----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Myers" <myers@...>
To: "clem clarke" <oscarptyltd@...>
Sent: Sunday, February 26, 2006 1:15 PM
Subject: Iran's nuclear facility could be bombed in one night - Edward
Luttwak


Edward N. Luttwak is Jewish, and an expert on military strategy.

He wrote in his book Strategy: the Logic of War and Peace (The Belknap Press
of
Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Ma, 1987):

{p. 9} Secrecy is often recommended to those who practice war as if it were
costless, but an enemy can rarely be denied all knowledge of an impending
action
without some sacrifice of valuable preparations. ... With secrecy rarely
absolute, the leakage of the truth can only be {p. 10} countered by
deception,
so that the "signals" generated by such preparations as are allowed will be
submerged by contrived "noise." {endquote}

(1) Iran's nuclear facility could be bombed in one night - Edward N. Luttwak
(2) Jim Petras: Denmark and the Cartoon - the Mossad connection
(3) European Jewish Congress lays the law down to EU on Hamas & Iran

(1) Iran's nuclear facility could be bombed in one night - Edward N. Luttwak

Date: Sat, 25 Feb 2006 09:22:34 -0800 From: Jeff Blankfort
<jblankfort@...>

This was originally published in the Wall St. Journal. Only one of the many
op-ed pieces by long time and well entrenched Zionist propagandists that
have
been appearing in the US media lately supporting an attack by either Israel
or
the US against Iran.

w w w . h a a r e t z . c o m Last update - 23:10 24/02/2006
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/686984.html

(2) Jim Petras: Denmark and the Cartoon - the Mossad connection

Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 19:01:35 -0800 From: Jeff Blankfort
<jblankfort@...>

In this article James Petras and Robin Eastman-Abaya present important
evidence
connecting the decision of Flemming Rose, a Jewish immigrant from the
Ukraine
and a fervent Zionist to commission the drawing of the cartoons of Muhammed
that
caused the recent protests, not only to arch Zionist and racist David Pipes
but
to Mossad which has long used Denmark as an operating base. Who is Flemming
Rose
and how did he, not a journalist, become cultural editor of a Danish paper?

I am not aware that there is a URL for this yet, so you would have to read
it,
for the moment, in a Word file.

http://www.total411.info/2006/02/ cartoon-editor-fleming-rose-and.html

The Caricatures in Middle East Politics

James Petras and Robin Eastman-Abaya

February 19, 2006

The center piece of the current explosive confrontation between Islamic and
Arab
protestors, political leaders and governments and the US and Western
European
regimes and publishers is rooted in Israeli efforts to polarize the world in
its
favor and to promote isolation, economic sanctions and/or a military attack
on
Iran. There are several key questions, which almost all commentators and
analysts have failed to address. These include:

Why did the "cartoons" get published in Denmark? What is the political
background of "Flemming Rose" the cultural editor of Jyllands-Posten, who
solicited, selected and published the cartoons? What larger issues coincide
with
the timing of the cartoons publication and reproduction? Who "benefits" from
the
publication of the cartoons and the ensuing confrontation between the
Arabs/Islam and the West? What is the contemporary political context of the
Arab/Islam protests? How is the Israeli secret service, Mossad, implicated
in
provoking the Western-Islamic/Arab conflict, and how do the consequences
measure
up to their expectations?

A starting point for analyzing the cartoon controversy, which has been a
focus
for attacking Muslims and Muslim countries as intolerant of Western 'freedom
of
expression' is the long-standing role of Denmark as a major operation point
for
Mossad activity in Europe. Re-phrased: How could a tiny Scandinavian country
of
5.4 citizens and residents (200,000 or less than 3% of whom are Muslim),
renowned for fairy tales, ham and cheese, have become a target for the fury
of
millions of practicing Muslims from Afghanistan to Palestine, from Indonesia
to
Libya and into the streets of cities all over the world with significant
Muslim
populations? Why, after the bombing of Baghdad, the tortures of Abu Ghariab,
the
massacres in Fallujah and the utter destitution of the entire Iraqi and
Afghan
people.would Moslems turn their anger at symbols of Denmark from its tinned
cookies to its Embassies and overseas business offices?

