Ramzy Baroud, PhD
Politics for the People

Syrian refugees sit in front of the border fence between Hungary and Serbia. (Photo: Oren Ziv, Activestills.org)

The Italian ‘activist’ was keen on that photo, as if her social media activism career was dependent on it. As if the misery of the poor Syrian child was not palpable enough in his dejected face and his rash-infested skin, she wanted to define a point of absolute misery for a perfect Instagram photo.

So she handed him a bucket filled with rocks collected from the arid Jordanian desert, not far away from the Syria border. He carried the heavy rocks and posed for the photo.

Photo by DFID – UK Department for International Development

The boy, along with his family, and many others lived in tents in the middle of nowhere. The refugee camp was deemed ‘informal’. It received no water, electricity and not even regular supplies of food, however meagre. The refugees subsisted on what drivers racing at ridiculous speed on a nearby highway would toss their way.

But malnutrition was not the only enemy. No water also meant no washing, and skin diseases is something the Syrian refugees in the informal refugee camp all had in common.

To keep the tents in their intended location, the refugees had positioned buckets filled with rocks atop the wooden poles, thus keeping the tattered tents in place, especially during the gusts of violent sandstorms.

The ‘activists’ took their fill of photos with no particular purpose, aside from exhibiting their peculiar brand of solidarity, which often finds its way to social media platforms, accompanied with seemingly fitting emoticons and generalized, empty truisms: “Please do something,” followed by the emoticon that denotes feelings of anger or, “the children need us,” followed by the emoticon conveying tears, and so on.

Expectedly, their social media friends validate the empty gestures by exalting the courage, heroism and greatness of the person who took the photo. In reality, however, the ‘activists’ have done nothing but aggrandized their false sense of valor, injured the dignity of the proud refugees, while selling them plenty of false hope as they continue to await salvation in the desert.

The baffled Syrian boy, who must have participated in that charade in the hope of getting a sandwich or even a piece of chocolate, carried the bucket of rocks so that the Italian ‘activist’ would produce a photo that was the personification of despair. And it was picture perfect, indeed, followed by a fun-filled trip to the Dead Sea and other Jordanian attractions.

When a friend of mine, who was enraged by the dehumanizing display, conveyed the scene on to me, I was equally distressed, but not entirely surprised. I am all too familiar with that kind of ‘activism’. I was assaulted by it as a child in Palestinian refugee camps, was repulsed by it as a young reporter in Iraq and Lebanon and warned against it as a writer in later years.

This scene happened only a few days ago but, actually, it is a recurring reality, where ‘activists’ – westerners, especially – seek in the Middle East (and all over the world) a respite from their consumerism-driven, often uneventful world. They view their relationships with humanitarian crises as saviors, carrying the ‘White Man’s burden’ wherever they go, yet always aware, if not proud, of their privilege and their sense of superiority.

While there, indeed, exist true humanitarians with a clear purpose and an unmistakable sense of mission and little self-promotion, there are many others who have no identifiable purpose, aside from a fleeting interest, a sense of adventure, and an opportunity to unburden themselves from the nagging guilt.

They know well that the roots of conflict in the Middle East stems from 19th and 20th century colonialism. More recently, they know that the US war on Iraq has destroyed that country and destabilized the whole region for decades to come. They are fully aware of the horrendous implications of western interventionism – including those sold as ‘humanitarian’ interventions – on Libya and Syria and other countries in recent years. The ongoing tragedy in Yemen, which is advertised in the media as a solely internal Arab conflict, is also rooted in the American so-called ‘war on terror’, which shattered the country to pieces and undermined its internal cohesion.

But, for many, this is too messy, too complicated, and ‘too political.’ It is far easier to declare oneself an ‘activist’ and snap a thousand photos which parade victims of war in total isolation from one’s own moral responsibility.

Personal and collective ‘moral responsibility’ is a risky notion, for it invites more than ambiguous feelings of ‘guilt’ that misleadingly spread responsibility for war equally among all; instead, it propels a moral stance, mobilization, political pressure and direct action.

Many have given ‘activism’ such a bad name that the word itself has now become devoid of meaning.

Some use ‘activism’ as a platform to serve pre-existing political and ideological notions, unable to truly grow out of the limited confines of ideas which are mostly governed by groupthink, but never by true experience.

For them, the self-bestowed title ‘activist’, is self-validating and is often used to shut out those who dare to have opposing views.

Others position themselves as saviors – for example, saving the children of the Middle East – but would shy away from ever articulating a bold political stance against their own governments and their own culpabilities in ongoing wars and tragedies.

Although they might not be constantly aware of it, such ‘activists’ hold on to the legacy of Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘The White Man’s Burden’:

“Take up the White Man’s burden, Send forth the best ye breed

  Go bind your sons to exile, to serve your captives’ need.”

They are utterly blind to their own transgressions and perceive their victims in an apolitical vacuum, or as victims of their own wrong-doing.

Humanitarianism is not a photo op: it is not an adventure; it is not a vacation; it is not a stress or guilt reliever; it should not be an expression of cultural hegemony or driven by a sense of superiority, and must refrain from selling false hope.

