This ten day advanced course is designed for practitioners from government, inter-governmental non-governmental agencies, donors and community representatives in the Middle East and Africa with institutional responsibilities in the field of refugees and migration. The participants will explore the practical implications and challenges of applying the much-touted human rights approach to policy making in real situations. The course will be both theoretical and practical, drawing on the wealth of lessons arising from trial and error, to determine the best-possible development outcomes for hosts, refugees, and migrants. Participants will take away new skills and techniques to apply in their own context.

FEATURED: The first-ever convention on the rights of persons with disabilities has been passed. Lina Lindblom explains what it means
COMMENT AND ANALYSIS:
- Eva Dadrian writes on the aftermath of the Lebanese conflict - and its implications for Africa
- Nnimmo Bassey argues for clean and renewable energy
LETTERS: A tribute to Bi Kidude
PAN-AFRICAN POSTCARD: Tajudeen Abdul Raheem puffs about why he quit smoking and hasn't sold out!
BLOGGING AFRICA: Sokari Ekine interrogates the “keep the child alive” campaign. Ekine also questions Jeffrey Sachs’s developmental theories
BOOKS AND ARTS: Book review on the complexities of media regulations
CONFLICT AND EMERGENCIES: Links to news on Sudan, Somalia, Uganda
HUMAN RIGHTS: Statement from Sanctions Against Israel on Capitalism
WOMEN AND GENDER: Monuc troops among the most sex offenders
REFUGEES AND FORCED MIGRATION: Somalia’s refugees lose hope.
ELECTIONS AND GOVERNANCE: Nigerian elections set for April
DEVELOPMENT: A primer on foreign aid
CORRUPTION: Corruption in humanitarian aid
HEALTH AND HIV/AIDS: AIDS message to change in South Africa
EDUCATION: Girls’ education under microscope
RACISM & XENOPHOBIA: Racial profiling led to detention, harassment at airport
ENVIRONMENT: Satellite chronicles depleted continent
LAND AND LAND RIGHTS: Surviving the land invasions
MEDIA AND FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION: Threatened from everywhere
DIASPORA: First Anniversary of Hurricane Katrina
INTERNET AND TECHNOLOGY: Ministers to sign broadband agreement
PLUS: e-Newsletters and Mailings Lists; Fundraising and Useful Resources; Courses, Seminars and Workshops; Jobs.

Nnimmo Bassey argues for clean and renewable energy. “The truth is that Nigeria has been immersed in the murky waters of energy crisis for many years now and with current groping in the corridors of power it does not seem that there is light at the end of the tunnel,” writes Bassey.

President Olusegun Obasanjo, while inaugurating the board of Nigeria Atomic Energy Commission (NAEC) which he chairs, declared among other things that although Nigeria was “unequivocally committed to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, the country cannot but embrace the global trend in the utilisation of nuclear energy for the generation of electricity."

Unless this trend is seen in the light of activities going on in Iran and South Korea, it is difficult to see new developments in the nuclear power generation sector as a popular move among nations. However, it is also thought that this commission will provide the answer to the “imminent energy crisis facing the country.”

The president must have been making a politician’s speech when he spoke about an imminent energy crisis facing the country. The truth is that Nigeria has been immersed in the murky waters of an energy crisis for many years now, and with the current groping in the corridors of power it does not seem that there is light at the end of the tunnel.

This writer fully agrees with the president that Nigeria should look for alternatives to existing oil and gas, hydro or thermal sources. But we think that looking at nuclear energy is a misstep and this thinking should be revisited and reversed.

When people think of nuclear power the pictures that come to mind are those of a cheap and clean energy option. Some analysts even suggest that nuclear energy is one of the solutions to climate change, as it would not lead to the release of greenhouse gases as fossil fuels do when they are used to generate energy. There is also the rather romantic view that the power plant would possibly be so small you could compare it to the size of an atom. In 1980, a presidential candidate in the United States of America was quoted as saying that the matter of nuclear waste ought not to worry anybody as “all the waste in a year from a nuclear plant can be stored under a desk.” (See the book, The Experts Speak, the Definitive Compendium of Authoritative Misinformation by Christopher Cerf and Victor Navasky).