The story, presented with straight faces, by television news-people, is of,
Mr.
'Flemming Rose', a crusading cultural editor of a widely read Danish daily
newspaper who wanted to counter the growing 'political correctness' of
Europeans
about criticizing Moslems and which he compared to the 'self-censorship' he
had
witnessed in his native Soviet Union. The oddly named Ukrainian-born editor
of
the culture page of the Jyllands-Posten commissioned Danish cartoonists to
submit a series of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed as they (the
Danish
cartoonists) might imagine him. However four of the twelve cartoons selected
for
publication were illustrated by 'Rose's' own staff including the most
controversial 'bomb in the turban' one. Braving Denmark's anti-blasphemy
laws
Mr. Rose published the cartoons on September 30, 2005 and the rest is
history.

A huge world wide attack on the West's "sacred right to free expression"
erupted
in the Moslem world with millions of shocked Europeans and North Americans
rushing to defend their cherished freedoms in this 'clash of civilizations'.
Syria and Iran were prominently blamed for the stirring up of furious
believers
in the streets of Damascus and Teheran, Beirut and in the slums of Gaza.
According to US Secretary Rice, "Iran and Syria have gone out of their way
to
inflame sentiments and to use this to their own purposes and the world ought
to
call them on it." The Pakistani and Libyan authorities allied to the US
fired on
demonstrators killing and wounding scores while numerous religious leaders
were
arrested. The Western governments urged their Arab and Moslem allies to
prevent
more attacks on Danish products and property and blamed those unable to
quell
the fury with complicity and instigation. All of this was over a series of
cartoons, or so we are told. The cultural editor, 'Flemming Rose', who soon
tired of being surrounded by a team of Danish police and security to protect
him
from assassination and missing his daily jogs through his tranquil
Copenhagen
neighborhood, chose to seek safe haven in Miami, Florida (rather than his
native
Ukraine) among the Cuban exiles, Israeli sayanim*(see footnote) and Mah
Jong-playing retirees as the drama plays on.

Denmark Center of Mossad Activity

Why Denmark? Could this crudely manufactured controversy have been generated
on
the pages of any major London or New York paper? Who would wish to put
Denmark
at the center of this 'clash of civilization' ? appearing as a script from
some
grade B Islamophobic thriller? An interesting chapter in former Israeli
Mossad
agent, Victor J. Ostrovsky's book, By Way of Deception (1990 St. Martin's
Press), outlines the close relationship between the workings of the Danish
intelligence services and the Israeli Mossad over decades:

"The relationship between the Mossad and Danish intelligence is so intimate
as
to be indecent. But it is not the Mossad's virtue that is compromised by the
arrangement; it's Denmark's. And that's because the Danish are under the
mistaken impression that because they saved a lot of Jews in World War II,
the
Israelis are grateful and they can trust the Mossad." The Mossad has the
capacity to monitor the entire population of Arabs and especially
Palestinians
(presumably including those with Danish citizenship) through their special
relations with the Danes: ".a Mossad man monitors "all Arabic and
Palestinian-related messages (among Denmarks Arab community) coming into
their
(the Danish Civil Security Service) headquarters.an extraordinary
arrangement
for a foreign intelligence service." The Danish Intelligence officers' high
regard for their Israeli Mossad office mates is apparently not, according to
Ostrovsky, reciprocated:

"The Mossad have such contempt for their Danish counterparts that they refer
to
them as 'fertsalach', the Hebrew term for a small burst of gas, a fart.they
tell
the Mossad everything they do." Pp. 231-232 In return for their servility,
the
Danes get valuable 'training' from the Israelis: Once every three years,
Danish
intelligence officials go to Israel for a seminar conducted by the Mossad".
which generates useful contacts for the Mossad "while perpetuating the
notion
that no organization deals with terrorism better than they (Mossad) do."

In the wake of the US debacle in Iraq and the world's resistance to a
massive
'preemptive military attack' or economic and diplomatic embargo of Iran,
which
could send oil prices to over $100 a barrel, Israel needed to turn the war
of
ideas on its head. It would make sense that a campaign, aimed to further
whip up
justifications to attack countries like Iran and Syria (Israel's current
enemy
du jour), would emanate from one of the US strongest European ally in the
invasion and destruction of Iraq and Afghanistan and whose national
intelligence
apparatus (so fondly known as 'fertsalach') would be eager to serve Israel's
interest.

