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Thursday, April 18, 2024
[Salon] A desperate situation in Sudan - ArabDigest.org Guest Post
A desperate situation in Sudan
Summary: Sudan’s civil war passed the one year mark this week with millions displaced and thousands killed by the fighting; peace talks are scheduled in three weeks but as the fighting continues the humanitarian crisis deepens.
This week marked the one year anniversary of Sudan’s catastrophic civil war which has pitted two ruthlessly ambitious generals against each other with the Sudanese people caught between them. The cost has been staggeringly high with nearly 2 million fleeing Sudan, most to neighbouring Chad, another highly unstable country, while nearly 7 million are internally displaced. The death toll of civilians is in the thousands and the forces of both sides – General Burhan’s Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and Hemedti’s Rapid Support Forces (RSF) – are guilty of committing war crimes. Hospitals, schools and other essential infrastructure have been destroyed. In a 14 April video message US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke of “eighteen million children, women, and men in Sudan (who) face acute food insecurity, with the UN warning that the country is on the brink of famine.” He added that “without a significant influx of aid, 220,000 children could die from malnutrition in the coming months”
Efforts to secure at least a temporary ceasefire, led by Saudi Arabia and heavily backed by the US failed miserably last year. Now the Saudis have said they will reconvene the talks in Jeddah within three weeks. The talks were supposed to begin today and it is unclear why they have been delayed. However the UAE which backs Hemedti and Egypt which backs Burhan have said they will attend the talks.
The presence of the UAE, which had shunned previous efforts in Jeddah is perhaps a sign that pressure from Washington is beginning to pay off. The State Department was not best pleased when in September last year a New York Times investigation revealed that the UAE under the guise of delivering humanitarian aid had established a field hospital in Chad for wounded RSF fighters. The investigation also alleged that the Wagner group had supplied surface to air missiles to the RSF via the Central African Republic where the Russian mercenary force has been engaged since 2018.
A destroyed medical storage facility in Nyala, the capital of South Darfur province, Sudan, May 2, 2023.
On Monday the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres spoke about the situation in Darfur where Hemedti’s force are menacing the last regional capital, in North Darfur State, not already in the hands of the RSF. His soldiers were already on the outskirts of the capital el-Fasher. “Let me be clear,” Guterres said “any attack on el-Fasher would be devastating for civilians and could lead to full-blown intercommunal conflict across Darfur.” When speaking about the looming humanitarian crisis Guterres was succinct about where the blame fell: "The main problem is clear: there are two generals that have opted for a military solution and they have until now, obstructed all serious efforts of mediation."
Meanwhile an aid meeting chaired by French President Emmanuel Macron was convened in Paris on Monday. Unlike stuttering pledges for Yemen (see our 22 February newsletter) the world did seem ready to respond, with over €2 billion (US$2.1 billion) promised. The UK doubled its aid to Sudan and the surrounding region to £84.25 million (US$105 million) while Washington promised an additional US$100 million, a figure matched by the UAE. The European Commission has said it will commit about €355 million to Sudan and neighbouring states in 2024. This comes after US Special Envoy to Sudan Tom Perriello had earlier described the international response as “pitiful” noting that only 5% of the amount needed had been secured.
However as the fighting continues getting aid to those in desperate need will be a significant challenge, one that can only be eased if a ceasefire is agreed. Waiting three weeks for the conversation to begin means that civilian casualties will continue to rise in Darfur, in the Sudanese capital Khartoum and elsewhere in the country with Hemedti - his powerful UAE ally still very much in play - hoping to secure more battlefield wins before the talks begin. General Burhan will be thinking the same; using drones supplied by Iran the SAF is making progress in retaking Khartoum potentially giving him the stronger hand to play with in Jeddah.
Wednesday, April 17, 2024
[Salon] Iran And Saudi Arabia - A Common Future Looking East - Guest Post
Iran And Saudi Arabia - A Common Future Looking East
April 17, 2024
In March 2023 Iran and Saudi Arabia restored their diplomatic ties with each other. The deal had been mediated by China.
As I remarked at that time:
This is huge!
...
Reviving relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran will make a lot of new things possible.
That Iran and Saudi Arabia accepted China's mediation is a recognition of Beijing's new standing in world policies. That alone is enough reason for the White House to hate the deal.
I later summarized the diplomatic action in the Middle East:
For the last 30 years the U.S. considered the Middle East as its backyard. Twenty years ago it illegally invaded Iraq and caused 100,000nds of death and decades of chaos. Now China, by peaceful means, changed the balance in the Middle East within just one month.
...
Xi and Putin are now running the multilateral global show. Biden and the hapless 'unilateral' people around him are left aside.
Amwaj.media, which translates everything into Persian, Arabic and English, has published a piece written by two academics from Iran and Saudi Arabia. Such cooperation is still rare. This can then be seen as a semi-official explanation and/or vision of those countries' global policies.
The piece confirms the loss of U.S. influence and the rise of China's role in the Middle East:
How Gaza war is pushing the region eastward
The unwavering US support for Israel’s war on Gaza has left a bitter taste in the region. Anger is mounting not only in the Arab world but also across the Global South, over what is seen as western double standards towards Israel’s continued onslaught. There is a unified demand for a ceasefire and sharp criticism of what it viewed as unchecked Israeli aggression.
...
One main trend of regional dynamics in recent years has been a pivot to the east. Underscoring this shift, Iran and Saudi Arabia in Mar. 2023 struck a deal to resume diplomatic ties in a historic agreement brokered by China. In particular, Beijing’s role in the breakthrough sent a clear message to Washington that it is not the only diplomatic heavyweight in the region.
Both Iran and Saudi Arabia have their own individual reasons for prioritizing better relations with their neighbors. For Tehran, getting closer to Riyadh presents a unique opportunity to break free from its economic isolation—after enduring years of US sanctions—by diversifying economic and political partnerships.
...