At present, Britain has an estimated 470,000 cubic metres of radioactive waste. This includes 2,000 cubic metres of high-level waste at Sellafield, stored in surface vaults across the country. But the lack of any long-term disposal strategy has alarmed experts, who fear an accident or terror attack, according to a recent report published in the Guardian newspaper. Three years ago, the government set up the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management to find a long-term solution to the nuclear waste problem. Their published report proposes that a concrete bunker, cut into solid rock at least 300 metres (1,000ft) underground, would be needed to store the waste. It is also reported that the ‘so-called "deep geological disposal" would require a repository that would take 35 years to build and 65 years to fill’. It sounds like this would not fit under a desk! And now the British government is currently planning to ask regions to compete to see who would provide the hole for this hazardous waste.

In return, the regions would have new projects provided as compensation. They would also be trained to act as monitors over the permanent hazard they would inevitably be exposed to. It reminds you of promises made to Niger Delta communities after their environment had been wrecked.

Cape Town’s chapter of Earthlife Africa, a South African environmental NGO, recently raised an alarm over alleged negligence by ESKOM at the Koeberg Nuclear Power Station in that country. Reports indicate that certain maintenance works may have been neglected at the power station for over ten years. The organization lamented this laxity saying “Safety at a nuclear power station is of the highest concern. The potential for accidents at nuclear power stations and the consequences of such accidents have been well illustrated by historic events at Chernobyl and inthe USA and Japan. These accidents have resulted in numerous deaths and environmental destruction as well as a legacy of radioactivity that isresponsible for illnesses and deaths until today.” Would Nigeria do better?

Conceiving of nuclear energy as clean energy is only possible if one turns a blind eye to the entire production cycle of the energy. This may be true when considering only reactor operations, but if we consider the process by which uranium is mined, transported and processed it becomes quite clear that this is not a clean energy form.

What about the uranium enrichment process, fuel fabrication, and the unavoidable long-term radioactive waste storage? Nuclear power stations may generate little greenhouse gas but their radioactive by-products are among the most toxic substances imaginable, and remain so for thousands of years. We see the dilemma for the British. Nigeria can simply not handle it.

Perhaps the president needs to take another look at nuclear power generation in Nigeria. It is still early in the day and this is the right time to retrace our steps. We need to look critically at how much we have failed as a nation at efforts to provide electricity supply through the rather conventional hydro and thermal generation systems. President Obasanjo has failed spectacularly to deliver on his first term promise on this matter. Nuclear energy is not a solution to the abysmal infrastructural deficit confronting us as a nation.

Nuclear power is basically about energy generation. Nuclear power reaches users through a power-grid system. In other words, it is not a wireless system. And if truth be told, the distribution grid in Nigeria is rather substandard. This is because of weak controls and because home owners often extend power lines to their properties with very little official oversight. This has engendered a situation where cables of diverse qualities reign in the land, and electricity transformers are often camouflaged by weeds. Thus, even if sufficient electricity power were to be generated today, we lack the infrastructure to deliver such power to users. Even if we were to have the power plants up and running in a couple of years, we are decades away from having a good enough power distribution network.

Another draw back is that there is a worldwide shortage of skilled manpower in this field. We can add to this concern the fact that we have a poor record of environmental safety and our emergency response mechanisms are still suspect. Nuclear energy is a ticking bomb and needs extreme care.

Besides, nuclear plants need to be shut down for periods of maintenance. Thus where such plants are in use, the country would still need to maintain an elaborate system of alternate plants thus adding to the overall costs outlay.