Flemming ( or Flaming) Rose: Journalist with a cause

Given Mossad's long-standing penetration of the Danish intelligence
agencies,
and their close working relations with the right wing media, it is not
surprising that a Ukranian Jew, operating under the name of "Flemming Rose"
with
close working relations with the Israeli state (and in particular the far
right
Likud regime) should be the center of the controversy over the cartoons.
"Rose's" ties to the Israeli state antedate his well-know promotional
"interview" with Daniel Pipes (2004), the notorious Arab-hating Zionist
ideologue. Prior to being placed as a cultural editor of a leading
right-wing
Danish daily, from 1990 to 1995 "Rose" was a Moscow-based reporter who
translated into Danish a self-serving auto-biography by Boris Yeltsin,
godchild
of the pro-Israeli, post-communist Russian oligarchs, most of whom held dual
citizenship and collaborated with the Mossad in laundering illicit billions.
Between 1996-1999 "Rose", the journalist, worked the Washington circuit
(traveling with Clinton to China) before returning to Moscow 1999-2004 as a
reporter for Jyllands-Posten. In 2005 he became its cultural editor, despite
few
or any knowledge of the field and over the head of other Danish journalists
on
the staff. In his new position "Rose" found a powerful platform to incite
and
play on the growing hostility of conservative Danes to immigrants from the
Middle East, particularly practicing Moslems. Using the format of an
'interview'
he published Pipes' virulent anti-Islamic diatribe, probably to "test the
waters" before proceeding to the next stage in the Mossad strategy to
polarize a
West-East confrontation.

Political Context for Action

There is a great body of evidence demonstrating that Iraq war was largely a
result of a massive disinformation campaign by civilian militarists in the
Pentagon and US Zionists in and out of high places in the Pentagon and civil
society, in coordination with the Israeli state, which wanted Iraq to be
destroyed as a viable nation. There is no evidence that the major US oil
corporations pressured Congress or promoted the war in Iraq or the current
confrontation with Iran. There is plenty of evidence that they are very
uneasy
about the losses that may result from an Israeli attack on Iran.

The Zionist succeeded in their goals in Iraq: establishing a beachhead in
the
northern Kurdish enclave ('Kurdistan'), and securing assets in the new
"Iraqi"
regime via Chalabi and others. The major Jewish organizations mobilized to
oppose any critics of the Zionist policymakers, predictably accusing them of
'anti-Semitism'. Nevertheless, over time, FBI investigations, CIA reports
and
judicial indictments have pointed to key Israeli operatives and their
domestic
collaborators as Israeli spies. While Israel benefited from the Bush-Blair
invasion in Iraq, the same cannot be said for the United States. As
thousands of
casualties mounted, and war spending skyrocketed to hundreds of billions of
dollars, opposition to the war escalated.

Israeli strategic plans to extend US military operations to Iran and Syria
faced
major challenges, from within the US military and public and even sections
of
the mass media. Mossad assets in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and
elsewhere had to settle for puff pieces on Iran's non-existent nuclear
weapon
threat, right after the same plot with regard to Iraq was exposed as a total
fabrication. Another line of propaganda was needed to silence war critics
and
heighten animosities to the Islamists/Arabs in general and Iran in
particular.
This is where the "Flemming Rose"-Mossad operation came into the picture.
The
Islamic-hate cartoons were published in Denmark in September 2005 as Israeli
and
US Zionists escalated their war propaganda against Iran. The initial
response
from the Islamic countries however was limited. The story wasn't picked up
in
the International Herald Journal until late December 2005. By early January
2006, Mossad "Katsas" (Hebrew for case officers) activated sayanim
(volunteer
Jewish collaborators outside of Israel) throughout Western and Eastern
European
media to simultaneously reproduce the cartoons on Feb. 1 and 2, 1006. One
such
sayanim operation would have been the decision by France-Soir Senior Editor,
Arnaud Levy and Editor in Chief Serge Faubert, to publish the cartoons. The
paper's French Egyptian owner almost immediately fired the paper's Managing
Editor, Jacques Lefranc, who, according to an interview with CNN, had
initially
opposed their publications, without touching Levy and Faubert.