For Saudi Arabia, looking east is part and parcel of its ambitious Vision 2030—an extensive reform plan aimed at diversifying its economy. China, India, and Russia are key partners in realizing this vision, given their expansive trading relations with Riyadh. [...]
Overall, Riyadh understands that the success of Vision 2030, particularly the touristic aspect of it, partially hinges on a safer neighborhood. The attacks on Saudi oil installations in 2019, which were blamed on Tehran but claimed by Yemen’s Ansarullah movement—better known as the Houthis—marked a turning point.
The Kingdom was shocked by the lack of US action, [...]
The U.S. plan to bring the Arab states and Israel together into an anti-Iranian coalition gets rejected, the scholars write, because of lack of U.S. pressure on Israel to pursue a two state solution.
In consequence:
[T]he US is losing its standing among regional countries as a security partner. To many, the full-fledged western support for Israel is incomprehensible—and jeopardizes their own safety. [...]
All in all, pivoting towards Asia has become an attractive alternative for regional players seeking to counter US hegemony. Non-western countries are less open to adhering to Washington’s rules for the game, and this inclination will further consolidate intra-regional relationships—especially as key actors find more similarities than differences.
Although the perception of US double standards is not new, the willingness of non-western countries to challenge this amid a changing global order has increased. Previously, regional players tolerated the status quo as the US was seen as the sole superpower. However, with the rise of new global powers in the east, these actors see no reason to stay silent about the suffering in Gaza while passively accepting the moral arguments of the US regarding Russia’s war on Ukraine. If the current trend continues, western influence in a region where it has long been dominant will diminish.
This is quite a slap to the Biden administration which still seems to dream that it can broker some Saudi-Israeli deal and isolate Iran with it.
The times where the U.S. could dictate to the Middle East are definitely over.
Fr. Bob's Reflection for Third Sunday in Easter
When the Disciples who were on the road to Emmaus sit together with Jesus for a meal and He breaks the bread, they recognize Him as the Lord. And like the Disciples who Jesus revealed Himself to, many people come to realize that on life's journey, they are not alone.
But how do we break through to a sense that we are never alone? That walking with us is a God who is madly in love with us?
We have a clue in the Emmaus story. The two Disciples share their food with Jesus. Share their hospitality. They forgot themselves and their disappointments and hurts for a moment. They focused on another.
That was their point of entry that revealed the Christ who was there all along. On their journey, the presence that had been hidden was revealed in the breaking of the bread.
My friends, sometimes it can feel like we are all alone. We all face difficulties and tragedy in our lives. The loss of a job, or poor health. A loved one dies or a relationship ends, and suddenly life is not the same. The rough times cause us to lose faith. No problem is harder to explain than the mystery of suffering.
This is our life. This is our human condition.
But the Emmaus story is also our story. It reminds us that we are not alone. God is always giving us life. He is there to be our strength when trials come. No, we do not carry our cross alone.
Yet, the Emmaus story reminds us that it is OK to be disappointed, and even complain. And it is OK to talk about hopes that have been dashed and to wonder if anyone cares.
This Gospel reassures us that God is always right there, right beside us. But as we saw, that revelation only comes in hindsight. It reminds us that no matter what we are going through, not to be turned in on yourself. So that nothing matters but your own needs and wants.
It was only when the two Disciples reached out to Jesus to care for Him that they knew who He was.
It would seem that to recognize Jesus, the resurrection was not enough. Like those two followers of Jesus, you must reach out to the stranger you meet on the road.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Robert Warren, S.A.
Spiritual Director
[Salon] Iran's Retaliation: the Facts
[Salon] Iran's Retaliation: the Facts - micheletkearney@gmail.com - Gmail
In the wake of Iran’s attack on Israel in response to the April 1 bombing of its consular annex in Damascus, it’s important to keep the facts front and center:
Iran launched 185 one-way attack drones, 36 cruise missiles, and 110 medium-range ballistic missiles (MRBMs) in a multi-phase attack that last several hours, likely intended to probe U.S. and Israeli air defenses, determine radar saturation points, and demonstrate Tehran’s capability to reach Israel with its arsenal. But given the telegraphing from Iran, diplomatic backchanneling, and good intelligence collected in advance of the attack, it’s clear Tehran calibrated this strike as an easily anticipated “Goldilocks”response meant to leave room for an off-ramp toward de-escalation.
Iran only used a small portion of its missile and drone arsenal. Iran has tens of thousands of drones, and at least 3,000 ballistic missiles, though perhaps as many as twice that number. The fact that Iran chose to employ older missile variants, like the Emad—launching them in smaller salvos that would not overwhelm air defenses—means one should be cautious about what lessons to draw from Saturday. Iran, thankfully, did not show a “maximum effort,” as some have suggested.
While primarily U.S. air defenses successfully neutralized Iran’s drones and missiles, the evidence shows replicating such a performance would be operationally difficult and logistically costly for the United States, especially if another attack occurred in short order, with much less or no notice, and at a greater scale. The total cost of this single operation—to defeat less than 3 percent of Iran’s ballistic missile arsenal—likely exceeded $1.5 billion.
Iran’s total defense budget amounts to just 5.17 percent of what America spends on our military. It’s wrong to inflate the Iranian threat, but policymakers should acknowledge the real dangers Tehran’s missiles and drones—which have already killed three American soldiers since October 7—pose for the U.S. and Israel, and we should deliberately avoid escalation. Iran is a fourth-rate military power with an antiquated air force, a small navy, and an army that hasn’t conducted large-scale maneuver warfare in decades. It is not a burgeoning regional hegemon, nor does it have the hard power necessary to become one. It can, however, use proxy forces and asymmetric capabilities to exact high costs on the United States and our partners in the region.
As Tel Aviv decides how it will respond, U.S. analysts and policymakers should appreciate that more escalation means a greater likelihood that Iran’s next attack won’t be as easily thwarted.
