Schiller Institute Webcast with Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Wednesday, November 8, 2023.
HARLEY SCHLANGER: Hello and welcome to this week’s dialogue with Schiller Institute founder and Chairwoman Helga Zepp-LaRouche. It’s Wednesday, Nov. 8, 2023. I’m Harley Schlanger and I will be your host. You are welcome to send questions or comments for us.
Last weekend there were several million people marching for peace around the world, calling for a ceasefire and ending Netanyahu’s “mighty vengeance” campaign which has already killed more than 4,000 children in Gaza. But at the G7 foreign ministers’ meeting in Tokyo over Nov. 7-8, there was no resolution for a ceasefire—in fact, it was rejected—and U.S. Secretary of State Blinken reaffirmed U.S. support for Netanyahu’s actions. He said, a ceasefire would lead to an “unacceptable result.”
Given this, it’s clear that there’s a cry from around the world for peace, but it doesn’t seem to be falling on receptive ears in the West, especially in the United States and the NATO countries. So, Helga, what’s your assessment of where things stand and what needs to be done?
HELGA ZEPP-LAROUCHE: There are many people who have said important things, but I want to quote the Secretary General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres, who said that “Gaza is turning into a graveyard for the children.” And I think that captures the situation the best. He also said, this is not a crisis of the region, but a crisis of humanity. And I think that is absolutely the case, because there is no doubt any more what is happening before our eyes, that the proportionality with which Israel is answering to the attack of Oct. 7 is completely out of proportion, that more than 10,000 people have been killed, 4,000 of them children. And there is no way to rationalize what is going on, and it is also very clear that the aim is also that Israel wants to stay, after the war is over (whatever that means) in Gaza.
So there are several levels on which this thing has to be looked at: One is the immediate danger of an escalation into a wider war. You have an unbelievable deployment of U.S. military force in the region; you have the two U.S. aircraft carrier groups off the coast of Israel. Then, the latest news is that the Ohio-class submarine, probably the USS Florida, is on the way to probably the Persian Gulf, and the only reason why you would have such a vast deployment, it’s mooted that there are 30,000 American troops deployed there, is in the expectation of a wider war, possibly opening a second flank with Lebanon and Hezbollah, somehow, then, involving Iran. If that happens, then we are in the immediate danger of an escalation of war way beyond Southwest Asia, the so-called Middle East. That is the one danger.
There are major efforts by both China and Russia to try to propose an immediate peace conference for the entire region. There is hectic diplomatic activity. The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), which is comprised of the large Islamic organizations and countries, which altogether have over 1 billion members. They will have an emergency meeting this coming Sunday, Nov. 12, call for by Saudi Arabia; the meeting will take place in Riyadh. And the new factor in that situation is that Saudi Arabia and Iran have reestablished diplomatic relations and they’re working together on the effort to coordinate some response. Then there are many, many bilateral discussions and so forth, of Lavrov, of the Chinese, in particular talking to all the Arabs.
However, this thing could really only be stopped in the United States. Because Israel is one thing, but if the United States would definitely say this has to be stopped, it could be stopped. But it is Blinken, who went around in the region, talking to various Arab foreign ministers, and he basically refused to use the word “ceasefire.”
Now, there is the immediate effect this has in Gaza itself, in the West Bank, where, since Oct. 7, some 133 Palestinians were murdered as well. And one can only start to think what people are going through, now that the cold and rainy season is starting, half of the people are already homeless, they have no food, they have no shelter, no water, and it’s just unbelievable that there would be people who are not calling for a ceasefire in the face of this situation. But there is a larger aspect: The larger aspect is the danger of a military escalation beyond the regional war. But whatever happens, the fact that the Western establishments did not respond, to try to cool down the situation, and go for a ceasefire, go for humanitarian intervention in Gaza, this is changing the image of the so-called “rules-based order” for good. Because, if you look at what people are saying around the world, in Germany, for example, in Britain, in Sweden, in the United States, there is an effort to impose gag orders, so that people are not allowed to comment on that.
For example, in the United States, there is a Congresswoman, Rashida Tlaib, of Palestinian origin, and she said, that there is no difference for her between the cry of Israeli children and Palestinian children, and what is wrong with the people who only hear the cries of the Israeli children? So there is now an effort to censure her, and there was actually a vote in the Congress for a censure against her. There are similar moves in Sweden, in Germany, where there is a reaction to the demonstrations which took place last Saturday, Nov. 4. And I’m not commenting whether all of these demonstrations were focussed in the right way or not—the point is, if you have right now an ongoing situation, which many people, including Brazilian President Lula da Silva, including the former head of the UN human rights division in New York, Craig Mokhiber, who resigned over the situation, who said he has seen many genocides, but that this one is the worst. And they all call it “genocide.”
Now, if you look at what the Latin American governments are saying, they have a complete condemnation in unmistakable terms, and I think if the West is not changing their attitude on this question, that their reputation in the global majority of the world population will be lost, maybe forever, at least for this important juncture, where we seek in any case a change where the old colonialist order is no longer respected, and their countries of the Global South trying to create a new system. So, if they in this situation, then look at the completely immoral attitude of the countries of the so-called “Global North” and the so-called “rules-based order”—if these are the rules, I think no country wants to be part of it.