A true humanitarian activist is one who is able to make a tangible difference in the lives of others – focused, sensitive to cultural sensibilities, compelled by a tug of moral responsibility, able to read political contexts and daring enough to hold accountable those responsible for war and other collective tragedies.

Chances are the Syrian child with the bucket full of rocks had his photo exhibited to the delight of many other social media ‘activists’.

Yet chances are, he is still hungry and waiting.

(Italian writer Roman Rubeo contributed to this article.)

Ramzy Baroud, PhD

Has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books include ‘Searching Jenin’, ‘The Second Palestinian Intifada’ and his latest ‘My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story’. His website is: www.ramzybaroud.net.

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Photo by Mustafa Khayat

Felicity Arbuthnot

Warrior for Peace and Justice

ICRC donated morgues (from ICRC twitter account)

“ … a landmark agreement that will save lives and ease the immense human suffering caused by armed conflict around the world. It will reduce the number of illegal arms …We should be proud of the role Britain has played to secure this ambitious agreement … that will make our world safer for all.” (David Cameron on the Arms Trade Treaty, 2nd April 2013.)

The death toll in Yemen is now so high that the International Committee of the Red Cross is donating “entire morgue units” (1) to hospitals still standing, having so far escaped the illegal Saudi assault, backed, advised and armed by the US and UK.

“The hospitals were not able to cope,” said Rima Kamal, a Yemen-based spokesperson for the Red Cross. “You could have more than 20 dead people brought into one hospital on one single day. The morgue capacity at a regular hospital is not equipped to handle this influx of dead bodies.”

“It is not that common for the ICRC to donate morgues,” she observed. “The fact that we now do is telling of the size of the human tragedy in Yemen.” The ICRC has donated body bags and refrigerated storage facilities to three hospitals with: “More in the pipeline.”

Meanwhile, according the international agency, Oxfam: “The UK government has switched from being an enthusiastic backer of the international Arms Trade Treaty into one of the most significant violators.” (2) The Arms Trade Treaty entered in to force in December 2014 and has been signed by 130 nations, 87 have ratified – including the UK – 46 have signed but not yet ratified.

“UK arms and military support are fueling a brutal war in Yemen, harming the very people the Arms Trade Treaty is designed to protect. Schools, hospitals and homes have been bombed in contravention of the rules of war.

“The UK government is in denial and disarray over its arms sales to the Saudi-led coalition bombing campaign in Yemen. It has misled its own Parliament about its oversight of arms sales and its international credibility is in jeopardy as it commits to action on paper but does the opposite in reality.

“The UK government has been supplying arms to the Saudi-led coalition for use in the war in Yemen, including export licences for £3.3bn worth of arms in 12 months from March 2015 … The UK is also providing Saudi Arabia with military advice and personnel, both Ministry of Defence personnel and private contractors.”

Ironically, the UK government was an architect of the Arms Trade Treaty, which is incorporated in to British law. The Treaty aims to regulate trade in “conventional” weapons, contributing to wider global peace, reduce human suffering and generate transparency and responsible actions “by and amongst states.” For the UK government such admirable aims seemingly count for nothing.

In April, Amnesty International sent an expert team in to Yemen (3) who discovered that British made cluster bombs had been used by the Saudi “coalition.” Cluster bombs are illegal weapons and have been banned under international law since 2008.

Amnesty’s team found a: “British-made BL-755 – a particularly nasty model, which consists of a large bomb that opens mid-air to scatter 147 smaller explosive bomblets across a wide area.

“The bomblets eject a stream of molten metal as they detonate, which is designed to pierce metal armour. After this, they explode into more than 2,000 fragments killing and maiming all in the vicinity.”

Yemen: human damage from cluster bombs (source unknown – reddit.com)

If they don’t explode on impact, they remain on the ground, scattered across the area, with “hundreds of live, lethal devices” waiting to be triggered by vibration, tripped on or picked up by curious children or uninformed adults who are either killed or terribly maimed. Interviewing survivors it was found that: “These incidents took place days, weeks or sometimes months after the bombs were dropped by coalition forces in Yemen.”

Amnesty has been pressing the British government on the Saudi’s use of these outlawed weapons, only to be told sanguinely that UK Ministers have been provided with “assurances” by Saudi “of their proper use.”

Work that one out, “proper use” of illegal weapons.

However: “On 22 July 2016, the last day of Parliament before their summer holidays, the UK government admitted that they had misled MPs six times over investigations into Saudi Arabia’s conduct in Yemen.” (Emphasis added.)

Thus, having assured Amnesty repeatedly of assessments conducted  finding no breach in international law: “ … it is now apparent no investigations has been done at all.” It seems when it comes to weapons of mass destruction of all hues, British governments of whichever party contain serial liars. Iraq was destroyed on the lies that it had weapons of mass destruction, the UK government sells them, then misleads about the consequences.

This is one type of US cluster munition. You have the large outer shell which will open upon being dropped from the plane. The “bomblets” inside are the true destructive munitions and they will come down (sometimes with individual parachutes) to explode either as they near the ground, or when they hit the ground, causing significant mutilation and death.

