Some things are far scarier than a map

By Rami Khouri
Daily Star

"An article and map in The New York Times’ Sunday edition two weeks ago examined the possibility that current upheavals may cause some Arab states to break up into smaller units. Written by the veteran foreign correspondent Robin Wright, the article created lively discussion among Middle East-focused circles in the United States, and in the Middle East it sparked wild speculation that it evidenced a new plan by Western powers, Israelis and others of evil intent to further partition large Arab countries into many smaller, weaker ones. The title of the article, “How 5 Countries Could Become 14,” naturally fed such speculation, as did the immediate linkage in millions of Arab minds of how British and French colonial officials in 1916-1918 partitioned the former Ottoman lands of the Levant into a series of new countries called Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Israel, while their colonial handiwork had also created new entities that ultimately became independent countries such as Kuwait, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and others.Wright’s article explored the possibility that Libya could fracture into three units, Iraq and Syria into five units (of Druze, Kurds, Alawites, Sunnis and Shiites), Saudi Arabia into five units, and Yemen into two units. Syria might trigger such fragmentation across the region in stressed multisectarian societies. She did not advocate this, but only speculated whether sectarian stresses and conflicts might reconfigure countries that were not designed by the will of their own people.

Most critics of the article and map were horrified by the possibility that foreign powers may once again be at work redrawing the map of the Middle East, reaffirming two of the greatest lived traumas that have long plagued the Arab world: the ability and willingness of external powers to meddle deeply and structurally in our domestic condition, and the total inability of vulnerable, helpless Arab societies to do anything about this.
I understand the harsh reactions by Arabs who fear another possible redrawing of our map by foreign hands, but I fear that this is not really the bad news of the day; the really bad news is the state of existing Arab countries, and how most of them have done such a terrible job of managing the societies that they inherited after 1920.
The horror map is not the one published in the NYT two weeks ago; it is the existing map and condition of the Arab countries that have spent nearly a century developing themselves and have so little to show for it.
Not a single credible Arab democracy. Not a single Arab land where the consent of the governed actually matters. Not a single Arab society where individual men and women are allowed to use all their God-given human faculties of creativity, ingenuity, individuality, debate, free expression, autonomous analysis and full productivity. Not a single Arab society that can claim to have achieved a reasonably sustainable level of social and economic development, let alone anything approaching equitable development or social justice. Not a single Arab country that has protected and preserved its natural resources, especially arable land and renewable fresh water resources. Not a single Arab country that has allowed its massive, ruling military-security-intelligence sectors to come under any sort of civilian oversight. Not a single Arab country that has spent hundreds of billions of dollars on foreign arms and other imports and found itself able to ensure the security of its own land and people. And not a single Arab country that has developed an education system that harnesses and honors the immense wealth and power of millions of its own young Arab minds, rather than corralling those minds into intellectual sheep pens where the mind’s free choice is inoperative, and life only comprises following orders.
This perverse reality of Arab statehood and independence – not any possible future map – is the ugly reality that should anger us, even shame us. We have endured this for over four generations now, unsurprisingly bringing us to the point today where every single Arab country, without exception, experiences open revolt of its citizens for freedom, dignity and democracy of some sort, demands for real constitutional reforms, or expressions of grievances via social media by citizens in some wealthy oil-producing states who are afraid to speak out because they will go to jail for tweeting their most human sentiments or aspirations.
There is not much to be proud of in the modern era of Arab statehood, and much to fix and rebuild along more rational, humane lines. I don’t much care about lines on a map. I do care about the trajectories of our own national management experiences, which have been mostly disappointing, and in some cases profoundly derelict."

تعذيب الفلسطينيين ليس أمنا

فهمي هويدي


حين تورط صاحبنا في تصريح دعا فيه الى فتح معبر رفح أمام فلسطينيي قطاع غزة، فإنه تعرض للاتهام والتجريح من قبل من وصفوا بأنهم "سياسيون" إذ اعتبر كلامه دليلا على الجهل بمقتضيات الأمن القومي لمصر.

وكان ذلك هو العنوان الذي نشرته جريدة الاهرام على ستة أعمدة يوم الخميس الماضي 10/10. وأصل الحكاية أن السيد حمدين صباحي مؤسس التيار الشعبي والقيادي في جبهة الإنقاذ كان قد التقى بعضا من ممثلي حركة حماس، يتقدمهم الدكتور موسى أبومرزوق نائب رئيس المكتب السياسي للحركة، وفي أعقاب اللقاء قال السيد صباحي كلامه الذي استفز أولئك النفر من السياسيين الذين كنت أتصور أنهم أدرى من غيرهم بحقائق الموضوع. وبالتالي توقعت منهم أن يكونوا أكثر رصانة ومسؤولية في التعبير عن آرائهم إزاءه.