The roughly 40,000 U.S. troops still in the Middle East will no doubt bear the brunt of further escalation between Israel and Iran and remain targets of opportunity for local militias. U.S. interests are only undermined by direct conflict with Iran.
U.S. policy should avoid any escalation that might lead to regional war, and the United States remains overly invested militarily in the Middle East—a region of limited and diminishing strategic importance. You can find compelling analysis here, here, and here from DEFP experts on rightsizing U.S. commitments in the region, as well as additional commentary at defp.org.
Tuesday, April 16, 2024
[Salon] Arab countries are looking for balance as Israel-Iran tension escalates.
https://harici.com.tr/israil-iran-gerilimi-tirmanirken-arap-ulkeleri-denge-arayisinda/
Arab countries are looking for balance as Israel-Iran tension escalates
16.04.2024
Jordan has become a target of criticism for being a “Israel's ally” after entering its airspace early Sunday and shot down dozens of Iranian missiles and drones firing at Israel.
Criticizing Israel's war in Gaza harshly, Jordan claimed that its actions against Tehran were a necessary step to "ensure the safety" of its citizens rather than defending Israel. Officials in Israel have hinted that other Arab countries have also helped either by opening their airspace or by providing intelligence and early detection support. However, Jordan was the only country that openly accepted the role it played.
“[Jordan] may be taking a risk if the events escalate,” Jordan's former foreign minister and deputy prime minister Marwan Muasher told the Financial Times (FT), but “so far this is a limited risk.”
Claiming that Amman's actions were not pro-Israel, Muasher said, “This was a way to prevent the tension from escilating. Moving the conflicts beyond Gaza will not benefit anyone, especially Jordan," he said.
Israeli officials tried to highlight the help provided by the US, Britain and France, as well as their neighbors, and War Cabinet Minister Benny Gantz praised 'regional cooperation'.
Despite Israel's statements, Arab governments remained mostly silent, neither confirming nor rejecting any intervention, according to the FT. The region has called for restraint as they approach the war that many have feared since Hamas' raid on Israel on October 7.
It is particularly difficult for Jordan to achieve this balance. The kingdom shares the same border with Israel and is the protector of the Al-Aqsa Mosque (Masjid al-Aqsa) in Jerusalem, which requires regular cooperation with Israeli officials. Amman also fears that Israel's war against Hamas will spread to its borders, especially from the occupied West Bank.
However, Jordan's attitude during Tehran's response to the attack that Israel organized at the Iranian consulate in Syria this month, which led to the death of the senior commanders of the Revolutionary Guards, was the target of criticism on the grounds that Israel's interests were defended within the country at the expense of the interests of the country.
A 30-year-old Jordanian woman, who did not want her name to be revealed for being pressured for criticizing the government, told the FT, "It is another thing to allow coalition planes to use their airspace, it is something else to actively drop these unmanned aerial vehicles for the sake of a country that committed genocide on our Palestinian brothers and risk the safety of your people."
More than two-thirds of Jordan's population is known to be of Palestinian origin.
Confirming that Jordan has blocked several aircraft, Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said, "Let me be very clear, no matter where these unmanned aerial vehicles come from, from Israel, Iran or anywhere else, we will do the same again."
Jordan, Israel and their Arab allies have been involved in the Middle East Air Defense Alliance, led by the U.S. military's central command (CENTCOM), which has enabled monitoring radar and early warning network drones and missile launches since at least 2022.
Jordan has diplomatic relations with Iran, but these relations are cold. The fact that Iran threatens that Jordan will be the "next target" if it cooperates with Israel has once again shown the extent of the tension, the semi-official Persian news agency reported.
The two biggest powers of the Gulf, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, are equally cautious against Iran. They have long seen Iran as an 'enemy' power, but in recent years they have tried to reduce tensions in the region by normalizing relations with Iran. Saudi Arabia re-established diplomatic relations with Tehran last year in an agreement mediated by China.
They were also getting closer to Israel. The UAE normalized relations with Israel in 2020, and Saudi Arabia was preparing for a similar US-backed agreement before its war in Gaza, which began on Oct. 7.
After Oct. 7, the UAE informed Washington that the U.S. wanted it to be applied for approval before launching any military operation from its territory. He warned that he did not want any U.S. presence in the UAE to be used against Iranian targets.
This approach was born from the uncertainty over the extent to which the U.S. is committed to protecting the UAE from Iran or the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen with more missile defenses and more intelligence against the counterattack.
Although the UAE and Saudi Arabia led the Arab coalition that interfered with the civil war in Yemen, they did not join the U.S-led naval task force to prevent the Houthis from attacking on ships in the Red Sea last year.
There are similar accounts for Saudi Arabia to its neighbor in the Gulf.
Ali Shihabi, a Saudi commentator close to the royal palace, said Riyadh would not officially allow the U.S. to use its territory for actions against Iran, but that it would “allow it if the U.S. takes responsibility for the consequences.” However, the Kingdom was wary of the dangers of escalating tension because 'after all, the risk of paying a price is high.'
Shihabi said, “Everyone wants Iran's capabilities to be reduced because Iran is a malicious actor and threatens the security of the Gulf. But they don't want to be seen as part of an attack unless America is full-throttle. . . . they won't risk it,” he said.
Saudi analyst St. Alghashian also told the FT that Saudi Arabia is unlikely to have blocked Iranian missiles because they do not want to appear to be taking sides.
H.A., a Middle East expert at the Royal United Services Institute in London. 'Riyad was just trying to avoid this kind of scenario,' Heller said: 'This is tension after tension, which is of no use to Saudi interests.'
In Saudi Arabia and the UAE, there has been a long-standing disappointment due to the moderate reactions from the US to the attack on Saudi oil infrastructure in 2019 and to which Iran is blamed, and to the Houthi missile and drone attacks on Abu Dhabi in 2022.
'Although Saudi understands that the Israel-US dynamic is different, it believes that Israel is not as much a burden to the USA as it is a burden to the USA, but it is (almost) treated unconditionally,' Alghashian said.
