In this mailing:
- Avi Jorisch: Economic Warfare against Iran
- Michael Curtis: The Real Purpose of Boycotts
Economic Warfare against Iran
by Avi Jorisch
June 6, 2012 at 5:00 am
June 6, 2012 at 5:00 am
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What is
less understood is Tehran's abuse of the financial sector, banks, front
companies, and other deceptive techniques to evade controls responsible
countries have instituted to stop it from achieving nuclearization.
The world is aware of Iran's pursuit of nuclear
weapons and its sponsorship of terrorist organizations. What is less understood
is Tehran's abuse of the financial sector, banks, front companies, and other
deceptive techniques to evade the controls responsible countries have
instituted to stop it from achieving nuclearization. Yet it is precisely these
techniques that make Iran vulnerable to economic warfare, and such warfare, if
deployed intelligently and strategically, could hurt the regime where it is
weakest—its pocketbook.
Securing Uranium Ore
Iran is scouring the earth in search of
countries that possess uranium deposits, searching in Asia, Latin America, and
Africa. Iranian engineers have reportedly mapped out all of the world's uranium
deposits to assess countries most likely to sell them the coveted mineral. Iran
has reportedly decided that Congo, Nigeria, Senegal, and Zimbabwe are the
countries with uranium most likely to do business with it.
If Iran secures large quantities of uranium
that can ultimately be converted into yellowcake, this would likely be the nail
in the coffin in preventing Iran from achieving nuclearization. Policymakers
around the world must be vigilant in tracking Iran's efforts to secure uranium
Crude Oil and Liquefied Natural Gas
The United States has spent tremendous
resources to cut off refined petroleum sales to Iran. Although it is a major
producer of crude oil, Iran imports 40% of its gasoline needs because it lacks
the refining capacity to meet its consumption. Some companies have been
identified, and sanctioned, for supplying gasoline to Iran.
Yet we should be targeting not only what goes
into Iran, but also, what comes out. The biggest source of revenue for Iran,
which has the world's third-largest known oil reserves and second-largest
natural gas reserves, is export of crude oil and liquefied natural gas. Both
the oil and natural gas industries are heavily subsidized by the government.
Targeting and sanctioning the countries and
companies that buy oil and gas from Iran would make a significant contribution
toward cutting off this source of income.
Banking
There are currently thirty Iranian banks around
the globe, and twenty have been designated by the U.S. Treasury Department for
illicit behavior. At this point, no U.S. banks are providing Iranian banks with
financial services, and Treasury has informed major foreign financial
institutions that if they offer such services to designated Iranian banks, they
could lose access to the U.S. market. Furthermore, global banking
organizations, such as SWIFT, are finally turning their backs.
However, some international financial
institutions still offer services to blacklisted Iranian banks, and while many
have operations in the United States and/or access to the U.S. market through
local partners, Treasury has not yet sanctioned a single one. The United States
must start to take advantage of the leverage it possesses over these banks.
Bonyads (Iranian Charities)
Bonyads are tax-exempt Iranian charitable
trusts that control an estimated 20–40% of Iran's GDP. Subsidized by the
government, they answer only to Iran's Supreme Leader. Bonyads represent an
important target for sanctions because they control such a large share of
Iran's economy.
As charities, they supposedly provide social
services to the poor and the needy, but in fact, they are also involved in
every major industry, including soybean and cotton production, hotel
administration, soft drink firms, shipping line ownership and car
manufacturing.
The United States should publicly name, shame,
and blacklist all major bonyads, thus making it illegal to make a charitable
contribution to them.
The United States and its allies have all the
tools necessary to punish the banks, corporations and charities helping Iran
achieve nuclearization. If we are truly going to stop Iran from pursuing
nuclear weapons, we must use as many of the bows in our quiver as possible.
Avi Jorisch is a Senior Fellow for
Counterterrorism at the American Foreign Policy Council and Executive Director
of the Economic Warfare Project, an initiative geared to stopping Iran's quest
for nuclear weapons.
Related Topics: Iran
The Real Purpose of Boycotts
by Michael Curtis
June 6, 2012 at 4:30 am
June 6, 2012 at 4:30 am
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What goes
unmentioned is that the boycott called for by the Palestinian Authority is a
violation of the April 29, 1994 Paris Agreement between Israel and the PLO
which expresses "respect for each other's economic interests," and
recognizes "the need to create a better economic environment for their
peoples and individuals."