A strident campaign was launched in practically all the pro-Western mass
media
condemning the initial, relatively moderate Islamic protests, which had
occurred
between September to December 2005 and rapidly provoked the subsequent
massive
escalation, doubtlessly aided by covert Mossad operatives among Arab
populations. Mossad's 'little farts', the Danish intelligence fanned the
fires
by advising Denmark's rightwing Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen not to
give
way by refusing to apologize as the pro-Western Arab regimes requested and
even
refusing a request for a meeting with a group of Denmark-based diplomats
from
Arab and Moslem countries to discuss the 'situation'. "Flemming Rose"-Mossad
tried one more gambit ? to further heighten East-West tension. He publicly
offered to publish any Iranian cartoons which would mock the Holocaust in
'his'
paper'. The senior editor of Jyllands-Posten, apparently belatedly caught on
to
"Flemming Rose" hidden agenda and vetoed the 'offer' and asked Rose to take
a
leave of absence. Rose left for Miami, not Tel Aviv ? where his residency
might
raise suspicions about his claim to be merely an opponent of
"self-censorship".
In Miami, he no doubt will have the protection of the locally based sayanin,
armed and train for "self-defense" of threatened Zionists. Sayanim ?
Defenders
of Western Civilization

The sayanim, derived, according to Victor Ostrovsky, from the Hebrew word
'to
help' are a huge world-wide network of Jews in strategic or useful places
(real
estate, mass media, finance, car dealerships etc.) who have been agreed to
help
in Israeli Mossad actitivies within their own countries. This has been
ascribed
to the supra-national loyalty sayanim offer to Israel, above and not always
in
the interest of their home country. According to Gordon Thomas and Martin
Dillon, in their detailed biography, Robert Maxwell, Israel's Superspy
(Carroll
and Graf Publishers, 2002), the notorious media mogul, Robert Maxwell, was a
super-sayanim, providing cover, offices, political connections,
money-laundering
services and planted stories in the service of Israel at the Mossad's
beheast.
Jonathan Pollard, the American Naval Researcher jailed for espionage, is
another
notorious sayanim. The activities of these 'helpers' really range from the
spectacular to the more mundane and, according to Victor Ostrovsky, in his
1990
biography By Way of Deception, the sayanim represent a pool of thousands of
active and inactive individuals who can provide services discretely out of
loyalty to 'the cause of Israel' as defined by any current Mossad operation.
The
cynicism of this arrangement is clear: It makes little difference to the
Mossad
if an operation, such as 'Flemming Rose', jeopardizes the national and
economic
interests of the sayanim's own country and , if exposed, might harm the
status
of Jews in the diaspora. The standard response from the Mossad would be: "So
what's the worst that could happen to those Jews? They'd all come to Israel?
Great." This recklessness clearly has ramifications for Jews who have
refused to
be recruited as Mossad helpers in affected countries.

Mossad War Propaganda and the "Cartoon Controversy"

Israeli leaders expressed their opposition to the Bush Administration's
diplomatic efforts to engage the European powers in the Iran negotiations.
Automatically and without question all the major Zionist and Jewish
organizations in the US (AIPAC, Presidents of the Major Jewish
Organizations,
ADL and others) unleashed a sustained national campaign to mobilize congress
and
their "friends" in the executive branch to take immediate military action or
to
impose economic sanctions on Iran. The Bush Administration however while in
agreement, lacked public support in the US and among his European allies and
their national electorates. The Mossad policy was to create a pretext to
polarize public opinion between the Middle East (and beyond) and the West in
order to escalate tensions and demonize Islamic adversaries to its Middle
East
hegemonis pretensions. "Rose" cartoons served the Mossad perfectly. The
issue
could be presented as a free speech issue, a conflict of "values" not
"interests", between the "democratic West" and the fundamentalist
"totalitarian"
(as characterized by Pipes-Rose) Islamists. Nothing could be further from
the
truth. Rose had solicited and selected the Islamic caricatures while his
paper
had rejected similar cartoons of Jesus Christ in an earlier context. The
image
of Rose as a "cultural iconoclast" - while working for a right wing daily
whose
daily fare was publishing anti-(Mid-East)immigrant "news stories" and
favorable
interviews with Zionists extremists - is prima facie not credible, although
that
image has been purveyed by all the major media outlets. While "Rose"
initiated
the international tensions, liberal and neo-con colleagues and his comrades
in
and out of the Mossad publicized his transgressions and provoked the ire of
the
Arab and Islamic world.