لكن ما قرأناه منسوبا اليهم فيما نشرته "الاهرام"  يكشف عن بعض أوجه الأزمة التي تعاني منها بعض عناصر النخبة المصرية الجديدة، التي تعاني من الفقر في الإدراك والمعرفة، ينطبق ذلك على قائمة طويلة ممن يكتسبون تلك الألقاب الكبيرة بمجرد ظهورهم على شاشات التليفزيون الذي يوزع عليهم تلك الألقاب بالمجان.

النقطة الجوهرية والتي اتكأ عليها أولئك السياسيون هي أن فتح معبر رفح يعد تهديدا للأمن القومي المصري، ولم يقل أحد لماذا يعد كذلك، ولا أورد واقعة واحدة تدعم ذلك الرأي، لكنهم اعتمدوا على الانطباع الشائع في أوساط عامة المصريين الذي يعتبر حركة حماس التي تدير القطاع تهديدا لأمن مصر، وأن الأنفاق التي حفرها الغزاويون للتغلب على الحصار وتوفير احتياجاتهم المعيشية ليست "سوى منافذ لتهريب الأسلحة والإرهابيين إلى داخل سيناء، لتحويلها إلى قاعدة دولية للإرهاب العالمي".

وهذه العبارة الأخيرة وردت على لسان أحد السياسيين الذين تحدثت إليهم جريدة الأهرام. واستطرد (صاحبنا بالمناسبة هو متحدث باسم حزب التجمع اليساري) قائلا إن مصر لن تشعر بأمان كامل على حدودها مع رفح الفلسطينية، إلا بعد سقوط حركة حماس من السلطة، لأنها امتداد لحركة الإخوان وفرع عن التنظيم الدولي، ورغم أن آخرين رددوا الفكرة ذاتها بدرجة أو أخرى، إلا أنني تعمدت اقتباس الفقرة التي وردت على لسان القيادى اليساري ــ الذي يكاد يتبني بالكامل وجهة النظر الإسرائيلية إزاء حركة حماس ــ لكى يدعونا ذلك إلى تصور المدى الذي يذهب إليه اليمين في مصر.

لقد دعوت أكثر من مرة في السابق إلى تفنيد التهديد من خلال تقصي حقائق الانطباع الشائع الذي يعتبر الأنفاق وحماس في القطاع بمثابة تهديد لأمن مصر،  لأن ذلك الانطباع تحول بمضي الوقت إلى عقيدة استقرت في أوساط عامة الناس ونخبهم السياسيين والأمنية.

وهذه الحقيقة تشكلت بفعل حملات التعبئة الإعلامية، وروجت لها أطراف لها مصلحتها ليس فقط في تسميم العلاقة بين مصر وحماس، ولكن لها مصلحة أيضا في ضرب المقاومة وإحكام الحصار المفروض على فلسطينيي القطاع لتركيعهم وإذلالهم.

ولا يشك أحد في أن إسرائيل صاحبة المصلحة الأولى في ذلك، كما أننا لا نستطيع أن نتجاهل الدور الذي لعبته الأجهزة الأمنية التابعة للسلطة الفلسطينية في رام الله، التي لها ثأرها الذي لم تنسه إزاء حركة حماس، وكانت الوثائق التي نشرت مؤخرا قد كشفت النقاب عن الجهد الذي تبذله للوقيعة والدس بين حماس ومصر، حكومة وشعبا.

إن جهابذة السياسة الذين تحدثوا عن تهديد حماس والأنفاق لأمن مصر، انطلقوا من الاستسلام للأكاذيب الإعلامية التي لا دليل عليها، وأبدوا استعدادا مدهشا للقبول بإحكام الحصار حول القطاع، غير مبالين بمعاناة أو تدمير حياة أكثر من مليون ونصف المليون فلسطيني في غزة، الأمر الذي يمكن أن يؤدي في حال استمراره إلى المساس بأمن مصر الذي يدعي هؤلاء أنهم حريصون عليه.

في حين أن فتح معبر رفح وإخضاعه لإشراف السلطة المصرية كأي معبر حدودي آخر هو الحل الحقيقي الذي يحمي مصالح الطرفين المصري والفلسطيني.

اننا لا نستطيع أن نحمي أمن مصر بمضاعفة معاناة الفلسطينيين، ثم إن الأمن لن يقدر له أن يتوفر ويستقر إلا إذا تم التوصل إلى صيغة توفق بين المصالح المصرية والفلسطينيين في القطاع، هذا إذا كانت مصر تملك قرارها، وبوسعها ان تتحرر من حسابات وضغوط الأطراف الاخرى التي لا تتمنى الخير لا لمصر ولا للمقاومة في القطاع.

