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US General Builds A Palestinian Army
Last Thursday, in what was billed as his very first on-the-record address, Lt. Gen. Keith Dayton, U.S. security coordinator for Israel and the Palestinian Authority, spoke to the 2009 Soref Symposium organized by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. WINEP, of course, is the chief thinktank for the Washington-based Israel lobby.
A peace activist runs for cover with a Palestinian flag as Israeli soldiers fire tear gas during a protest in the West Bank village of Bilin, near Ramallah, on May 1. Dozens of Palestinian and foreign activists sporting protective face masks demonstrated against the "occupation flu" from Israel they said was worse than swine flu. (AFP/File/Abbas Momani) And in his talk, Gen. Dayton delivered an important warning.
First, the background. For the past three and a half years, Dayton has lived and worked in Jerusalem and across the West Bank, overseeing the creation of three Palestinian battalions of troops, hand-picked in the West Bank, trained at an academy in Jordan, and then deployed in the occupied territory.
The three 500-man battalions are intended to grow, to as many as ten battalions. Their mission, he said, is to "create a Palestinian state." Recognizing that many in the WINEP audience were not exactly enamored with the idea of an independent Palestine, Dayton told his audience: "If you don't like the idea of a Palestinian state, you won't like the rest of this talk."
From the detailed description provided by Dayton, it's clear that the Palestinian forces he's enabling could certainly be accused of carrying out the self-policing of the West Bank for the Israelis. Because the West Bank is, after all, occupied by Israel and riddled with illegal settlements besides -- plus beset by a surrounding wall, 600-plus intrusive checkpoints, and a network of Jews-only highways -- the Palestinian troops are utterly at the mercy of the Israelis. Each recruit is vetted by US security forces (i.e, the CIA), then vetted by Shin Bet, the domestic intelligence arm of Israel, and then by Jordan's super-efficient intelligence service, before they begin their training in Jordan. Dayton made it quite clear that the Palestinian units thus trained are primarily deployed against two targets in the West Bank: against criminal gangs, and against Hamas.
So far, they've received $161 million is US funding.
Dayton described how, during the Israeli assault on Gaza last December and January, the West Bank remained quiet -- even though some analysts were predicting an upsurge of sympathy for Hamas, which controls Gaza, along with violence, even a third intifada. "None of these predictions came true," said the general, who added that the Palestinian battalions allowed peaceful demonstrations of solidarity with Hamas, but kept the lid on violent actions. Israel, he said, "kept a low profile," and not a single Palestinian was killed in the West Bank during the three-week carnage in Gaza.
Most of the work he's done, Dayton said, occurred in the West Bank after the June, 2007, Hamas takeover in Gaza. "What we have created are 'new men,'" he added.
Now for the warning. Recognizing that by organizing and training thousands of Palestinian troops, professionally led, he is creating in effect a nationalist army, Dayton warned the 500 or so WINEP listeners that the troops can only be strung along for just so long. "With big expectations, come big risks," said Dayton. "There is perhaps a two-year shelf life on being told that you're creating a state, when you're not." To my ears, at least, his subtle warning is that if concrete progress isn't made toward a Palestinian state, the very troops Dayton is assembling could rebel.
Dayton was responding to a question from Paul Wolfowitz, the neoconservative former deputy secretary of defense, who now hangs his hat at the neocon-dominated American Enterprise Institute. "How many Palestinians see your people as collaborators?" Wolfowitz asked. In answering Wolfowitz, the general acknowledged that Hamas and its sympathizers accuse the Palestinian battalions of being "enforces of the Israeli occuption." But he stressed that each one of them believes that he is fighting for an independent Palestine. The unstated message: the United States and Israel had better deliver. Thus the two year warning. Which, to me, sounds spot on with the Obama administration's timetable.
One more thing: General Dayton signed up for another stint in the West Bank. And how long did he agree to serve? Yes--two years.
- Posted in
32 Comments so far
Show AllThis batallion that Dayton is creating will be used by the Israelis for target practice when the appropriate time comes to steal more land.
Palestinians will not accept a bantustan run by Palestinians loyal to Israel. A flag and recognition do not turn a prison into a state.