In an another Report (4) Amnesty makes the point that: “Cluster munitions are banned by over 100 countries, including the UK, and campaigners argue that the UK has a strong moral responsibility to ensure that any cluster bombs – such as the BL-755 – sold in the past are traced and that measures taken to destroy existing stockpiles. Since the 1980s and 1990s the UK is thought to have sold large numbers of cluster munitions to Saudi Arabia and the UAE (which is also part of the Saudi Arabia-led military coalition) and the weapon is known to be in the current ordnance stockpiles of both Saudi Arabia and the UAE.”

UK cluster bombs being deployed. (CommonDreams)

BL-755

No doubt the British government is more concerned about being asked to repay the purchase moneys were they to demand Saudi and the UAE destroyed the cluster bombs stock, with barely a mental glance towards the lives and limbs at stake.

In northern Yemen: “thousands of unexploded bomblets litter villages”, with a goat herder telling the researchers: “In the area next to us, there are bombs hanging off trees.”

There may be even further British involvement: “The BL-755 is designed to be dropped from the UK Tornado fighter jet, scores of which the UK has sold to Saudi Arabia. Given that the UK is known to have several hundred specialist support staff working closely with the Royal Saudi Air Force, Amnesty is warning that any involvement of UK personnel – whether in Saudi Arabia or in a liaison or political role in the UK – would constitute a clear breach of the UK’s legal responsibility under the Convention on Cluster Munitions.” (Emphasis added.)

In December last year Amnesty and Saferworld commissioned a legal opinion from eminent international law experts, Professor Philippe Sands QC, Professor Andrew Clapham and Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh of London’s Matrix Chambers. (5)

They concluded that: “any authorisation by the UK of the transfer of weapons and related items to Saudi Arabia … in circumstances where such weapons are capable of being used in the conflict in Yemen, including to support its blockade of Yemeni territory, and in circumstances where their end-use is not restricted, would constitute a breach by the UK of its obligations under domestic, European and international law.”

They also opined that the UK Government can properly be deemed to have: “actual knowledge … of the use by Saudi Arabia of weapons, including UK-supplied weapons, in attacks directed against civilians and civilians objects, in violation of international law”, since at least May 2015.

It should also be noted that of the over one hundred licenses to arms exports to Saudi, by value the top items are combat aircraft and air-delivered bombs.

Matthew Norman sums the whole, murderous, shameful, filthy business (literally) up admirably (Independent, 23rd August 2016.)

“Coming second to the US in the medals table at one Olympics might be a flash in the pan. Finishing second behind America year after year in the global league of net arms exporters suggests a commitment to flogging the means of death to any regime – however disgusting – with the cash to buy them.”

1. https://theintercept.com/2016/08/25/the-death-toll-in-yemen-is-so-high-the-red-cross-has-started-donating-morgues-to-hospitals/
2. http://www.oxfam.org.uk/media-centre/press-releases/2016/08/uk-government-in-denial-and-disarray-over-treaty-it-helped-create-to-regulate-the-arms-trade
3. https://www.amnesty.org.uk/exposed-british-cluster-bombs-used-deadly-attacks-yemen
4. https://www.amnesty.org.uk/press-releases/saudi-arabia-led-coalition-has-used-uk-manufactured-cluster-bombs-yemen-new-evidence
5. https://www.amnesty.org.uk/press-releases/government-breaking-law-supplying-arms-saudi-say-leading-lawyers

^a – Also Coalition Dropping  US-Made Cluster Bombs on Yemen.

About the author

Paying the Price — Killing the Children of Iraq, which investigated the devastating effect of United Nations sanctions on people of Iraq.^[1]   Ms. Arbuthnot is a dedicated pacificist, and her work proves the adage that "the pen is mightier than the sword."

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=By=
Alaa Al-Mohammad
ALMASDARNEWS.COM

ISIS would not cede territory in Manbij without a costly and protracted battle.

Some of the most recent news to dominate coverage of the Syrian War has been exceptional in that it highlights the victims of coalition airstrikes, and not just those of the Syrian Arab Republic (SAR), or its Russian allies. As the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) retake most of Manbij, we are exposed to the sad images of civilians from the city lying in rubble – the latest victims of a brutal war in which every actor has been blood-soaked.

The shocking images that accompany each of the many condemnatory articles reacting to these strikes could just as easily have come from the fallout of a Russian airstrike in Idlib, a Syrian airstrike in Darayaa, or a rebel mortar attack in Aleppo. And yet matching the accompanying text to the perpetrator of the attack could hardly be easier: thought to be among the deadliest air-strikes in the Syrian war, the US-led coalition’s highly publicised strikes in Manbij are still rightly described as ‘accidental’, while Syrian airstrikes resulting in a fraction of these civilian casualties are often described as intentional.

Why, and how, have we reached such differing assessments of the intentionality guiding these aerial bombardment campaigns? How can we compare the actions of military forces that are so differentially involved in this war?

The battle for Manbij itself may act as a good starting point for such a line of inquiry.

The Kurdish-led SDF have had much success fighting ISIS in Northern Syria, and turned their attention to Manbij in early June having recently crossed the Euphrates after taking control of the Tishreen dam. Barring a few exceptional cases of Russian air-support, the US-led coalition has been the primary source of air-support for the SDF, and their combined efforts have liberated dozens of villages and towns from ISIS in the past year; accounting for most of ISIS’ territorial losses in Syria.