Dead Last (With an Emphasis on Dead!) - TomDispatch.com
Dead Last (With an Emphasis on Dead!) - TomDispatch.com
Juan Cole, Playing Russian Roulette with Middle Eastern Oil
April 16, 2024
Sometimes it seems as if it just never sinks in. I mean, it shouldn't be that complicated anymore. It's hardly news that 2023 was a year of unnerving heat globally -- the hottest "by far" since records began to be kept -- including month by month, May through December. And should you think that was an anomaly, 2024 has taken up the cudgel (so to speak), with each new month hitting a startling global record. March was the tenth in a row to do so. Worse yet, as should be all too painfully obvious by now, this isn't the end of something but -- given the continued massive burning of fossil fuels on this planet -- just the beginning, with so much worse still to come. And don't forget the dramatic heating of global oceans and seas, where records are now also being broken in an unnerving fashion.
Yes, of course we know why this is happening. It's not exactly a mystery anymore. Humanity's (mis)use of fossil fuels, sending greenhouse gasses soaring into the atmosphere, is all too literally creating a future hell on earth and a potentially unimaginable world for our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. And it's not exactly a secret who's truly responsible for so much of what's now happening. As Thor Benson recently highlighted at the Common Dreams website: "A report released by Carbon Majors on Thursday says that 57 companies were responsible for 80% of the world's CO2 emissions from fossil fuel and cement production between 2016 to 2022."
And anyone who checks out the latest piece by TomDispatch regular Juan Cole, creator of the must-read Informed Comment website, won't be surprised to learn that Saudi Aramco leads that list. Oh, and "in terms of investor-owned companies, Chevron, ExxonMobil, and BP contributed the most to CO2 emissions. ExxonMobil alone was responsible for 3.6 gigatons of CO2 emissions over a seven-year period."
Yet, strangely enough, as I've written elsewhere, we humans continue to fight wars with each other (pouring yet more greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere) rather than facing the war on the planet that Big Oil and crew are conducting in a distinctly apocalyptic fashion. (I've long wondered what the CEOs of those companies would say to their kids and grandkids about profiting off the destruction of their world.) Anyway, let Cole take you onto the very planet we're destroying in such a remarkable fashion, with an emphasis on the area in which he's an expert, the distinctly overheating, fossil-fuelizing Middle East. Tom
[Salon] Of bombs and bluffs - ArabDigest.org Guest Post
Of bombs and bluffs
Summary: Iran’s massive missile attack on Israel did little damage which was unsurprising given the advance warning Tehran provided; all sides can claim a measure of victory. But as the Gaza war edges ever closer to a regional conflict the question is what comes next ?
Lord Cameron described the knocking down of the more than three hundred drone, cruise and ballistic missile strikes on Israel over the week- end as a “double defeat” for Iran. In saluting what he called the bravery of Israel and the support it received from the US and “our limited role” the foreign secretary denounced the Iranians for a “dangerous act in a dangerous world.”
The first defeat, according to David Cameron, was that the attack almost completely failed and the second that the world could now see “(Iran’s) true nature as the malign influence in the region.” Regarding the latter, others might point to Israel as another malign influence in the region. As to the former, Lord Cameron neglected to mention that as the first drones were launched, Tehran broadcast the fact giving the Israelis and their allies as well as supportive Arab states, among them Jordan and Saudi Arabia, plenty of time to prepare and co-ordinate what proved a meticulously effective response. There was minimal damage and one casualty, an 8 year old girl seriously wounded by shrapnel.
Our regular contributor Kristian Ulrichsen noted in a social media post:
My view is that publicising a strike that would take hours to unfold effectively guaranteed that it would be intercepted, hence my belief (which could of course be wrong) that the Iranian leadership felt they had to be seen to be doing something but in a carefully messaged way.
Andreas Krieg, another of our regular podcast guests concurred:
#Iran and #Israel have been engaged in a shadow war for years in which there were clear red lines. Israel has crossed these red lines several times in recent months, most notably last week in Damascus. Iran had to react. Iran did so in moderation, hoping that this would bring the episode to an end.
Whilst Western analysts may proclaim this as something of a win for an embattled Benjamin Netanyahu, Lord Cameron’s “double defeat” for Iran seems a trifle overegged. A more realistic view, one that both Ulrichsen and Krieg hint at, is how adroitly the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei handled the dangerous, and some might (fairly) argue, reckless Israeli attack on the Iranian consulate in Damascus on 1 April. Khamenei needed to respond as much if not more to shore up his domestic base than to send a message to Israel and the ‘Great Satan’ aka America.
On 1 April 2024, an Israeli airstrike destroyed the Iranian consulate annex building adjacent to the Iranian embassy in Damascus, Syria, killing 16 people, including a senior Quds Force commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and seven other IRGC officers.
Hard on the heels of the foreign secretary’s victory declaration came his call for restraint. Lord Cameron while confirming that Israel does have a right to respond to the unprecedented missile barrage, pointedly added “we do not support a retaliatory strike. There are times where we have to be smart as well as tough, where we have to use head as well as heart.”
In that he was echoing an earlier and even more pointed declaration from President Biden. In a phone call with Netanyahu the president reportedly told the Israeli PM to “take the win” and warned that if Israel attacked Iran directly, the US would not join in.
For their part the Iranians announced at the UN that “the matter can be deemed concluded” unless of course the Israelis carried out an attack on Iran itself. In which case “should the Israeli regime make another mistake, Iran's response will be considerably more severe." That, as far as Iran is concerned, has left the ball squarely in Israel’s court.
Anshel Pfeffer writing in Haaretz noted that securing the backing of Arab states against Iran’s missile offensive was indeed a significant achievement, one he called an “inflection point.” He argued that “it is now up to Israel to calibrate its inevitable response and coordinate it with the Biden administration, to avoid a regional conflagration and minimise fallout for those neighbours that are now de facto allies.”
