Fisking Tony Blair

Tony Blair has delivered his major foreign policy speech on the Middle East to the Los Angeles World Affairs Council. The media is calling it a coded criticism of George Bush, but I doubt Dubya will decode it as anything other than endorsement of his policies.

In the speech he called for a "complete renaissance" on foreign policy to combat "Reactionary Islam". I don’t usually fisk speeches or articles so I’m out of practice, but I couldn’t resist this. It’s such a load of the usual Blairite garbage it deserves a good fisking.

Overnight, the news came through that as well as continuing conflict in the Lebanon, Britain's Armed Forces suffered losses in Iraq and Afghanistan. It brings home yet again the extraordinary courage and commitment of our armed forces who risk their lives and in some cases tragically lose them, defending our country's security and that of the wider world. These are people of whom we should be very proud.

They are not defending our country’s security. Iraq was never a threat to us. They are risking their lives for Bush’s imperial mission, control of oil supplies oh, and your legacy.

I know the US has suffered heavy losses too in Iraq and in Afghanistan. We should never forget how much we owe these people, how great their bravery, and their sacrifice.

I planned the basis of this speech several weeks ago. The crisis in the Lebanon has not changed its thesis. It has brought it into sharp relief.

The crisis in Lebanon demonstrates yet again how many innocent people you are willing to see die, this time so that Israel can expand into Lebanon for the 5th time in 30 years.

The purpose of the provocation that began the conflict was clear. It was to create chaos, division and bloodshed, to provoke retaliation by Israel that would lead to Arab and Muslim opinion being inflamed, not against those who started the aggression but against those who responded to it.

The purpose of the “provocation” as you put it was to get some its prisoners back and to show support for the beleaguered Palestinians in Gaza who are being massacred.

It is still possible even now to come out of this crisis with a better long-term prospect for the cause of moderation in the Middle East succeeding. But it would be absurd not to face up to the immediate damage to that cause which has been done.

If it would be absurd not to face up the immediate damage to the cause of moderation in the Middle East, then why are you silencing the voices of moderation and encouraging extremism? You should be helping Lebanon, a moderate state. By encouraging the slaughter you are going to turn them into fanatics.

We will continue to do all we can to halt the hostilities. But once that has happened, we must commit ourselves to a complete renaissance of our strategy to defeat those that threaten us. There is an arc of extremism now stretching across the Middle East and touching, with increasing definition, countries far outside that region. To defeat it will need an alliance of moderation, that paints a different future in which Muslim, Jew and Christian; Arab and Western; wealthy and developing nations can make progress in peace and harmony with each other. My argument to you today is this: we will not win the battle against this global extremism unless we win it at the level of values as much as force, unless we show we are even-handed, fair and just in our application of those values to the world.

The point is this. This is war, but of a completely unconventional kind.

You have done nothing to halt the hostilities and, in fact, done everything possible to prevent the ceasefire that the whole world is calling for, except for the USA, Israel and Britain. A “renaissance of our strategy”? A complete re-think you mean, surely. Its been an unmitigated disaster right from the start and is getting worse. This “arc of extremism”, was that term thought up by the same idiot who came up with “axis of evil”? And this “alliance of moderation”, that’s you I suppose; rendition, Guantanamo etc. Last year you were saying “the rules have changed”. Your argument that you cannot win against global extremism unless you show even-handedness and fairness sounds good Tony. Have you just realised that? We’ve been saying it for years. Perhaps the fact that you are not winning shows that there is no fairness, no even-handedness, and as for values … explain them to the survivors of Qana of Fallujah. And as for war of an “unconventional kind”, well I’m not sure about that. After all in World War II thousands of innocent civilians were also deliberately targeted by superpowers levelling cities with WMD. And there were also resistance groups, only they weren’t called “terrorists” in those days; partisans, maquis or just the resistance, but not terrorists.

9/11 in the US, 7/7 in the UK, 11/3 in Madrid, the countless terrorist attacks in countries as disparate as Indonesia or Algeria, what is now happening in Afghanistan and in Indonesia, the continuing conflict in Lebanon and Palestine, it is all part of the same thing. What are the values that govern the future of the world? Are they those of tolerance, freedom, respect for difference and diversity or those of reaction, division and hatred? My point is that this war can't be won in a conventional way. It can only be won by showing that our values are stronger, better and more just, more fair than the alternative. Doing this, however, requires us to change dramatically the focus of our policy.

