Norway's PM on Aggression vs. Ukraine/Iran-Israel

Well, who would've thought that a brief comparison of official gov't comments in Feb. 2022 vs. June 2025 reveals: grand hypocrisy and the core of the problems we face: double-standards

Given the rapidly evolving events in the Middle East, I feel like one should write about it; at the same time, since there’s so much agit-prop, disinformation, and outright lies floating around, here’s the one thing I think is reasonable to do at this moment:

Compare the nonsense coming out of Western capitals with that other kind of nonsense that came from the same mouths in February 2022.

You see, by way of a prelim, I’m doing this to chronicle the one thing that I consider the worst quality of any politician (human): hypocrisy. That trait is precisely what makes the situations in Ukraine and the Middle East quite comparable—if all sides are lying (which I understand to be the primary MO in int’l relations), any kind of resolution, however temporarily, will come only about once all involved parties muster the courage and honesty to stop lying to themselves and each other for a moment.

That, I submit, is the essence and enduring quality of int’l relations (it’s also the result of 15+ years of studying early modern European history…).

Without much more ado, here we go—as another instance of record-keeping.

Translation, emphases, and [snark] mine.

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Støre: Norway Condemns the Escalation of the War Situation Around Iran

Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre and Minister of Foreign Affairs Espen Barth Eide are concerned about a worsening of the situation in the Middle East following Israel’s attack on Iran.

Via Johanna Hauge et al., NRK, 13 June 2025 [source]

This is a very serious development, and I would like to say that Norway condemns the escalation of the war situation around Iran [so far, so obvious and expectable]. There is a significant escalation and a risk of further escalation of the conflict between Israel and Iran [while there’s no fine way to say this, there are certain conventions to observe: talk is cheap, ‘even’ if the Mullahs call for the destruction of Israel for decades—int’l relations is a bit more like anarchy: the deed is what matters, and in this regard, while I consider neither side blame-less (ahem), this week, Israel was the one who attacked].

This is what Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre [Arbeiderpartiet, or Labour Party] said during a press conference.

Norway joins countries that strongly urge restraint in order to avoid a major war in the region, and contributes to reducing the level of conflict...

The fundamental thing is that we consider the security situation to be serious, it is unstable.

[Even though the (Nordic) left has a long and strong tradition of philo-Arabic/anti-semitic stances, PM Støre can’t bring himself to utter even one clear and unanimous word in this regard: isn’t that interesting?]

[Foreign Minister Barth] Eide: ‘Extremely serious’

This is extremely serious, it’s alarming, and I’m worried that the situation in the Middle East has now become a good deal worse than it was until last night [another round of empty words].

This is what Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide (Arbeiderpartiet [Labour]) told NRK after Israel attacked dozens of targets in Iran last night.

It seems that Netanyahu and Israel now want to go all the way on what has been his long-standing goal of knocking out Iran’s ability to produce nuclear weapons on its own [Israel has been claiming this for 30+ years, and while I’m not saying it can never happen, it hasn’t yet]. If he doesn’t get the US on board, he will do it himself [Israel is currently doing that, and the risk of escalation is the US getting ‘on board’].

Barth Eide says this is in direct contradiction to what President Trump wants [note that Mr. Eide claims to know what Mr. Trump thinks].

We knew that Iran was worried about a future attack [we also knew that Israel was worried about a future attack, but nevermind…]. We also knew that the US was concerned. President Trump has explicitly asked Netanyahu not to do this [well, I’m unsure if that’s true, if Trump lied, and/or whatever the US told the Israelis privately: the first rule of stupid things to avoid is—don’t make stupid claims that cannot be verified].

There is no support for this attack, as far as I can see, anywhere [well, w/o US assistance, since that’s the official US position (via Newsweek)]

Although we must hope that all parties manage to come to their senses, there is probably every reason to believe that there will be a strong response from Iran.

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Captain Obvious & his Intrepid Sidekick, BS Bingo Boy

What else is there to say?

War and peace are technically two quite clear-cut legal concepts; most of their meaning has vanished since the 1930s.

When anyone speaks of either ‘war’ or ‘peace’, the discrepancy between what people think these mean and what their technical meaning is growing.

WW1 was the last ‘war’ that began in the conventional manner and was ended with a formal peace agreement, although the weirding is palpable: the West commemorates 11 Nov. (1918) as ‘Armistice Day’, which renders WW1 the only war in human history whose end is taken to be the end of hostilities, as opposed to the conclusion of a peace treaty.

In Germany, there is but the Volkstrauertag, or Nat’l Day of Mourning, which takes place two Sundays before the first day of Advent. It shows the difference between ‘winning’ and ‘losing’, I suppose.

Flashback: Støre in February 2022 and Now

These days, however, we’re way less fortunate as regards the accuracy and honesty of the very same people who’re peddling all that nonsense. For some of what has been said back in February 2022 sounds—awfully absurd and reeks of: hypocrisy.

Here’s what Mr. Støre said on 24 Feb. 2022 (source), which ran with headers like ‘Støre: Norway will introduce more sanctions against Russia, but must safeguard relations with its neighbours’:

‘Today we woke up to war in Europe. We have long feared that Russia would launch a massive military attack on Ukraine. It’s happening now’, says Jonas Gahr Støre.

Støre announces that Norway will make clear statements to Russia, which launched a military attack on Ukraine in the morning hours of Thursday [note that none like this has happened now].

‘Norway will join the sanctions now being discussed with European partners as a reaction’, said Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre (Ap) at a press conference on the situation [no talk of sanctions, let alone military aid to the attacked country].

‘These sanctions will be in addition to those announced earlier this week. The government will also send humanitarian aid to the civilian population in Ukraine and increase emergency aid by NOK 200 million [c. US$ 20m]’…

‘It will clearly have consequences. But we have received recognition both in NATO and elsewhere that we must take care of the neighbourly relationship with Russia in a wise way.’

‘But the clear challenges we face as neighbours in the north, concerning the sea, the common fishing stock and search and rescue work, it is in Norway’s interest to take care of this in a good way.’

Isn’t it…telling? I’ll leave these words here for the sake of record-keeping.

Bottom Lines

How do explain the discrepancy? My money is on both racism and chicken-hawkery on part of Norway. It’s disgusting, totally expectable, and pathetic.

We note that doing so reeks not merely of hypocrisy but will, at some point, also invite Nemesis, the ancient goddess of righteous retribution.

At this moment, there’s not much to add, I fear: I hope that ordinary people make it through this uptick in state violence, for they are, and always will be, at the receiving end.

If you’re as disgusted by all of this, well, you’re not alone.