Why is Nigeria contemplating this energy system in a time when the world is concerned with developing sustainable energy and is gradually shifting away from nuclear energy? It is reported that industrialized countries such as Germany are moving towards more friendly energy sources. Indeed , a June 2006 report commissioned by the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety suggests that “Europe could cut carbon emissions from electricity generation by 70 per cent and phase out nuclear power by 2050 using 'concentrating solar power' (CSP) generated in the Middle East and North Africa.”

It appears that if Nigeria pursues the nuclear energy path, she will end up with an unnecessary liability when the system is finally ready. I say this because the world would have shifted away from this unsustainable mode of energy generation.

Another matter that may not have been inserted into the decision-making matrix may be the fact that nuclear power stations require huge amounts of water for cooling the reactor’s core. Experts say that nuclear plants do not work particularly well in warm climes. In a nation where fire trucks often run dry and water hydrants are left literally dehydrated, it takes very little imagination to reach the conclusion that setting huge quantities of water aside for this purpose will only compound the water problem of the nation.

We have a penchant of saying that issues like this are of no consequence because we do not lay much stock in analyzing scenarios that indicate how we unnecessarily, but rather continuously, box ourselves into tight corners. We have a penchant of superstitiously repeating to ourselves that everything will be okay even when we are taking wrong decisions and sliding down precipitous slopes.

In addition, the nuclear industry is yet to sufficiently address any of the negative aspects of this power generation system. It is a dirty industry, it is an expensive venture and it is extremely hazardous. There is nothing to recommend it except that it may confer some sense of “power” on the nation to say that we are on the nuclear league.

Honestly, rather than waste the resources of the nation on this wild enterprise, the Nigerian government should take steps to popularize solar energy systems in the nation. Solar and wind power systems may be expensive at the onset, but these costs are quite likely to fall as the world turns more to it in the face of rising cost of fossil fuels and the harmful potential of nuclear plants.

Moreover, solar systems are safe, the energy is clean and the system is amendable to discrete small scale whereby even remote communities can be easily serviced. In fact with the demise of crude oil that will happen in a few decades, the oil giants who hold vested interests in solar power development will see the need to allow popular access as this will be the next profit spinner.

In his speech to the NAEC board, President Obasanjo pointed out that "The new policy initiative of the US Government on nuclear energy, The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership" seeks to popularise and expand the generation and use of electricity from nuclear plants around the world. It does appear to us that the government is once more buying into offshore economic policy thrusts. The entire idea is rigged to shore up an American industry that is set to face decline. It may be argued that the dream of nuclear electricity plants has been on the shelves for three decades now, but common wisdom dictates that we should let sleeping dogs lie!

Again, I regret to say that I totally disagree with the president’s thinking that nuclear power would uplift the citizenry to a state of prosperity. It will rather expose our hapless citizenry to untold dangers apart from being another uneconomic sinkhole.

The World Bank, in its internal report on climate change, categorised nuclear energy as clean energy and announced plans to support it. The document, which was leaked to an environmental NGO, shows that the Bank lays a lot of emphasis on what poor countries could do to reduce greenhouse emissions, and says little about what the huge polluters should do. Although the bank keeps harping on the need for clean and renewable energy, it has not slowed down on its continual funding of oil and gas projects. Could Nigeria’s nuclear dream have been concocted by alchemists at the World Bank?

We have already squandered borrowed resources that rightly belong to future generations. Let us not make the problem worse.

Friday 25 August saw a UN General Assembly committee approve a UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The Convention is the first human rights treaty of the 21st century and is designed to encourage governments to pass legislation protecting people with disabilities and to eliminate discriminatory laws and practices. Lina Lindblom from the Secretariat of the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities explores the implications for the 60 million people in Africa living with disabilities.

The first human rights treaty of the twenty-first century has just been finalised at the United Nations. It will serve to promote and protect the human rights of 650 million persons with disabilities around the world. In Africa, the decade between 1999 and 2009 has been proclaimed the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities by the African Union. The first-ever human rights convention for persons with disabilities will be an important tool for the Secretariat that facilitates the implementation of the African Decade’s plan of action.

