WHEN OIL AND WATER MIX

By Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich

05/26/07 "ICH"
-- -- -The concoction becomes lethal. America’s relentless drive to dominate the Middle East and its oil, blends well with Israel’s insatiable appetite for water and unstoppable expansion. It is said that oil and water do not mix – but when they do, it becomes a lethal concoction with no easy solution. The fatal blend engulfing the Middle East today seems to have no end in sight other than darker clouds showering more innocent blood.

The relationship between war and resources is nothing new. “One drop of oil,” said Georges Clemenceau, the Prime Minister of France in the second half of World War I, “is worth one drop of blood of our soldiers.” Today, the U.S. policy makers seem to think that one drop of oil is worth one drop of blood of soldiers and the slaughter of thousands of Arab and Muslim lives. However, to cover their racist ambitions, they disguise their greed as ‘war on terror’ or ‘democratization’.

Knowing that by controlling the world's energy resources in conjunction with the superiority of the U.S. military, the United States would be able to intimidate and coerce the world more effectively, oil policy--wars or covert actions -- have become the overriding determinant of the American foreign policy.

In a New York Times article on February 24, 2006, “Ted Koppel responded to what he described as the Bush administration's "touchiness" about the charge that we are in Iraq because of oil by stating the obvious, though often unsaid, truth, "Now that's curious. Keeping oil flowing out of the Persian Gulf and through the Strait of Hormuz has been bedrock American foreign policy for more than half a century."

Today control over the world's oil supply is at the forefront of Washington policy makers' thinking, even if the president and his team deny any such intent and talk publicly of reducing dependence on Middle East oil by three-quarters of present levels, an absurdly impossible goal. Two-thirds of the oil in the world is in the Middle East, much of it under Iraq and Iran, the axis of oil, the current targets of the U.S. War on Terrorism. Control of oil is integral to Washington's official goal of world domination, a goal stated this baldly in national security documents.”[i]

While oil is the primary motive for the United States, water ideology and expansion are Israel’s motives for giving the Bush administration reason for war, leaving Israel room to benefit from the Bush administration’s ambitions.

In an astonishing interview[ii], the world renowned Israeli military strategist, Martin Van Creveld, whose books are required reading for the U.S. Army officers, revealed that there was “no danger at all of having an Iranian nuclear weapon dropped on us. We cannot say so too openly, however, because we have a history of using any threat in order to get weapons. And it works beautifully: Thanks to Iranian threat, we are getting weapons from U.S. and Germany. I think some people in Israel are deliberately exaggerating our fears because it prompts the response, "Oh, those poor Jews. They're going to have the Holocaust again. Give them weapons"[iii].

Israel needs weapons for wars of aggression and expansion. In its nascent stages, Zionism not only advocated a return to Palestine, but also the redemption of the Jewish people through agrarian physical labor, “and the transformation and rebirth of the ‘wasteland’ of Palestine into a ‘land of milk and honey’”.

The goal of the early Zionist leadership became not only to secure all water resources, but control them at their sources.[iv] Following independence, the same doctrine continued. Israel continued its policy of establishing Jewish settlements in areas of Arab majority (e.g. Galilee) as well as peripheral areas alongside the borders of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and the Negev. Saul Arlosoroff, Chairman of the Israel-Water Engineers Association says:
“The whole philosophy of the Zionist movement was that you maintain control of the land, over your country, by working there and being there. There’s no doubt that if they move out of the border with Lebanon, somebody else will be there, and that somebody is Arabs, not Jews, and the government of Israel doesn’t want Arabs to be there on the border, because the border will move further and further south. The same is true in the Negev.”

Although today Israel imports most of its food staples from the US, and while agriculture is economically insignificant, in territorial-political terms it is of utmost importance. In July 2006, Israel bombed and destroyed Lebanon for 33 days as the world stood by. This was oil and water mixing. Israel did not want Arabs on the border, the United States wanted Hezbollah disabled, a fact readily admitted by then ambassador to the United Nations, John Bolton[v].

In January the Jerusalem Post announced that Israel the Israeli Air Force had plans to buy military equipment from the United States that would help transform regular missiles into precision, satellite-guided weapons. Israel is busy bombing and destroying Palestine and the Gaza at the moment. While on the other hand, it would seem that even a year is too long for the people of Lebanon to recover from destruction and death.

Lebanon is being subjected to internal conflict; Arab is being set up against Arab. After the renowned investigative reporter Sy Hersh revealed that the United States, the Saudis, and the Siniora government are engaged in covert operations in funding and supporting the Jihadist movements in Lebanon in a fight against Hezbollah, the Bush White House had to reveal that it was sending military aid to the Lebanese army[vi].

Once the administration is assured of a full scale civil war which will no doubt engage Hezbollah, the U.S. will attack Iran.

The stage has been set. As nine more U.S. warships enter the Persian Gulf threatening Iran, and with news leaked (informative leak in this writer’s opinion) that the Bush administration has authorized new covert actions against Iran, it is undoubtedly a sign that Bush & Co. hope to provoke a strong reaction from Iran in an attempt to justify a military attack.

Having convinced the world that Iran’s nuclear program is an existential threat to Israel, and outrageous accusations abound, where even the once reputable paper The Guardian is repeating the warmongers allegations of linking Iran with al-Qaeda, the only enemy recognized by the less savvy global citizen, and those thought to have been responsible for 9/11- given that perhaps differentiating between Sunni and Shiite may be too much of a burden for some to consume,[vii] the U.S. seeks to commit mass murder for the sake of power and greed while Israel will expand unhindered.

One has to wonder how many more millions have to be slaughtered before the collective consciousness of humanity is stirred into action. Has the ongoing stench of the genocidal concoction obscured our compassion? Perhaps the fatal potion brings with it another message - shame? Or perhaps even a glimmer of hope that there is still time.

Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich has lived and studied in Iran, the UK, France, Australia and the US. She obtained her Bachelors Degree in International Relations from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, and she is currently pursuing a Masters Degree in Middle East Studies concentrating in Political Science. She has done extensive research on US foreign policy towards Iran and Iran’s nuclear program.
[i] Tabb, William, K. “Monthly Review.” New York:Jan 2007. Vol. 58, Iss. 8, p. 32-42
[ii] Levin, R. “Reality Fights: The Future of War, A talk with military theorist Martin Van Creveld” Playboy Magazine. June 2007, pages 52-53
[iii] http://img158.imagevenue.com/img.php?image=68991_VanCreveld_122_899lo.jpg
[iv] Selby, Jan. “Water, Power & Politics in the Middle East: The Other Israel-Palestinian Conflict” Palgrave & MacMillan NY:2003 pp65-69
[v] http://news.bbc.co.uk:80/2/hi/middle_east/6479377.stm
[vi] UPI
[vii] Guardian