Yes Tony is all part of the same thing, if you look at the injustices heaped on these peoples prior to 9/11. That’s not justifying what they do, it's obviously totally wrong and has to be stopped, but it does mean you need to look at the causes then you can go about preventing these atrocities. You keep using the word “values”. Your values (whatever they are) haven’t succeeded in Iraq, unless utter chaos and anarchy are part of your values. And yes, you certainly do need to change your policy, not just the focus of it.

Unless we re-appraise our strategy, unless we revitalise the broader global agenda on poverty, climate change, trade, and in respect of the Middle East, bend every sinew of our will to making peace between Israel and Palestine, we will not win. And this is a battle we must win.

You’ve failed on poverty, failed on climate change, failed on trade and failed with Israel and Palestine, and you will continue to fail until you stop putting the interests of the USA and Israel above all else.

What is happening today out in the Middle East, in Afghanistan and beyond is an elemental struggle about the values that will shape our future.

That word again, please stop using it until you know what it means.

It is in part a struggle between what I will call Reactionary Islam and Moderate, Mainstream Islam. But its implications go far wider. We are fighting a war, but not just against terrorism but about how the world should govern itself in the early 21st century, about global values.

In other words you think that you and Bush should govern the world and there is no room for any other kind of governance, that doesn’t sound very tolerant and moderate.

The root causes of the current crisis are supremely indicative of this. Ever since September 11th, the US has embarked on a policy of intervention in order to protect its and our future security. Hence Afghanistan. Hence Iraq. Hence the broader Middle East initiative in support of moves towards democracy in the Arab world.
The point about these interventions, however, military and otherwise, is that they were not just about changing regimes but changing the values systems governing the nations concerned. The banner was not actually "regime change" it was "values change".

Not about changing regimes? That’s not what you said when you went about changing those regimes was it? I don’t recall you saying “values change” three years ago.

What we have done therefore in intervening in this way, is far more momentous than possibly we appreciated at the time.

You can say that again, it will take generations to put right, and Iraq is probably destroyed forever.

Of course the fanatics, attached to a completely wrong and reactionary view of Islam, had been engaging in terrorism for years before September 11th. In Chechnya, in India and Pakistan, in Algeria, in many other Muslim countries, atrocities were occurring. But we did not feel the impact directly. So we were not bending our eye or our will to it as we should have. We had barely heard of the Taleban. We rather inclined to the view that where there was terrorism, perhaps it was partly the fault of the governments of the countries concerned.

Have you any idea how you sound when you, a Christian, say which bits of Islam are right and which are wrong? Yes, there is obviously Islamic extremism. Look at the causes not the symptoms. Extremist Islam is the excuse for a much deeper problem.

We were in error. In fact, these acts of terrorism were not isolated incidents. They were part of a growing movement. A movement that believed Muslims had departed from their proper faith, were being taken over by Western culture, were being governed treacherously by Muslims complicit in this take-over, whereas the true way to recover not just the true faith, but Muslim confidence and self esteem, was to take on the West and all its works.

And you call us conspiracy theorists. The West and all its works is largely the cause of the extremism IMHO.

Sometimes political strategy comes deliberatively, sometimes by instinct. For this movement, it was probably by instinct. It has an ideology, a world-view, it has deep convictions and the determination of the fanatic. It resembles in many ways early revolutionary Communism. It doesn't always need structures and command centres or even explicit communication. It knows what it thinks.

What are you on about? Are you trying to convince us we should go back to the reds-under-the-bed McCarthy climate of fear that existed in America in the 1950s?

Its strategy in the late 1990s became clear. If they were merely fighting with Islam, they ran the risk that fellow Muslims - being as decent and fair-minded as anyone else - would choose to reject their fanaticism. A battle about Islam was just Muslim versus Muslim. They realised they had to create a completely different battle in Muslim minds: Muslim versus Western.

So Muslims decided to become fanatical and attack the West why, out of boredom with killing each other? No reason at all, whatsoever, just a unilateral decision to attack the West? Are you serious?

This is what September 11th did. Still now, I am amazed at how many people will say, in effect, there is increased terrorism today because we invaded Afghanistan and Iraq. They seem to forget entirely that September 11th predated either. The West didn't attack this movement. We were attacked. Until then we had largely ignored it.