Around 60 million persons with disabilities live in Africa. These individuals are barely visible in most African societies, and rarely appear to have voices or opinions about general issues that are brought to our attention by the media. The majority of them are excluded from schools, work opportunities and participation in development programs. The African disability movement’s struggle for human rights is essentially a fight against this exclusion and against the overwhelming poverty that it leads to.

The Secretariat of the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities advocates for the inclusion of disability into the existing development priorities of African Union member states, because the exclusion of disability from them perpetuates the poverty and despair of disabled Africans. The new convention constitutes a broad framework for disability, human rights and development. It will be increasingly important to associate any work on disability to the convention, including poverty reduction processes. The African Decade for Persons with Disabilities, 1999-2009, was proclaimed by the African Union to address the human rights and development needs of disabled Africans.

Representatives of DPOs and UN Agencies came up with a continental plan of action for the Decade. It was endorsed by the executive counsil of the AU in 2002. The government of the Republic of South Africa accepted to host the Secretariat of the African Decade in 2003, and the Secretariat was established in Cape Town, South Africa, in 2004. The Secretariat facilitates the implementation of the Continental Plan of Action through its African Decade Disability Programme (ADDP), a program primarily funded by the governments of Sweden and Denmark.

One of the working focuses of the disability movement has become to mainstream disability, i.e. to get disability and persons with disabilities included in the existing development community. It is about getting governments and development organisations to include disability into policies and programs, and to invite persons with disabilities to participate in the development of these policies and programs. The disability movement does not want separate, exclusionary processes, keeping them out of the mainstream societies.

If mainstreaming is a buzz word in the disability movement, how come they have designed a new and separate human rights convention just for persons with disabilities?, you may ask. Some within the movement are indeed wishing that disability had been inserted and mentioned in the existing human rights provisions instead, but most people are actively supporting the new convention. Petronella Linders, who works for the South African government and assisted the South African delegation to the convention deliberations in New York, explains that she believes that the convention will force countries to look at their own legislation from a disability point of view. In so doing, a separate convention can actually enhance and enforce mainstreaming of disability into national legislation. Before, the approach of many African governments has been to implement human rights provisions for persons with disabilities on an ad-hoc basis. Now there will be a legally binding document that governments must implement if they ratify it.

Thomas Ong’olo from Kenya, who works as a program manager at the Secretariat of the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities, agrees. He says that the convention will be a crucial instrument “to remind governments that we are here”. So many times before, Africans with disabilities have simply been left out of the equation. It has also been argued that persons with disabilities find themselves in a legal disadvantage in relation to other vulnerable groups such as refugees and women, because the latter have the protection of single bodies of binding norms in thematic human rights conventions. The convention on the Rights of the Child has been the only one of the conventions to explicitly mention persons with disabilities. In the other ones, individuals with disabilities are only covered as being part of “vulnerable or marginalized groups”. Governments that ratify the new convention will be legally bound to treat persons with disabilities not just as a vulnerable group or a minority, but as subjects to the law with clearly defined rights.

The process of developing the new convention has been said to be very participatory and well functioning. More than 400 delegates and disability advocates from around the world have attended the eight sessions since 2002 at the United Nations in New York. One of the few serious problems mentioned is that many persons with disabilities and Disabled Persons’ Organizations (DPOs) from developing countries have not been able to attend the meetings, meaning that their issues and voices have not been adequately captured in the draft convention. This, again, is down to the issue of poverty. Many African DPOs have simply not had the money to send representatives to the United Nations headquarters in New York.

