IS IT GAME OVER

Ceylon Today

Monday 15 September 2014

Is It Game Over?

Hameed Abdul Karim

‘It is true the brutal beheadings of two journalists were acts of savagery’

When the now renamed Islamic State exploded on the world scene there was shock and revulsion all over the Middle East and the Gulf state. Shock at the lightening speed with which they conquered large swathes of land in Iraq and Syria. Revulsion at the indescribable atrocities the fighters committed in achieving this objective.

At first the US and its satellite states didn’t seem to bother too much about the IS, largely because it was the CIA that had trained sections of the hard core fighters in Jordan. In the first appearance of this terrorist outfit questions arose about the sophisticated weaponry in their possession and the virtually inexhaustible financial resources at their command. Who was funding them? There were reports that they were selling oil worth at least a million dollars a day and that’s where they were getting their finances from. If that is the case who was it that was buying their ‘produce’?  And why wasn’t the US or its allies in the region able to stop their sales? The land the IS had captured had no sea port access and so all such sales had to be overland. The US had actually ‘arrested’ a shipment carrying ‘illegal’ oil ‘sold’ by rebels in Libya some months ago. Why was there no such attempt by anyone to put a stop to this illegal trade?

All this suggests the IS had support from the US, its satellite states and its allies in the region. Remember ‘caliph’ Abu Bakr al Baghdadi was in US custody for five long years. Add to this the fact that the IS’s enemies, Iran, Hezbollah and Syria also happen to be Israel’s enemies and you begin to wonder whether there is a strategic game at play. Recently there were some clashes on the Golan Heights prior to the kidnapping of UN peace keepers by the Al Nusra rebels. In one such clash an Israeli soldier was reportedly injured and yet Israel had neither retaliated, as it is its wont, nor did it go on a military alert! These incidents were sensational by standards of journalism and yet they were inexplicably under reported.

It looks like IS was set up to topple Maliki in Iraq and Assad in Syria. The first objective has been achieved and now the ‘game’ moves towards Assad. And then it will move to Iran and Hezbollah. The plan is to allow Israel to be the dominant regional power in the region.

Those of us who have watched the antics in the media know that an attack on Syria on the pretext of wiping out I.S is imminent.

It is true the brutal beheadings of two journalists were acts of savagery. It is also true these two atrocities have been magnified in the media so as to win world support for an impending slaughter. Each and every life is precious. And when we read and watch reports of the two cruel beheadings, our minds also must go to those literally thousands of children, men and women who have been slaughtered by Obama’s drone attacks in Afghanistan, Yemen and Iraq. Take note also of the 500,000 children who perished dues to lack of food and medicines because of the US instigated UN sanctions placed on Iraq. These criminal acts were no less brutal in their savagery. In fact these were mass murders. But you won’t find anybody in the west’s media who will know the names of even a dozen of the children who died in Iraq or Afghanistan. Madeline Albright went on public record saying the deaths of these little children in Iraq were justified in order to promote democracy and the rule of law in the Middle East, or words to that effect.

Picture this. Obama having dinner with his wife and daughters in the White House whilst at the same time he orders his drones bomb to bits little children as they sleep on the floor with their parents in hovels in Afghanistan. These slaughters hardly get a mention in the media and yet these are human beings, flesh and blood like you and I and like the Foley and Sotloff. 

The exaggerated reports of the IS being a threat to the region, and eventually to the US are just that, exaggerations. The barefaced lies that Bush uttered about WMD’s and Tony Blair’s claim ‘Saddam Hussein can fire a nuclear bombs at London within 45 minutes', are fresh in our minds. And yet we believe the same liars. 

Only the other day it was reported  the CIA had greatly underestimated the IS’s strength. In its latest report they say there are as many as 31,500 fighters and that they are a deadly force. The IS’s military prowess and their 'threat to world civilisation as we know it'  is also exaggerated to win support for a unilateral bombing spree of Syria without UN approval. 31,500 fighters are not a match for the US’s military machine. Remember how the abilities of Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guards were exaggerated creating a kind of expectation that a huge fight was about to take place and that the US soldiers were putting their lives on line for the hapless Iraqi’s. Now they know they were fighting for Halliburton and the rest of the oligarchy that is the U.S.

Apart from exaggerations there are reports that ‘evilise’ IS’s fighters (no problem there) but the propaganda line is all too familiar. We are told British Muslim women recruits are running brothels for IS fighters. The women are allegedly Zaydis held back for this enterprise. Remember western media reports that Saddam Hussein had sodomised boys? All this is well scripted. Australia’s Prime Ministers goes on TV claiming there are Australian citizens fighting alongside the IS, same goes for Denmark, France and the UK. Whilst this may be true, the figures don’t amount to much, barely 2000 according to the same news agencies which are suspect. All this is intended to create a fear psychosis in the world against Muslims in general and Islam in particular. A similar exercise is taking place in Sri Lanka. For the past three years or so stories of Al-Qaida training camps in Sri Lanka and Sri Lankan Muslims being arrested in India for spying for Pakistan’s ISI appear too often in the local media. Up until now India has not produced even a shred of evidence to back its claims.

The hope that Russia might come to Syria’s aid when the real objective of striking at the I.S is to finish off Bashar Al Assad becomes patently clear is also now dashed. Russia has been corralled with sanctions and is too busy fighting its fight to survive. And the Chinese couldn't care less, until the guns are pointed at them.

All in all it seems the game is over for the IS. But the empire will need a new enemy to continue its hegemony. Who will it be? The empire is sure to come with another one like the I.S. they created. Hilary Clinton had bragged it was ‘we’ who created Al Qaeda. That’s on public record.