Yes, we were attacked on September 11th no one is justifying it or excusing it. Because you think that nothing at all was done to provoke it and that history started on that day (no mention for instance of the Gulf War and American troops in Saudi Arabia, the continuing Israeli expansion into Palestinian territories and the American arming of the Mujahadim in Afghanistan etc.) then I guess you think the resulting chaos across the entire region was proportionate, and successful.

The reason I say our response was even more momentous than it seemed at the time, is this. We could have chosen security as the battleground. But we didn't. We chose values. We said we didn't want another Taleban or a different Saddam. Rightly, in my view, we realised that you can't defeat a fanatical ideology just by imprisoning or killing its leaders; you have to defeat its ideas.

You can’t kill an idea. And, now that you mention it, security seems like a pretty good idea, certainly better than what you achieved; a resurgent Taliban, Iraq in civil war and increasingly fanatical and theocratic. What were those values of yours again?

There is a host of analysis written about mistakes made in Iraq or Afghanistan, much of it with hindsight but some of it with justification. But it all misses one vital point. The moment we decided not to change regime but to change the value system, we made both Iraq and Afghanistan into existential battles for Reactionary Islam. We posed a threat not to their activities simply: but to their values, to the roots of their existence.

Wrong, first of all, you lied to us about WMD, remember? You’re so called values again no doubt. Again you never mentioned changing value systems. When the WMD lie was exposed, the reason for the invasion kept changing. We’ve had every conceivable excuse from you except the one about America’s need to control the world’s oil supply, and of course your famous legacy.

We committed ourselves to supporting Moderate, Mainstream Islam. In almost pristine form, the battles in Iraq or Afghanistan became battles between the majority of Muslims in either country who wanted democracy and the minority who realise that this rings the death-knell of their ideology.

You support moderate, mainstream Islam. Is that why women in southern Iraq can no longer work or go out or wear what they want the way they used to. Tell us some more about you’re support for the very moderate Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan. From what I’ve heard, the death-knells in that country come from large vats of boiling water.

What is more, in doing this, we widened the definition of Reactionary Islam. It is not just Al-Qaeda who felt threatened by the prospect of two brutal dictatorships - one secular, one religious - becoming tolerant democracies. Any other country who could see that change in those countries might result in change in theirs, immediately also felt under threat. Syria and Iran, for example. No matter that previously, in what was effectively another political age, many of those under threat hated each other. Suddenly new alliances became formed under the impulsion of the common threat.

Not only did you widen the definition of reactionary Islam, you spread reactionary Islam, I don’t think Al Qaeda feels threatened by tolerant democracies, mainly because you have failed to create tolerant democracies. Countries do feel threatened and are banding together to defend themselves better from Anglo-American aggression.

So in Iraq, Syria allowed Al-Qaeda operatives to cross the border. Iran has supported extremist Shia there. The purpose of the terrorism in Iraq is absolutely
simple: carnage, causing sectarian hatred, leading to civil war.

That’s putting the cart before the horse don’t you think? Blair, it was you’re invasion of Iraq that caused the carnage, the sectarian strife and the civil war. None of that would have happened if you hadn’t invaded. Saddam was the lesser of many evils you have unleashed on that country.

However, there was one cause which, the world over, unites Islam, one issue that even the most westernised Muslims find unjust and, perhaps worse, humiliating: Palestine. Here a moderate leadership was squeezed between its own inability to control the radical elements and the political stagnation of the peace process. When Prime Minister Sharon took the brave step of disengagement from Gaza, it could have been and should have been the opportunity to re-start the process. But the squeeze was too great and as ever because these processes never stay still, instead of moving forward, it fell back. Hamas won the election. Even then, had moderate elements in Hamas been able to show progress, the situation might have been saved. But they couldn't.

Yes Tony, Palestine, and still you are misinterpreting it. Here a moderate leadership was squeezed by a vicious and brutal occupier supported by a superpower, with carte blanche do precisely what it pleased with total impunity and any nation or group trying to help labelled “terrorist” or “extremist”. The crushing daily humiliation and suffering on that population and no help at all from you caused them to vote in Hamas. The moderate element in Hamas vanished when you and your master ensured that all funding was cut off from them.

