Why Did Obama Harshly Scold Mubarak, Demanding that He Leave, while Coddling Bashar Assad?

UPDATING 4-23&24&26&27&5-7-2011See at bottom

Many have noticed that Obama and Hilary were rough with Mubarak, telling him to leave office just a few days into the mass demonstrations in Egypt, whereas it took them two or three weeks to tell Qaddafi to get out, and whereas Washington --Obama, Hilary, the State Dept-- are still coddling Bashar [Basher] Assad. What explains this differential treatment? Many competent commentators have taken a stab at the question. Lee Smith wrote a fine article on the subject. Just this afternoon [4-22-2011, Israel Channel 1], Eyal Zisser of Tel Aviv University, pointed out that Hilary called Basher a "reformer" just a few weeks ago, albeit to widespread contempt. Zisser, like Smith, discussed the differential treatment for Mubarak who was not exceptionally bad or cruel, as Arab rulers go, and for Bashar, who --Zisser pointed out-- is being protected or coddled or treated leniently by the Washington mob. But Zisser did not claim to have an answer.

Why this differential treatment? In fact, there is one and the same answer for Obama wanting to get rid of Mubarak while keeping Assad in power. Obama and his evil advisors and mentors, like Zbig Brzezinski and Lee Hamilton, want Israel to be encircled by enemies. So Obama encourages Turkey against Israel, scoffing at the Armenian-Americans who naively supported him on account of his promise to acknowledge the Armenian genocide. He encouraged the Code Pink and Free Gaza campaigners who teamed up with the Turkish jihadists on last May's convoy to Gaza. Lee Hamilton's Woodrow Wilson Center even gave Turkish FM Davutoglu the Woodrow Wilson award a few weeks after the Mavi Marmara incident. No doubt as a reward for embarassing Israel in world public opinion.

Syria is a very hostile state on Israel's northeast which supports the equally hostile Hizbullah on Israel's north in Lebanon. Both, by the way, are clearly Judeophobic, not merely "critical" of Israel. The Hizbullah, well-armed by Iran and Syria, could not exist in Lebanon as a state within a state --as the hegemonic body in the state-- without Syrian support. Iran which is farther away threatens Israel with the Bomb and with long-distance rockets. Obama was counting on a strong, stable anti-Israel front on Israel's north and northeast to threaten and pressure Israel, joining with Western diplomatic pressure from the US, UK, EU, etc. The protest movement in Syria threatens that strong, stable anti-Israel front.

Mubarak on the other hand was cooperating with Israel on security matters, especially in regard to Hamas and Iran. To be sure, he was violating the 1979 treaty with Israel in regard to anti-Israel agitation and propaganda in the Egyptian media, schools, etc. But he was cooperating, if only minimally, on security, especially in regard to Hamas. Hamas is an offshoot of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, a sworn enemy of Mubarak, and of course a bitter enemy of Israel and the Jews based on medieval Islamic teaching. Obama wanted to much increase MB influence over Egyptian policy towards Israel, if not to bring the MB into the govt. Recall that a US official said --before Mubarak's ouster-- that "non-secular" factors in Egyptian society and politics should be brought into the govt for the sake of "democracy." "Non-secular" factors was a clear reference to the MB. And now, the post-Mubarak regime is giving in to various MB demands, warning of renegotiating the agreement for purchase of Egyptian natural gas. The two serious candidates for president of Egypt, `Amr Musa --head of the Arab League-- and the repulsive Muhammad al-Barada`i who helped along the Iranian Bomb Project, are talking against Israel, warning of intervening against any Israeli attack on the Hamas and demanding reopening of the 1979 treaty besides the gas purchase agreement. Obama's endeavors to encircle Israel with a more hostile power on the south [more hostile, less amenable to peace with Israel than Mubarak was] have borne fruit. That has happened. Note that democracy was never Obama's real concern. Demonstrators have been shot since Mubarak's ouster. Dissidents like Maikel Nabil Sanad are now in jail. Ten or more Copts were killed in clashes with MB thugs. The army damaged Coptic monasteries. Moreover, the people in Egypt are poorer and less secure economically than before the ouster, albeit things were bad then too.

So here Obama succeeded in having a more anti-Israeli front set up on the south. Yet, the northern anti-Israel front is being shaken by pesky demonstrators in Syria who demand freedom for their country and improvement in their situation. The Syrian demonstrations are a blow to Obama's encirclement strategy. So after more than a month of anti-regime protests in Syria, Obama and his Washington gang have not demanded that Assad get out. The criticisms from the State Department are relatively mild. Of course, the Assad regime is immensely more bloodthirsty than Mubarak ever was. Obama's concern is not with decency or democracy but with encircling Israel with very hostile powers. Hence, the answer to the question asked by Lee Smith and Eyal Zisser is one and the same. Obama wants to encircle and besiege Israel. Assad serves that purpose much better than Mubarak.