Considering the lack of modern military leadership and training has plagued the Palestinians since the time of the British mandate (even though they had their own militias which out-numbered and out-gunned the Haganah & others), this is a move in the right direction. The lack of a modern, professional military has long been one of the main weaknesses of the Palestinians. Hamas can bluster, launch rockets, & fight guerrilla wars amongst civilians, but the possibility of them carrying out a successful military campaign is remote. This other force, in time, is a whole different matter.
Once it's up and running and has proved itself, it'd be an excellent pressure point to get Israel out of there and ignore whatever security claims it makes when the time comes. Of course, that depends on an American administration actually dedicated to an independent Palestine. We'll see.
Get a clue! Are you serious or a just propagandist? Did you read the article?
"Because the West Bank is, after all, occupied by Israel and riddled with illegal settlements besides -- plus beset by a surrounding wall, 600-plus intrusive checkpoints, and a network of Jews-only highways -- the Palestinian troops are utterly at the mercy of the Israelis. Each recruit is vetted by US security forces (i.e, the CIA), then vetted by Shin Bet, the domestic intelligence arm of Israel, and then by Jordan's super-efficient intelligence service, before they begin their training in Jordan."
and...the "vichy" soldiers will have no weapons capable of stopping Israeli troop movements inside occupied Palestine, and they do not answer to the Palestinians' elected leaders, Hamas, but to the US/Israeli collaborators.
Al Qaeda, anyone?
That was a CIA creation.
Oregoncharles
General Dayton is a brave man.
Sounds to me like the US & Israel using Palestinians to do their own dirty work...
Like man the checkpoints, patrol the "freedom walls", and put down their own insurgencies...
This is a similar strategy of other colonial powers occupying another country... The locals are less likely to throw rocks and shoot bullets and rockets at their own people...
What Hamas 'takeover' in 2007?
You mean when Hamas was [democratically] [elected] by the Palestinians, the majority of them?
Ramzy Baroud has educational views and the following is a recent piece by him.
"War without Context: Fatah, Hamas and Flawed Language",
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/05/08-4
Like he says, the Mahmoud Abbas, the President of the PA, his term has [expired], and there's much more that Ramzy Baroud educates readers about, including in his above article.
====================================
"GoldenMean May 11th, 2009 1:07 pm
...
This is a similar strategy of other colonial powers occupying another country..."
Definitely!
Like The Nation's article says, the US general has been working on forming not a democratically-aligned army, but one aligned with or which is rather part of Fatah, the president of which is no longer president, as just mentioned, above. Fatah is the grouping that the U.S. supports for it and Israel to make use of as they pretty much wish and as former President Abbas proved or demonstrated, with his so-called presidential term.
As The Nation's article indicates, this is evidently or clearly to oppose Hamas, because it's the plan of the U.S. "elites" to try to maintain dominant control in Palestine.
This might be better worded, but it should be clear enough, I believe.
=================================
"ezeflyer May 11th, 2009 12:36 pm
General Dayton is a brave man."
BS! It doesn't take bravery or courage to do what he's been doing. After all, he knows that Israel won't have its forces attack him and that the U.S. won't go bomb him; in addition to knowing that it's [not] Hamas that would attack him, for its leadership knows very well the bloody and destructive consequences would be extremely fatal.
"After all, he knows that Israel won't have its forces attack him"
The same forces that attacked the Liberty?
A waste of $161 million of US funding.
the Nazis used to use Jewish prisoners as "trustees" in the camps too...
"The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing, to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts." - John Keats
And armed them, trained them professionally, and paid them a living wage.
Oh wait, they didn't.
"ezeflyer May 11th, 2009 4:32 pm
"After all, he knows that Israel won't have its forces attack him"
The same forces that attacked the Liberty?"
Israel [knows] the U.S. also knows about the attack on the USS Liberty and that the U.S. presidency covered this up, criminally. But Israel knows it [needs] the protection, funding, military arms, ... from the U.S. and won't be about to go and "bite the hand that feeds it" so ... richly.
Your reference [is] an example of [over]-generalisation.
===================================
"hopedup May 11th, 2009 4:29 pm
Get a clue! Are you serious or a just propagandist? Did you read the article?"
