteworthy enough. That they are doing so without — and, in some cases, despite — the United States is more remarkable still.
The Gaza deal is being brokered by Egypt. Qatar mediated the Lebanese accord. Turkey is shepherding the Israeli-Syrian contacts. All three countries are close allies of the United States. Under normal circumstances, they would be loath to act on vital regional matters without America’s consent.
Yet in these cases they seem to have ignored Washington’s preferences. The negotiations either involved parties with whom the United States refuses to talk, initiated a process the United States opposes or produced an outcome harmful to its preferred local allies.
The region is in a mess, and Washington’s allies know it. They privately blame the United States and have given up waiting for the Bush administration to offer them a way out.
By acting as they did, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey gave the true measure of America’s dwindling credibility and leverage after American debacles in Iraq, the Palestinian territories and Lebanon. They are willing to take matters into their own hands and overlook American ambivalence about their doing so.