According to Phitalis Were Masakhwe, an international advisor on disability within the United Nations, there appears to be a wide gap between the wishes, needs and aspirations of persons with disabilities from poor developing countries and those from the so called developed world. In Africa and parts of Asia people would have wanted a convention that emphasizes their main challenges; poverty, disability and conflicts, and invisibility of disability in international development and cooperation, he says. Thomas Ong’olo of the African Decade Secretariat agrees. The benchmark of the discussions in New York has been set by the rich, he argues: “Sometimes the discussions may be around issues that are simply not relevant to most Africans, such as choice of services. Choosing the type of accessible transport you want to use or the exact time of pickup by that transport of your choice, is not an issue in developing countries. The main African issue is around basic survival.”

Implementation is the main concern now. International monitoring of the convention and international cooperation in the implementation process have been two of the most difficult issues to agree on during the eighth session of the convention committee. This is possibly an even bigger concern in Africa than in other parts of the world, because of the lack of capacity and funds at the national level. Many Africans worry that the convention will be just another document not put into practice by their governments. The money issue is the predominant concern here too. Putting the provisions of the convention into practice will be costly. Concerns have been raised that lack of money will hinder states to meet even the most urgent obligations. All countries will face costs, but it will be hardest for developing countries.

International cooperation must play an important part in this, Ambassador Don MacKay, who chairs the Ad Hoc Committee on the convention at the United Nations, says, for example in incorporating into development cooperation programmes elements to assist with disability related matters.

A worry is also that the DPOs are expected to monitor the governments in the implementation process, but many of these organisations in many countries are simply too weak. Training programs are taking place, but the problem remains. Much more capacity building and better structures are needed. In the five pilot countries of the African Decade Disability Program, [1]Decade Steering Committees (DSCs) have been established, comprised of representatives of government ministries, DPOs, civil society, media, experts on disability and international organizations. The private sector in the countries has been invited to participate. A partnership between the public and the private sectors is crucial for job creation and effective resource mobilization.

The major functions of the National Decade Steering Committees include playing a key role in the preparation of a comprehensive national plan and in the development of national policy. The committees also monitor the implementation of policies and programmes for persons with disabilities in their countries. The African Decade Secretariat’s plan is to facilitate the establishment of new committees in at least 15 other African countries by the end of 2009.[2] The mission of the Secretariat is to empower governments, DSCs, DPOs and development organisations to work in partnership to include disability and persons with disabilities into policies and programs in all sectors of society in Africa. This means that the emphasis is on capacitating these actors to work together. One of the Secretariat’s strengths is that we are able to learn from initiatives in one country, and bring them to (or avoid them in) another.

We are also engaging large international organisations in the struggle for mainstreaming. Our experience is that it often only takes one meeting, a small effort that brings large results if we manage to get them on board. One current new initiative is collaboration between the Secretariat and UNESCO, to train African journalists in how to report on disability issues in a way that respects their human rights and does not reproduce common stereotypes. Another is to collaborate with UNICEF to ensure that children with disabilities are included in their programs.

Prejudice, exclusion, stigmas and a tendency to still view disability within a charity perspective or a medical model, rather than within the human rights discourse, are all very real barriers to participation for persons with disabilities in Africa today. Combined with a high level of poverty, the African disability movement is facing an uphill struggle. There are positive signs and opportunities, however. The topic of disability and development has been featured in the development discourse for a couple of decades now. Many global and regional discussions and pledges abound to ensure that policies, programs and resources are accessible to persons with disabilities and inclusive of everyone.

Some ten African countries, e.g. Ghana, Malawi, Kenya and South Africa, have developed White Papers on national disability strategies. These are model documents for the mainstreaming of disability. The African Union has taken important and promising initiatives in recent years, such as proclaiming the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities. However, Africans with disabilities are increasingly frustrated by the beautiful words, and want action. For this reason the establishment of the Secretariat of the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities is an important step from talk to implementation.