I don't know who that was written in response to, but if it's my first post, then hopedup's argument is awfully incomplete in terms of analysis; selectively taking only one thing said in the article while disregarding other things said in the same piece.
But not knowing whose post hopedup's was in response to, I won't explain further with this post.
""ezeflyer May 11th, 2009 4:32 pm
"After all, he knows that Israel won't have its forces attack him"
The same forces that attacked the Liberty?"
Israel [knows] the U.S. also knows about the attack on the USS Liberty and that the U.S. presidency covered this up, criminally. But Israel knows it [needs] the protection, funding, military arms, ... from the U.S. and won't be about to go and "bite the hand that feeds it" so ... richly.
Your reference [is] an example of [over]-generalisation."
Israel needed US protection, funding, military arms when it attacked the Liberty didn't it? Besides, one of our servicemen is much easier to kill than hundreds of them on one of our battleships. If Israel can get away with that, it can certainly cause an accident for our General.
War is big business...this is simply the opening of another branch of War Inc. courtesy of the USA. Disgusting.
Well, seems this Palestinian army "business" is apparently worthless and, most probably (or surely!), not intended to be really otherwise. F.e., consider the following article, which is from the "International Middle East Media Center", imemc.org. And there have been similar reports posted at Uruknet ... for quite "some" time, already.
"Jerusalem governor: “Palestinians facing ethnic cleansing in Jerusalem”", May 10, 2009
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m54146
QUOTE:
Jerusalem governor at the Palestinian Authority, Adnan Al Hesseini, stated Saturday that Jerusalem and its Palestinian natives are subjected to ethnic cleansing and blatant racism as they face expulsion, as Israeli forces continue demolishing their homes, and replacing them with settlers.
In a press release, Al Husseini said that the Jerusalem Municipality waged a war against the Palestinians by issuing orders to demolish their homes, stores, and even by wiping out whole neighborhoods, to replace them later on with more illegal settlement outposts.
"This is an Israeli war against the Palestinians and their land in Jerusalem", he stated, "This is a war that targets the very existence of Arabs and Palestinians in the city, this war targets our history".
The Jerusalem governor demanded the Arab countries to take more serious stances towards the illegal Israeli acts, and added that Jerusalem is the heart and essence of every Palestinian".
"The Palestinian people must defend their land, must counter the Israeli plans, must defend the Arab Jerusalem and its holy sites", he stated.
It is worth mentioning that Al Husseini met on Saturday with dozens of Jordanian pharmacists and physicians visiting the country.
END QUOTE
Curiously, I have seen no mention of this US Lt Gen. forming a Palestinian army at Uruknet, which posts a lot about Palestine, Gaza, Jerusalem, West Bank, and more. Perhaps there have been some articles there on this topic and I just haven't seen them, but ... let's see what a Web search will turn up.
Yep, found some. The one at Haaretz.com was obtained through the source link in an article or copy at Uruknet; actually Uruknet.biz, this time. I'll post on the second article in a following post after this one.
"U.S. preparing Abbas guard to take on Hamas",
By Aluf Benn and Avi Issacharoff, Oct 31 2006
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/781482.html
QUOTE:
The Bush administration has undertaken efforts to arm and train the Presidential Guard of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in order to prepare it for a potential violent confrontation with Hamas forces in the Gaza Strip.
According to information received in Jerusalem, the American security coordinator in the territories, General Keith Dayton, appeared before representatives of the Quartet in London last week and presented them with a program for bolstering the Palestinian presidential guard. The program calls for Egyptian, British and perhaps even Jordanian instructors to train the force loyal to Abbas.
However, Palestinian sources say that the training of a "Special Presidential Guard" started already a month ago, under the guidance of an American military instructor. The training is taking place in Jericho, at a compound near the InterContinental Hotel, and involves men from Force 17, an elite Fatah force traditionally assigned the protection of the Palestinian Authority Chairman.
According to reports, 400 Force 17 troops have been involved in the training since August.
The Palestinian Authority Chairman's office has recently barred the access of reporters to the compound.
Palestinian sources say that the training program is part of Dayton's recommended initiative for the reinforcement of Abbas' forces, and which involves the transfer of $2 million to set up the necessary training facilities.