Pfeffer added:
Ultimately, in order to allow (the Arab states) to gradually cooperate more openly with Israel in the future and to withstand the criticism within their own countries for the lack of "solidarity" with the Palestinians, Israel's strategy has to be a swift end to the war in Gaza, as part of a wider agreement to release the hostages and implement UN Resolution 1701 in the north, pushing Hezbollah away from the border.
An opportunity then and one that Netanyahu should grasp says Pfeffer. However even in the unlikely event 1701 - the 2007 call for a cessation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah - was implemented the bigger reality, of course, is that Netanyahu does not want an end to the war. Nor can he easily ignore the demands from his extremist National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to hit Iran fast and hard. Putting it in gangland-speak the minister said “the boss must go nuts.” Ben-Gvir and his fellow extremist Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich - Israel, he said, must respond “not with slogans but with action”- are all that is holding Netanyahu’s coalition together.
Benjamin Netanyahu is as adroit as Ayatollah Khamenei in playing high stakes games. For Khamenei the risk was that a ballistic missile got through and did significant damage with multiple and perhaps massive casualties. It didn’t happen so the gamble would appear to have paid off. At least thus far. Netanyahu will have to decide to make a call. Is Biden bluffing when he says he will not have Israel’s back if it conducts a major military action against Iran? Or is Ben-Gvir the bluffer implying he will bring the Netanyahu government down if a hard hit is not swiftly carried out? No doubt, as he has so often done in the past, Netanyahu will try and hold off Smotrich and Ben-Gvir with a promise of action to come mixed with harsh actions against Palestinian civilians and Hamas such as last week’s killing of the three sons and four grandchildren of Hamas’ political leader Ismail Haniyeh (see our newsletter of 12 April.)
But as this game is played out in Washington, London, Tel Aviv and Tehran the bombs continue to fall in Gaza and settler attacks continue in the West Bank; humanitarian aid is withheld at the border as Gazans face starvation and disease. The US, Britain, Israel and Tehran can all claim a measure of victory. As ever it is the Palestinians who pay the price.
> Resisting the 'Ecstasy of War': Gaza Through the Eyes of Religious, Left-wing Israeli Soldiers
> https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-04-15/ty-article-magazine/.premium/resisting-the-ecstasy-of-war-gaza-through-the-eyes-of-religious-leftist-israeli-soldiers/0000018e-ce86-d283-a5ee-fe9ff47e0000
>
> Resisting the 'Ecstasy of War': Gaza Through the Eyes of Religious, Left-wing Israeli Soldiers - Israel News - Haaretz.com
Article excerpt:
>>
>> "He says he saw reservists armed with pamphlets from extremist rabbis such as Yigal Levinstein and Zvi Tau, distributed by rabbis in uniform sent by the Israel Defense Forces' department of Jewish education.
>>
>> "War "shouldn't be treated as a 'mistake' or 'error' that we would prefer to avoid. War is a great thing," Levinstein wrote. These words echoed what an IDF rabbi, Amichai Friedman, said a month after the Israeli military response to the Hamas massacre began: "I imagine in these days there are no murdered people, no hostages and no wounded. And then, I am left with perhaps the happiest month of my life."
>>
>> "Schwartz shared that on the front lines, rabbis in IDF uniforms came to lecture the soldiers. "Once, a rabbi from Kiryat Arba in the West Bank said we need to destroy and shoot everyone, and that the IDF's [rules of engagement] ethics are a 'distorted Western morality.'"
>>
>> . . .
>>
>> "Schwartz felt what he describes as a complete and painful theft: "They take away from me what is precious to me, my faith, and direct it against me," adding that he "witnessed people feeling joy about this war."
>>
>> "Calls to "restore Jewish honor" through intense military action weren't only heard among rabbis or far-right politicians. On October 7, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised to "avenge" Hamas and was quoted on social media citing the biblical verse "God, to whom vengeance belongs." Days after the ground invasion of Gaza at the end of October, in a letter to soldiers, Netanyahu invoked a biblical commandment for Israelites to decimate their nemesis: "Remember what Amalek did to you."
What is described above is the very definition and essence of “Fascism,” the “Ecstasy of War!” Now shared collectively throughout the U.S. in a bi-partisan love of "War as a Great Thing,” deserving of dedicating our society to it with our love of all things military. With the M-16 and its civilian variants our national religious icon now (see Republican X-mas cards). And ever-increasing massive military spending, with Republicans always outdoing Democrats (but not by much) in their clamor for more, more, and a “National Security Strategy” fully articulated in 2017 and 2018 by the Trump administration of strangling our “Peer Competitors” by any means necessary. At all levels throughout the “Spectrum of Conflict;” Economic (Blockade, i.e., sanctions), “Information,” and Military Encirclement as Phase Zero of a "War of Aggression Plan” in “plain view.” With that set in motion in 1995 by the Republican “Contract for America,” calling for NATO expansion, and carried on successively by all administrations since, with the only slight “ebb” in that by sequestration during the Obama administration. Remedied in full and more by Trump, and carried on by the Biden Administration, with our “War of Aggression Plan” even more set for the incoming Trump administration (they hope and work for) with the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. In plain view, if one can actually see “reality.” The Ecstasy of War! We can never get enough of it, nor the incitement and provocation that leads to it, making it the one immutable fact of existence for the USA and Israel!
Monday, April 15, 2024
[Salon] Sisi and the evisceration of the middle class -ArabDigest.org Guest Post
Sisi and the evisceration of the middle class
Summary: Egypt’s president ploughs ahead with huge debt-funded mega projects that saddle the middle classes and poor Egyptians with ever heavier tax burdens as inflation soars and the Egyptian pound plummets.
We thank Maged Mandour for today’s newsletter. Maged is a political analyst and a regular contributor to Arab Digest and to Middle East Eye and Open Democracy. He is also a writer for Sada, the Carnegie Endowment online journal. Maged is the author of the recently published Egypt under El-Sisi (I.B.Tauris) which examines social and political developments since the coup of 2013. Keep an eye out for it! You can find Maged’s most recent AD podcast here.
