Wednesday, January 08, 2014
Barry Rubin: The Middle East at the Beginning of 2014
The Egypt-Muslim Brotherhood-Hamas conflicts, the Syrian civil war, the conflict between the Shi'a and Sunni blocs (the latter including Saudi Arabia), and Turkish-Arab friction are all signs of this. If the West is willing to keep Asad as dictator of Syria, the Sunni rebels will never accept this, and the Syrian civil war will only be intensified in the coming year.Why Is There Really No Palestinian State: The 1-State Solution
Ammar Abdulhamid, a respected analyst on Syria, has pointed out that "re-legitimating the Assad regime today, after all it had done, will green light genocidal ventures elsewhere in the world." Of course, if the United States helped to overthrow the Asad regime in Syria, there would also be a risk of genocide against the Alawites and the Christians (who make up about 30% of the population).
I hate to say it, but it is almost as if the Obama administration simply wants to keep the supposed "deal" alive until after the 2016 elections, so it can boast a great diplomatic triumph in the Middle East by resolving all problems, only to then let the deal collapse. This could explain why President Obama said there was only a 50-50% chance that the deal would go through. Usually, the president and secretary of state do not talk about the certainty of deals before they are much closer to being completed.
The difference between radicals and moderates was well represented by the remark of the Palestinian Arab delegates in their May 1939 meeting with Egypt's leaders, "We cannot now tell our people, 'Stop the revolution because we got some high posts. . . .'"But that was precisely what moderate Arab politicians wanted: not a revolution in Palestine but a solution to Palestine. And they viewed that as having been achieved in the London negotiations because Palestinian Arabs would obtain "high posts" and thus would be running the country.Jews, lies and Christian victims
The story of al-Husaini and the 1939 London Conference would be reenacted by Arafat at the Camp David meeting in 2000, when Arafat rejected getting a Palestinian state through negotiations because he preferred the illusory hope of getting it all by violence.
In late December, The Independent published an article about the bleak situation of the Christians in the Middle East. It had the right idea. The Christians in the Middle East are in trouble. They’re being slaughtered in dozens of different places and millions have become refugees or been forced to flee. Amazingly enough, however, the article was devoted almost entirely to their sad situation in Israel, of all places. “Will Prince Charles, the ‘Defender of Faiths,’ stand up for Christians in Israel?” read the astonishing headline.
Blogger Elder of Ziyon has enumerated lies so egregious – and there are many – in this manifest masquerading as an article. They saved me the trouble of having to refute the lies myself. Not a single Christian in Israel is being persecuted because of his religion. There has been no pogrom. Israel’s Christians are fully integrated at the top of their professions as physicians, lawyers and judges. The Israeli Christian community is a minority that in many areas, such as higher education, has made remarkable achievements. Even more so than the Jews. They do not need any Prince Charles or The Independent to defend them. But somehow, the author of the article and the newspaper have managed once again to turn the situation on its head and make truth lies and lies truth.
When is Incitement “Incitement”?
The most recent example (January 7) is instructive. The story headline reads: “Israeli Officials Point to an Intensifying Campaign of ‘Incitement’ by Palestinians.” Nothing new about that, to be sure – except for the quotation marks surrounding “Incitement,” which imply that it is a figment of the Israeli imagination. To be sure, Jerusalem Bureau Chief Jodi Rudoren offers several compelling – and disgusting – examples of the phenomenon. The website for Palestinian Authority schools carries quotations from Hitler. A young girl appears on Palestinian television to describe Jews as “barbaric monkeys, wretched pigs.” Palestinian maps do not show Israel. A Fatah video featured masked fighters singing “With these rockets we will crush the Zionist enemy.” And so it goes.Journalists Press State Dept. Over Silence in Response to Anti-Israel Incitement by Chief Palestinian Negotiator
One might imagine that such evidence, which flourishes in abundance in Palestinian media and among Palestinian Authority officials, including President Mahmoud Abbas, would qualify as incitement, not “incitement.” But not for the Times. What “Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and others call ‘incitement’ as a prime obstacle to peace” is, by Rudoren’s strong implication (and liberal use of quotation marks), merely fanciful rhetoric.