Also consider why Obama has been soft on Iran, friendly to Erdogan's Turkey and Pakistan [another Muslim fanatic state].

Lastly, consider the role of the so-called "left" and the so-called "human rights" organizations. These bodies, insofar as they focus their hatred on Israel, serve the anti-Israel policy of the EU, UK, and the old hatred for Jews of the US State Department. The self-styled "human rights" outfits like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch hate Israel more than they love or believe or serve the cause of human rights. The anti-Israel "Left" cares much less about exploited, ill-treated workers --in Abu Dhabi or Dubai, let us say-- or about the vast capital concentrated in the hands of the Arab oil billionaires than they do about harming Jews in Israel. They are unwitting tools at best of the UK, EU, & US State Department.

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UPDATING 4-23-2011 Can it be true that goody goody "peace groups", like CodePink for instance, can be considered "tools" of wealthy and powerful Establishment forces? Alana Goodman thinks so. She wondered why "the anti-war movement has pretty much evaporated under President Obama". She concludes that "the anti-war movement was little more than a partisan anti-Bush movement. Obama has continued most of Bush’s counterterrorism tactics, increased AfPak [Afghanistan-Pakistan] drone strikes, kept open Guantanamo Bay, sent the U.S. into a war in Libya and tinkered with Miranda rights for terrorists. And yet no massive anti-war protests greet him in California, nobody burns him in effigy, nobody chants that he’s 'the real terrorist.'" [here]
Simon Tisdall admits that Western govts are soft on Assad the Basher, some --such as the US & UK-- wanting to keep him in office supposedly for the sake of "Israel-Palestine peace efforts." The so-called "peace efforts" & "peace process" are thinly disguised efforts to weaken Israel and thereby give the Arabs a chance to finish Hitler's work. As I say above, the Obama gang wants to maintain a strong, stable anti-Israel front on Israel's northern & northeastern borders. [Tisdall here]
Walter Russell Mead points out that the reasons given for US intervention in Libya are present "in spades" in Syria. Mead also reminds us that, "For decades now, Syria has been a principal state sponsor of terrorism in the Middle East. Hezbollah and Hamas would not exist in their present forms without Syrian protection and support. On its own behalf, and as Iran’s closest strategic ally in the Arab world, Syria has a long record of arming, training and sheltering terrorists." [here]
Washington Times editorial 4-23-2011 [here] supports Alana Goodman's premise that the "anti-war movement" dried up under Obama and her conclusion that the "anti-war movement" under Bush was mainly a partisan movement cynically manipulated by Democrats [here].
4-24-2011 Elliott Abrams notes the disrepancy in Obama's positions toward Mubarak and Assad respectively. Abrams calls for stronger US action.
William Harris says that Bashar the Basher is committing war crimes. Further, Harris does not think very highly of Obama's Syria policy: "It is difficult to think of anything more obstinately counter-intuitive than Barack Obama's reluctance to give up on the Syrian dictatorship and the bankrupt policy of "engagement" [with Assad]. Morality, strategic interest, and simple good sense together demand an end to the nonsense about reforming what cannot be reformed; if it survives, the dictatorship will be so blood-soaked that no decent person could "engage" its leadership. On the other hand, a new Syria will mean a new Middle East, with the Iranian theocracy's capability in the Levant dealt a stunning reverse and new prospects for a real Arab-Israeli peace process. " [see here]
Carlo Panella has written several pieces about Syria: "Assad First Slaughters the Demonstrators, Then He Calls Them Martyrs"[in Italiano qui] e "Nazi Repression in Syria. . ." [qui] e "Assad's Opponents" qui.
Wall Street Journal on the Syria lobby in Washington [here].
4-27-2011 Aaron David Miller, ex-State Dept, informs us that "the Assads hold a special place in the schemes and dreams of U.S. policymakers." But, but. They're bloodthirsty bastards, aren't they? How could Washington possibly like them? [here]
Lee Smith asks "Why Is Obama Protecting Assad?" [here]. He quotes Michael Doran who writes that Obama was counting on Assad's Syria to be part of a general, comprehensive "peace" agreement between Israel and the Arab states. Doran writes: “the Obama administration has made the Arab-Israeli peace process the organizing principle of its Middle East policy.” Getting rid of Assad would somehow thwart that purpose. Doran implies that Assad staying in power in Syria is essential to this "peace" strategy. Doran doesn't explain why a Syrian govt without the Assad clan could not also make "peace" or even peace with Israel. Or be just as likely or just as unlikely to do so.
Lee Smith concludes: "the Obama White House’s Syria policy is not pragmatic and cautious. Rather, it is adventurist and ideological. The administration is sheltering Damascus in order to salvage its own bankrupt Middle East policy. If he loses Assad, Obama is lost in the region and the administration will be forced, obviously against its will, to recalibrate. The question is, how much will U.S. interests suffer in the meantime?" [here]. What Lee Smith and Doran say fits in with what Aaron David Miller wrote: "the Assads hold a special place in the schemes and dreams of U.S. policymakers."
Syrian oppositionist Farid Ghadry asks where the West is in Syria's time of travail. He especially wants to know why Erdogan of Turkey wants to send a "freedom flotilla" to Hamas-ruled Gaza but is not interested in sending a similar "freedom flotilla" to the Syrian people [here].
Elliott Abrams on Obama's Syria policy [here]
Julian Borger on British Syria policy since Junior Basher rose to power in 2000 [here]
St Andrews University in Britain said to be embarassed over Syrian funding for a "Syrian Studies" center [here]. A pimp of the pen like Patrick Seale, a toady for the Syrian regime, is an advisor to the center.
Washington Times editorial scolding Obama's policy ["The Nobama Doctrine"] & calling for intervention to save the Syrian people [here]
Lee Smith has more on why Obama & Company are soft on the Assads [here]: ". . . in place of a rational intellect and a moral center, all the White House has is an imaginary peace process, a pipe dream that requires the “reform-minded” Bashar al-Assad to come to his senses and engage with Washington."
4-30-2011 James Traub gives reasons why he thinks that Western powers were so fond of Syria and Bashar the Basher [here]
Elliott Abrams complains about the soft Obama adminstration response to Syrian govt physical abuse of an American diplomat [here]
Jonathan Spyer takes on the Israeli fools [Uri Sagi, Alon Liel, etc] who want a "deal" with Assad's Syria and need the West to prop him up until that will o'the wisp eventuality [here]
Barry Rubin points out that Assad's Syria has never been a real partner for peace for Israel despite what the Obama and previous US administrations have "believed" or pretended to believe. This should have been known and understood in the West as far back as the 1960s. [I believe that it probably was understood in the West]. He goes on to point out the danger of surrendering Israel's natural defense of the Golan Heights to Syria. How can we know in advance that the Assad gang or any succeeding regime in Syria will keep a peace treaty with Israel if it controls the strategic advantage of the Golan Heights? [here]
Barry Rubin points out that everybody --every Western govt, in particular-- should have [& could have] known just how bad the Syrian regime was many years ago. But up till the recent revolt, the Western govts were playing dumb about Junior Assad, Bashar the Basher [here].
Another piece by Barry Rubin, if combined with his two articles linked to above on Syria, supports my argument that Obama and his gang want Israel to be surrounded by hostile powers. Barry might not agree explicitly with my sound inferences from his analyses.
5-7-2011 Barry Rubin despairs over any decent response to the Syria crisis emerging from Washington's Foggy Bottom [and Foggy Top][here]

