US President George W Bush said he saw a new opportunity for peace in the Holy Land as he arrived in Israel on Wednesday at the start of a landmark regional tour.
However, his Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was more to the point. She told the BBC: ‘We shouldn’t expect that there are going to be any great breakthroughs on this trip.’
In fact, there is no sign of peace in Palestine. The Israelis have stepped up the blockade of the Gaza Strip, cutting off its oil supplies, to threaten the whole population with starvation and endangering the lives of children, the old and the sick.
As well, Gaza is coming under repeated Israeli military attacks from the ground and the air, while Israeli troops continue to raid West Bank cities such as Nablus, and Israeli settlers continue to construct illegal settlements on the West Bank.
There is no peace anywhere in Palestine, not even a stand-down of Israeli attacks during Bush’s visit.
His visit is to do with war not peace. He was greeted by Israeli President Shimon Peres who said that stopping Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas was the key in advancing peacemaking.
He told Bush: ‘We take your advice to not underestimate the Iranian threat. Iran should not underestimate our resolve for self defence.’
Bush on his arrival immediately recognised and saluted the racist nature of the Israeli state, saying: ‘The alliance between our two nations helps guarantee Israel’s security as a Jewish state.’
Bush is holding talks with Prime Minister Olmert and Peres on Wednesday and then heading to Ramallah to meet the Palestinian President, Mahmud Abbas, on Thursday.
In a bid to win backing for his campaign against Iran, Bush will then travel to key allies in the oil-rich Gulf – Kuwait, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia – before ending his tour in Egypt on January 16.
Meanwhile, nothing is being allowed to interfere with the Bush war agenda. An Israeli minister, Rafi Eitan, a key member of Israel’s security cabinet, has been invited to dine with Bush during his stay in Jerusalem.
Eitan is the official who was the handler of Jonathan Pollard, who was jailed for life in the US as an Israeli spy. Pollard passed thousands of secret documents about US activities in the Arab world to Israel between May 1984 and his arrest in November 1985.
Pollard’s wife Esther said yesterday that her husband was ‘shocked and disgusted’ by the fact that Eitan was invited to the president’s dinner while he sat in jail. Bush and Eitan will not allow such a trivial matter to get in the way of their war plans.
Bush took aim at Iran on Tuesday after a confrontation between Iranian vessels and US warships in the strategic Strait of Hormuz.
‘We viewed it as a provocative act. It is a dangerous situation and they should not have done it, pure and simple,’ Bush declared.
The main issues on the Bush agenda for this week are:
• Organising economic and military measures to overthrow Hamas in Gaza, and to disarm all of the Palestinian militias in the West Bank, including urging Jordan and Egypt to consider taking responsibility for the security of Gaza and the West Bank.
• Organising to mobilise the right wing in the Lebanon to support a new Israeli attack on the Hezbollah movement, to prepare the way for military action against Syria.
• Organising Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States into an anti-Iran coalition, prepared to support military action against Iran.
As far as Palestine is concerned, nothing will be achieved except a signed and worthless paper declaration by Abbas and Olmert to work for a Palestinian state in the period ahead.
The only road to peace in the Middle East and to the establishment of the Palestinian state is the victory of the Iraqi revolution, with the expulsion of all imperialist troops, and the spread of that revolution throughout the whole region.