So I think that this whole thing will have ramifications of a dramatic historic impact. And the former Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Barak, he said that he thinks the Israeli Defense Forces have maybe, at best, two weeks to defeat Hamas, because he thinks that the whole world opinion is crumbling, that the mood is even shifting in the United States, and that the loss of support for Israel will mean two weeks at most, and maybe less, he said.
This is highly dramatic, and I can only say, if you cannot intervene when something is going so completely out of whack, then we do, indeed, have a crisis of humanity, as Guterres was saying.
SCHLANGER: Helga, you just answered some of the questions in your opening remarks, but I’ll give you these questions, because you can get a sense of how people are looking at what you’re talking about. From a contact in Southwest Asia, as well as one from Oakland, California, they both ask: Why have the Muslim and Arab governments not done more to put pressure on Israel and the West, for example, an oil embargo?
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: I think the Arab governments could have done for a long time, far more for the Palestinians, and I’m not going to make a big judgment about that, but that’s generally the opinion of many people. I mean, why did they not invest their sovereign wealth funds into Gaza and make it an example of economic prosperity?
I think this is now changing—I hope. And I think this coming Sunday, when the OIC is meeting, I think they will come out with some policy, putting in the weight of the entire Islamic world behind it. And I think the best would be if they would wholeheartedly support the Chinese and the Russian peace proposal: Both of these governments are demanding an immediate peace conference, basically an immediate ceasefire, humanitarian corridors to immediately save the people whose lives are in utmost danger. But then beyond that there needs to be a real settlement of the situation, basically like the Peace of Westphalia, where you have to bury the hatchet; you have to say for the sake of peace that all crimes on both sides have to be forgotten; for the sake of peace, one has to take into account the interest of the other, because without that, there is no peace possible.
But then, most important, there has to be a comprehensive, total economic development plan for all of Southwest Asia: This is basically the idea of my late husband, Lyndon LaRouche, who already proposed in 1975 the famous “Oasis Plan,” which was the idea to green the deserts, to develop new freshwater, to build basic infrastructure for industrialization and the development of agriculture in the entire region. And right now, if you look at Southwest Asia, you have Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya (which is North Africa): But this whole region has been destroyed by these interventionist wars, and the humanitarian situation in all of these countries is absolutely terrible. Naturally, now, Gaza is the worst by far. But you need an economic development plan for the entire region: This is so urgent, and fortunately, with the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative, the possibility to really look at the region as a whole, as one comprehensive plan, is absolutely there.
So I think this initiative will come, from China for sure. I’m sure it will be supported by whatever Russia is doing, and give the fact that the three major oil-producing countries, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia, are in the process of joining the BRICS-11, they are all supposed to become full members of the BRICS on Jan. 1st, 2024, I think the potential to turn the situation around and go for an economic buildup of the entire region is absolutely there. And if there are signs coming out in this direction, I think what the West European nations, the United States, the best they could do is to wholeheartedly support that, rather than looking at it as something to be defeated.
SCHLANGER: Here’s a question about China’s presidency of the UN Security Council, and their call for an international peace conference. The person wrote that according to Craig Mokhiber, the former Director in the New York Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), who resigned on Oct. 28, the UN is impotent to enforce its resolutions. Mokhiber accused the U.S., U.K. and Europe of complicity in genocide, and the person asks, “Is there any other venue that can enforce international law, if the UN is impotent?”
ZEPP-LAROUCHE: No, I don’t think so. I think the United Nations is the only body in existence, representing all the countries of the world. We have seen in the last years, that the authority and integrity of the United Nations was undermined. I think one major step in that direction was when the United States lied to the UN Security Council about what the aim was of their operation against Libya in 2011, which led to the NATO strikes, and then finally the murder of Qaddafi.
It was clear, afterwards that the United States and NATO had planned a full-fledged attack, a military takeover of Libya, and they had said it was an “air operation.” And that is why, at that point, Russia and China remained silent, or they voted neutral. After it was clear that this was a much, much larger operation, from that point on, the UN Security Council practically did not function any more, because when you start to lie in that sort of top leadership of the world, then the potential to use it for peace purposes has been greatly diminished. And at that point, Lyndon LaRouche, absolutely presciently said that this was not just an operation against Libya, but that this was the beginning of a coming world war against Russia and China. And I think if you look at all the subsequent developments—the Ukraine Maidan coup in 2014; the global NATO efforts to create a global NATO involving the Indo-Pacific—what has the Indo-Pacific to do with the North Atlantic defense treaty? I don’t know.
The problem is, we have seen that all the votes in the United Nations were completely compromised since then, because only those countries that are strong enough that they feel they can resist pressure, voted their real opinion, their real conviction;, while many of the smaller countries, countries that are only a small island, or a little country here or there, they normally would vote with the West on resolutions against Russia and China, and that has naturally been noted by everybody. There is no secret, there is only stupidity, one can say.
I think the United Nations definitely needs a reform! There are many former UN officials who are working on such proposals, but I think the Ten Principles for a New International Security and Development Architecture that I proposed, the last three principles are not programmatic: The first seven principles are programmatic, calling for a new credit system, health system, all of these things; but the last three principles I put in there, having in mind the shortcomings of the United Nations, and these three principles are philosophical, because I always thought, and I discussed this in past a lot already at various occasions, the United Nations always suffered from a lack of what you could call a metaphysical component: Meaning that you have to have something in there, which is beyond daily necessities, programmatic things, you need something which pertains to the way the universe is organized. In European history, this was generally called “natural law.”