According to foreign press reports, the United States would like to see the number of men in Force 17 grow from approximately 3,500 to 6,000. Conscripts in the force range from 18 to 22, and undergo basic training for three months. Some are then selected for the Presidential Guard.
In the past, Dayton had proposed that the Presidential Guard, bolstered by international inspectors, be deployed at the Karni crossing in the northern Gaza Strip in order to expand the transit of goods between Gaza and Israel.
Israeli sources say that the United States is interested in the fall of the Hamas government currently in power in the Palestinian Authority.
During the Quartet meeting in London, the Americans expressed their satisfaction with the results of the boycott of Hamas' government, which has undermined its standing among the Palestinians.
However, the U.S. administration is also certain that the sanctions against Hamas will inevitably result in a violent confrontation between Hamas and Fatah, and in such a scenario, they would prefer to strengthen the "good guys" headed by Abbas.
It is unclear whether the European and Russian representatives of the Quartet support this position.
...
Abbas meets Muslim and Jewish religious leaders in Ramallah
Meanwhile, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas met with private delegations of religious Jewish and Muslim leaders in Ramallah on Tuesday.
Among the delegates to the meeting was Rabbi Menachem Fruman, chief rabbi of the West Bank settlement of Tekoa, known for his coexistence work with Palestinian leaders over the years.
END QUOTE
This is the second article found when trying to find any at Uruknet about this Lt Gen. Keith Dayton and I'll only excerpt the two paragraphs that specifically refer to him.
"The Palestinian question: What now?",
by Mark Perry, ConflictsForum.org, June 18, 2007
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=33805
QUOTE:
What is so shocking about the recent events in Gaza is not the bloodletting — though that was shocking enough — or even the decisive victory of Hamas (which should have been predicted), but the total lack of embarrassment inside the White House. The only exception seems to be Lt. General Keith Dayton, U.S. Security Coordinator in the West Bank and Gaza — he has consistently refused to take reporters calls since the events in Gaza wound down to their inevitable end. And he certainly should be embarrassed, as he recently described his task as "an attempt to reestablish law and order." Nor does it appear that Elliott Abrams or any other members of the National Security Council staff are even vaguely perturbed. On the contrary, the events in Gaza show that the way forward is to provide more of the same. "They live in a parallel universe over there," a Washington colleague says. "They’re in their own bubble. They probably think they’ve won a great victory."
...
So here is what will happen. The United States will fail to deliver. Some money will trickle in, but not nearly enough. The little that does trickle in will be spent unwisely. Israeli may remove some outposts, but only a few, and the settlements will continue to expand and settler roads will continue to be built and Palestinians will continue to die. Israelis will die too. A Palestinian security guard will be trained and it will march smartly through the streets of Ramallah. If it should exchange fire with a militia led by Hamas it will just as smartly be defeated. And if there is an election in "Fatahstine," Hamas will win, while at the White House, Tony Snow will talk about how the outcome was engineered in Tehran. And nineteen months from now, in the waning days of the Bush Administration — with American foreign policy in tatters — Elliott Abrams and Keith Dayton will proudly stand alongside a smiling President Bush as he honors them, the newest recipients of the Medal of Freedom.
END QUOTE
Actually, I had found three related articles at Uruknet and the following one is an excellent analytical piece.
"Seamless Continuity From Bush Time
Obama and "Two States"",
By ELLEN CANTAROW
April 30, 2009
(originally posted Counterpunch.org and she "has written since 1979 on Israel and Palestine")
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m53859
QUOTE:
A false claim is wafting through the press: Obama is hanging tough with Benjamin Netanyahu, he’s going to "twist Israel’s arm" and at long last force the Jewish state into a two-state agreement, settling the Israel-Palestine question for good. There’s even talk that Obama backs the Arab League’s 2002 peace initiative, complete with its main demand: Israel’s withdrawal to its 1967 borders.
There’s no proof for any of this. Obama has said nothing about when, where, and with what boundaries a Palestinian state might be established. Neither did George Bush. ...
In regard to a critical document invoked by Obama in his first policy speech about the region last January -- the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative -- Obama has not changed an iota, at least publicly. He gave the speech before State Department employees last January, announcing George Mitchell as his Middle East envoy. Most important, the speech delineated the clear outlines of Obama’s Middle East doctrine, as I described in my "The Problem Isn’t Avigdor Lieberman"
Obama’s reference to the Arab Peace Initiative was crucial for what it omitted -- .... ...