The cartoons, the subsequent insults and calumnies attacking the Islamic
protestors and their secular allies throughout Africa, the Middle East, Asia
and
Europe eventually provoked major peaceful and then violent protests by
millions
of people. Visual images of violent protests and demonstrations were
featured by
the Western mass media, successfully creating the intended fear and
apprehension
against Muslim countries and minorities in Europe. Islamophobia gained
momentum.
Zionist propagandists in Europe and the US linked the defense of "free
speech"
issue to Israeli "security" policies. While the West turned its fury against
the
Islamic protestors, Israel blockaded Gaza and the US and Europe cut off all
funding to the Palestinians, threatening the population with mass starvation
for
exercising its democratic right to elect its own leaders! "Rose's" free
speech
charade revived the discredited ZionCon doctrine of "Clash of
Civilizations".
Playing on European Islamophobia and the increasing sensibility of
practicing
Moslems and Arab nationalists to Western abuses, it is likely that Israeli
psych-war experts pinpointed the "free speech" issue as the ideal detonator
for
the conflict.

The democratic electoral victory of Hamas ? dubbed by Israel as a terrorist
movement ? accelerated Israeli efforts to convince Western governments to
insist
that regimes in Muslim countries repress the 'irrational Islamic masses' or
face
Western censure or elimination of aid. (The failure to crack down violently
on
demonstrators was presented by the media as official approval or
instigation)
The major US Zionist organizations were able to influence Secretary of State
Rice into blaming Iran and Syria for fomenting the worldwide demonstrations,
from Gaza to the Philippines. The Israeli strategy was to use European
outrage
to weaken opposition to a military attack or economic sanctions on Iran and
Syria.

Beyond Religious Blasphemy

While most establishment analysts have narrowly focused on the cartoon as
the
source and target of the massive global demonstrations, in fact it is at
best
the immediate detonator of a whole series of ongoing events of much greater
political significance. From the "shock and awe" carpet bombing of Iraq, to
the
mass torture and routine everyday humiliation in occupied countries, from
the
utter destruction of Fallujah (an American example as Guernica was for the
Nazis), to Israeli devastation of Jenin and Palestine, from the everyday
assassinations of Palestinians by the Israeli occupiers, to the smearing of
the
Koran with filth at Guantanamo, Israel, the US and Europe have attempted to
demonstrate that no Moslems are safe anywhere- not in their schools, home,
offices, fields, factories or mosques- and that nothing is sacred.

The reasons that millions are demonstrating against a caricature of Mohammed
published in an insignificant Scandinavian rightwing newspaper is that this
is
the last straw ? the detonator ? of a series of deliberate violations of
fundamental social and political rights of Muslim, Arab and colonized
peoples.
While the Western media have focused exclusively on the religious content of
the
demonstrators, almost every country, where massive sustained demonstrations
have
taken place, has been subject to recent Western intervention, large-scale
pillage of raw materials and/or experienced the destruction of their secular
rights: countries invaded, homes, schools, hospital, systems of health and
clean
water demolished, agriculture and natural resources looted, museums,
libraries
and archeological sites pillaged and mosques desecrated. The present
condition
for material existence has been a Western inferno for all the people (both
secular and observant) living in Arab or Islamic countries. Now their most
profound, historic, spiritual reference point, the prophet Mohammed ? the
most
cherished religious figure ? has been repeatedly trampled with impunity by
arrogant imperialists, their media servants, aided and abetted by the
Israeli
state and its overseas 'sayanin' operatives. It is cynical to suggest that
practicing Moslems could desecrate the figure of Jesus Christ with impunity
when
that too is forbidden by the Koran.

As the Israeli strategists well knew in advance, the vilification of Islam
was
not taking place in a political vacuum: The material conditions for an
Islamic-Arab uprising were ripe: Hamas had swept the Palestinian elections,
the
US military were aware that they were losing the war in Iraq, Iran was
refusing
to capitulate, Bush was losing public support for ongoing and future Middle
Eastern wars, AIPAC, Israel's main political instrument for influencing US
policy was under criminal investigation.Israel's strategy of having the US
fight
its wars was boomeranging. There was a need to revive the political-military
tensions which they had exploited after September 11, 2001 to Israel's
advantage: hence the "Flemming Rose" provocation, hence the coordinated,
wide
promotion of the act, hence the free speech agitation among Western
'sayanin',
liberals, conservatives and neocon ideologues, hence the predictable
explosion
of protest, hence the 'recreation' of Mid-East tension.and the advances of
Israel's agenda.