Harf responded by delineating between public and private conversations, prompting journalists to ask whether Washington, as a declared “honest broker,” had “an obligation to speak out when someone says something that is not honest, when something is dishonest.” Harf eventually said that she had not yet seen Erekat’s comments and would examine them further. By the end of the afternoon Associated Press reporter Matthew Lee noted that that State Department was continuing to resist taking a public position on the incident specifically or more broadly on Israeli complaints regarding Palestinian incitement. A spike in Palestinian terrorism against Israeli civilians has deepened Jerusalem’s concerns regarding statements and actions made by top Palestinian figures that demonize Israel and celebrate violence. Abbas, for instance, has embraced Palestinian terrorists freed in both December and October as “heroes.” Israel’s cabinet this weekend blasted what Israeli officials described as the Palestinian “culture of hate.”Liberman defends his population transfer plan
Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman on Wednesday defended his promotion of a controversial plan to transfer jurisdiction of some Israeli Arab towns to a future Palestinian state by saying their residents have never wanted to part of the Jewish state. He further noted that those who oppose the idea didn’t object when Jews were relocated from the Gush Katif settlements in the Gaza Strip in 2005.Hotovely Challenges Ahmed Tibi: Admit It, You Want to be Israeli
President Shimon Peres on Wednesday rejected the idea of a population transfer as “impractical,” adding that ”Israel cannot take away its citizens’ citizenship simply because they’re Arab.”
However, she said, “The Palestinians’ objection to a land swap reveals their true face, and their intention to benefit from both worlds. On the one hand, they want a Palestinian state, on the other hand, they want to be citizens of Israel and to enjoy the benefits offered here.”Temple Mount Report Fuels Concern About Future of Holy Site
“No Arab state gives its citizens rights like the state of Israel gives its citizens,” she added.
A recently revealed Israeli State Comptroller’s report that remains under a government gag order has ignited concern over the Muslim Waqf’s attempts to erase Jewish ties on the Temple Mount—Judaism’s holiest site—and Israeli authorities’ neglect of those activities.Palestinians Take Shelter in Jewish ‘Settlement’
The classified document, whose contents were published by the New York-based newspaper The Jewish Voice, details ongoing illegal excavations being carried out on the Temple Mount by the Muslim Waqf (trust) and places blame on those responsible for overseeing the site—namely the Israel Antiquities Authority, the Jerusalem Municipality, and the Israeli police. The report suggests that those Israeli bodies have been turning a blind eye to the damage caused by the Waqf pertaining to ancient Jewish archeological findings.
The two approached Israeli residents at the gates of the community and explained that they were being pursued by members of the Palestinian Authority security forces. The PA officers were planning to kill them, they said.Former Fatah Strongman Mohammed Dahlan Plotting to Oust Mahmoud Abbas From Power
Residents called security guards to the scene. The guards searched the two men for weapons and then brought them into the town.
Security forces then searched the area for the alleged would-be killers. They found four Palestinian Arab men waiting nearby with loaded weapons; the four presented themselves as members of the PA police special forces.
Former Fatah Central Committee member Mohammed Dahlan has been plotting to overthrow Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, according to Major General Majid Faraj, head of the Palestinian General Intelligence Service, Israeli daily Ma’ariv reported on Tuesday.YMedad: They Keep Getting Shot
Dozens of men loyal to Dahlan, the one-time Gaza strongman, recently attacked Faraj’s forces inside a Palestinian-Arab refugee camp located in the PA-controlled city of Nablus, Ma’ariv said.
There are complaints that Israel doesn't treat Gaza Arabs who are near the security fence properly.Fifty US senators line up behind new Iran sanctions bill
I am fairly sure we're doing better than Egypt, however:-
Egyptian army shoots 2 Palestinians crossing through Gaza tunnel
GAZA CITY (Ma'an) -- The Egyptian army shot and wounded two Palestinian youths as they exited a tunnel from the Gaza Strip.