Two features of the battle to liberate Manbij make it relevant for a comparison of the methods of the US-led coalition against those of the SAR and its allies:

1. The early stages of the battle for Manbij proceeded with the unambiguous aim of imposing a siege upon the town, a siege which has been upheld for over 60 days now.
2. A campaign of aerial bombardment has been critical both for the advance of the SDF towards the ISIS held town and during the assault on it – we can be sure that over 60 days of airstrikes have seen more civilian casualties than those which have received media attention.

There are therefore already two ways in which this battle resembles many of the SAR-led assaults on a Jihadist-held town, which brings us to a third parallel: the enemy being fought is one and the same.

The ISIS units of Manbij are well equipped and utilise the same range of tactics as they do in any other Syrian, Iraqi, or Libyan urban battle-ground: normal infantry units fight alongside tanks and artillery, but they add to this entire units of suicide bombers, using either personally carried explosives or Vehicle Based IEDs (VBIEDs), whilst also making extensive use of mines and other roadside bombs (all methods that are not exclusive to ISIS, but shared amongst most of the jihadist groups which utilise suicide bombers*). All of which take a heavy toll on the attacking ground forces, even in the presence of air support.

Why then do we hear of the civilian casualties of coalition air-strikes only rarely, and only ever in connection with the overall battle that is being fought, whilst the same tactics employed by the SAR are depicted as having intentionally targeted civilians, and presented as if they were random? A certain level of demonisation must set-in before we are willing to believe that so many air-strikes are being targeted primarily at civilians. Moreover, pundits must struggle to explain how it is that such a strategy would lead to the various victories and the recapture of towns and cities that the SAR’s campaign has overseen.

Similarly, why do we only ever hear of ‘regime’ sieges? Does the siege on Manbij not count, despite lasting for over two months? Though some news outlets did cover the SDF siege, all were quick to point out the presence of a sanctioned and monitored route allowing the entry of food and medical supplies into the beleaguered town. Nevertheless, evidence of a similar strategy employed by the SAR leads only to the condemnation of the use of starvation as a weapon of war, and again, the presence of armed jihadists in the town is only ever secondary, if at all present, in this narrative.

A suite of accusations by Western powers, Gulf states and their media outlets seem to suggest that the SAR is uniquely brutal in its aerial campaign; the situation being further muddied by a reliance upon biased sources that list rebel combatant casualties as civilian (such as the SOHR). But if it is beyond the US-led coalition’s abilities to prevent civilian casualties, despite their superior technology and their limited involvement in the war, are we not to expect something similar from a less well-equipped air-force fighting a five-year war against jihadists that use the civilian population as cover? Are these problems not inherent to fighting an enemy that utilises guerrilla tactics in densely populated urban centres? Is this not a more likely explanation than the vague accusations with regards to ‘barrel-bombs’, though nothing resembling these exists in the SAA’s arsenal?

This is not to say that the aerial campaign of the SAR has been wholly justifiable – there is much to criticise here, and there is much for which the government and military must be held to account. In particular, the campaign of airstrikes over Jabhat Fatah Al-Sham (formerly the Jabhat Al-Nusra branch of Al-Qaeda) controlled Idlib seems to have done untold damage to civilian life there with few tangible military gains. But we cannot begin to address the very real problems of the Syrian Army’s campaign when our view is based on broad demonisations with little basis in fact, and lacking any specificity or particular evidence.

The problems inherent to the use of air-strikes and sieges as revealed by the coalition’s campaign highlights the double standard in the media treatment of various military tactics and their outcomes.

Given the devastation that is caused by air-strikes and sieges, some are led to make an even broader challenge: that these tactics should be wholly avoided. Indeed, a number of anti-war activist groups in Europe and the United States campaign against the use of air-strikes altogether – a stance that is superficially noble, but in reality condemns entire cities and populations to Islamist rule. What alternatives do they propose? None have been offered, and so this position seems to be little more than a disavowal of responsibility and an abandonment of the Syrian people and the secular future of their country, as there exists no ‘clean’ method of war.

The various jihadist groups controlling Syrian towns and cities can not be defeated without a concerted military effort making use of the aerial advantage that the various state actors have at their disposal. Nor could any military campaign, with or without aerial support, completely avoid inflicting civilian casualties – such is the cost of a war that has been thrust upon the Syrian people and their country.

This argument may of course come across as cruelly pragmatic, but if one still doubts the necessity of such methods then they are encouraged to produce an example of a war that has been fought by kinder means, and to produce strategic advice for the militaries of the US, Russia,  Syria, or their favoured militant group,  from the blueprint of such fiction.

* In fact, ISIS are far less effective at doing this than the more experienced and professional Al-Qaeda associated terrorist groups, such as Jabhat Fatah Al-Sham, which have typically achieved greater gains against the Syrian Army.

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Nauseated by the
vile corporate media?
Had enough of their lies, escapism,
omissions and relentless manipulation?

Ramzy Baroud, PhD
Politics for the People

Syrian and Palestinian refugees now pack Yarmouk as this picture of people queuing up for food distribution shows. Photo: EPA/UN

(Based on interviews with Palestinian refugees from Syria.) 