إنني لا أمل من التذكير بأن نزاهة الموقف إزاء قضية فلسطين هى أحد معايير الوطنية المصرية، من ثم فإن وطنيتك تصبح مجرَّحة إذا انحزت باسم الأمن إلى صف تعذيب الفلسطينيين وتركيعهم مقدما بذلك هدية مجانية لإسرائيل.
 

هربوا من سورية ومن ليبيا: غرق أكثر من 200 لاجئ فلسطيني في المتوسط

أحد الأطفال الناجين

عــ48ـرب/ وكالات

قالت مجموعة العمل من أجل فلسطينيي سوريا إن سفينة تقل مئات اللاجئين الفلسطينيين غرقت في عرض البحر الأبيض المتوسط
 بعد أن أطلق خفر السواحل الليبي النار عليها ما أدى لتعطل محركاتها.

وأوضحت المجموعة أن السفينة تعرضت لإطلاق نار من قبل مسلحين ليبيين في وقت متأخر من مساء الخميس، واستمرت في مسيرتها حتى فجر الجمعة، مؤكدة أنه لم تكن هناك اتصالات ولا أي جهة تواصل منذ ذلك الحين، لهذا تم الكشف والحديث عن هذه الفاجعة مساء يوم أمس الأحد.

وقال أحد الناجين في مالطا إن خفر السواحل الليبية أطلق الرصاص عليها، وأصاب اثنين من اللاجئين، فيما استمرت السفينة بالإبحار حتى وصلت إلى منطقة ما بين مالطا ولمبيدوزا، وهناك توقفت المحركات عن العمل بسبب إصابتها بالرصاص، مما أدى لغرق السفينة بمن فيها، والحديث يدور عن فقدان 200 لاجئ فلسطيني على الأقل.

وذكرت مجموعة العمل أنه تم إنقاذ حوالي 70 فلسطينياً موجودين الآن بمالطا، ويوجد عدد من المفقودين فيما كانت السفينة تقل 375 مهاجرًا.

وكانت قد انطلقت السفينة من ليبيا من شواطئ طرابلس الليبية يوم الجمعة الماضي، بعد أن ضاقت بها السبل للعيش الكريم والآمن في ليبيا حيث وصلوا من سوريا هربا من الأحداث، وتركوا ليبيا هربا من الأحداث أيضا، وقضوا لاحقا غرقا في عرض البحر.

وناشد اللاجئون الفلسطينيون الناجون الجهات الدولية والحقوقية والصليب الأحمر المالطي التدخل العاجل والفوري لانتشال من تبقى من ركاب المركب حيث لا يزال عدد كبير من ذويهم في عداد المفقودين.

وذكر منسق مجموعة العمل طارق الحمود أن ركاب السفينة تفرقوا بين غريق وناجٍ ومفقود، محملا المسؤولية للمسؤولون العرب والفلسطينيون والنظام السوري أيضا.

