{"id":77360,"date":"2016-08-08T12:00:35","date_gmt":"2016-08-08T11:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=77360"},"modified":"2016-08-07T18:53:53","modified_gmt":"2016-08-07T17:53:53","slug":"team-clinton-focuses-on-the-demise-of-hezbollah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2016\/08\/team-clinton-focuses-on-the-demise-of-hezbollah\/","title":{"rendered":"Team Clinton Focuses on the Demise of Hezbollah"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Franklin<\/a>Tel Hara, on the Golan Plain, Syria<\/em><\/p>\n

7 Aug 2016 – <\/em>The likely next American President, Hilary Clinton is fielding an array of foreign policy advisers, a few being sort of table scraps from the Bush administration and others having resigned from Obama\u2019s. They are today preparing white papers on all manner of \u201cadjustments\u201d to what the presumed 45th<\/sup>\u00a0American President reportedly believes was a weak and wrongheaded Obama Middle East policy, particularly with respect to the Syrian crisis and Hezbollah.<\/p>\n

This\u00a0according to sources at the Democratic National Committee\u2019s (DNC) Judicial Council on which this observer served representing his State of Oregon many moons ago. One staffer reports that the Neocon-Zionist lobby has a Middle East Policy deal with the Clinton campaign as a linchpin of her pledge to \u201ceternally cover Israel\u2019s back.\u201d \u00a0The Clinton camp, which appears to be gaining adherents within the CIA, the State Department and the Pentagon, believes that the Obama administration\u2019s policy toward Russia and Syria is badly flawed partly because, so they claim, Obama wrongly assumes that Russia wants to limit its involvement in Syria. Clinton advisers claim that, on the contrary, Putin\u2019s key objectives include demonstrating that Russia is winning in Syria, that the US has become a paper tiger in the region, and that the Arab states best follow Russia\u2019s lead as it dramatically returns to the region a la the former USSR.<\/p>\n

To set the stage for the her administration, some would-be Clinton advisers such as WINEPS Dennis Ross, are counseling that she must increase political pressure now, as the clock runs out on the Obama administration, to dramatically beef up what they view as Obama\u2019s weak \u201ctruce agreement\u201d between Washington and Moscow.\u00a0 This as former Defense Secretary and Clinton adviser, Leon Panetta, is advocating that the next president increase US Special Forces in Syria and launch air strikes to shore up \u2018moderates\u201d fighting the Syrian government.Others are urging that after Clinton is sworn-in the US must ponce on all \u201ctruce violations\u201d with drones and cruise missiles and target Syrian airbases and artillery positions, while simultaneously setting up safe areas for civilians, and if deemed necessary, no-fly zones.<\/p>\n

Still others, including a dissenting internal memo last month signed by 51 State Department diplomats\u00a0advocated attacks<\/a>\u00a0on Syrian government forces especially Hezbollah \u00a0to end aggression against the country\u2019s civilian population, \u00a0to alter the military balance and bring about a negotiated political settlement.\u00a0As Clinton\u2019s Syrian policy is being formed, details will likely be kept out of the Presidential campaign, at least from her side, so as not to alienate the crucial Obama camp before November 8th.<\/p>\n

There is reportedly one aspect of Clinton\u2019s Middle East policy that has been detailed and is ready for implementation following her inauguration once details are coordinated with Israel, NATO and the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).\u00a0It is being advocated by AIPAC on Capitol Hill and among Clinton operatives at the DNC and details how the Clinton administration \u201cmust destroy Hezbollah and cut off Tehran\u2019s anti-Arab, anti-Sunni and anti- Christian\u00a0<\/em>hegemonic lifeline for its rapidly escalating domination of the Middle East.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clinton\u2019s Middle East foreign policy shift reportedly will focus on the complete destruction of Hezbollah. Rather than merely containment as Obama insists at meetings of his National Security Council. John Kerry, a rumored Clinton cabinet member refers to Hezbollah solely as \u201cIran\u2019s Basij in Lebanon\/Syria\/Iraq\/Yemen\/Bahrain and you name it.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0History may soon record whether the Clinton administration, breaking sharply with the Obama administration, is able to \u201creshape the region\u201d as Israel\u2019s Netanyahu is squeezing her to do, and destroy Hezbollah, and if necessary, Iran\u2019s IRGC-Al Quds Force. The latter, according to Clinton\u2019s advisers and US allies are active in all the countries on Kerry\u2019s list and far beyond.<\/p>\n