The refugee camp of Yarmouk was ever present in his being, pulling him in and out of an abyss of persistent fears that urged him to never return. But what was this refugee without Yarmouk, his first haven, his last earth?  

How could any other spot in this unwelcoming universe ever be a ‘home’ when he had learned that only Palestine, which he had never visited, can ever be a home? When questioned, he always answered without hesitation: “I am from the village of so and so in Palestine.” Yet the Yarmouk Refugee Camp in Syria was all that remained of Palestine, as the Palestine he knew only existed in books or the tattered map in his family’s living room.  

But at least he had her along to share his grief; without her he would have never embarked on his quest. His name was Khaled al-Lubani and her name was Maysam.  

Their first attempt at crossing the sea was doomed to fail. The one thousand American dollars that Khaled’s father had given him in Yarmouk was almost depleted, and the money promised to him by his aunt in the UAE was still nowhere to be seen. By then, they had settled in Izmir at Turkey’s farthest western corner, and the closest in proximity to Greece.  

Wanting opportunities and a chance at a real life, they knew this was just a temporary stopover in their long-term plans.  

After a short stay at a cheap hotel, they sought an even cheaper accommodation, a small flat that cost them 400 Turkish liras each month. But with money running out, and Maysam’s anxieties increasingly suffocating her every thought, Khaled felt the pressure mounting. As he waited and waited for his aunt’s money, he felt as if she were dangling him off the side of a cliff.  

When the Syrian war started, Khaled cared little for the politics of war. He had reached the conclusion a long time ago that nothing good came out of politics and that anyone wearing a government or militia uniform could not be trusted. However, the war inched closer to Yarmouk, despite the pleas of the refugees to the warring parties to spare them more agony.  

And when Yarmouk was roundly destroyed, Khaled, pressured by the tears and pleas of his parents, fled. A long, costly and agonizing journey landed them both in Izmir.  

Their first attempt to cross the sea was with Abu Dandi. There was something about his shady looks and face that suggested he lacked honor and could not be trusted. In his fifties, he was heavy, with a large, protruding belly, and short white hair. He was addicted to overcooked black tea, and spent most of his time at the ‘Syrian Club’ playing backgammon, oozing the crude confidence of an unatoned gambler.  

Other Palestinian refugees pledged all of their faith to finding a new life via this no-guarantees trip. But an hour after their journey began, the dinghy’s small engine came to a complete halt.  

In one single, heavy choke, without any sign or introduction, it completely expired. As alarm permeated Khaled from head to toe, he knew going back was just not an option. Adding to the acute drama, Maysam’s fears and anxieties were culminating into unintelligible mumbles about the scary sea below. 

Left without any options, Abu Dandi called the Turkish coast guard, who eventually showed up and hauled them back to an Izmir prison.  

They had met the captain of the second dinghy, Abu Salma, while in prison. Captured freshly after his own failed expedition, Abu Salma promised them deliverance or their money back, guaranteed. Sadly, their original payment was never refunded by the miserable smuggler with the protruding belly.  

The second expedition was not successful, either, although, this time, the smugglers managed to take the boat much further. The engine did not abruptly stop, but nervously made a ticking sound before it quickly began to hemorrhage a line of dark diesel fuel into the crisp, blue Mediterranean Sea. The pathetic dinghy then suddenly stalled, immediately on reaching Greek waters. When the coast guard intercepted them, they threw out a rope from their large boat so that they could haul the unwelcome passengers to safety.  

Trying to circumvent the Greek boat, the passengers rowed frantically and with all their remaining energy. It was as if this was their final task in their epic struggle to feel human again. But the dinghy was brought to a forced halt as the crushing emotions of defeat weighed heavy on their slouched backs.  

With little interest in bringing the refugees to their side of the sea, the Greek coast guard robotically tuned out their chronicles of death and disgrace, and quickly telephoned the Turkish gendarmes who hauled the dinghy back to square one, holding its passengers prisoner for two more days.  

Swearing in the name of his three-year-old daughter once more, Abu Salma insisted he was still the best smuggler in the business, and if it were not for their cursed luck, they would have already reached Greece and would have been dining like kings while the Greek gods watched from above. Promising the group a bigger and faster engine for their fourth try, Abu Salma, once again, led the passengers back to the same old designated spot where the dinghy was supposedly tucked away; but the boat was nowhere to be found.  

Emotionally drained and tired, they walked back to the main road, only to find the gendarmes waiting for them.  

When they attempted again, the group of nine had materialized into twenty, and included other war refugees, longing for the safety they were denied at home. This dinghy was slightly larger than the last one, but the engine was even smaller than their first. Heated reactions by the men ensued as they yelled and roared in anger. The women cried out in pain, some grabbing their hearts, some dropping to their knees. Maysam broke down and buried her sopping wet face into the sand.  

Most of the passengers just walked away and stood in the sand trying to conjure up a plan that no one had envisioned prior. But the Palestinians, along with Khaled and Maysam, stayed. Their will was just too strong to give up after all they had gone through. Assuming the role of leader, they were urged on by Khaled, yet again.  