EU to Remove Ban on Iranian Nuke Officials Coming to EU Lands

Catherine Ashton, the EU foreign affairs commissioner, is going to lift the ban forbidding the Iranian foreign minister, Ali Akbar Salehi, to travel in EU territory. The ban was imposed on him because he was previously head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Agency which is working to produce a nuclear bomb, thereby violating Iran's commitment not to make a nuke bomb, a commitment undertaken by Iran when it signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty back in the 1960s. Salehi was declared "persona non grata" in the EU because of his role in Iran's nuke Bomb Project. Now the British Lady [Lady Ashton is supposed to be a lady] is overlooking Iran's treaty violation, thereby encouraging Iran's nuke Bomb Project.

Lady Ashton intends to remove the ban on Salehi so that he can properly carry out his new functions.

Funny, isn't it, that "extreme leftist revolutionaries" defend the Iranian Bomb Project, and high officials of the EU do so as well?? Leading EU states plus the USA played games for years with Iran over the nuke project, setting several new deadlines in order to cater to Iran after Iran had failed to meet previous deadlines. Lately, Muhammad al-Barada`i, who covered up for Iran's bomb project as head of the International Atomic Energy Agency in the fateful years of Iranian nuclear development, has been touted as a suitable leader for a new "democratic" Egypt by the Obama White House and the State Department. Islamic fanatics in the Hizbullah and other terrorist organizations also defend and support the Iranian Bomb Project. Maybe the EU and the "Left" and the jihadists all think that an Iranian bomb is just what the world needs in the 21st century. With that kind of broad agreement coming from almost everybody, maybe the world is heading towards peace!

