In Focus: Another slip of the tongue In a recent speech, US President George Bush once again confounds realities in Iraq with his version of what the world should be like, writes Galal Nassar Speaking at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, US President George Bush urged patience, saying his strategy in Iraq would pay off while offering Israel as a model for Iraq's future. President Bush said the US wants Iraq to become a democratic country that, like Israel, knows how to deal with violence, insisting the creation of a democratic state is not contingent on an end to violence but on the ability of a "functioning democracy" to protect its people and deliver basic services to all its citizens. Bush once again cited Israel as the model that deserves to be emulated. Bush delivered his speech at a time when opposition to his administration's policies in Iraq is growing, with Congressional majority leader Nancy Pelosi promising to use a report due in September on the course of Bush's security plan in Iraq to demand a timetable for withdrawal, something the president has doggedly opposed. The request for a timetable has extensive backing among intellectuals, writers, artists, and the families of the casualties, as well as among large sections of the troops. Opposition to the war is also growing within the ruling Republican Party. In the run-up to the 2008 elections, senior Republican figures have been keen to underline their opposition to Bush's policy. Richard Logar, head of the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee, said this week that Bush's policy in Iraq was futile and demanded an early withdrawal of US troops. A day later, Senator George Voinovich called for "gradual" disengagement in Iraq. Bush's Newport speech hinted at the pessimism expected to colour the Pentagon's September report, widely viewed as dealing yet another blow to US policy in Iraq, especially so since it follows the dispatch of over 38,000 additional troops, as recommended by the Baker-Hamilton Report. It is now clear the only solution to Washington's debacle in Iraq is not through any further building up of troops but is contingent on a political decision. The US administration must admit that the occupation, and the constitution, bylaws and institutions it has put in place, are a failure. It must acknowledge the power of the nationalist project of resistance and withdraw unconditionally. The US president cannot feed the American public forever with the kind of remarks made in Newport. He cannot ask for ever more patience while claiming fictitious successes. He cannot continue to claim his security strategy was formulated by military experts and therefore deserves the support of the American public regardless of how badly it is failing, for more time means greater losses, a greater number of people killed and wounded, a tightening spiral of chaos and failure. Bush's likening of Washington's project in Iraq to the Zionist project will be called a slip of the tongue, just as earlier utterances have been. Bush talked of the Crusades when sending US troops to occupy Iraq. The usual excuse is that Bush is trying to stay on the good side of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the spearhead of the Jewish lobby which has immense clout in US media and financial circles. Bush's slip of the tongue is telling. It makes sense to compare the Zionist project to Washington's own. Both are based on aggression. The Zionist project was based on killing civilians, butchering women, displacing the original inhabitants from their homes and creating an entity of mercenaries who came from every part of the world to form a buffer between, as Theodor Herzl once put it, civilised European civilisation and the barbaric Arab inhabitants. In Iraq, daily news coverage speaks of massive numbers of beheaded bodies, of death squads at large, of people being killed because they belong to the wrong sect, of bridges blown up and of museums and universities being looted. The other similarity between the two projects is that both were imposed from outside. The Zionist project was the outcome of the Balfour Declaration. It was conducted with the military and financial support of the colonialist West and its institutions. Its aim was to deny the Palestinians the right to self-determination, and in doing so it ran roughshod over international norms and the principles of international law. Likewise, the occupation of Iraq was a violation of international legitimacy, international legal norms, and the universal declaration of human rights. The Zionist project was more straightforward in its denial of the rights of its opponents. The Zionists spoke of a land without people and a people without land. As a result of the American project more than six million Iraqis now live in exile. There is a third resemblance between the two projects. The Jewish entity was created as a homeland for Jews. Those Jews used to live in many countries, where they were integrated into the local culture. They carried the identity and nationality of their countries. The Jewish entity was based on a legend of historic right, on a parochial myth. Iraq, by contrast, is a country of great history, a country full of vitality, activity, and veteran secular parties going back to the time of the Ottoman Empire. Iraq is a country where various sects used to live in harmony, where various sections of the population intermarried and intermingled. Now the occupiers have transformed that country's culture and traditions beyond recognition. The first interim government in Iraq was appointed by the Americans on the basis of ethnic and sectarian quotas. A phoney federation was put in place to consolidate the state of fragmentation that started with the formation of the first government after the occupation. President Bush claims that the formation of the interim government, the writing of the constitution, and the establishment of federalism were all steps towards democracy. Such claims are as strange as they are false. They defy everything we understand about evolution, human history and the rights of people to self-determination. The measures the Americans introduced in Iraq were unprecedented by any democratic standard. The main difference between the Zionist project in Palestine and the American project in Iraq is that the Zionist project adapted some European liberal traditions. Those traditions didn't prevent the thieves who stole Palestine from dispossessing another nation. In Iraq the victims of the US project are an ancient Arab people with a history going back to Nebuchadnezzar, Sargon and Hammurabi. Iraq has been a bastion of Arab and Islamic civilisation since the time of Caliph Omar. It remained so throughout the time of Haroun Al-Rashid and his son Al-Mamoun. Iraq's historic cities of Basra and Al-Kufa were outstanding centres of logic, theology, and history. Until the time of occupation, Iraq was an active member of the international community. Iraq didn't need anyone to lecture it on freedom, democracy, and civilisation. The Iraqi resistance, starting within hours of the occupation of Baghdad, was proof that the country rejected the US project. The Iraqis had basic services before the occupation. They had housing, education, medical facilities and electricity. Their darkest times started with the occupation. Iraq wasn't a breeding ground for terrorists or thieves, nor was it a land haunted by gangsters and cutthroats. After the occupation it became a country full of thieves, a country ravaged by men who stole billions, presided over by former administrator Paul Bremer. The only excuse for the US president, who wants us to be patient while Iraq follows in Israel's footsteps, is that everyone has grown accustomed to Bush's slips of tongue, his ignorance and his errors. This excuse may be good for some people, but not for history. And history's judgement is likely to be harsh.