“Just go this way,” the smuggler pointed his stubby fingers into some direction in the dark. And that is just what Khaled did. He challenged the darkness and what he saw as the final push towards freedom. For the entire journey, Maysam quietly sobbed and held onto his arm for dear life.  

Then, finally, the much awaited lights of the Island of Mytilene glittered in the distance. “Ya Allah, Ya Allah, Ya Allah,” muttered Maysam in a final attempt to cram in as many prayers as she possibly could so that the dinghy would reach the shores, bringing an end to the Syrian and Turkish nightmares, and freeing them from the abyss of the condemned. 

A small jar of crunchy peanut better was all that Khaled and Maysam had left in their small duffel bag when their feet first touched the sand of Mytilene late one night. The exhilaration of their success blasted up their spines as they cried and jumped for joy.  

But as they tried to process the unbelievable comfort the white sand offered them, it was quickly overshadowed by a haunting, unforeseen and unexpected fear of the future. The water soaking through their trainers suddenly felt like a cold omen. 

Ramzy Baroud, PhD

Has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books include ‘Searching Jenin’, ‘The Second Palestinian Intifada’ and his latest ‘My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story’. His website is: www.ramzybaroud.net.

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WITNESSES TO HISTORY
CALEB MAUPIN

Protest in 2014 Caracas, Venezuela. by Leo Ramirez via Diariocritico de Venezuela

Do not believe all you see of global event through the lens of corporate media. Like the contagious chaos in the Middle East, many of the struggles of Venezuela are due to the unceasing efforts of the .S> to make Venezuela an obedient vassal state – apparently the only kind of relationship that satisfies the U.S. The U.S. has its hand on the spigot of the oil glut; hoping that this will play a role in various efforts: finally crashing Venezuela and undermining the Russian economy; playing a part in destabilizing BRICS; and distracting from the unpleasant fact that the dollar is losing power as the base global currency. Tangled plots by idiots. -rw

Americans have been trained by decades of Cold War propaganda to look for any confirmation that ‘socialism means poverty.’ But in the case of Venezuela and other states not governed by the free market, this cliche simply doesn’t ring true.

The political and economic crisis facing Venezuela is being endlessly pointed to as proof of the superiority of the free market.

Images and portrayals of Venezuelans rioting in the streets over high food costs, empty grocery stores, medicine shortages, and overflowing garbage bins are the headlines, and the reporting points to socialism as the cause.

The Chicago Tribune published a Commentary piece titled: “A socialist revolution can ruin almost any country.” A headline on Reason’s Hit and Run blog proclaims: “Venezuelan socialism still a complete disaster.” The Week’s U.S. edition says: “Authoritarian socialism caused Venezuela’s collapse.”

Indeed, corporate-owned, mainstream media advises Americans to look at the inflation and food lines in Venezuela, and then repeat to themselves clichés they heard in elementary school about how “Communism just doesn’t work.”

In reality, millions of Venezuelans have seen their living conditions vastly improved through the Bolivarian process. The problems plaguing the Venezuelan economy are not due to some inherent fault in socialism, but to artificially low oil prices and sabotage by forces hostile to the revolution.

Global oil glut courtesy Saudi Arabia (and the U.S.). Source AFP

Starting in 2014, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia flooded the market with cheap oil. This is not a mere business decision, but a calculated move coordinated with U.S. and Israeli foreign policy goals. Despite not just losing money, but even falling deep into debt, the Saudi monarchy continues to expand its oil production apparatus. The result has been driving the price of oil down from $110 per barrel, to $28 in the early months of this year.The goal is to weaken these opponents of Wall Street, London, and Tel Aviv, whose economies are centered around oil and natural gas exports.

And Venezuela is one of those countries. Saudi efforts to drive down oil prices have drastically reduced Venezuela’s state budget and led to enormous consequences for the Venezuelan economy.

At the same time, private food processing and importing corporations have launched a coordinated campaign of sabotage. This, coupled with the weakening of a vitally important state sector of the economy, has resulted in inflation and food shortages. The artificially low oil prices have left the Venezuelan state cash-starved, prompting a crisis in the funding of the social programs that were key to strengthening the United Socialist Party.

Corruption is a big problem in Venezuela and many third-world countries. This was true prior to the Bolivarian process, as well as after Hugo Chavez launched his massive economic reforms. In situations of extreme poverty, people learn to take care of each other. People who work in government are almost expected to use their position to take care of their friends and family. Corruption is a big problem under any system, but it is much easier to tolerate in conditions of greater abundance. The problem has been magnified in Venezuela due to the drop in state revenue caused by the low oil prices and sabotage from food importers.

The Bolivarian experience in Venezuela

Americans have been trained by decades of Cold War propaganda to look for any confirmation that “socialism means poverty.” A quick, simplistic portrait of the problems currently facing Venezuela, coupled with the fact that President Nicolas Maduro describes himself as a Marxist, can certainly give them such a confirmation. However, the actual, undisputed history of socialist construction around the world, including recent decades in Venezuela, tells a completely different story.

Hugo Chavez was elected president of Venezuela in 1999. His election was viewed as a referendum on the extreme free market policies enacted in Venezuela during the 1990s. In December, when I walked through the neighborhoods of central Caracas, Venezuelans spoke of these times with horror.