Almost a decade after the election of President Sisi, and the entrenchment of a militarised form of state capitalism, signs of economic decline and impoverishment are everywhere. Poverty rates, which stood at 26.3% in FY 2012/2013, the year of the coup, have increased to reach an estimated whopping 35.7%. Those categorised as “not poor” have decreased by 8%, from 45.23% in 2019/2020 to 36.99% in 2022/2023 as the decline of the middle class accelerates. These figures should not come as a surprise , considering the historic collapse of the national currency against the dollar, which is hovering around 47.1 EGP per US$ after the latest devaluation on 6 March. In May 2014, when Sisi won the election, the exchange rate stood at around 7 EGP per US$, an immense loss of value. This impoverishment was driven by record inflation, which reached an historic high of 39.7% in August 2023 with food and drink inflation reaching 71.9%. This record is expected to be broken in the second quarter of 2024 with inflation anticipated to reach 45% after the latest devaluation of the pound. The destitution of millions of Egyptians is a direct result of the regime’s model of militarised state capitalism, which has driven the country to an unprecedented debt crisis. More profoundly, however, it is a direct result of the regime’s grand political project, namely, the concentration of political and economic power in the hands of the military establishment and with it the transfer of wealth from the lower and middle classes to the military elites.
Military generals have become multi-millionaires thanks to corruption in Sisi's mega projects [photo credit: Steve Hanke]
With the ascension of Sisi to the presidency, on a wave of mass popular support, the full militarisation of the state and the political system was set loose. For example, the Mubarak era policy of populating the state apparatus with retired or active military personnel accelerated with the state bureaucracy, economic authorities, ministries and local government all heavily populated by retired or active members of the Egyptian Armed Forces. This was coupled with legal and constitutional amendments that heavily curtailed the power of the judiciary, severely weakening the ability of the State Council and the Constitutional court to challenge the executive. Finally, a new parliamentary majority party was engineered by the security services; it does not seem to play an active role in policy making nor does it populate any important government posts. It rather acts to rubber stamp the government's policy and to provide an aura of legitimacy for the regime. This heavily militarised political landscape has allowed the military and the Presidency to embark on a mass appropriation of public funds, through an historic debt spree, whose burden has fallen on the shoulders of the poor and the middle classes. The list of examples are too numerous to survey, but the most prominent example is the New Administrative Capital, with a total estimated budget of US$300 billion. In spite of official government pronouncements that the capital is not being funded by the state budget, implying that it is not a burden on public finances, there is mounting evidence that it is, indeed, funded by loans and public money drawn from the budget of economic authorities. The reason that it does not appear on the state budget is the fragmented nature of the Egyptian budgetary landscape which allows the regime to obfuscate and obscure its spending. This is only possible within the confines of a fully militarised political system, and with a parliament that is too docile to challenge the supremacy of the executive. It is important to note that the project is executed by the Administrative Capital For Urban Development (ACUD); 51% of the company is owned by the military.
Even with the recent mass capital inflows, namely the US$35 billion Ras El Hekma UAE investment, the increased value of the IMF loan to US$8 billion, the return of hot money, and the EU funding package estimated at US$8.1 billion, a trend that further impoverishes the vast majority of Egyptians is set to continue though it is expected to alleviate the worst symptoms of the debt crisis. Still, the regime’s policy of mega projects with dubious economic returns seems to be very resistant to change. For example, in January 2024, ACUD announced plans to start the second phase of the New Administrative Capital with an estimated cost of 250-300 billion EGP, doubling its size. There are also talk of another mega project for the Suez Canal with an expected cost hovering around the US$10 billion mark. That's in spite of the amount being transferred to the state budget from the revenues of the Canal dropping from US$4.5 billion in 2014/15 to US$3.8 billion in 2021/22, raising questions about the efficacy of a project like this. And since Yemen's Huthis began their attacks on Red Sea shipping, revenues have declined ever more precipitously.
Capital inflows for Sisi's mega projects will only benefit the military elites and the regime’s creditors, now enjoying record high interest rates. The interest rates are so lucrative that an estimated US$16 billion of capital investments in short term debt instruments have flowed into the country since early March. It is important to remember that an outflow of US$20 billion worth of investments in the same type of debt instruments triggered the crisis in 2022, illustrating how little the regime has learned over the past two years. In the end, the debt spree which has cost Egyptians US$132.7 billion in external debt servicing over the past decade has not only impoverished them but has allowed the military to entrench itself in the economy.
The core of Egypt's problem does not solely lie in economic policy but with the political system, an outright military autocracy, that produced this policy and an international consensus that has encouraged it. With the role of the EU and the US in enabling one of the most brutal dictatorships in the Middle East, the inevitable anti-Western popular backlash will be immense and generational. The European obsession with migrants will pale in comparison with the hostile regime that might emerge in the Southern Mediterranean if and when the Sisi regime changes.
Sunday, April 14, 2024
Saturday, April 13, 2024
Friday, April 12, 2024
[Salon] A dangerous week in the Middle East - ArabDigest.org
A dangerous week in the Middle East
Summary: despite widespread calls for de-escalation the war in Gaza has only become hotter and ever more menacing for both the region and the world.
In just two days, the 9th and 10th of April the Gaza war’s escalatory needle shot up. On Tuesday Hamas emphatically rejected the ceasefire offer that Israel had agreed to put on the table in Cairo. Hamas claimed it was interested in a deal that "puts an end to the aggression on our people.” However, the statement went on to say “the Israeli position remains intransigent and it didn't meet any of the demands of our people and our resistance."
Hamas has called for an end to the IDF offensive, a full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip and a return of displaced Gazans to their heavily destroyed communities. In return there would be a staged release of the surviving hostages and incremental ceasefires leading to a permanent ceasefire (for the full Hamas position see our 15 February newsletter.) It is a proposal Israel will not accept as it leaves Hamas in control of the Strip.