So the opportunity passed to Reactionary Islam and they seized it: first in Gaza, then in Lebanon. They knew what would happen. Their terrorism would provoke massive retaliation by Israel. Within days, the world would forget the original provocation and be shocked by the retaliation. They want to trap the Moderates between support for America and an Arab street furious at what they see nightly on their television. This is what has happened.

Wrong again, their retaliation provoked massive terrorism from Israel, and no one except you and the people you can dupe have forgotten the original provocation. They don’t want to trap anybody, they want to be free, and they want their land back. What they see on their television is real; Israel backed by you and bush bombing civilians …again. Of course they are furious.

For them, what is vital is that the struggle is defined in their terms: Islam versus the West; that instead of Muslims seeing this as about democracy versus dictatorship, they see only the bombs and the brutality of war, and sent from Israel.

It’s not about Islam, religion becomes an excuse (just as it does in America). It’s about occupation and freedom to decide one’s own destiny.

In this way, they hope that the arc of extremism that now stretches across the region, will sweep away the fledgling but faltering steps Modern Islam wants to take into the future.

I can’t help remembering that the “arc of extremism” you mention has the same shape as what historians call the “fertile crescent”. Is that just a coincidence? Perhaps if you left them alone they might find an easier path to democracy, because you’re interference certainly has the opposite effect.

To turn all of this around requires us first to perceive the nature of the struggle we are fighting and secondly to have a realistic strategy to win it. At present we are challenged on both fronts.

To turn this around requires you to stop what you’re doing and get out. The more you interfere the worse it gets. Can’t you see that?

As to the first, it is almost incredible to me that so much of Western opinion appears to buy the idea that the emergence of this global terrorism is somehow our fault. For a start, it is indeed global. No-one who ever half bothers to look at the spread and range of activity related to this terrorism can fail to see its presence in virtually every major nation in the world. It is directed at the United States and its allies, of course. But it is also directed at nations who could not conceivably be said to be allies of the West. It is also rubbish to suggest that it is the product of poverty. It is true it will use the cause of poverty. But its fanatics are hardly the champions of economic development. It is based on religious extremism. That is the fact. And not any religious extremism; but a specifically Muslim version.

Yes it is you’re fault, everyone knows that and if you don’t it is either because you are stupid, in denial or just lying again. It is global because, as you like to say, “We live in a globalised world”. Did you really think that globalisation was just about commerce? Do you think it’s a coincidence that the United States is in every major nation of the world? Just because these fanatics, as you call them, are not the champions of economic development doesn’t mean that you are either. And no, it is not just Muslim extremism. What country is banning stem cell research for religious reasons? Which country is going out of its way to prevent women from choosing whether or not to have children? Which country teaches creationism as if it was scientific fact? And which American president believes in all that and also the end-of-days theocracy with the rapture? Bush makes Mahmoud Ahmadinejad look sane.

What it is doing in Iraq and Afghanistan is not about those countries' liberation from US occupation. It is actually the only reason for the continuing presence of our troops. And it is they not us who are doing the slaughter of the innocent and doing it deliberately.

It is exactly about liberation from US occupation. You went in, created chaos and then say that you have to stay there because it is chaos. It is they and you doing the slaughter of the innocent, but mostly you, and you’re bombing campaigns are no accident.

Its purpose is explicitly to prevent those countries becoming democracies and not "Western style" democracies, any sort of democracy. It is to prevent Palestine living side by side with Israel; not to fight for the coming into being of a Palestinian State, but for the going out of being, of an Israeli State. It is not wanting Muslim countries to modernise but to retreat into governance by a semi-feudal religious oligarchy.

It is the west that prevents those countries becoming democracies. Iran was once a democracy until American and British interference removed the Prime Minister. Saudi Arabia is under no pressure from you to be democratic, nor is Kuwait. Palestinians elected their government and you punished them for it. Lebanon is a struggling democracy and you are standing by as it is snuffed out. It will probably turn into a semi-feudal religious oligarchy now.

Yet despite all of this, which I consider virtually obvious, we look at the bloodshed in Iraq and say that's a reason for leaving; we listen to the propaganda that tells us its all because of our suppression of Muslims and have parts of our opinion seriously believing that if we only got out of Iraq and Afghanistan, it would all stop.

No, it probably won’t all stop if you leave the damage is done and I fear its irreparable.