Venezuelans told of how the privatizations mandated by the International Monetary Fund made life in Venezuela almost unlivable during the 1990s. Garbage wouldn’t be collected. Electricity would go off for weeks. Haido Ortega, a member of a local governing body in Venezuela, said: “Under previous governments we had to burn tires and go on strike just to get electricity, have the streets fixed, or get any investment.”

Chavez took office on a platform advocating a path between capitalism and socialism. He restructured the government-owned oil company so that the profits would go into the Venezuelan state, not the pockets of Wall Street corporations. With the proceeds of Venezuela’s oil exports, Chavez funded a huge apparatus of social programs.

After defeating an attempted coup against him in 2002, Chavez announced the goal of bringing Venezuela toward “21st Century Socialism.” Chavez quoted Marx and Lenin in his many TV addresses to the country, and mobilized the country around the goal of creating a prosperous, non-capitalist society.

In 1998, Venezuela had only 12 public universities, today it has 32. Cuban doctors were brought to Venezuela to provide free health care in community clinics. The government provides cooking and heating gas to low-income neighborhoods, and it’s launched a literacy campaign for uneducated adults.

During the George W. Bush administration, oil prices were the highest they had ever been. The destruction of Iraq, sanctions on Iran and Russia, strikes and turmoil in Nigeria — these events created a shortage on the international markets, driving prices up.

Big oil revenues enabled Chavez and the United Socialist Party to bring millions of Venezuelans out of poverty. Between 1995 and 2009, poverty and unemployment in Venezuela were both cut in half.

After the death of Chavez, Nicolas Maduro has continued the Bolivarian program. “Housing Missions” have been built across the country, providing low-income families in Venezuela with places to live. The Venezuelan government reports that over 1 million modern apartment buildings had been constructed by the end of 2015.

The problems currently facing Venezuela started in 2014. The already growing abundance of oil due to hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, was compounded by Saudi Arabia flooding the markets with cheap oil. The result: massive price drops. Despite facing a domestic fiscal crisis, Saudi Arabia continues to expand its oil production apparatus.

The price of oil remains low, as negotiations among OPEC states are taking place in the hopes that prices can be driven back up. While American media insists the low oil prices are just the natural cycle of the market at work, it’s rather convenient for U.S. foreign policy. Russia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and the Islamic Republic of Iran all have economies centered around state-owned oil companies and oil exports, and each of these countries has suffered the sting of low oil prices.

The leftist president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, has already been deposed due to scandal surrounding Petrobras, the state-owned oil company which is experiencing economic problems due to the falling price of oil. Although much of Brazil’s oil is for domestic consumption, it has been revealed that those who deposed her coordinated with the CIA and other forces in Washington and Wall Street, utilizing the economic fallout of low oil prices to bring down the Brazilian president.

The son of President Ronald Reagan has argued that Obama is intentionally driving down oil prices not just to weaken the Venezuelan economy, but also to tamper the influence of Russia and Iran. Writing for Townhall in 2014, Michael Reagan bragged that his father did the same thing to hurt the Soviet Union during the 1980s:

“Since selling oil was the source of the Kremlin’s wealth, my father got the Saudis to flood the market with cheap oil.

Lower oil prices devalued the ruble, causing the USSR to go bankrupt, which led to perestroika and Mikhail Gorbachev and the collapse of the Soviet Empire.”

The history of socialist construction

Prior to the 1917 revolution, Russia was a primitive, agrarian country. By 1936, after the completion of the Five-Year Plan, it was a world industrial power, surpassing every other country on the globe in terms of steel and tractor production. The barren Soviet countryside was lit up with electricity. The children of illiterate peasants across the Soviet Union grew up to be the scientists and engineers who first conquered outer space. The planned economy of the Soviet Union drastically improved the living standards of millions of people, bringing them running water, modern housing, guaranteed employment, and free education.

There is no contradiction between central planning and economic growth. In 1949, China had no steel industry. Today, more than half of all the world’s steel is produced in China’s government-controlled steel industry.

Cuba has wiped out illiteracy, and Cubans enjoy one of the highest life expectancies in Latin America.

When the Marxist-Leninist governments of Eastern Europe collapsed in the early 1990s, economists like Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University, who can be counted among capitalism’s “true believers,” predicted rapid economic growth. Since the 1990s, conditions in what George W. Bush called the “New Europe” have becomefar worse than under socialism. The life expectancy has decreased and infant mortality has risen. Human and drug traffickers have set up shop. In endless polls, the people of Eastern Europe repeatedly say life was better before the defeat of Communism.

Russia’s recovery from the disaster of the 1990s has come about with the reorientation of the economy to one centered around public control of its oil and natural gas resources — much like Venezuela. The Putin government has also waged a crackdown on the small number of “oligarchs” who became wealthy after the demise of the Soviet Union. Once strong state control of the economy was re-established, Russia’s gross domestic product increased by 70 percent during the first eight years of Putin’s administration. From 2000 to 2008, poverty was cut in half, and incomes doubled.

Neoliberal capitalism has failed

It is only because these facts are simply off-limits in the American media and its discussions of socialism and capitalism that the distorted narrative about Venezuela’s current hardships are believed.