The Decade was proclaimed in 1999. We only started our work at the Secretariat in 2004. We can regret the delay, but we choose to focus now on our role as facilitators of the implementation of the Continental Plan of Action, capacity building, awareness raising, continued struggle for mainstreaming of disability and against the poverty and exclusion of disabled Africans. Now we will be enforced with a new and important tool, the first-ever human rights convention for persons with disabilities.

* Lina Lindblom, communications officer at the Secretariat of the African Decade of Persons with Disabilities.

* Please send comments to or comment online at www.pambazuka.org

Notes:

[1] The pilot countries are Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Rwanda and Senegal.
[2] Some African countries, e.g. Mali, Mauritania, Guinea Bissau and the DRC, have also set up their own Decade Steering Committees outside of the Secretariat’s programme.

For more information, see:
http://www.un.org/News/
http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/ahc8.htm

The Middle-East is on fire, and it does not look as if the political situation is going to improve anytime soon. Eva Dadrian looks at Africa’s response to the conflict. She argues that those who know how it feels like to be at the receiving end of colonialism have always criticised Israel’s occupation of Palestine.

After 34 days of fighting, more than 1,200 civilian casualties, 15,000 homes destroyed, 80 bridges and 94 roads damaged, the two-week-old cease-fire between Israel and Hezballah is holding. Apart from being a human tragedy, the recent conflict is also an environmental disaster with massive oil spills resulting from the bombing of a power plant close to Beirut.

The question now is how UNIFIL (the United Nations International Forces in Lebanon) will fully implement the UN Security Council Resolution 1701 that asks for the two Israeli prisoners held by Hezballah to be handed over to the International Red Cross, and that Israel lifts its blockade of Lebanon?

Should the cease-fire and the arrival of the peacekeeping force be considered a victory for the international community? The UN knows, like everybody else, that UN peacekeepers will never be in a position to “impose peace”, let alone become peacemakers.

But, it is expected that in the coming weeks, armed with a tougher mandate than any UN peacekeeping force has ever enjoyed before, the multinational force of some 15,000 troops from Bangladesh, Italy, Malaysia, Poland, and many others, will attempt to consolidate this cease-fire. They are also expected to help in the clearing up and to carry out humanitarian operations. But will this really happen?

According to observers, the government and the people of Lebanon are determined to implement Resolution 1701. Also, they are expecting the Israeli government to do so. However, to date Israel has been reluctant to withdraw from Lebanese territories and lift its air, land and sea blockade on Lebanon, thus hampering not only humanitarian aid in reaching the country but also delaying a full environmental damage assessment of the Lebanon coastline. Environmentalists estimate that between 11 and 40 million litres of heavy fuel oil leaked into the sea following the Israeli bombardment of Jieh coastal power station, 28km south of Beirut. The pollution is estimated to extend at least 150km (90 miles) off-shore and has hit the tourism and fishing industries hard. One UN spokesperson has been reported as saying the damage could last "up to a century". Furthermore, the oil has hit a 150km stretch of coastline extending even into Syria.

Has the war achieved anything that would make either Israel, Hezballah, Washington and others involved front line or back stage, proud? Was all this destruction the only means to secure the safe release of Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, the two Israeli soldiers captured by Hezballah? Is it possible to believe that Mossad, the Israeli secret service, considered by many as the world’s “best and most efficient” in the field, would have not been capable of getting back the two kidnapped soldiers by more discreet and efficient means?

Most Israelis and many others in the region, in the Arab nations, say that the war was meant to reduce Hezballah’s growing power in Lebanon and dismantle its arsenal.

Do we need to admit that this war has had the opposite result? Not only has Israel not managed to destroy Hezballah, but Israel’s war on Lebanon has reinforced Hezballah’s aura in Lebanon and in the Arab world, thanks to the resistance and the resilience of Hezballah’s fighters. This war will go down in history as the only war fought and lost by the State of Israel since its creation. Do we need to become cynical and laugh because the two soldiers whose kidnapping is said to have sparked this conflict are still in Hezballah’s custody?