The same day Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued a further threat in the wake of the 1 April Israeli bombing of the Iranian embassy in Damascus that killed senior IRGC officers. The lethal strike was, he said, an attack on Iran itself. “When they attack our consulate, it means our territory has been attacked,” adding “the evil regime made a mistake and must be punished and will be punished.”
The Israelis were quick to respond with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Foreign Minister Israel Katz threatening a strike on Iran if it was shown that Khamenei’s retribution came from Iranian soil. The last noted is an important caveat and an indication that Netanyahu’s government is cognisant of the fact that even though in a full-scale war Israel would prevail, Iran could still inflict serious damage with the ballistic missile capabilities it already possesses.
President Biden - who as we noted in Thursday's newsletter had expressed stern criticism of Netanyahu and how he was prosecuting the war - on Wednesday was quick to assure the Israelis that America’s support was “ironclad.” He added "We're going to do all we can to protect Israel's security."
Several members of the Israeli occupation force were killed in an ambush in Khan Younis on April 7 [photo credit: Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades]
The Iranians may choose a cyber attack or use the ‘Axis of Resistance’ - their proxies in Lebanon, Yemen and Syria – to respond to the embassy bombing. In a previous response to the killing of a senior advisor to the IRGC in Damascus, Iran chose to destroy what it claimed was an Israeli spy centre in Erbil, the capital of Iraq’s Kurdistan Region (see our 16 February newsletter.) Crucially the target was not inside Israel. The claim that the home of one of the three killed, a prominent Kurdish businessman, was a spy base was strongly denied by Iraq’s federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). Still it gave Khamenei a war-avoiding and face-saving gesture, one that was not a direct hit on Israel.
And while the Ayatollah was still pondering the form retaliation this time would take the Israelis further upped the ante on Wednesday morning with a targeted drone attack that killed three sons and four grandchildren of the Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in the Al-Shati refugee camp in Gaza. Haniyeh who lives in Qatar's capital Doha showed no emotion when he was informed of the deaths just ahead of a visit to wounded Palestinians being treated in a hospital there. When asked if he would like to cancel the visit he replied “No we can continue. May God have mercy on them.” He later said “I thank God for this honour which he bestowed upon us with the martyrdom of my three sons and my grandchildren. With this pain and blood, we create hope, a future, and freedom for our people, our cause, and our nation.”
The apparent complacency, the implacability, with which he took the news was both chilling and instructive. Hamas is prepared to sacrifice everything: its fighters, the families of its fighters, all the civilians trapped in Gaza to win this war.
And against that is the implacability of the Israelis perfectly captured by Netanyahu’s political foe and War Cabinet minister Benny Gantz. Shortly after the killing of Haniyeh’s sons and grandchildren Gantz had this to say:
The war with Hamas will take time. Youth in middle school will one day fight in the Gaza Strip, as in Judea and Samaria, and against Lebanon. But the truth must be clear, and the head must be high for our achievements: military-wise - Hamas is defeated. Its fighters are eliminated or in hiding. Its abilities are cut off, and we will continue to hit whatever's left. Victory will come, step by step. We are on our way to it and we won't stop.
Gantz backs Netanyahu to the full in defying Biden and launching a full-scale offensive on Rafah, viewed by the Israelis as Hamas’ last redoubt. In that he is supported by the respected Israeli historian Benny Morris who wrote in Thursday’s New York Times
An Israeli failure to take Rafah and smash Hamas’s last organised military formations and its governing structures will paint Israel, in its enemies’ eyes, as a weak, defeated polity, easy prey for the next potential assailant.
Morris mentioned almost in passing the more than 1 million non-combatants who will be trapped between two implacable forces, one prepared to fight to the death whilst using civilians as a shield and the other armed to the teeth with high tech weaponry and little or no regard for those civilians.
In such a stark and brutalist scenario lies the catalyst for a larger war, one that draws in not just Iran’s proxies but Iran itself and therefore America with consequences that are almost unimaginable.
Thursday, April 11, 2024
[Salon] Ukraine - To Hurt Russia Means Pain For Ukraine Guest Post
Ukraine - To Hurt Russia Means Pain For Ukraine
April 11, 2024
Ukraine is trying to hurt Russia by hitting its refineries. But the attacks fail to have the desired effects on Russia. The Russian response though, in form of de-energization attacks on Ukraine, seriously endanger the state.
Today the Russian Federation continued with the de-energization of Ukraine (machine translation):
As a result of a massive Russian missile attack on the night of April 11 , the Trypillya thermal power plant in the Kiev region was completely destroyed.
...
Located in the city of Ukrainka, Trypillia thermal power station was commissioned in 1973 and became the most powerful power plant in the Kiev region. It was also the largest supplier of electricity to the Kiev, Cherkasy and Zhytomyr regions.
Since the Zmiyevskaya TPP in the Kharkiv region was completely destroyed on March 22, and Russian troops occupied the Uglegorsk TPP in the Donetsk region on July 25, 2022, Centrenergo has now lost 100% of its generation.
After the complete destruction of the Trypillya TPP, the network recalls the statement of Centrenergo from August 2023 that the facility is equipped with physical protection "at 100%".
At the same time, it was reported that 70% of the work at the Zmievskaya TPP was completed. This facility was also destroyed by shelling in March of this year.
DTEK, another power supply company in Ukraine, also reported significant losses:
During the missile attack on early 11 April, Russia attacked two thermal power plants owned by DTEK company (Ukraine's largest private investor in energy), severely damaging the equipment there.
Source: DTEK press service
Details: "After the attack, the power engineers promptly began to eliminate the consequences and restore the equipment. According to early reports, there were no casualties," the statement said.
Since the start of the full-scale invasion, DTEK's thermal power plants have been attacked almost 170 times.