And most contemporaneously, and in some ways most perniciously, a very large and, I fear, growing part of our opinion looks at Israel, and thinks we pay too great a price for supporting it and sympathises with Muslim opinion that condemns it. Absent from so much of the coverage, is any understanding of the Israeli predicament.

Israel should be condemned. Not condemning it shows a double standard. If Iran behaved like Israel would you justify it? No, I didn’t think so. How many UN resolutions has Israel ignored with impunity? How many did Iraq ignore?

I, and any halfway sentient human being, regards the loss of civilian life in Lebanon as unacceptable, grieves for that nation, is sickened by its plight and wants the war to stop now. But just for a moment, put yourself in Israel's place. It has a crisis in Gaza, sparked by the kidnap of a solider by Hamas. Suddenly, without warning, Hizbollah who have been continuing to operate in Southern Lebanon for two years in defiance of UN Resolution 1559, cross the UN blue line, kill eight Israeli soldiers and kidnap two more. They then fire rockets indiscriminately at the civilian population in Northern Israel.

You obviously don’t find the loss of civilian life so unacceptable that you are calling for an immediate ceasefire as the rest of the world does. Israel created the crisis in Gaza. The day before the “kidnap” of the Israeli soldier, Israel “kidnapped” Palestinians. It was even reported in the news albeit briefly before the story mysteriously vanished. Here it is.

Hizbollah gets their weapons from Iran. Iran are now also financing militant elements in Hamas. Iran's President has called for Israel to be "wiped off the map". And he's trying to acquire a nuclear weapon. Just to complete the picture, Israel's main neighbour along its eastern flank is Syria who support Hizbollah and house the hardline leaders of Hamas.

And you’re point is? America supplies the bombs that are dropped on Palestinian and Lebanese civilians, and, as you know, they go through British airports.

It's not exactly a situation conducive to a feeling of security is it?

No, it certainly is not. Stop supplying weapons to terrorists.

But the central point is this. In the end, even the issue of Israel is just part of the same, wider struggle for the soul of the region. If we recognised this struggle for what it truly is, we would be at least along the first steps of the path to winning it. But a vast part of the Western opinion is not remotely near this yet.

Yes, the vast part of the Western opinion differs from yours, what does that tell you? Is it always the case that you are right and everyone else is wrong?

Whatever the outward manifestation at any one time - in Lebanon, in Gaza, in Iraq and add to that in Afghanistan, in Kashmir, in a host of other nations including now some in Africa - it is a global fight about global values; it is about modernisation, within Islam and outside of it; it is about whether our value system can be shown to be sufficiently robust, true, principled and appealing that it beats theirs. Islamist extremism's whole strategy is based on a presumed sense of grievance that can motivate people to divide against each other. Our answer has to be a set of values strong enough to unite people with each other.

The longer you stay in power the worse it seems to get, funny that. It is not a global fight against global values. That’s how you choose to spin it for your own agenda. It is lots of regional issues with similar causes. And, believe me, your values are no where near robust enough to beat the problems. It has come to our attention that you are not exactly “whiter than white”. Values will eventually help solve the problem, but not yours.

This is not just about security or military tactics. It is about hearts and minds about inspiring people, persuading them, showing them what our values at their best stand for.

The hearts and minds are blown all over the streets of Qana and Fallujah. Those that survive will remember Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Very inspiring eh?

Just to state it in these terms, is to underline how much we have to do. Convincing our own opinion of the nature of the battle is hard enough. But we then have to empower Moderate, Mainstream Islam to defeat Reactionary Islam. And because so much focus is now, world-wide on this issue, it is becoming itself a kind of surrogate for all the other issues the rest of the world has with the West. In other words, fail on this and across the range, everything gets harder.

It fails because it is based on falsehoods. Not even you can fool all the people all of the time. You are not empowering Moderate Mainstream Islam, you are scaring it.

Why are we not yet succeeding? Because we are not being bold enough, consistent enough, thorough enough, in fighting for the values we believe in.

You are not succeeding because you are utterly wrong. No amount of boldness, consistency, thoroughness, is going to help. Again, it’s your values that are flawed and in your arrogance you believe that you are right and the rest of the world is wrong.