Obama deliberately ignored all of this in his speech. Instead, he patted the Arab League on the head ("The Arab peace initiative contains constructive elements"), calling on Arab states to take "steps towards normalizing relations with Israel, and [stand] up to extremism that threatens us all." ... The US has found a proxy (and armed it -- more on this below). Hamas must "bow its head" to the master’s will. ...
...
What’s surprising is that left publications have focused so little on Obama’s clear statement of intent in the Arab League proposal reference. It is also surprising that the left press has seldom commented (if at all) on a March 4 address to the Brookings Institution’s Saban Center by Senator John Kerry. As Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Kerry made very clear the Administration’s "peace" plans:
(indented paragraph) To start with, we need to fundamentally re-conceptualize the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a regional problem that demands a regional solution. The challenges we face there – Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and the Middle East peace process – form an interconnected web that requires an integrated approach . . . . That’s why it is vital that we move quickly, with the Arab world and the Quartet, to build Palestinian Authority capacity. [Thanks to Noam Chomsky for drawing my attention to his discussion of Kerry’s role in his "Exterminate All the Brutes," on Znet.]
... Here’s Kerry at Brookings again:
(indented paragraph) For years, everyone has talked of the need to give the Israelis a legitimate partner for peace . . . . We must help the Palestinian Authority deliver for the Palestinian people, and we must do it now. . . . Most importantly, this means strengthening General Dayton’s efforts to train Palestinian security forces that can keep order and fight terror. Recent developments have been extremely encouraging: during the invasion of Gaza, Palestinian Security Forces largely succeeded in maintaining calm in the West Bank amidst widespread expectations of civil unrest.
... While one part of the "experiment" with a final solution to the Palestinian problem was underway – Israel’s bombing and shelling of Gaza, .... - another part, equally critical, was underway in the West Bank. To protect the population’s "human rights" the "truly professional" Palestinian National Security Force (N.S.F.) crushed West Bank demonstrations, .... According to reliable reports, Abbas also has CIA-run forces, Preventive Security and General Intelligence, which promise to be far more brutal than Dayton’s paramilitaries (these fall under State Department aegis).
END QUOTE
She has plenty MORE to SAY about this matter. I definitely recommend reading her analysis in [whole]. Great [education] it is. I only wanted to excerpt enough for some strong juxtaposition to The Nation's article by Richard Dreyfuss's lacking information.
The mere fact that he says Hamas conducted a "takeover" in 2007 tells me that he's not someone who can be trusted on the issue(s) facing Palestinians; as well as issues for the population of the USA. After all, it's the U.S. government that is hellbent worst criminal in all of this, given it could stop the Israeli government's criminality against Palestinians and their ancestral country. But the ruling elites of the USA need, well, no longer a "battleship" (what Ray McGovern said the U.S. first worked for the establishment of the thing called the state of Israel today for), but a full military power base that extends the USA's global power; military power anyway. Otoh, with military power "super" to all others, economic power is quasi assured.
"The mere fact that he says Hamas conducted a "takeover""
Would you be satisfied if he replaced that with "gained control"?
See the article linked in my earlier post and by Ramzy Baroud. He explains the answer to your absent-minded question, zmann.
So you decide not to answer my question on your words, not the words from one of the articles you link to, and try to insult my honest inquiry? I guess I will have to check it, since you're not capable of answering.
If true, this will probably backfire just like CIA-trained Al Qaeda did; just like Bush II's reign backfired by swallowing the free market KoolAid that Bush I and the CIA-IMF-World Bank conglomerate peddled to debtor nations to keep them in line; just like...(insert your "favorite" here).
zmann ,
Since you questioned my words and they're based on what I've learned from very good analysts, there therefore is nothing wrong with referring to a questioner, like yourself, to these other people. And yes, if you haven't read Ramzy Baroud's article yet, then I certainly recommend it. It's not extensive analysis, but is a good piece on the topic of the so-called 'takeover' by Hamas matter.
He is one of the good or excellent analysts on the truth about what's been and is going on in Palestinian territory.
The following is also another very good or excellent analyst.