So what was really achieved by all the parties involved: Israel, Lebanon, Hezballah, Washington, Syria and Iran?

Analysts and politicians from Europe, US, Asia and Africa, have implied that the conflict between Hezballah and Israel had the potential to become a wider regional conflict. So was this meant to provoke Syria and Iran and drag them into direct confrontation with Israel? Was it to distract world public opinion from the failures in Iraq, the sectarian killings and the body bags returning home, or the failures in Afghanistan and the renewal of the old tribal conflicts there?

In fact, the entire region is at war. From the East Mediterranean shores to the borders of Pakistan (save Iran at the present time) the so-called “New Middle East” as envisaged by President Bush, Secretary of State Rice, PM Tony Blair and the like, is but conflicts, rubbles, destruction, broken lives and dismantled nations.

For argument sake, let’s transpose Israel’s action against Hezballah elsewhere in the world. For example, in Christian, white Europe imagine that Sweden, the pillar of European democracy, disagrees with the fascistic politics of the French Front National of Jean-Marie Le Pen. So, the Swedish government decides to bomb Paris and destroy all the French “departments” where the Front National has its offices. It does it with an arsenal of weaponry supplied by Germany!

Or at the height of the IRA bombings in mainland Britain, London decides to bomb Dublin once and for all? Would it have been possible?

After touring Beirut’s devastated Dahiyeh district, where he was booed by the residents, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan is reported to have declared that “there is a lot of work to be done” and that the UN and international community would work effectively with all parties to “ensure that we do implement the resolution to the fullest and that we have a long-term peace in this region”.

The war in Lebanon was but another chapter in the Middle East conflict. And this conflict cannot and will not be resolved unless the Israeli-Palestinian question is resolved. Is it so difficult to secure a “long-lasting peace” that we have to accept today the small token of a “long-term” peace?

For the Israeli-Arab/Israeli-Palestinian question, one should look into the issue of colonialism, exactly in the same way as one would look into the Irish question and British colonialism in Africa.

Interestingly, those who know how it feels like to be at the receiving end of colonialism have always criticised Israel’s occupation of Palestine. For years, Africans have condemned Israel’s “colonial” policies in Palestine, and the recent conflict was yet another source of debates. Further, people took to the streets. Anti-war demonstrators marched in their hundreds through the streets of Gaborone (Botswana). The African Union strongly condemned what it described as Israel's “indiscriminate bombing”. This was particularly after the bombing of Qena, which the AU said “cannot be justified under any circumstances”.

In South Africa activists often liken Israel to Apartheid South Africa. The African National Congress condemned Israel for its disproportionate military action.

African politicians were not the only protestors. Many artists, writers and media people strongly expressed their views on the issue. At this year’s Zimbabwe International Film Festival (ZIFF) Israel’s war against Lebanon took centre stage. In its programme ZIFF had included the world acclaimed documentary “Paradise Now” – which was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards (Oscars) earlier this year and the winner of the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film (USA).

In complete contrast to the strong position against the war and Israel's action taken by Africa south of the Sahara, North Africa and particularly Egypt, adopted a much milder position. Precaution was the name of the game when it came to analysing and discussing the causes of the war. Most mainstream Arab political analysts avoided criticising Egypt's position and President Mubarak's condemnation of Hezbollah's kidnapping of the 2 Israeli soldiers. Pointing a finger at Washington' policies for the region and criticising president Bush's administration for the moral, financial and arms support, to Israel, Egypt remained "unstained". The Arab street had a very different position. In Cairo, protestors called for the dissolution of the Camp David agreement between Israel and Egypt (1978-79) labelling it as the "leach" that is "tying up Egypt's hands and feet" in any decision concerning Israel's and Washington's policy for the Middle East conflict.

In Tunisia, at the international Carthage Festival, the Tunisian artist Lotfi Bouchnaq, cancelled the final programme to replace it with patriotic songs and music in solidarity with Lebanon and the Palestinian people.