Is the purpose of the calls for boycotts
against Israel and its citizens because not a concern for the human rights or
welfare of Palestinians, or actually a call ultimately to eliminate the state
of Israel? If there were a real concern for human rights for the Palestinians,
why are there not calls for a free Palestinian press, or for the release of
journalists from Palestinian prisons, or for an end to the corruption in the
Palestinian leadership?
Instead, these calls for boycott look
suspiciously like a racist response to the existence of a Jewish state -- as if
most of its citizens were wearing a yellow Star-of-David in Nazi-like fashion,
and deserved to be punished or eliminated. Even Noam Chomsky and Norman
Finkelstein, well-known critics of Israel and pro-Palestinian activists, have
characterized the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement against Israel as
"hypocritical," and run by individuals who falsely claim to represent
the Palestinian people.
Whether the calls for boycott are the product
of leftist anti-nationalist posturing, antisemitism, or simple ignorance, is a
matter of judgment. In their disingenuousness nature they are simplistic
responses to complex, unresolved problems that ignore the distinctions between
diverse kinds of activities and issues, such as the different territories and
populations, or how "appropriately" to defend oneself in the face of
continued aggression. If the advocates for boycott do wish for peace, what they
are proposing is actually counterproductive: they create an atmosphere in which
calls for boycott have been, and are, an obstacle to the start of negotiations
between the parties, and in which adversarial positions only become hardened
even further as threats are seen to increase. There seems to be a cognitive dissonance,
an inability among the boycotters, to distinguish between facts and the spun
perception of them; or perhaps there is an indifference to facts, or perhaps
there is a reluctance to place any facts at all in the context of the real,
ongoing relationship between the disputing parties.
Boycotts of Jews and Jewish interests by Arab
groups go back almost a hundred years, and have become more prominent with the
declaration in December, 1945, of the newly formed Arab League Council of 23
countries. The declaration stated that, "Jewish products and manufactured
goods shall be considered undesirable to the Arab countries." Hypocrisy
was present from the start. The Arab states were less interested in helping
Palestinian Arabs than in preventing Jewish products from entering their own
countries and competing with them.
This boycott, administered by the Central
Boycott Office in Damascus, attempted to isolate Israel economically as well as
diplomatically, and did administer some temporary harm to the economy of Israel
after the state was established in 1948. In addition to the Arab states, some
non-Arab businesses, among them Pepsi, McDonald's and most Japanese car
companies, abided by the boycott, but it was more honored in the breach than in
the observance.
Since the 1980s a number of Arab states,
starting with Egypt, and with the exception of Syria, have abandoned the
boycott, wholly or in part, unable to ignore the new world of globalization,
international trade, and binding international trade agreements, particularly
that of the World Trade Organization. As a result, Arab countries, both through
legal channels and clandestinely through third parties, have been trading with
Israeli companies in a considerable fashion, including in irrigation and
security systems, and high-tech components, and have accepted Israeli
investment.
The boycott is still technically in force by
Arab countries, though often bypassed, ineffective and negligible. Its impact
now is less in economic affairs than in becoming a major polemical weapon in
the hands of those non-Arabs who are critical of ,or want to condemn, Israel --
purportedly because of their opposition of Israeli settlements and their
unwillingness to believe that, to the adversaries of Israel, it is regarded as
one big settlement.
People can understand the politically motivated
logic of Arabs, inside Israel as well as outside, calling for a ban on products
made in Israeli settlements, including Ahava Dead Sea health products, Beigel
and Beigel pretzels, Super Drink soft drinks, Oppenheimer chocolates, fruits,
vegetables, computers, and many other products. It is an illustration of
democracy in Israel --- and revealing about those who do not wish Israel well
-- that a major advocate of the boycott is Ahmad Tibi, the Arab-Israeli deputy
speaker of the Knesset.
Unmentioned is that the boycott called for by
the Palestinian Authority is a violation of the April 29, 1994 Paris Agreement
between Israel and the PLO which expresses respect of "each other's
economic interests," and recognizes "the need to create a better
economic environment for their people's and individuals." A further
fallacy in the Palestinian logic is not only that the boycott is a violation of
signed agreements, but also that, in a country the size of Vancouver Island or
New Jersey, it is difficult, if not impossible, to separate the economy of the
settlements from that of Israel as a whole.
