Noam Chomsky: "...no state has the right to "defend" occupied territories."

[Leigh Meyers <leighcmeyers@xxxxxxxxx>]

Informationclearinghouse, courtesy of Scoop News:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0608/S00079.htm

Noam Chomsky on Israel, Lebanon and Palestine
Tuesday, 8 August 2006, 11:29 pm

Interview By Kaveh Afrasiabi of Global Interfaith Peace
08/07/06

Q: Do you agree with the argument that Israel's military offensive in
Lebanon is "legally and morally justified?"

Noam Chomsky: The invasion itself is a serious breach of international
law, and major war crimes are being committed as it proceeds. There is
no legal justification.

The "moral justification" is supposed to be that capturing soldiers in a
cross-border raid, and killing others, is an outrageous crime. We know,
for certain, that Israel, the United States and other Western
governments, as well as the mainstream of articulate Western opinion, do
not believe a word of that. Sufficient evidence is their tolerance for
many years of US-backed Israeli crimes in Lebanon, including four
invasions before this one, occupation in violation of Security Council
orders for 22 years, and regular killings and abductions. To mention
just one question that every journal should be answering: When did
Nasrallah assume a leadership role? Answer: When the Rabin government
escalated its crimes in Lebanon, murdering Sheikh Abbas Mussawi and his
wife and child with missiles fired from a US helicopter. Nasrallah was
chosen as his successor. Only one of innumerable cases. There is, after
all, a good reason why last February, 70% of Lebanese called for the
capture of Israeli soldiers for prisoner exchange.

The conclusion is underscored, dramatically, by the current upsurge of
violence, which began after the capture of Corporal Gilad Shalit on June
25. Every published Western "timeline" takes that as the opening event.
Yet the day before, Israeli forces kidnapped two Gaza civilians, a
doctor and his brother, and sent them to the Israeli prison system where
they can join innumerable other Palestinians, many held without charges
-- hence kidnapped. Kidnapping of civilians is a far worse crime than
capture of soldiers. The Western response was quite revealing: a few
casual comments, otherwise silence. The major media did not even bother
reporting it. That fact alone demonstrates, with brutal clarity, that
there is no moral justification for the sharp escalation of attacks in
Gaza or the destruction of Lebanon, and that the Western show of outrage
about kidnapping is cynical fraud.

Q: Much has been said about Israel's right to defend itself from its
enemies who are taking advantage of Israel's withdrawal from Gaza, thus
causing the latest chapter in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Do you agree?

NOAM CHOMSKY: Israel certainly has a right to defend itself, but no
state has the right to "defend" occupied territories. When the World
Court condemned Israel's "separation wall," even a US Justice, Judge
Buergenthal, declared that any part of it built to defend Israeli
settlements is "ipso facto in violation of international humanitarian
law," because the settlements themselves are illegal.

The withdrawal of a few thousand illegal settlers from Gaza was publicly
announced as a West Bank expansion plan. It has now been formalized by
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, with the support of Washington, as a program
of annexation of valuable occupied lands and major resources
(particularly water) and cantonization of the remaining territories,
virtually separated from one another and from whatever pitiful piece of
Jerusalem will be granted to Palestinians. All are to be imprisoned,
since Israel is to take over the Jordan valley. Gaza, too, remains
imprisoned and Israel carries out attacks there at will.

Gaza and the West Bank are recognized to be a unit, by the United States
and Israel as well. Therefore, Israel still occupies Gaza, and cannot
claim self-defense in territories it occupies in either of the two parts
of Palestine. It is Israel and the United States that are radically
violating international law. They are now seeking to consummate
long-standing plans to eliminate Palestinian national rights for good.

Q: The United States has refused to call for an immediate cease-fire,
arguing that this would mean a return to the status quo ante, yet we are
witnessing a "back to the past" re-occupation of parts of Lebanon, and
Lebanon's rapid decline to political chaos by the current conflict. Is
the US policy correct?

NOAM CHOMSKY: It is correct from the point of view of those who want to
ensure that Israel, by now virtually an offshore US military base and
high-tech center, dominates the region, without any challenge to its
rule as it proceeds to destroy Palestine. And there are side advantages,
such as eliminating any Lebanese-based deterrent if US-Israel decide to
attack Iran.

They may also hope to set up a client regime in Lebanon of the kind that
Ariel Sharon sought to create when he invaded Lebanon in 1982,
destroying much of the country and killing some 15-20,000 people.

Q: What will be the likely outcome of this "two-pronged" crisis in
Lebanon and the occupied territories, in the near and long-term?

NOAM CHOMSKY: We cannot predict much. There are too many uncertainties.
One very likely consequence, as the United States and Israel surely
anticipated, is a significant increase in jihadi-style terrorism as
anger and hatred directed against the United States, Israel, and Britain
sweep the Arab and Muslim worlds. Another is that Nasrallah, whether he
survives or is killed, will become an even more important symbol of
resistance to US-Israeli aggression. Hezbollah already has a phenomenal
87% support in Lebanon itself, and its resistance has energized popular
opinion to such an extent that even the oldest and closest US allies
have been compelled to say that "If the peace option is rejected due to
the Israeli arrogance, then only the war option remains, and no one
knows the repercussions befalling the region, including wars and
conflict that will spare no one, including those whose military power is
now tempting them to play with fire." That's from King Abdullah of Saudi
Arabia, who knows better than to condemn the United States directly.

Q: What steps do you recommend for the current hostilities to be brought
to an end and a lasting peace established?

NOAM CHOMSKY: The basic steps are well understood: a cease-fire and
exchange of prisoners; withdrawal of occupying forces; continuation of
the "national dialogue" within Lebanon; and acceptance of the very broad
international consensus on a two-state settlement for Israel-Palestine,
which has been unilaterally blocked by the United States and Israel for
thirty years. There is, as always, much more to say, but those are the
essentials.

*************

Noam Chomsky is Professor of Linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology (MIT). He is the author of numerous books, and his latest
is Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy (2006).

Kaveh Afrasiabi is the founder and director of Global Interfaith Peace,
and a former political science professor at Tehran University. He is the
author of After Khomeini: New Directions in Iran's Foreign Policy
(Westview Press).

ENDS