The US assassination of General Soleimani and international law
JVL Introduction
A conflagration in the Middle East will have dire consequences for us all. We move closer to it, with the assassination of Major General Soleimani.
The purported justification (under the Bethlehem Doctrine of Pre-Emptive Self Defence) was developed by Netanyahu’s legal adviser – before he became Blair’s legal advisor as no-one else would justify the war on Iraq on the basis of Saddam’s “imminent threat” to the UK.
As Craig Murray points out below, the Bethlehem Doctrine is riddled with “obvious absurdities and revolting special pleading”.
But that hasn’t made Britain, in hock to the US in all kinds of ways, call out the assassination as the blatantly illegal act it is – “as US state terrorism, pure and simple.”
This article was originally published by Craig Murray's Blog on Sat 4 Jan 2020. Read the original here.
Lies, the Bethlehem Doctrine, and the Illegal Murder of Soleimani
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Thank you for such a lucid and illuminating evisceration of the obscene and dangerously illegal state assassinations that are being ordered by the US and our government.
It is interesting after the recent rout of Labour at the hands of the Tory press and the character assassination of Jeremy Corbyn, that Tony Blair is being wheeled out like one of the undead to rally the troops back to the good old days.
And the elimination of Himmler’s no 2 Reinhard Heydrich in 1942 would have been illegal according to this logic, even more so if it had been carried out when he was “just” murdering Jews and opponents in Germany and surrounds in the 1930s. Germany was busy subverting its neighbours then but the final solution wasn’t even yet “imminent” technically. However such a hit could have saved the lives of millions if Hitler had got the message in the 1930s, namely no appeasement and a credible threat to severely punish Germany if they carried out reprisals against innocents. The situations are not identical but there are distinct similarities when you consider cries from the regime sponsored mobs of “Death to Israel” .. home to 6 million+ Jews.
Bloody brilliant proper journalism. How refreshing. Thank you.
There was an excellent response from Prof Michael Clarke (Royal United Services Institute) on “Politics Live” today. He made the distinction between
“preventive” and “pre-emptive” actions and the necessity of proportionality.
He added that it was illegal by any definition and was likely disastrous for Iraq
and the whole area.
Seems that Professor Clarke is wrong and I was right as above. Lives have been saved, apart from the 50 Iranians trampled to death who the Iranian regime doesn’t care about, and Iran’d leaders have got the message. Shame the West didn’t act like Trump when the Nazis started subjugating Europe. I would expect JVL to at least concede that. The Ayatollahs are not human rights loving socialists but far more resemble the Nazis.