"The Israeli War on the Gaza Strip: "The Birth Pangs of a New Palestine/Middle East”",
by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, Jan. 15, 2009
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7928
This is how I get my education. And what do professors in schools employ for teaching students (without inferring that I'm your teacher and you're one of my students)? We all know that they usually use books. They teach contents of books, but not all of the contents; leaving the students to read whatever amount more is needed from the books.
MDN is very strong in analysis on Middle East issues in general, and this above article by him includes the topic of Lt Gen. Keith Drayton, and [more].
Ok, thanks for clarifying. And I apologize for my snide remark in response to your perceived insult.
zmann ,
"perceived insult"? You cleary mean my reference to your question as "absent-minded". That's not insulting if someone says it to me. I sometimes overlook or neglect to think of ... things.
Here's another piece.
"INTERVIEW / Top U.S. general lays foundation for Palestinian state",
by Aluf Benn, Aug. 14, 2008
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1009578.html
QUOTE:
...
Cobra and Dome
Keith Dayton has been in the U.S. army for 38 years, starting in .... ... In 1997 ... and as head of the delegation on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, following the American invasion in 2003. During his travels through ruined military barracks in Iraq, he saw graffiti ... the Dome of the Rock being strangled by a cobra symbolizing Israel. It was then that he realized how important and sensitive this issue is in the Arab world.
Dayton came to Jerusalem after the disengagement from the Gaza Strip, as a replacement for Gen. Charles Ward, .... His first job was to "downsize, right-size and professionalize" the PA forces in Gaza. Then Hamas won the elections, and .... ...
Congress refused to finance that first job, for fear the money would fall into Hamas hands. Dayton and his staff of Americans, Britons and Canadians tried to help PA President Mahmoud Abbas' Presidential Guard, .... Without any funding, however, "We didn't train or equip anybody."
Dayton and his men miscalculated the balance of power in the Gaza Strip, and when the battles between Hamas and Fatah began, in the spring of 2007, .... The Hamas takeover and the collapse of Fatah, a few weeks later, surprised the Americans.
...
Dayton and the administration asked Congress to transfer funds to the National Security Forces, which was the PA's main force against Hamas. Congress refused. ...
The fall of Gaza led to his job being shifted from Gaza to the West Bank. His boss, ... Condoleezza Rice, ordered him to rebuild the PA's forces in the West Bank. The establishment of the emergency PA government headed by Salam Fayyad lifted the political restrictions, and Congress was convinced to transfer money, for fear that the West Bank would follow in Gaza's footsteps. Dayton's aid mission received $86 million and was able to tackle its job.
Since then two more American generals have arrived in the territories: Jim Jones, who is formulating future security arrangements, and William Fraser, who is following the implementation of the U.S. road map plan. Dayton ... insists they are working together closely.
The work plan drafted by him with the Palestinians calls for the retraining of the Presidential Guard, and the establishment of five battalions of a revivified National Security Forces, which will operate as an armed gendarmerie alongside the "blue" police that the European Union is organizing, training and equipping. The Jordanian government offered its police-training facilities to the PA. At the same time ... the Interior Ministry in Ramallah was set up as a professional security headquarters with foreign advisors.
The security reforms in the PA are nothing new. They were proposed six years ago, as a way to end Yasser Arafat's institutionalized anarchy of many competing security forces. Dayton diplomatically evades the question of how many such forces are operating in the PA.
...
Ultimately, there are to be three forces: the police, the National Security Force and the internal security force (i.e., the intelligence service). ...
'Building a state'
Dayton is very enthusiastic about what the Palestinians he saw at the Jordanian training base.
"The Jordanians said, after the first couple of weeks, who are these people? They're quick learners, they're disciplined, they follow orders, and they're motivated," recalled Dayton, who visited them with PA Interior Minister Abdel-Razak Yahya, a familiar figure for Israelis from the early days of the Oslo process.
"He may look like an old man," said Dayton, "but he's a young man. He gave a speech to them, which was just amazing. He told these guys, 'You're not learning how to fight the Israelis, you're not here to fight the occupation, you're here to fight the forces of disorder, the forces of crime and lawlessness inside Palestine.' He said 'armed groups,' which was his way of saying 'terrorists.' He said: If you do your job properly, we will have a state. The national project will succeed.'