What is surprising is the acceptance of
this hostile strategy by non-Arabs, particularly citizens of Britain and other
European countries. The campaign of boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS)
began in July 2005 by 171 Palestinian non-governmental organizations (NGOs),
arguing that they support the Palestinian cause because Israel was not
complying with international law and universal principles of human rights --
regardless, of course, of whether they themselves were or not.
The campaign has led to various kinds of
actions: in the academic area, in the economy, in mainstream Churches, in the
media, in cultural activity, and by non-governmental organizations. In the full
irony of the camel never seeing his hump, and contrary to self-proclaimed
liberal ideas of free speech and opposition to censorship, academic and
cultural groups have expressed their support. The annual Israeli Apartheid Week
in the United States and Europe has led to demonstrations on university
campuses in which anti-Israeli advocates have prevented the expression of
dissent, and has also stimulated antisemitic demonstrations.
A few examples of boycott actions suffice to
illustrate the anti-Israeli malice. The British Association of University
Teachers (AUT) Council voted in April 2005 for different reasons to boycott two
Israeli universities, Haifa and Bar-Ilan; under pressure from members
supporting academic freedom, the boycott was cancelled. However, the British
National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education (NATFHE) in
2006 called for a boycott of Israeli academics and universities; and in 2009, a
new group, the British academic union (UCU), passed a resolution to the same
effect.
Moty Cristal, a well-known Israel expert on
negotiation theory and mediation was disinvited from the conference on conflict
resolution held in Britain in 2012 and arranged by the Manchester Mental Health
and Social Care Trust because of the objection by the Unison trade union, a
constant and open critic of Israel. Further, two Israeli scholars were
dismissed from editorial boards of scientific journals published in Manchester
by the Arab editor.
Economic businesses have entered the picture.
In April 2012 the British Co-operative Group, the fifth largest supermarket
group in Britain, said it would no longer do business with any supplier of
produce from Israeli settlements. It is probably the first major supermarket group
in Europe to implement such a boycott. Its customers will miss the Arava export
growers, Mehadrin, Agrexco, and Adafresh collective exports of fruits and
vegetables. Paradoxically, these companies have employed Arab workers in the
fields and packing-houses. Moreover, Histadrut, the Israel trade union, has had
good relations with PGFTU, the Palestinian counterpart for Palestinian workers.
Most surprising has been the activity of
mainstream Churches, and by individuals in the cultural and entertainment sections
of society. The latter are hardly likely to be sophisticated analysts of Middle
Eastern affairs, yet well known musicians, Elvis Costello, The Pixies,
Cassandra Wilson, Gil Scott Heron, performers including Emma Thompson and Mark
Rylands, and filmmakers Ken Loach and Jean-Luc Godard have expressed support
for a boycott, or refused to visit Israel. This attitude is more likely to
result from fear, intimidation, misplaced self-righteousness or from a desire
to be seen as politically correct among their peers, than from any political or
moral conviction. A group of anti-Israeli activists in 2009 tried to stop the
Toronto Film Festival from featuring Israeli films, and the films of Steven
Spielberg have been banned in 14 Arab countries because he had made a $1
million donation to Israel in 2006.
Recent studies by psychologists and
neuroscientists studying the causes of the unwillingness of individuals to deny
reality or to question either the situation at which they are looking or their
own behavior, suggest that advocates of boycotts against Israel seem to be
prevented by their pre-existing beliefs -- whether anti-Israeli or antisemitic
attitudes -- from appreciating the the context in which facts can be
understood. If they truly wanted to help the Palestinians, their time and
energy would be better spent in encouraging Arab states and Palestinians to
demand better governance from their leaders, and possibly even to enter into
negotiations to normalize political and trade relations with Israel. The
argument that the boycott should remain in place until the Arab-Israeli
conflict is resolved is the exact opposite of the path to either a settlement
or to peace.
Michael Curtis is Distinguished Professor
Emeritus at Rutgers University and author of Should Israel Exist? A
Sovereign Nation under Attack by the International Community.
Related Topics: Israel
| Michael
Curtis
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