Sending the Middle East to the Iranians

by Khaled Batarfi

Arab Views

January 20, 2006

Nuri Al-Maliki, Iraq’s prime minister threatened that he would review relations with any country that dared to criticize his government’s handling of Saddam’s execution. Now that the American president is doing exactly that soon after the British prime minister dared to, I wondered what he is going to do. George W. Bush went even further than most Arab critics by saying that it is hard now to convince Americans to support Al-Maliki government, which he described as a less than matured and trustworthy regime. Still, our usually macho Iraqi prime minister has, so far, nothing to say to his Western critics. It wasn’t his mistake to start with. America redrew the geopolitical maps, re-dealt the sectarian cards and helped in putting him where he doesn’t belong — or was it Iran who did so?

Politics is a confusing business. Its games have few rules and its cards are mostly dealt under the table. What we see is hardly what we get. The clearest rule is attributed to late British Prime Minister Winston Churchill: There are no permanent friends or permanent enemies, only permanent interests.

We will have to assume some hidden friends-foes understanding if we are to explain the unexplainable in the American foreign policies. Take for example hating Iran, then delivering Iraq, Palestine, Syria and Lebanon to her on a silver plate. Al-Maliki, like Ibrahim Al-Jafari before him, came from Iran. These are not even their true names — the real ones are Farsi. Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani is an Iranian. So is Abdulaziz Al-Hakim and most of his gang leaders. Hundreds of thousands of Iranians were allowed to settle in Iraq after the invasion. They changed its demographics and infiltrated its government, security forces and army.

Today, some 150,000 American soldiers, not including the 20,000 extra troops due soon, are virtual hostages in Iraq. With a push of a remote control button, Tehran can, in a minute, put them all in jeopardy. The Iraqi Shiite militias as well as the sectarian government, the US-trained police and the rest of the Ministry of Interior forces are loyal to Tehran. The army is still mixed, Sunni and Shiite, but Iran’s stooges are working hard on changing it. Most recruits today are Shiite, many not be even Arab. Leading positions are given to them. Sunni soldiers are forced to leave. In short, you may say that an Iranian Army is ruling Iraq. How can you threaten a war with a country that had your boys under her thump?

Bush talks about mistakes his administration committed in Iraq. He doesn’t specify, so should we assume that one of them is invading Iraq under false pretexts and with the guidance of self-interest parties, such as Israel, Tehran-based or allied opposition groups, and arm, oil and construction businesses? Or that after the invasion the Iraqi Army, the security forces and many government leaders and autocrats were dismissed overnight, and let go with their expertise, secrets and guns? Or was the biggest mistake, after the invasion, turning the government over to people who are known to be Iranian agents and stooges like Ahmad Chalabi, Al-Jafari, Al-Hakim and Al-Maliki?

Maybe the smart American president meant to apologize for delivering Sunni Hamas to Shiite Iran by supporting the Israeli torture of the Palestinians as punishment for choosing, in an internationally certified elections, a decent government that doesn’t suit Israel? Or maybe he was now regretting handing pro-West Lebanon to Hezbollah, Iran and Syria by supporting Israeli devastation of a peaceful country? Or could it be that he finally realized that his blind support of Israel and following its orders is turning 1.3 billion Muslims, Sunni and Shiite, away from the Zionist-Christian crusaders toward the other camp, be it Al-Qaeda (Sunni) or Iran (Shiite)?

If I were an Iranian leader I should declare George W. Bush my hero. My country fought Iraq for eight years without getting one inch or oil well. Taleban was a thorn on her side. The Sunni world was suspicious of us. But with one masterstroke after another this wonderful Superman brought down both regimes, and installed friendly governments.

In the midst of the chaos and mess he created, I managed to get my hands full of all resources of power in Iraq. I was also able to build a nuclear infrastructure that will eventually give me the ultimate deterrent power.

Now the redneck is making me a hero in the Muslim world. All these threatening cowboy postures and stupid strategic and tactical mistakes helped me unite the Iranian people around my leadership and improve my economics by the rise in oil prices. I wouldn’t have it better if I tried. But here is the superpower of the world delivering all these rewards and spoils of war to my door without costing me a single shot. Long live USA! Long live George W. Bush!

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