Here is the report on this news from Guysen News, 2-9-2011.

L'Union européenne devrait lever les restrictions interdisant au ministre iranien des Affaires étrangères, Ali Akbar Salehi, de voyager dans les pays européens, à cause de sa participation dans le programme nucléaire iranien. M. Salehi occupait comme précédent poste la direction de l'Agence iranienne de l'énergie atomique, et avait été de ce fait déclaré persona non grata en Europe. La chef de la diplomatie de l'UE, Catherine Ashton, compte changer la donne afin de permettre à M. Salehi de remplir comme il se doit ses nouvelles fonctions. [ici 2-9-2011, Guysen News 11:10]

The West Is Getting Ready to Surrender to the Ayatollahs over Iran's Nuclear Project

UPDATINGS 12-10, 14, 17, 19-2009 at bottom

Anti-Zionism is the anti-imperialism of fools

The Obama administration, even more so than the Bush administration before it, goes through some ineffective, rather transparent motions pretending to try or pretending to want to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear bomb. But in Europe, some serious people are very worried indeed, as Israelis are. We have already noted French President Sarkozy's rather overt criticism of Obama for not taking the Iranian bomb project seriously enough, for not doing anything really capable of stopping A-jad's quest for the bomb. Some French political authors have written seriously on the subject, more than is usual --it seems-- in the USA where Columbia University seems to have considered it perfectly acceptable to accept a large cash "contribution" from an Iranian-controlled foundation in exchange for inviting A-jad to speak at Morningside Heights.

In Italy too concerned voices have been raised. Indeed, the Italian political commentator, Carlo Panella, recently wrote that the West is getting ready to surrender on the Iranian nuclear issue, while the newspaper Il Foglio deplores Muhammad al-Barada'is' endeavors to water down and obfuscate the issue and conceal Iran's rather obvious nuclear bomb intentions. Panella discusses the futility of the Geneva talks --if one really wants to end Iran's nuclear bomb project, as well as criticizing Obama for temporizing.

Muhammad al-Barada'i took on the not so difficult task of explaining to the world --i.e. to Barack Obama-- what it means to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize that he received in 2005: playing three cards, cheating naturally. He did not deny himself yesterday when, at the end of the second Geneva meeting on the Iranian nuclear project between Teheran's delegation and the Four Plus One (USA, UK, France, Russia plus Germany), he triumphantly announced: "It was a good beginning"!
. . . .
Even worse, after Ali Shirizadian, the Iranian spokesman, announced that the transfer of uranium enrichment abroad, the subject of the negotiations, was only meant to contain costs, but did not in fact mean the end of the enrichment programs developed in Iran or the full transfer of these programs outside the country." In short, Iran will never transfer all of the nuclear processing outside its borders (and therefore will be quite free to obtain the heavy uranium that it needs for the atomic bomb) and will restrict itself to transferring a part of it abroad, but only for the savings. A solemn joke at the expense of the gullible, to which was added a dry kick in the teeth for France that Iran accuses of thwarting the negotiations. Therefore, it will never ever agree to transfer any enrichment processing to that country. A humiliation of one of the principal countries seated at the negotiating table, which follows dozens of other provocations.

. . .
Therefore, the Geneva negotiations are turning out to be what Iran wanted them to be: a loss of time which allows the pasdaran and the ayatollahs to proceed undisturbed to bestow an atomic bomb on themselves. It is the nth confirmation of the total failure of the "change" undertaken by Barack Obama, of the end of the carrot and stick policy started by George W Bush, and the obvious result of the end of any threat of reprisal against Iran --including military-- that the new president wanted. From delay to delay, Obama has given the Iranian military atomic program more than one year's time to develop undisturbed (Bush suspended his policy, based on negotiations but also on concrete military threats, in the Fall of 2008, specifically on the possibility that Obama might win the elections and make it moot), and now he continues to move back the date of a final check. First he set the end of September and then the end of October. Now it will go to December and then he will continue temporizing. Obama is giving the world a proof of extraordinary weakness and absolute blindness. He is demonstrating that he fully deserved the Nobel Peace Prize. Like al-Barada'i.

