You couldn’t make it up. Today’s Observer — the Guardian’s sister paper which appears on Sundays — is running an editorial about the Iranian elections which devotes the bulk of its critical energy to denouncing Israel. In other words, it uses the Iranian elections as a news peg in order to vent its fury at the Jewish state. There is no mention of Iran’s nuclear ambitions. No mention of its anti-Semitism. No mention of its declared ambition of destroying Israel. There is only the mildest and most neutral reference to the reality that the elections were rigged.

Instead, the Iranian elections provide the occasion for the following headline: “Israel should heed the clamour for peace”. The editorial team at the Observer thus looked at the unfolding tragedy in Iran and saw in it an opportunity to slam Israel. The article itself is one of the most twisted and deluded pieces of writing on the Middle East for quite some time.

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Iran’s presidential elections descended into farce this morning as first results gave a near 2:1 majority to the incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, even in areas where his rivals had overwhelming support. It will be interesting to see whether the Western commentariat draws the obvious conclusions: Iran remains hell-bent on becoming a nuclear armed power with annihilationist ambitions towards Israel, with hegemonic ambitions in the Middle East generally and with the continued will to arm terror groups near and far. That is what these election results really mean. But don’t hold your breath.

The reaction of President Obama will also be interesting. He had already been rebuffed across much of the Middle East after his speech to the Muslim world in Cairo this month (see previous postings), but now his policies towards the region risk falling apart altogether. Iran is going nuclear. Will he act or will he not? We shall see….

In the meantime, here are some analysts’ comments on the Iranian election as reported by Reuters:

KARIM SADJAPOUR, ANALYST AT CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL PEACE:

“I don’t think anyone anticipated this level of fraudulence. This was a selection, not an election. At least authoritarian regimes like Syria and Egypt have no democratic pretences. In retrospect it appears this entire campaign was a show: (Supreme Leader) Ayatollah (Ali) Khamenei wasn’t ever going to let Ahmadinejad lose.”

ALIREZA NADER, RAND CORPORATION:

“Ahmadinejad has of course won the election. What is surprising is his share of the vote — 64 percent according to some estimates. The opposition in Iran may protest this election as being fraudulent. Mousavi’s supporters were hopeful that he had a great chance of winning and that his presidency would lead to much needed reforms. Their enthusiasm may turn into frustration, and perhaps even active opposition against the government. Although the president is not the chief decision-maker, Ahmadinejad’s win is a sign that Iranian politics is in stage of flux.

“The power of the traditional ruling elite — men such as Ayatollah Rafsanjani — has been effectively challenged by Ahmadinejad and his supporters, including top-ranking and fundamentalist members of the Revolutionary Guards.

“Another Ahmadinejad term may translate into continued social and political repression, economic mismanagement and more assertive foreign policies, especially on the nuclear programme. It is not clear how Ahmadinejad’s victory will affect U.S.-Iranian engagement. There is still some room for limited engagement on specific issues, such as Afghanistan. But Ahmadinejad’s victory, and renewed sense of confidence, may make U.S. engagement with Iran more difficult than many had expected. Regardless, the ultimate decision will be made by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the top echelon of the Revolutionary Guards.”

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The message is starting to filter through. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s statement at his recent meeting with Barack Obama that the Palestinians must recognise Israel as a specifically Jewish state is now doing the rounds.

Today’s Guardian website, Comment is Free, carries an opinion piece on the subject. Typically, an Israeli of a far-Left disposition (ie. he represents thinking right at the fringes of Israeli society) is thrust into the front line to make the case that this is another example of Israeli obstructionism. The Jewishness of the Israeli state issue raised by Netanyahu is then tied in to Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s suggestions about asking Israeli Arabs to swear an oath of loyalty and his proposals that the borders might be redrawn in some areas so that Israeli Arabs unahappy with the Jewish state could become citizens of a prospective Palestinian state whose new borders would embrace their towns and villages.

The author, Dimi Reider asks: “Are we facing the prospect of an ethnic cleansing? To a degree, ethnic cleansing has always been part and parcel of Israeli political life.”

Ah, so that is what the article was all about then. Just another opportunity to bash Israel again. Unfortunately, the premise of the argument is fundamentally flawed.

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The real story about today’s results for the European parliamentary elections is one that is barely being talked about: turnout fell to a new record low of 42.8 percent. Since it is compulsory to vote in some European countries — Greece, Belgium, Cyprus and Luxembourg — that is an astoundingly poor figure.

The obvious conclusion to draw is that a solid majority of European voters feel little or no connection with the European project being pushed on their behalf and without their consent. The fact that turnout is falling rather than rising in European elections suggests that the premises underlying the integrationist model of European cooperation are false — the peoples of Europe are not merging into a single European people; they are less not more focused on EU politics; they are more not less focused on the domestic arena.

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From diametrically opposed starting points, Melanie Phillips and Robert Fisk — two of Britain’s leading commentators on the Middle East — have offered up sharply contrasting interpretations of Barack Obama’s landmark speech to the Muslim world. Comparing and constrasting the two analyses opens a window into the state of the debate about the Middle East in Britian in particular and Europe in general.

Phillips — far brighter, far sharper and far more profound — speaks for the counter-orthodoxy. Writing in her blog for the Spectator, she gives Obama his due for stressing the “unbreakable bond” between the United States and Israel and for condemning Palestinian violence, Muslim oppression of non-Muslims and women, and Iranian attacks on the United States. She then proceeds to deconstruct his speech in devastating style.

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