Troops Out Now Coalition blog: Stop War on Iran!

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Stop War on Iran!

Stop sanctions and war on Iran before they start!

Sign the petition online - Send messages to Haliburton, Bush and Congress!

Join George Galloway, Howard Zinn, Michael Parenti, Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, Ramsey Clark, and hundreds more in a campaign to stop a new war against Iran.

It is with grave concern that we observe the growing threat of a new U.S. war – this time against the people of Iran.

On July 31, 2006, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) adopted Resolution 1696, demanding Iran suspend all uranium enrichment related and reprocessing activities, including research and development by August 30, 2006. This resolution was passed before Iran had an opportunity to study and respond to the package of incentives, which Iran had said it would respond to by August 22, 2006. It states that Iran either complies with the provisions of 1626 and suspends uranium enrichment or will face the possibility of economic and diplomatic sanctions by the powers that sponsored the draft of the resolution.

For the UNSC to issue a resolution that orders a nation, which has suffered greatly at the hands of the U.S., to indefinitely suspend its nuclear energy program is one thing, to be lawful, just and fair is another. The UNSC resolution flagrantly violates the provisions of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and neglects the fact that more than 2000 inspection days of Iran’s nuclear facilities by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) found no transgressions from the NPT.

But this is not the first time that the UNSC under pressure of the U.S. has suggested sanctions against a country at odds with the U.S. Before the U.S. illegal war on Iraq, the UNSC passed a resolution that imposed harsh and broad sanctions on Iraq for more than a decade; sanctions which resulted in the deaths of half a million Iraqi children.

According to Seymour Hersh’s article Watching Lebanon in the August 12, 2006 issue of The New Yorker magazine, Israel’s war on Lebanon could “serve as a prelude to a potential American attack to destroy Iran’s nuclear installations.” Some U.S. figures admit that Israel’s invasion of Lebanon was a tactical preparation in the U.S.-Israel strategy of war against Iran. This prelude to the upcoming war with Iran will undoubtedly take the form of containment on financial, commercial, cultural, political, and diplomatic exchanges.

The main purpose of sanctions, as an instrument of particularly U.S. foreign policy, is to damage the backbone of the Iranian economy and drown the masses of people into poverty by the way of unemployment and lack of sanitation, transportation, education facilities and health services.

No doubt the imposition of sanctions by the West through the United Nations’ Security Council is a declaration of hostility towards Iran. The American-Iranian Friendship Committee (AIFC) and the StopWarOnIran campaign strongly believe that war with Iran could be halted in its inception by opposing the senseless imposition of any form of sanctions against the Iranian people.

It is essential that all voices opposed to the devastation of a new war in the Middle East speak out now. We urge an immediate end to Washington's campaign of sanctions, hostility, and falsehood against the people of Iran. We oppose any new U.S. aggression against Iran. We need funds for human needs, not endless war for empire.

Hereby, we appeal to all peace-loving people standing for justice around the world, sign the petition and vote against sanctions and war on Iran.

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