Clearly the burgeoning confrontation is more than a religious or free speech
issue, more than the crude provocations of an errant cultural editor coddled
by
the 'little farts' of a penetrated Danish intelligence agency. What is at
stake
is the deliberate racist stereotyping of Arab, Islamic and Third World
people in
order to sustain and deepen their oppression, exploitation and
subordination.

The most pervasive, prolific and influential source of racist Arab
stereotypes
are Israel and its overseas (particularly US and European) academics, terror
'experts', psychologists at the most prestigious universities and think
tanks,
who have provided the "psychological profile" to torture, humiliate, provoke
and
repress the millions struggling for self-determination against colonial and
imperial dominance.

Once again Israel and especially its overseas operatives have placed the
expansion and militarist interests of Israel above the interests of the
people
of the US and Europe. "Is it good for the Jews?": A criterion as defined by
the
Israeli state, has led to the blind alley of massive confrontations,
deepening
animosity between Arabic/Muslim peoples and Western regimes. What appeared
so
clever to the 'Roses' of the world and their Katsas and docile Sayanim, in
provoking confrontation may once again boomerang: The uprisings may go
beyond
protesting symbols of vilification to attacking the substance of power,
including the Arab and Moslem pro-consuls and collaborators of the
Euro-American
political and economic power. While the Mossad is very astute in
infiltrating
and provoking oppressed groups, it has been singularly inept in controlling
and
containing the resultant uprisings as the recent victory of Hamas
demonstrates
and the success of the Iraqi resistance illustrates. The next controversial
cartoon may show Moses leading his people into the desert.

Epilogue

While the Mossad-provoked 'free speech versus blasphemy' controversy between
the
West and the Islamic peoples continues to deepen, Israel proceeds to impose
a
Nazi-like economic siege over 4 million Palestinians, intended to starve
them
into surrendering their democratic freedoms. Intended is the concise term,
Gideon Levy, star reporter for the Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz
(19/02/06)
records Dov Weissglas, advisor to the Israeli Prime Minister, jokingly
telling
top officials "Its (the economic blockage ? which may include electricity
and
water, as well as food) like an appointment with a dietician. The
Palestinians
will get a lot thinner but won't die." The Israeli officials "rolled with
laughter". As Levy points out "more than half of all Palestinians are
already
living in poverty.last year 37% had difficulties obtaining food. 54% of the
residents of Gaza cut back the amount of food they consume.child mortality
rose
by 15%.unemployment reached 28%." Planned pre-meditated mass starvation of a
ghettoized population, jokingly discarded by its executioners as a 'visit to
the
dietician', is an exact replica of the internal policy discussion of the
Nazi
high command over the population in the Warsaw Ghetto. Israel's capacity to
impose and implement a genocidal policy has been greatly facilitated by the
symbolic sideshow, which the Mossad-'Rose' orchestrated in Western Europe.
"Cultural" conflict at the service of genocide ? is hardly a clever ruse or
merely a violation of Islamic sensibilities, it is a crime against humanity.

(3) European Jewish Congress lays the law down to EU on Hamas & Iran

Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 14:57:36 -0800 From: Jeff Blankfort
<jblankfort@...>

"..Ariel Muzicant, president of the Austrian Jewish community, warned
Ferrero-Waldner that Europe's 2.5 million Jews, as well as Israel, would not
sit
idly by if the European Union did not stand fast on Iran and Hamas.

"We expect the E.U. not to move one single inch. Until Hamas recognizes
Israel
and renounces violence, no talking. I have lots of relatives in Israel and
if
the E.U. betrays Israel, the Israelis will implement something extreme."

And they wonder why there has been an increase of anti-Jewish sentiment in
Europe?

http://www.jta.org/page_view_story.asp?intarticleid=16342&intcategoryid=2

E.U.

Benita Ferrero-Waldner, the European Union's foreign affairs commissioner.

AROUND THE JEWISH WORLD European Union and Jewish officials remain at odds
over
Hamas and Iran By Dinah Spritzer VIENNA, Feb. 23 (JTA) - The European Union
is
trying to reassure European Jewish officials that it will stand tough on
Hamas
and Iran, but so far it isn't having much luck.

Speaking this week to the leaders of 40 European Jewish communities
federations
at the general assembly of the European Jewish Congress, the European
Union's
foreign affairs commissioner, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, tried to strike a note
of
solidarity with the Jewish leaders, but the leaders weren't buying into the
notion.