If the kind of neoliberal “free trade” advocated by U.S. corporations was the solution to global poverty, Mexico, a country long ago penetrated with the North American Free Trade Agreement, would be a shining example of development, not a mess of drug cartels and poverty. The same can be said for oil-rich countries like Nigeria, where exports are massive but the population remains in dire conditions.When discussing the merits of capitalism and socialism, American media usually restricts the conversation to pointing out that socialist countries in the third world have lower living standards than the United States, a country widely identified with capitalism. Without any context or fair comparison, this alone is supposed to prove the inherent superiority of U.S.-style capitalism.

The governments of Bangladesh, Honduras, Guatemala, Indonesia, and the Philippines have done everything they can to deregulate the market and accommodate Western ”investment.” Despite the promises of neoliberal theoreticians, their populations have not seen their lives substantially improve.

If one compares the more market-oriented economy of the U.S., not to countries in the global south attempting to develop with a planned economy, but to other Western countries with more social-democratic governments, the inferiority of the “free market” can also be revealed.

The U.S. is rated 43 in the world in terms of life expectancy, according to the CIA World Factbook. People live longer in Germany, Britain, Spain, France, Sweden, Australia, Italy, Iceland — basically, almost every other Western country. Statistics on the rate of infant mortality say approximately the same thing. National health care services along with greater job security and economic protections render much healthier populations.

Even as the social-democratic welfare states of Europe drift closer to the U.S. economic model with “austerity cuts,” the U.S. still lags behind them in terms of basic societal health. Western European countries with powerful unions, strong socialist and labor parties, and less punitive criminal justice systems tend to have healthier societies.

The American perception that socialism or government intervention automatically create poverty, while a laissez faire approach unleashes limitless prosperity, is simply incorrect. Despite the current hardships, this reality is reflected in the last two decades of Venezuela’s history.

A punishment vote, not a vote for capitalism

The artificially low oil prices have left the Venezuelan state cash-starved, prompting a crisis in the funding of the social programs that were key to strengthening the United Socialist Party.

It is odd that the mainstream press blames “socialism” for the food problems in Venezuela, when the food distributors remain in the hands of private corporations. As Venezuelan political analyst Jesus Silva told me recently: “Most food in Venezuela is imported by private companies, they ask for dollars subsidized by the government oil sales to do that; they rarely produce anything or invest their own money.”

According to Silva, the economic sanctions imposed on Venezuela by the U.S., in addition to the oil crisis, have made it more difficult for the Venezuelan government to pay the private food importing companies in U.S. dollars. In response, the food companies are “running general sabotage.”

“Venezuela’s economy depends on oil sales. Now that oil prices are dropping down, the challenge is to get other sources of economic income,” he explained. “Meanwhile, the opposition is garnering electoral support due to the current economic crisis.”

When the United Socialist Party and its aligned Patriotic Pole lost control of Parliament in December, many predicted the imminent collapse of the Bolivarian government. However, months have passed and this clearly has not taken place.

While a clear majority cast a voto castigo (“punishment vote”) in December, punishing the government for mismanaging the crisis, the Maduro administration has a solid core of socialist activists who remain loyal to the Bolivarian project. Across Venezuela, communes have been established. Leftist activists live together and work in cooperatives. Many of them are armed and organized in “Bolivarian Militias” to defend the revolution.

Even some of the loudest critics of the Venezuelan government admit that it has greatly improved the situation in the country, despite the current hardships.

In December, I spoke to Glen Martinez, a radio host in Caracas who voted for the opposition. He dismissed the notion that free market capitalism would ever return to Venezuela. As he explained, most of the people who voted against the United Socialist Party — himself included — are frustrated with the way the current crisis is being handled, but do not want a return to the neoliberal economic model of the 1999s.

He said the economic reforms established during the Chavez administration would never be reversed. “We are not the same people we were before 1999,” Martinez insisted.

The United Socialist Party is currently engaging in a massive re-orientation, hoping to sharpen its response to economic sabotage and strengthen the socialist direction of the revolution. There is also talk of massive reform in the way the government operates, in order to prevent the extreme examples of corruption and mismanagement that are causing frustration among the population.

The climate is being intensified by a number of recent political assassinations. Tensions continue to exist on Venezuela’s border with the U.S.-aligned government of Colombia. The solid base of socialist activists is not going to let revolution be overturned, and tensions continue to rise. The Maduro and the United Socialist Party’s main task is to hold Venezuela together, and not let the country escalate into a state of civil war.

Caleb Maupin

Is an American journalist and political analyst. Tasnim News Agency described him as "a native of Ohio who has campaigned against war and the U.S. financial system." His political activism began while attending Baldwin-Wallace College in Ohio. In 2010, he video recorded a confrontation between Collinwood High School students who walked out to protest teacher layoffs and the police. His video footage resulted in one of the students being acquitted in juvenile court. He was a figure within the Occupy Wall Street protests in New York City. Maupin writes on American foreign policy and other social issues. Maupin is featured as a Distinguished Collaborator with The Greanville Post.  READ MORE ABOUT CALEB MAUPIN HERE.

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