...
END QUOTE
FATAH! They work for strengthening Fatah; clearly. Have or take a peak at what the following piece says on this topic.
"Palestine: How the Western media took Fatah’s lies at face value",
by Khalid Amayreh, Pal. Info. Center, Jan. 14, 2008
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7810
Re. Salam Fayyad (mentioned in the Haaretz piece):
He's been picked to head the new PA government because PA President Mahmoud Abbas' term [expired] already (and would require either new elections or, else, acceptance by Hamas without a need for elections in order to stay on). So, and but, Fayyad's appointed, not elected, which means the U.S. is certainly to blame this anti-democratic act.
About Fayyad, the article by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya at globalresearch.ca and linked in my prior post in this CD page has the following to say.
QUOTE: "Mahmoud Abbas was also put in a position where he could claim "legitimacy" in the process of forming his own administration in the West Bank, that would otherwise have been seen, by international public opinion, for what it really was: an illegitimate regime, without a parliamentary base. It is also no coincidence that the man picked to lead Mahmoud Abbas’ government, Dr. Salam Fayyad, is a former World Bank official".
A WB official; an already trained and "convenient" puppet.
Good first step. I have always said, that if the Israelies and Palistinians could ever form a union, they could control the middle east. They are essentially the same people, ethnically. They have different religions but both believe in the God of Abraham. Patience and restraint in dealing with each other in the west bank could lead to cllaboration that could solve Gaza.
An *extremely* important issue on this Lt. Dayton character, which no comments here have yet noted, is his role in the US-sponsored Fatah coup attempt in Gaza in 2007.
The definitive article on attempted armed Fatah coup, and the US role (including Lt. Dayton) in arming, funding, and training the coup plotters, is "The Gaza Bombshell", by David Rose, published in April 2008, Vanity Fair.
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/04/gaza200804
The Gaza Bombshell
After failing to anticipate Hamas’s victory over Fatah in the 2006 Palestinian election, the White House cooked up yet another scandalously covert and self-defeating Middle East debacle: part Iran-contra, part Bay of Pigs. With confidential documents, corroborated by outraged former and current U.S. officials, the author reveals how President Bush, Condoleezza Rice, and Deputy National-Security Adviser Elliott Abrams backed an armed force under Fatah strongman Muhammad Dahlan, touching off a bloody civil war in Gaza and leaving Hamas stronger than ever.
"Vanity Fair has obtained confidential documents, since corroborated by sources in the U.S. and Palestine, which lay bare a covert initiative, approved by Bush and implemented by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Deputy National Security Adviser Elliott Abrams, to provoke a Palestinian civil war. The plan was for forces led by Dahlan, and armed with new weapons supplied at America’s behest, to give Fatah the muscle it needed to remove the democratically elected Hamas-led government from power.
...Within the Bush administration, the Palestinian policy set off a furious debate. One of its critics is David Wurmser, the avowed neoconservative, who resigned as Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief Middle East adviser in July 2007, a month after the Gaza coup.
Wurmser accuses the Bush administration of “engaging in a dirty war in an effort to provide a corrupt dictatorship [led by Abbas] with victory.” He believes that Hamas had no intention of taking Gaza until Fatah forced its hand. “It looks to me that what happened wasn’t so much a coup by Hamas but an attempted coup by Fatah that was pre-empted before it could happen,” Wurmser says."
...In a clear reference to the covert aid expected from the Arabs, the memo made this recommendation for the next six to nine months: “Dahlan oversees effort in coordination with General Dayton and Arab [nations] to train and equip 15,000-man force under President Abbas’s control to establish internal law and order, stop terrorism and deter extralegal forces.”
(continued in next post)
Another article, by Gareth Porter, was written during Israel's criminal attack on Gaza this past winter. Porter basically summarizes the David Rose article, and puts it in the context of the Bush administration effectively establishing a pretext for an Israeli attack. After Fatah's failed attempt at carrying out a coup (on behalf of and with support from a foreign power), Hamas inevitably, and violently, took control of Gaza. This enabled Bush administration officials to make the propaganda claim that Hamas had carried out a "coup" in Gaza, and therefore were illegitimate (because they committed the very serious crime of defeating the U.S. coup attempt, which was, of course, inherently legitimate).