Here is Panella's original:

Mohammed el Baradei si è assunto il non difficile compito di spiegare al mondo –ae a Barack Obama- cosa significhi essere insignito del Nobel per la Pace, che ricevette nel 2005: giocare alle tre carte, barando, naturalmente. Non si è smentito ieri, quando, a conclusione del secondo incontro di Ginevra sul nucleare iraniano, tra la delegazione di Teheran e i “quattro più uno”, ha annunciato trionfante: “E’ stato un buon inizio”!
. . . . .
Ancor peggio, dopo che Ali Shirizadian, portavoce iraniano, ha annunciato che lo spostamento dell’arricchimento dell’uranio all’estero –oggetto della trattativa di Ginevra- punta solo ad un contenimento dei costi, ma che non significa affatto la fine dei programmi d’arricchimento sviluppate in Iran o il trasferimento integrale di queste operazioni al di fuori del paese”. Insomma, l’Iran non trasferirà mai l’intero processo nucleare fuori dalle sue frontiere (e quindi sarà liberissimo di arrivare all’uranio pesante che gli serve per la bomba atomica) e si limiterà a spostarne una parte all’estero, ma solo per risparmiare. Una solenne presa per i fondelli, a cui si aggiunge un secco calcio nei denti alla Francia che l’Iran accusa di avversare la trattativa, per cui mai e poi mai accetterà di trasferire nessun processo di arricchimento in quel paese. Una umiliazione ad uno dei principali paesi seduti al tavolo della trattativa, che segue decine di altre provocazioni. . .

. . . . . .
La trattativa di Ginevra si conferma dunque per quel che l’Iran voleva che fosse: una perdita di tempo, che permette ai pasdaran e agli ayatollah di procedere indisturbati a dotarsi di una bomba atomica. E’ l’ennesima conferma del fallimento pieno della “svolta” impressa da Barack Obama, della fine della politica della carota e del bastone avviata da Gorge W. Bush e il risultato ovvio della fine di ogni minaccia di ritorsione all’Iran –inclusa quella militare- che il nuovo presidente ha voluto. Di rinvio in rinvio, Obama ha dato al programma militare atomico iraniano più di un anno di tempo per svilupparsi indisturbato (Bush sospese la sua politica basata su trattative, ma anche concrete minacce militari, nell’autunno 2008, proprio nell’eventualità che Obama vincesse le elezioni e che la vanificasse) e ora continua a spostare in avanti la data per una verifica finale. Prima inidcò fine settembre, poi fine ottobre, ora si andrà a dicembre e poi si continuerà temporeggiando. Una prova di debolezza straordinaria e di cecità assoluta che Obama sta dando al mondo, dimostrando però di essere pienamente meritevole del Nobel per la Pace. Come el Baradei. [qui]

Links:
Arab agreement with Israel on the Iran nuclear bomb project and concomitant disagreement with the Obama Administration on that issue.
Curiously, while the American president, Mr Obama, seems to be consciously allowing Iran to develop a nuclear bomb, some Europeans, so often derided by Americans in the past for softness on threats to Western civilization, find that it is Obama and his administration who are soft on the threat represented by Ahmadinajad's Iran, not only Carlo Panella in Italy but in France, President Sarkozy, Francois Thual, Richard Darmon, Michel Gurfinkiel and others.

Several years ago I wrote here that it seemed that nobody really important in the West wanted to stop the Iranian bomb and therefore, that that bomb would become real. Unfortunately, my ominous prophecy was right. I don't always want to be right [also see here]

UPDATING12-10-2009
Barry Rubin on Obama's collaboration in building the Iranian nuclear bomb [here]
Prof Jean-Pierre Bensimon argues that "the cost of a nuclear Iran is certainly infinitely greater than what Western experts now assign to it" while "an ideology of appeasement is now winning a decisive victory among the Western decision-makers," including Obama [in French ici]
Ari Shavit of HaArets faults Obama's leadership [here]. ". . . Obama is liable to leave our children a world in a state of nuclear vertigo. If the Nobel laureate does not want to be remembered as the leader in whose term of office the nuclear genie escaped from the bottle . . . must gain his composure immediately. He must use the little time remaining to lead a resolute campaign against the extremist forces acquiring nuclear capability."
12-14-2009 A document in Farsi describing a detonator for a nuclear bomb said to have been found [here]
12-17-2009 Carlo Panella writes [qui] that Obama should stop thinking that harassing Israel will solve the problem of the Iranian nuclear bomb project.
12-19-09 Former French official Olivier Debouzy in the Wall Street Journal [here]