We start this battle with some self-evident challenges. Iraq's political process has worked in an extraordinary way. But the continued sectarian bloodshed is appalling: and threatens its progress deeply. In Afghanistan, the Taleban are making a determined effort to return and using the drugs trade a front. Years of anti-Israeli and therefore anti-American teaching and propaganda has left the Arab street often wildly divorced from the practical politics of their governments. Iran and, to a lesser extent, Syria are a constant source of de-stabilisation and reaction. The purpose of terrorism - whether in Iran, Afghanistan, Lebanon or Palestine is never just the terrorist act itself. It is to use the act to trigger a chain reaction, to expunge any willingness to negotiate or compromise. Unfortunately it frequently works, as we know from our own experience in Northern Ireland, though thankfully the huge progress made in the last decade there, shows that it can also be overcome.

You are repeating yourself Blair. All your language is dressed in words like “battle”. It’s a dead giveaway. You’ll be talking about crusades next if you’re not careful. What is extraordinary about Iraq’s political process is that it has survived despite you not because of you, but I might be speaking too soon. The drugs trade in Afghanistan has got worse since the “defeat” of the Taliban. And just give up talking about Israel and Palestine until you are prepared to level equal criticism at Israel. I’m sure Lord Levy won’t mind.

So, short-term, we can't say we are winning. But, there are many reasons for long-term optimism. Across the Middle East, there is a process of modernisation as well as reaction. It is unnoticed but it is there: in the UAE; in Bahrain; in Kuwait; in Qatar. In Egypt, there is debate about the speed of change but not about its direction. In Libya and Algeria, there is both greater stability and a gradual but significant opening up.

In the short-term you are losing. In the long-term you or Bush won’t be around to screw things up any more than you already have. The way things are going there will be a series of revolutions among your Middle Eastern allies and things may well get significantly worse.

Most of all, there is one incontrovertible truth that should give us hope. In Iraq, in Afghanistan, and of course in the Lebanon, any time that people are permitted a chance to embrace democracy, they do so. The lie - that democracy, the rule of law, human rights are Western concepts, alien to Islam - has been exposed. In countries as disparate as Turkey and Indonesia, there is an emerging strength in Moderate Islam that should greatly encourage us.

Isn’t that so typical of Blairism, to spout a truism as though everyone was saying the opposite? Of course the Middle East is able to embrace democracy, if only you would let it. Lead by example not by bombing. British democracy evolved over years, we weren’t bombed into it.

So the struggle is finely poised. The question is: how do we empower the moderates to defeat the extremists?

By resigning, you are part of the problem and an extremist.

First, naturally, we should support, nurture, build strong alliances with all those in the Middle East who are on the modernising path.

You mean in places like Lebanon… Oops!

Secondly, we need, as President Bush said on Friday, to re-energise the MEPP between Israel and Palestine; and we need to do it in a dramatic and profound manner.

When has Bush done anything to help the MEPP? Oh, yes he made some noises about a Palestinian state and then said Israel could keep its settlements. He then vetoed any attempt to stop a wall being driven from what’s left of Palestinian land. Solving the problem in a dramatic and profound manner would be to have a process not run by Zionists. You wouldn't put a fox in charge of a chicken coup, would you?

I want to explain why I think this issue is so utterly fundamental to all we are trying to do. I know it can be very irritating for Israel to be told that this issue is of cardinal importance, as if it is on their shoulders that the weight of the troubles of the region should always fall. I know also their fear that in our anxiety for wider reasons to secure a settlement, we sacrifice the vital interests of Israel.

The vital interests of Israel being: the extermination of the Palestinians, the theft of their land and hegemony over all its neighbours as the only nuclear power in the region. A racist Zionist state controlling all the surrounding Muslim states.

Let me make it clear. I would never put Israel's security at risk.

Funnily enough I never doubted it.

Instead I want, what we all now acknowledge we need: a two state solution. The Palestinian State must be independent, viable but also democratic and not threaten Israel's safety.

Except that it can’t be because Israel continues to swallow up the West Bank and you have just said that you would never put Israel’s security at risk. So far we have not heard a word of criticism towards Israel, have we Blair?

This is what the majority of Israelis and Palestinians want.

If that was true then they would have it.

Its significance for the broader issue of the Middle East and for the battle within Islam, is this. The real impact of a settlement is more than correcting the plight of the Palestinians. It is that such a settlement would be the living, tangible, visible proof that the region and therefore the world can accommodate different faiths and cultures, even those who have been in vehement opposition to each other. It is, in other words, the total and complete rejection of the case of Reactionary Islam. It destroys not just their most effective rallying call, it fatally undermines their basic ideology.