"Bush Plan Eliminated Obstacle to Gaza Assault", by Gareth Porter, IPS News, January 5, 2009.
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=45297
"Until mid-2007, there was a serious political obstacle to a massive conventional war by Israel against Hamas in Gaza: the fact that Hamas had won free and fair elections for the Palestinian parliament and was still the leading faction in a fully legitimate government.
But the George W. Bush administration helped Israel eliminate that obstacle by deliberately provoking Hamas to seize power in Gaza. That plan was aimed at getting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to dissolve the democratically elected Hamas government - something Bush had tried unsuccessfully to do for many months...
Then, on Jun. 7, 2007 the Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz revealed that Israel had been asked to authorise the shipment of dozens of Egyptian armoured cars and hundreds of rockets and thousands of hand grenades for the Fatah security forces.
The leaked plans for a military buildup were an open invitation to Hamas to take preemptive action. The day after the Haaretz story, Hamas launched a campaign which eliminated the Fatah security presence in Gaza in five days.
The day after the complete defeat of Dahlan's forces in Gaza, Abbas dissolved the Haniyeh unity government and named his own prime minister, in violation of the Palestinian charter.
The rout of Dahlan's forces was a predictable consequence of the Bush administration's policy. As the commander of Fatah's al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, Khalid Jaberi, told Vanity Fair's David Rose, "We can only conclude that having Hamas in control serves [the Bush administration's] overall strategy, because their policy was so crazy otherwise."
But the Bush administration had not only accomplished its goal of eliminating a Hamas-dominated government; it had also set up a new argument that could later be used to justify an all-out Israeli offensive in Gaza: that Hamas had mounted an "illegal coup" in Gaza. That was the term that Rice used on Jan. 2 in justifying the Israeli operations against Gaza."
Probably the best analysis of the US/Israeli backed coup attempt can be found here:
"Engineering a coup in Gaza", The Heathlander, March 4, 2008.
http://heathlander.wordpress.com/2008/03/04/engineering-a-coup/
Indeed, as recently leaked confidential documents show, Israel and the U.S. were bent on toppling Hamas from the moment it entered office in early 2006...
Support for the “good guys” involved arming, financing and training an elite Fatah militia with the goal of destroying Hamas. This force would be under the control of Muhammad Dahlan, a Fatah warlord described by President Bush in 2003 as “our guy”.
Lieutenant General Keith Dayton was put in charge of the operation. In November 2006 Dayton met with Dahlan to discuss the new “security plan”...
The obvious conclusion, though not drawn explicitly by the ICG, is that the U.S. (supported by the EU) wanted the national unity government to fail, so that it could continue with its plans to overthrow Hamas...
The objective, again, was clear: to give Abbas “the capability to take the required strategic political decisions … such as dismissing the cabinet, establishing an emergency cabinet.” That is, to enable Abbas to overthrow the Hamas government.
The plan went through several draft stages, detailing U.S. proposals to expand Fatah forces and provide them with “highly specialized training abroad”, in total amounting to $1.27 billion in “lethal and non-lethal” military aid over five years. The final draft confirmed that Abbas had “approved” the plan, and presented it as if it were a Palestinian idea as opposed to an American one...
Of course, the plan went awry when Hamas took the initiative and soundly defeated Fatah forces in June 2007, taking control of Gaza in the process. Since then the U.S. and Israel have continued their efforts to depose Hamas, specifically by treating the 1.4 million residents of Gaza like vermin, progressively reducing their supply of food, water, electricity and fuel until they learn to follow orders...
This approach continues today – despite almost universal recognition that some basic level of cooperation between Hamas and Fatah is a necessary pre-requisite for any serious attempt at peace, Israel and the U.S. have explicitly conditioned aid and diplomatic engagement with Abbas on his refusal to negotiate with Hamas. This in itself reveals a lot about the sincerity of Israel’s professed intentions.
Those who systematically undermine all alternatives to violence make violence inevitable. As long as Israel and the U.S. view a Palestinian ‘peace offensive’ as something to be feared rather than welcomed, the conflict will continue, and you’ll know just who to blame.