In addition to the power supplies Russian attacks also targeted parts of the national electricity distribution network:
Russia has damaged Ukrenergo’s substations and generation facilities in Odesa, Zaporizhzhia, Lviv, Kharkiv and Kyiv Oblasts as a result of a massive missile attack on the night of 10-11 April (Ukrenergo is the electricity transmission system operator in Ukraine).
Europe's biggest underground storage facility for natural gas in western Ukraine was also attacked (machine translation):
On the night of April 11, Russian cruise missiles of various classes and drones attacked two critical energy infrastructure facilities in the Lviv region.
This was announced by the head of the Lviv OVA Maxim Kozitsky.
"This is a gas distribution infrastructure facility in the Stryi district and an electric substation in the Chervonograd district. Fires started. They were quickly extinguished by firefighters. There were no casualties. All life support systems in the Lviv region are operating normally," Kozytsky said.
The underground storage facility is partly used by west European companies. But without the pumping and distribution system at the surface the underground facility, and anything stored in it, becomes useless.
Russia has not attacked any of the nuclear power plants in Ukraine. They, and limited electricity imports from western Europe, can still provide a minimum of basic load electricity to the country. But any peaks in consumption, which are usually buffered by the now destroyed thermal and hydroelectric power plants, will put the system under stress. Significant blackouts will thus become unavoidable.
Aleksey Arestovich, a former advisor to the president of Ukraine, is not happy about this (machine translation):
The Russians consistently knock out our generation - hydroelectric and thermal power plants.
More than UAH 50 billion was allocated to protect the stations.
This is the same amount as according to the NBU, Ukrainians collected defense donations in two years.
I throw up questions that should be asked to our leaders.:
how and what was the money spent?
why haven't alternative generation circuits been created in the last two years - gas-fired power plants haven't been purchased?
why didn't you listen to the experts for two years, who predicted what was happening back in May 2022 and offered to do business for two years, and not to fuck around and publish?
Energy is the foundation of the country's life. If there is no energy, there is nothing.
We are still holding on, thanks to the energy bridge with the EU and nuclear power plants, but the prospect that some regions will sit without electricity for weeks (and therefore without production and storage of food-in the summer!) getting closer.
Neither Arestovich nor other commentators in Ukraine acknowledge that the Russian campaign to de-energize the country is a direct consequence of Ukrainian attacks on infrastructure in Russia.
The daily reports by the Russian Ministry of Defense have emphasized this several times:
In response to the Kiev regime's attempts to damage Russian oil and gas and energy facilities, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation launched a massive strike on Ukrainian fuel and energy facilities with long-range precision weapons, air-and sea-based weapons, as well as unmanned aerial vehicles. The strike goals have been achieved. All objects are hit.
As a result, the work of Ukrainian military industry enterprises was disrupted, the transfer of reserves to combat areas was disrupted, and fuel supply to units and military units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine was hampered.
Ukraine has, over several weeks, used drones to attack oil refineries deep within Russia. It did not stop even after it received the first Russian responses in form of renewed strikes on its energy facilities.
The U.S. has said that it does not like the Ukrainian strikes on Russian oil facilities because they could lead to an increase in global gasoline prices which could lower president Biden's chance for a re-election.
Only yesterday U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin again criticized such attacks:
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Ukraine’s recent drone strikes on Russian oil refineries have a “knock-on effect” that could affect the global energy situation and suggested Kyiv focus on “tactical and operational targets” instead.
“Those attacks could have a knock-on effect in terms of the global energy situation. Ukraine is better served in going after tactical and operational targets that can directly influence the current fight,” Austin told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday, April 9, Bloomberg reported.
...
Austin’s comments are the latest confirmation of Washington’s position on Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian refineries, which first started circulating following a Financial Times (FT) article – citing unnamed officials – that said Washington had relayed wishes to Ukraine’s intelligence units to stop hitting Russian oil refineries for fear of rising crude prices and retaliation.
However, unable to provide further money and weapons to Ukraine, the Biden administration has lost much of its leverage over Ukraine.
It has also failed to put its ducks in a row. Remarkably the General Secretary of NATO, usually a spokesperson for U.S. policy, takes a position that is in opposite to what the U.S. Secretary of Defense says:
Oil refineries in Russian territory are “legitimate” targets for Ukrainian drone strikes, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg during a joint press briefing with Finnish President Alexander Stubb on April 10.
Stoltenberg reiterated that Ukraine has the right to defend itself by military means.
“Ukraine has the right to strike legitimate military targets outside the territory of their country to defend itself,” the secretary said.
While the Economist lauds the Ukrainian attacks it notes that the intended consequences like a gasoline shortage in Russia, are unlikely to happen:
The government has kept a lid on prices by banning petrol exports for six months from March 1st, and striking a deal with Belarus, its client state. Russia imported 3,000 tonnes of fuel from Belarus in the first half of March, up from zero in January. Fearing that may not be enough, officials have also asked neighbouring Kazakhstan to set aside a third of its reserves, equivalent to 100,000 tonnes, should Russia need them, according to Reuters.
Nor will Russia lose any income:
The government will even save some cash by paying out fewer per-barrel subsidies to refineries. Russia’s biggest money-earners are resource taxes. And because these are levied as royalties at the well-head, the government is indifferent between oil exported as crude or as refined fuel, says Mr Vakulenko. As long as Russia is able to export crude, it can collect royalties.
To sum up:
The Ukrainian attacks on Russian refineries do not have the desired secondary effects on Russia. Fuel is available at cheap prices and resource based state income continues to be high.
Ukraine's attacks on Russia are the purported reason given by Russia for the de-energization of Ukraine.
NATO and the U.S. defense establishment do not have a consistent position.
Global fuel prices are rising and are hurting Biden's campaign efforts.
Ukraine continues to be de-energized.
One might think that the negative effects from the above are significant enough to lead to a change in policies.
How come I do not expect to see any?
Posted by b on April 11, 2024 at 13:53 UTC | Permalink
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