Err what about reactionary Zionism that will never allow it to happen. You know the old ‘put the MEPP in formaldehyde’ trick.

And, for sure, it empowers Moderate, Mainstream Islam enormously. They are able to point to progress as demonstration that their allies, ie us, are even-handed not selective, do care about justice for Muslims as much as Christians or Jews.

There is just one problem with that. You are not even-handed, you are selective and don’t care about justice full stop.

But, and it is a big 'but', this progress will not happen unless we change radically our degree of focus, effort and engagement, especially with the Palestinian side. In this the active leadership of the US is essential but so also is the participation of Europe, of Russia and of the UN. We need relentlessly, vigorously, to put a viable Palestinian Government on its feet, to offer a vision of how the Roadmap to final status negotiation can happen and then pursue it, week in, week out, 'til its done. Nothing else will do. Nothing else is more important to the success of our foreign policy.

No Blair, it won’t. But who is it who sidelines Europe, the Russians and the UN? You have just destroyed one Palestinian Government, they might be rather cautious to form another one now that they know your attitude to democracy. Your foreign policy has been a dismal failure. You and your foreign policy have as much credibility as the Roadmap that we all know Israel will never allow.

Third, we need to see Iraq through its crisis and out to the place its people want: a non-sectarian, democratic state. The Iraqi and Afghan fight for democracy is our fight. Same values. Same enemy. Victory for them is victory for us all.

Too bad that what your foreign policy created in Iraq, was, in fact, a sectarian civil war then. How likely do you think it is that Iraqis and Afghans are going to buy cheap soundbites after what they have experienced? Some Americans may buy that crap but no one else will.

Fourth, we need to make clear to Syria and Iran that there is a choice: come in to the international community and play by the same rules as the rest of us; or be confronted. Their support of terrorism, their deliberate export of instability, their desire to see wrecked the democratic prospect in Iraq, is utterly unjustifiable, dangerous and wrong. If they keep raising the stakes, they will find they have miscalculated.

Syria and Iran are doing no more than you are doing. If their export of instability is so “utterly unjustifiable” then why are you doing the same? Threats won’t help here. You need to talk to Iran and Syria. You don’t need me to tell you just how many problems Iran will give you if you try to confront it. They will play havoc with oil prices, spread even more chaos than you have in southern Iraq, and that’s before a war starts. Confront Syria and you risk consequences from Egypt which is very unstable at the moment.

From the above it is clear that from now on, we need a whole strategy for the Middle East. If we are faced with an arc of extremism, we need a corresponding arc of moderation and reconciliation. Each part is linked. Progress between Israel and Palestine affects Iraq. Progress in Iraq affects democracy in the region. Progress for Moderate, Mainstream Islam anywhere puts Reactionary Islam on the defensive everywhere. But none of it happens unless in each individual part the necessary energy and commitment is displayed not fitfully, but continuously.

What you need is a completely new strategy, and new people to carry it through. Everything you have done has failed. Everything you have done to try and correct the failure has made matters worse. You won’t make any progress in Iraq. Iraq is finished as a country. Your killing spree has ended Moderate Mainstream Islam in the region.

I said at the outset that the result of this struggle had effects wider than the region itself. Plainly that applies to our own security. This Global Islamist terrorism began in the Middle East. Sort the Middle East and it will inexorably decline. The read-across, for example, from the region to the Muslim communities in Europe is almost instant.

I thought you said that 7/7 had nothing at all to do with the war in Iraq. What brought on the change of heart? When you learn to show even-handedness both in the Middle East and at home then things might improve, but you are too enslaved to an American agenda for that.

But there is a less obvious sense in which the outcome determines the success of our wider world-view. For me, a victory for the moderates means an Islam that is open: open to globalisation, open to working with others of different faiths, open to alliances with other nations.

Open to exploitation by America and Britain you mean.

In this way, this struggle is in fact part of a far wider debate.

Here we go, your vision of the future.

Though Left and Right still matter in politics, the increasing divide today is between open and closed. Is the answer to globalisation, protectionism or free trade?

That’s part of the problem. You abandoned the left in favour of greed and exploitation.

Is the answer to the pressure of mass migration, managed immigration or closed borders?

If you hadn’t wrecked the rest of the world they wouldn’t be trying to get here in such numbers.