One Israeli blogger has gone so far as to write, the Palestinians are victims of “a colonial type of oppression”. Their land is confiscated, their homes bulldozed, their olive groves uprooted, their youth disturbed by 50 years of wars, killings, bombs and displacements and their sons in Israeli jails. Aren’t these the real stigmata of colonialism as practised in the past by the colonial powers?

The 50 years of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have engendered resistance. Depending on the standpoint from which one views the political situation in the Middle East, Palestinians militants have become “freedom fighters” or “terrorists”. As political dialogue became a futile exercise, Palestinian militants have become “Islamic Terrorists”. However, in reality, the militants of Hamas and Hezballah are only “resisting” the occupation of their lands - Palestine for Hamas and South Lebanon for Hezballah – and refuse to accept Israel’s expansionist policy.

In the very early days of the conflict, As Safir, the Lebanese daily, published the translation of a “secret” report presented by Wayne Madison*, a journalist at the New Yorker, specialising in the political intricacies of Washington D.C. and the CIA. The report preceded an article published by the San Francisco Chronicle (July 21, 2006) under the title: ‘Israel set war plan more than a year ago, Strategy was put in motion as Hezbollah began gaining military strength in Lebanon’. Matthew Kalman, the author of this article, wrote the following: “Israel's military response by air, land and sea to what it considered a provocation last week by Hezbollah militants is unfolding according to a plan finalized more than a year ago.

In the six years since Israel ended its military occupation of southern Lebanon, it watched warily as Hezbollah built up its military presence in the region. When Hezbollah militants kidnapped two Israeli soldiers last week, the Israeli military was ready to react almost instantly”.

But the report presented by Wayne Madison has far more to reveal about the recent conflict. 1) The aggression against Lebanon was planned by key Israeli decision-makers and members of the Bush Administration during a meeting organised by the American Enterprise Institute, held at Beever-Creek-Colorado, on 17 and 18 June 2006.

2) During that meeting, US Vice-President Dick Cheney, Israel’s Prime Minister Ehoud Olmert, and Benjamin Netanyahu, Ehoud Barak, Shimon Pérès and Nathan Charansky were all present.

3) The two parties agreed on the following plan: the American Administration will provide ‘all the necessary assistance’ to Israel so that it (Israel) can put into execution Plan ‘Clear Infiltration’ formulated some 10 years ago. This plan dealt with ‘new strategies’ concerning global ‘matters of security’.

4) Clear Infiltration was in fact the “next” step to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. This was to be followed by wars in Palestine, Lebanon, then Syria and Iran.

5) To put the plan into motion, two steps were foreseen: the first was to last for four years and incorporated “secret activities from the Pentagon, the White House and Mossad, inside Lebanon” These secret activities included using booby-trapped vehicles to assassinate high-ranking Lebanese officials. The objective: forcing Syrian troops to withdraw from Lebanon. The author of the report mentions three names: Elie Hobaïka, former minister who was in charge of the Lebanese Forces and who sided with the Syrians, Georges Haoui, former secretary general of the Lebanese communist party and Rafiq Hariri, former Prime minister.

Whereas the second step included bombardment and then the invasion of Lebanon, observers reckon that somehow ‘Clear Infiltration’ has succeeded: invasion and occupation of Iraq, the assassination of Rafiq Hariri and other prominent Lebanese, bombardment and invasion of Lebanon have happened. ‘Plan Clear Infiltration’ would come into completion if Israel and Washington succeeded in removing Hezballah from South Lebanon and transferring them in the same way they had planned to “transfer” the Palestinians from the West Bank.

Notes:

* Wayne Madison, first journalist to reveal and write about the horrors of Abu Ghraib Prison in Iraq

* Eva Dadrian is an independent broadcaster and Political and Country Risk Analyst for print and broadcast media.

* Please send comments to