Destroying or severely crippling Hezbollah is also being advocated as a cheap throw-away \u2018crowd-pleaser\u2019 for the incoming Clinton administration, both in Congress\u00a0where both sides of the aisle, Democrats and Republicans, would very likely applaud attacks on Hezbollah as part of a rejuvenated \u201cmanned-up\u201d and expanding US-led War on Terrorism.\u00a0 The Israel lobby is expressing confidence on Capitol Hill that relentlessly targeting Hezbollah militarily and economically will please and embolden Washington\u2019s friends who remain chagrined by Obama\u2019s containment policy in Syria while this needed policy shift will be discomfiting to US adversaries. It is also being argued that the six GCC monarchies will welcome tough Clinton administration action and can be expected to redouble their funding to shore up the Syrian opposition while at the same time the Clinton administration will also demonstrate US resolve to renew Washington\u2019s commitment to holding Hezbollah accountable for its claimed terrorism. All the above it is claimed would hasten an end to the war here in Syria and make a political settlement more likely.<\/p>\n

One \u201cemeritus\u201d Clinton advisor is\u00a0Amos Yadlin, Israel\u2019s former Military Intelligence chief. Recently Yadlin has been arguing that Israel and the US need to intervene in Syria more actively with a policy, that leads to the defeat of the \u201cour most bitter enemies:\u201d Iran and Hezbollah.\u201d\u00a0 Yadlin makes no secret of the fact that Israel will destroy Hezbollah \u2018next time\u2019 in Lebanon and that only the approaching date will not be revealed in advance.<\/p>\n

Clinton supports the\u00a0Hizbullah International Financing Prevention Act<\/em><\/strong>,\u00a0<\/em>signed by Obama<\/em>\u00a0on this past April. the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, (OFAC) issued regulations aimed at implementing act. The latest U.S. regulations target those “knowingly facilitating a significant transaction or transactions for” Hezbollah and those “knowingly facilitating a significant transaction or transactions of a person identified on the List of Specially Designated Nationals (SDN\u2019s) and Blocked persons.” OFAC’s list includes names of officials, businessmen and institutions that the U.S. says are linked to Hezbollah such as the group’s al-Manar TV and Al-Nour Radio. Clinton advisers argue that even more has to be done targeting Hezbollah.<\/p>\n

Several hundred pages of \u2018selling points\u2019 circulating Capitol Hill and among EU countries are designed to build \u201can unshakable global commitment to destroy Hezbollah\u201d according to one staffer on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. \u00a0Also being distributed on Capitol Hill are \u201cresearch papers\u201d from a Iranian opposition group called Naame Shaam. One is titled\u00a0\u201c<\/em>Iran in Syria: From an Ally of the Regime to an Occupying Force<\/em><\/a>.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0The 200-page report analyzes various aspects of the military, political and economic role played by Hezbollah and Iran since March 2011, following the outbreak of the Syrian conflict.<\/p>\n