Is the answer to global security threats, isolationism or engagement?

In the case of you and Bush, isolation would be best until someone competent comes along.

Those are very big questions for US and for Europe.

It’s quite easy really.

Without hesitation, I am on the open side of the argument. The way for us to handle the challenge of globalisation, is to compete better, more intelligently, more flexibly. We have to give our people confidence we can compete. See competition as a threat and we are already on the way to losing.

Hmm we’re back to the problem of your ability to display intelligence and flexibility. I’m afraid you just don’t inspire confidence, and by the way, you’ve already lost. Your international credibility is slightly above zero.

Immigration is the toughest issue in Europe right now and you know something of it here in California. People get scared of it for understandable reasons. It needs to be controlled. There have to be rules. Many of the Conventions dealing with it post WWII are out of date. All that is true. But, properly managed, immigrants give a country dynamism, drive, new ideas as well as new blood.

That’s why in America they are building a huge wall across the Mexican frontier, and in Britain you don’t even know how many illegal immigrants there are. Unless of course they are ex-prisoners who should have been deported.

And as for isolationism, that is a perennial risk in the US and EU policy. My point here is very simple: global terrorism means we can't opt-out even if we wanted to. The world is inter-dependent. To be engaged is only modern realpolitik.

I think the world has had enough of your realpolitik. You talk about the dangers of isolation. You have isolated Britain from Europe and the rest of the world. America is seen as a pariah state, as is Israel. Three countries against everyone else, what an achievement!

But we only win people to these positions if our policy is not just about interests but about values, not just about what is necessary but about what is right.

Yeah right, everyone is flocking to your values… dream on.

Which brings me to my final reflection about US policy. My advice is: always be in the lead, always at the forefront, always engaged in building alliances, in reaching out, in showing that whereas unilateral action can never be ruled out, it is not the preference.

I’m sure they will be doing just that now that you’ve told them to.

How we get a sensible, balanced but effective framework to tackle climate change after the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012 should be an American priority.

The American priority is to get its hands on the world’s remaining oil supplies and blackmail the rest of the world. Bush wouldn’t believe in climate change if California caught fire year after year and hurricanes took out large cities… Oh, it’s already happened.

America wants a low-carbon economy; it is investing heavily in clean technology; it needs China and India to grow substantially. The world is ready for a new start here. Lead it.

The growth of China, India and pretty much everywhere else is unsustainable. Resources are limited and we will be fighting over them in no time unless another system is found.

The same is true for the WTO talks, now precariously in the balance; or for Africa, whose poverty is shameful.

And guess who sabotaged the WTO talks? Not “precariously in the balance”… wrecked!

If we are championing the cause of development in Africa, it is right in itself but it is also sending the message of moral purpose, that reinforces our value system as credible in all other aspects of policy.

I wonder how many times you’ve used the word “value” so far. Hmm, 19 times, I bet that’s more than the words “peace” or “immediate” or “ceasefire”.

It serves one other objective. There is a risk that the world, after the Cold War, goes back to a global policy based on spheres of influence. Think ahead. Think China, within 20 or 30 years, surely the world's other super-power. Think Russia and its precious energy reserves. Think India. I believe all of these great emerging powers want a benign relationship with the West. But I also believe that the stronger and more appealing our world-view is, the more it is seen as based not just on power but on justice, the easier it will be for us to shape the future in which Europe and the US will no longer, economically or politically, be transcendant. Long before then, we want Moderate, Mainstream Islam to triumph over Reactionary Islam.

We are already in a global situation based on spheres of influence, we always were. That’s why Americans are not marching into North Korea, or doing anything about Chechnya. India and China already have relationships with the West. The longer the Bush/Blair axis lasts, the less appealing our world-view is, with both power and justice waning. Unless that axis is dismantled, Reactionary Islam will triumph.

That is why I say this struggle is one about values. Our values are worth struggling for. They represent humanity's progress throughout the ages and at each point we have had to fight for them and defend them. As a new age beckons, it is time to fight for them again.

21 uses of the word “values” and still no credible explanation as to what you mean. 10 uses of the word “fight”, 11 uses of the word “battle” and 3 uses of the word “peace”.
I’m sure the speech went down a storm.

Tags: Blair, Lebanon, Palestine, Isreael, UK Politics, US Politics