If you listen to the mainstream media their reports say that the White House respects the democratic rights of people around the world to demonstrate. Do you believe that to be the case? Has there ever been a more striking example where the United States has rammed a more contested policy down the throats of the rest of the world? Preemptive invasion just doesn’t seem to be playing to standing applause, if you ask the throngs that are marching around the globe. For most of the world, Iraq is not an imminent problem and disarming Saddam Hussein is not a primary objective. Thugs and villains abound, what makes him the inborn enemy that demands immediate, decisive and definitive removal?  What rational person can reasonably assert that Iraq is the indisputable focus of undeviating evil in the world? Has Iraq changed that much since they were the agent and cohort of the United States during their war against Iran?

The collation that repelled the invasion of Kuwait, in the Gulf War was sold and justified on the basis of territorial violation. No doubt that the conventional consensus supported that campaign. Leaving aside the implied acquiescence that Hussein received from the US State Department, before entering into that principality, the stakes were clear and visible. That can’t be said today. Let’s not forget that Saddam Hussein was allowed to stay in power after that war, by the same people who now tell you that he is the reincarnated Shaytaan Devil. What a slippery slope from the recent call for regime change to a planned colonial occupation. What significant change has taken place to make such a leap, and what has altered the landscape in just over a decade that now requires a new armada of conquistadors to sail to the Gulf?

Funny, we are told it’s not about the lubricate, when the deployment of troops have their earliest mission of securing the oil fields. Oddly, we are told it’s not about Israel when the West Bank and Gaza are under lock down, with expansion blueprints ready to be implemented. Curiously, we are told that it’s the Pax Americana that will save the world, when most of the people in that world view this menacing mindset and unilateral policy as  the Pox Americana. No doubt the “Ugly American” is back in town, and is infecting the region with a remedy that is worse than the ailment.

Are you getting the full story from the sanitized press, from the sterilized media and from the indubitable government spokesmen? Are the NeoCons reflecting your interests and are the Bush patrons representing your benefit? Many typical and solid conservatives are blind to the sham that is staring them directly in their eyes and refuse to accept that they have been had. Just look at the condition of  U.S. “good will” that has exploded in our faces - no longer “the shot heard round the world” - no it’s become  “the shell that wants to shoot a hostile world”. You are with us or against us is all that matters to the War Party.

The unprecedented global demonstrations against an ill-conceived, unsupported and perilous policy is the voice of common sense and sincere opposition. Are you hearing or seeing these appeals on the nightly news? 

"What I would say to Mr. Blair is stop toadying up to the Americans and listen to your own people, us, for once," said Elsie Hinks, 77, who marched in London with her husband, Sidney, a retired Church of England priest.

The New Zealand government is already generally opposed to the war, and in Australia, tens of thousands of people joined protests across the nation, including the capital Canberra, and the state capitals of Perth and Hobart. Andrew Bartlett, the leader of the Australian Democrats, the third main force in Australian politics, said the world's leaders must pursue alternatives other than war to disarm Saddam Hussein. "And it sends a message not to just Australia's political leaders but to leaders around the globe that people everywhere want us to pursue the peace options," he said.

In Barcelona, Spain police estimated that up to 1.3 million people marched in support of peace, with around 200,000 marching in Seville and more than 600,000 in Madrid, the Associated Press news agency reported. In a rare sign of unity, 3,000 Jews and Arabs marched together in Tel Aviv.

With light snow falling, almost half a million marchers passed through the Brandenburg Gate in the biggest peace rally since the end of the second world war. “We Germans, in particular, have a duty to do everything to ensure that war -- above all a war of aggression -- never again becomes a legitimate means of policy,' shouted Friedrich Schorlemmer, a Lutheran pastor and former East German pro-democracy activist.

From Belgrade:  “We are not supporters of Saddam Hussein nor of George Bush, we are simply against the violence of war so we are joining the global peace movement” said Women in Black coordinator Stasa Zajkovic.

With more than 80% of people in France supporting President Jacques Chirac's anti-war stance, this is a huge vote of support for the French president. As 47-year-old Dominique, a florist from Paris, puts it, "nobody wants war", while another stated, "The more President George Bush wants war the more we, the French, will mobilise against him", he said.

These are not just radical extremists of the Left. Of course some antiwar organizations are “collectivist” fronts, having an entirely bogus agenda; but the overwhelming sentiment opposing the imposing unnecessary war against Iraq, comes from ordinary people. Note the voices absent from this opposition and the argument they use to advocate their own narrow and injurious objectives. Might their own biased agenda be the root cause of the conflict that has most of the planet displaying their discontent with a war of expansion?

“While ADL does not consider mere criticism of Israel to be anti-Semitic or illegitimate, large rallies opposing the Jewish state - spurred by events in the Middle East - repeatedly serve as forums supporting violence and terrorist organizations, and have been marred by anti-Semitic expression. In attempting to de-legitimize Israel and challenge its right to exist, members of organizations that publicly repudiate bigotry against Jews - as do most of those named below - tolerate or initiate at their events a grotesque inversion of history equating Zionism with Nazism.”

When hundreds of demonstrators in Seoul rallied, shouting chants such as "Bush, Terrorist!" and carrying banners urging "Drop Bush, not bombs", specifically over this aggressive Middle East incursion, are we to believe that these Asians are anti-Semitic? Or how about, in the Bosnian city of Mostar, where 100 Muslims and Croats united for an anti-war protest - the first such cross-community action in seven years in a place where ethnic divisions remain tense, despite the 1995 Bosnian peace agreement. "We want to say that war is evil and that we who survived one know that better than anyone," said Majda Hadzic, 54. And what about Italy, "You don't fight terrorism with a preventive war," said Tommaso Palladini, 56, who traveled from Milan to Rome. "You fight terrorism by creating more justice in the world."

Is it any surprise that in the Syrian capital of Damascus more than 200,000 people marched, with one banner carrying the slogan "Axis of Evil: America, Britain, Israel"? As long as the Bush/Blair/Sharon greater Israel policy is waged, the war against Iraq will just be the first battle. Americans better wake up soon, the entire world is watching.

SARTRE - February 15, 2003