An Israeli Embassy brief targeting Hezbollah includes the following excerpt on the subject of claimed Hezbollah crimes against humanity and urges the US and the EU to intensify sanctions:\u00a0\u201cContrary to claims by Hezbollah\u2019s Sec-General Hassan Nasrallah and Iran\u2019s \u201cSupreme Leader\u201d Ali Khameini, Hezbollah entered Syria in large numbers by April 2011 and started sniping at demonstrators and Syrian army soldiers who refused to shoot children. A July 2012 video taken by Hezbollah and published in July 2011 shows heavily armed Hezbollah fighters and a number of tanks in Horan near Deraa, the city where the uprising started. A report in January of 1212 by The Times, documented large numbers of Hezbollah and Iranian snipers were deployed \u201cto shoot anti-regime protesters.\u201d These reports were confirmed by scores of Deraa residents who have confirmed more than 200 eyewitness reports that Iran deployed Hezbollah fighters \u201cto stand behind Syrian troops and kill Syrian soldiers immediately, if they refused to open fire on demonstrators.\u201d Local residents have confirmed these reports as have some of the more three dozen Iranian and Hezbollah snipers who participated. Three months after the start of the March 2011 civilian protests, the first clashes were reported in June 2011 in al-Qusayr, in the countryside of Homs. By May 2012 Hezbollah, overran 10 of the 23 (Syria-Lebanon) border villages and established fortified bases exclusively for its use, at time expelling Syrian army troops in \u201ctheir\u201d area which led to the Syrian army killing of three Al Manar journalists at Ma\u2019loula.\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u00a0document, which includes satellite photos, continues, \u201cNasrallah explained to Lebanese media that \u2018Hezbollah did not tell them what to do and this has nothing to do with the fighting in Syria. He omitted to mention that historically this area has been the main route for Iranian arms entering Lebanon and is located near Hezbollah arms depots in Lebanon\u2019s Bekaa Valley.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another handout reads: \u00a0\u201cFrom the spring of 2011 until today, the Hezbollah\u2019s siege, starving and slaughter of innocent women and children across Syria has continued to intensify despite, until recently, denial after denial. Hezbollah crimes have been extensively documented in an undisclosed European country bythe Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic, established on 22 August 2011 by the Human Rights Council through resolution\u00a0S-17<\/a>\/1<\/a>\u00a0adopted at its 17th special session with a mandate to investigate all alleged violations of international human rights law since March 2011 in the Syrian Arab Republic.\u00a0Also gathering and documenting hundreds of cases of individuals committing crimes against humanity is the Commission for International Justice and Accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the intense anti-Hezbollah campaign gets organized in Washington, Israel reportedly\u00a0considers itself the winner to date in Syria, and expects to have much more influence and a green-light to destroy Hezbollah in a Clinton administration than was the case with Obama\u2019s.\u00a0 Tel Aviv has to date been content to bide its time and simply deter Hezbollah in southern Syria\/Lebanon and along the Golan Plain while recently occupying another roughly 20 by 12 miles strip of Syria territory. This latest land confiscation was done with impunity as UNDOF observers watched with binoculars.\u00a0\u00a0One reason UNDOF was impotent during the Israeli land grab was that a majority of them had relocated from the Syrian side to the Israeli side of the Golan ceasefire line in September 2014. UNDOF will not return until the Syrian war ends, if then.<\/p>\n

Israel has made clear via its new Defense Minister, Avigdor Lieberman , \u00a0leader of the fascist Yisrael Beiteinu party, that Israel will not \u00a0return one centimeter of its recently occupied \u00a0Syrian territory \u201cuntil we sign a peace agreement with the new government of Syria. All Muslims must know that we Israelis are their friends and that we are on the right side of this Syrian war.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile Israel has an understanding with various rebel groups in Southern Syria including the newly re-named Jabhat al Nusra (The Front for the Defense of the Syrian People) now calling itself –\u00a0Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (the Front for the Conquest of the Levant),\u00a0giving\u00a0food and medical treatment to anyone asking for assistance within its new zone.\u00a0 Israel is also reportedly recruiting \u2018operatives\u2019 from southern Syria militia around\u00a0Quneitra,\u00a0the largely destroyed and abandoned capital of the\u00a0Quneitra\u00a0Governorate.\u00a0Similar recruitments from the local population to what its army undertook during its 22-year occupation of South Lebanon before it was liberated by Hezbollah. Israel is reportedly\u00a0paying up to $ 1000 per month, \u201csalaries\u201d, (compared to the average monthly salary in Syria these days of approximately of $ 100). Israel offers even more for \u201cspecial services\u201d targeting Hezbollah. \u00a0\u00a0Israel is in the process of occupying, in one way or another, parts of southern Syria. And one can feel it in the air.<\/p>\n

Whatever success the Clinton team will have with its goal of destroying Hezbollah and however one evaluates Obama\u2019s policy, this region appears headed for yet more prolonged violence and many more deaths of innocent civilians.<\/p>\n

__________________________________________<\/p>\n

Franklin Lamb is doing research in Syria and Lebanon. His new book,\u00a0The Case for Palestinian Civil Rights in Lebanon<\/u>\u00a0is expected by late summer. He is reachable c\/o\u00a0<\/em>fplamb@gmail.com<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The likely next American President, Hilary Clinton is fielding an array of foreign policy advisers, table scraps from the Bush administration and from Obama\u2026. Whatever success the Clinton team will have with its goal of destroying Hezbollah and however one evaluates Obama\u2019s policy, this region appears headed for yet more prolonged violence and many more deaths of innocent civilians.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-middle-east-north-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77360"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77360\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}