50 senators across party lines now co-sponsor the Nuclear Weapons Free Iran Act of 2013, according to multiple Senate aides, who expect support to increase in the coming days. That amounts to half of all Senate members, just one shy of the number required for a bill to pass.Debbie Wasserman Schultz Blocking Bipartisan Iran Sanctions
Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Robert Menendez introduced the bill just before Christmas with 25 co-sponsors. The move was an affront to the Obama administration, which fears the bill could derail fragile nuclear talks among Iran, the US and world powers.
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D., Fla.) has become a major obstacle to a new bipartisan Iran sanctions measure, according to multiple sources on Capitol Hill and in Florida.Iran’s Double Talk on Iraq is Disgraceful
Wasserman Schultz has broken with leading pro-Israel Democrats like New York Senator Chuck Schumer and New Jersey Senators Robert Menendez and Cory Booker, privately urging her fellow Democrats to follow the White House’s lead by opposing a bipartisan House resolution backing new sanctions on Iran, according to multiple congressional sources close to the debate. (h/t MtTB)
Iran has reportedly offered to help the Iraqi government fight “al Qaeda terrorists” in the Anbar province, where radicalism and sectarian fighting have reared their ugly heads. Western media outlets have reported on this story without comment, as if Iran was simply offering to help a neighbor in need, or trying to play a responsible role in the international community.U.S.: Iran Helping Assad 'Brutalize' His People
The United States on Tuesday accused Iran of helping "brutalize" Syria as Secretary of State John Kerry prepared to talk to Russia about Tehran's potential role at a peace conference, AFP reports.First Batch of Chemical Weapons Shipped Out of Syria
Kerry will meet in Paris on January 13 with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to discuss whether Iran should take part in the conference later this month in Switzerland aimed at ending the nearly three-year-old war in Syria, the State Department said.
Syria has moved the first batch of chemical weapon materials out of the country after transporting it from two sites to the port city of Latakia and onto a Danish vessel, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said Tuesday, according to Reuters.New Evidence of Sanctions-Busting Iran-Turkey Cooperation Complicates White House Sanctions Position
"The vessel has been accompanied by naval escorts provided by Denmark and Norway, as well as the Syrian Arab Republic," the OPCW said in a statement.
The Daily Beast assessed in late December that the open political warfare shaking Turkey – which has pitted elites in the ruling Justice and Development (AKP) Party against followers of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen – “could destabilize [President Barack] Obama’s nuclear deal and threaten the government of Prime Minister [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan.” Judiciary figures linked to Gulen are pursuing a corruption probe that has already ensnared AKP elites, and that unearthed an oil-for-cash scheme between Tehran and Ankara that – per the Daily Beast – “may only be start of more uncomfortable disclosures about Iranian dealings in Turkey.” Fully one-sixth of companies that began investing in Turkey in 2013 were backed by Iranian money, and Turkish outlet Zaman outlined over the weekend how Turkey and Iran building mechanisms to further boost their cooperation in the coming weeks and months.Turkey dismisses 350 police officers in Ankara
Claiming that it is the target of a conspiracy, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government has dismissed hundreds of police chiefs and officers since police launched raids targeting close Erdogan allies on December 17. He has alleged that followers of an Islamic movement led by US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen have infiltrated the judiciary and police and are using their powers to attack the government.Police units in southeastern city perform ‘moral profiling’ of students’ private lives
The profiling targeted students studying at faculties and schools of higher education affiliated to Gaziantep University and located in the Islahiye district, which lies 80 kilometers west of Gaziantep’s urban center.Brotherhood Leader Planned an Egyptian 'Revolutionary Guard'
The profile details on students provided even the most intimate and trivial information about their private lives, some of the files obtained by daily Milliyet showed.
One of the leaders of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood planned to establish a “Revolutionary Guard” modeled after Iran’s elite military unit, Al Arabiya reported on Monday.Egyptian Novelist Youssef Ziedan: Our Politicians Curse Israel to Gain Popularity
The report cited a former member of Al-Qaeda who spoke to an Egyptian TV channel.
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