The disagreements reflect the tensions between the European Union and the
continent's Jewish community over how to deal with the thorny issues of
Iran's
nuclear program and the rise of Hamas to the leadership of the Palestinian
Authority.

They also come as cracks are emerging between the United States and its
European
allies over how to deal with Hamas' ascension.

Ferrero-Waldner prefaced her comments on Hamas to the delegates gathered in
Vienna on Sunday with an emphasis on compromise: "Israel must do more to
ensure
the peaceful coexistence of two viable states, such as ending the new
construction of settlements."

She urged Israel not to withhold tax revenues from the Palestinian
Authority, as
the Israeli government has said it would.

But she promised Sunday that before engaging the new Hamas government, the
European Union would stick to the requirements laid out on Jan. 30 by the
"Quartet" for Middle East peace, made up of the European Union, Russia, the
United Nations and the United States.

These requirements state that Hamas must renounce terrorism, recognize
Israel
and adhere to all previous agreements made under the rubric of the road map
for
Middle East peace.

"We hope we can continue to work with the Palestinian Authority to build up
the
infrastructure of democracy and work towards building a state," she said.
The
ball is in Hamas' court, she added, although she did not specify which moves
the
European Union wants Hamas to take.

Ferrero-Waldner never said the European Union would not "talk to" Hamas,
only
that the European body would not "work with" Hamas if it did not adhere to
the
Quartet principles.

This distinction has become crucial since Russian President Vladimir Putin
invited Hamas leaders to Russia for talks. Ferrero-Waldner said Russian
Foreign
Minister Sergey Lavrov has promised the talks are in keeping with the
Quartet's
guidelines, but many Jewish leaders view any engagement with Hamas as a
betrayal.

The prospect of E.U.-Hamas talks angered Pierre Besnainou, president of the
European Jewish Congress, who grilled Ferrero-Waldner on the E.U.'s stance.

"I just saw a woman from the Hamas election list on Israeli television
saying
that she was proud that her son killed Jews. Now you say that you feel
Russia
holding talks is consistent with your policy. Do you mean the E.U. will have
discussions with the Hamas government? Should we imagine you will have
discussions with such terrorists?" he said.

Urging patience, Ferrero-Waldner responded that the European Union has been
very
clear about its requirements. But she added: "We have to see what happens
with
the new Hamas government. Israel has elections coming. Both sides have to be
tough right now, but then after I hope there will be a positive direction."

In addressing the Iranian nuclear issue, Ferrero-Waldner, Austria's former
foreign minister, said, "Tehran should have no illusions about the
international
community's resolve."

If Iran did not change its stance and continued its nuclear program, the
matter
will definitely be dealt with by the U.N. Security Council, she said. "Of
course
what happens at the Security Council is another matter entirely."

Russia and China, two members of the council, are known to be reluctant to
pass
any resolution criticizing Iran on its nuclear program.

During her speech, Ferrero-Waldner condemned Iranian President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad's recent denial of the Holocaust, his statement that Israel
should
be wiped off the face of the earth and an Iranian newspaper's Holocaust
cartoon
contest, which she referred to as "a race to the bottom for religious
intolerance."

Despite such assurances, Ariel Muzicant, president of the Austrian Jewish
community, warned Ferrero-Waldner that Europe's 2.5 million Jews, as well as
Israel, would not sit idly by if the European Union did not stand fast on
Iran
and Hamas.

"We expect the E.U. not to move one single inch. Until Hamas recognizes
Israel
and renounces violence, no talking. I have lots of relatives in Israel and
if
the E.U. betrays Israel, the Israelis will implement something extreme.

"I am telling you it is Europe this time, not the U.S., that is the key
player,"
he said.

In a weekend meeting involving Besnainou, Muzicant and Austrian President
Wolfgang Schussel, the latter told Muzicant that an "armed solution" was not
possible in Iran.

Stephan Kramer, general-secretary of the Central Council of Jews in Germany,
summed up the emotional tenor of the Jewish community leaders when he nearly
shouted at Ferrero-Waldner, "We will not accept an Iran with nuclear
weapons,
Israel will not accept this, all there has ever been from the E.U. on this
is
appeasement."

--
Peter Myers, 381 Goodwood Rd, Childers 4660, Australia ph +61 7 41262296
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