المعارضة السورية لن تذهب الى جنيف 2

A GOOD EDITORIAL

رأي القدس

October 13, 2013

بعد المذابح والقصف بالطائرات والصواريخ والمدفعية وقذف البراميل المشتعلة (وحتى الخرسانات المسلحة التي تزن 500 كغ حين تقلّ امدادات الذخيرة) والابادة بالسلاح الكيميائي وتهجير الملايين جاء دور تجويع المناطق الثائرة على النظام السوري تحت شعار ‘الركوع او الجوع′.
… لكن هذا آخر ما يهمّ روسيا او امريكا بالطبع فكل ما هو مطلوب الآن، بعد أن وافق النظام السوري على تسليم ترسانته الكيميائية، هو العمل على اعادة تأهيله سياسيا، من خلال اعتباره شريكاً في مفاوضات تخفي تحتها مسؤوليته عن جبل جثث السوريين المتعاظم يوما بعد يوم.
تصريح رئيس المجلس الوطني السوري، جورج صبرا، أمس ان المجلس لن يذهب الى جنيف 2 يعيد تذكير روسيا وامريكا بوجود معارضة سورية لا يمكن تجاهلها في سياق ترتيبات الأمم العظمى لشؤون الشعوب المنكوبة.
بعد اتفاق الكيماوي يمكن القول انه صارت هناك خطوط عامة امريكية – روسية متقاربة فيما يخص الشأن السوري.
تقوم اوركسترا واسعة متلائمة مع طروحات هذا التقارب باشاعة ‘وقائع′ ومعلومات تصب كلّها في ضرورة الحل على الطريقة الروسية الامريكية.
من هذه المعلومات هي ان المعارضة السورية متشرذمة وضعيفة، وان تشكيلاتها العسكرية صارت أقرب لتنظيم القاعدة والجهادية الاسلامية، وان المعارضة بصيغها كافة فشلت في تقديم بديل مقبول لنظام الأسد الخ…
يشتغل هذا التقارب أيضاً على التعامل مع تلفيق واختراع سريعين لاحزاب جديدة داخل سورية (وقد قام الأخضر الابراهيمي بزيارة بعض منها لإعطائها شرعية دولية)، وتلميع ما يسمى ‘معارضة الداخل’ التي هي من صلب النظام (امثال نائب رئيس الوزراء السوري قدري جميل و’وزير المصالحة الوطنية’ علي حيدر).
بعد اعدام واعتقال المعارضين وتحويل أغلب معارضة الداخل الى معارضة عسكرية، حافظ كل من النظام وحشده السابق على احتكار لقب ‘معارضة الداخل’، منافسين في ذلك حتى ‘هيئة التنسيق’، التي قام النظام بارهاب المعارضين الحقيقيين داخلها من خلال اعتقال بعض قياداتها مثل عبد العزيز الخير، او اعادة تدجين المدجن بينهم أكثر، وأخيرا لا آخراً، تفعيل المتحالفين العضويين معه ضمن ‘هيئة التنسيق’ (مثل صالح مسلّم، رئيس حزب الاتحاد الديمقراطي)، والذين يشاركون عملياً بالقتال ضد المعارضة السورية وحتى اتهامها باستخدام الكيماوي.
يحظى كل هذا الحشد، بمباركات متفاوتة من ما يسمى ‘المجتمع الدولي’ لدعم مشاركته المفترضة في المفاوضات بين النظام و’معارضته’ الديكورية، وذلك لتجويف هذه المفاوضات من أية معنى حقيقي لها.
ساهم القمع المنهجي للناشطين السلميين والتنسيقيات والحراك السياسي عموماً داخل سورية في انهاك المعارضة السورية وحرمانها من قيادات كبيرة على الأرض، كما وسّع ذلك من العسكرة والاتجاه الجهادي داخل صفوف المعارضة، وارتكبت المعارضة السورية الكثير من الأخطاء أثناء تشكيلها وما بعده، كما عجزت أكثر من مرة عن ابتكار مبادرات سياسية فاعلة.
لكن كل هذا لا يعني ان المعارضة السورية الحقيقية لنظام الأسد، الممثلة بالائتلاف الوطني (وهو أوسع تمثيل للحراك السياسي والعسكري في سورية) ضعيفة كما يقول النظام ويشيع الراغبون في إتمام الصفقة الدولية.
يتجاهل الراعيان الروسي والامريكي لـ’جنيف 2′ قضايا جوهرية لا يمكن لأية معارضة سورية حقيقية ان تتجاوزها، وأولها تنحي رئيس النظام لإفساح المجال لعملية سياسية حقيقية تقود البلاد الى مصالحة وطنية، وتقديم ضمانات دولية بتشكيل حكومة كاملة الصلاحيات على الجيش والأمن والاقتصاد، وخروج القوات الايرانية وعناصر حزب الله من سورية، وتحديد مدة محددة للتفاوض بحيث لا يستمر سنوات فيما الشعب السوري يعاني من القمع والتهجير والتجويع.
وإلا فليعقد ‘المجتمع الدولي’ مؤتمره في دمشق حيث يمكن للنظام ان يتحاور مع نفسه!

Current Al-Jazeera (Arabic) Online Poll

After 100 days since the military coup, do you see Egypt moving in the right direction?

With over 500 responding so far, 92% said no.

Mystery Attackers Hit Sinai

By Adam Morrow and Khaled Moussa al-Omrani

"CAIRO, Oct 12 2013 (IPS) - A period of more than three months since former president Mohamed Morsi’s ouster by Egypt’s powerful military establishment have been marked by almost daily attacks on Egyptian security personnel, especially in the restive Sinai Peninsula. The identity of the attackers remains a mystery.
“The armed groups carrying out the Sinai attacks aren’t drawn from local families and tribes,” Sinai-based journalist Hatem al-Bulk told IPS. “Often masked, they strike their targets and vanish into the mountains.”
“The local people,” he added, “have no idea who they are.”...."

Syria and its chemical weapons

What we are not being told
By Brian Whitaker

"The destruction of Syria's chemical weapons got under way this week. In a letter to the Security Council, UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon reported:

"Under the supervision of OPCW experts, supported by the United Nations, the Syrian Arab Republic began to destroy its chemical weapons. Syrian personnel used cutting torches and angle grinders to destroy or disable a range of materials, including missile warheads, aerial bombs and mixing and filling equipment."

This first stage of the process is basically about making Syria's chemical weapons unusable before moving on to destroying the chemicals themselves. A note on the OPCW's website refers to the destruction of "certain Category 3 chemical weapons". Category 3 includes "unfilled munitions, devices and equipment designed specifically to employ chemical weapons".

So far, though, no detail has been released about what these Category 3 weapons were and it's not at all certain that we shall ever be allowed to find out.

Although the task of the OPCW is merely to ensure Syrian compliance with the Chemical Weapons Convention, knowing exactly what "unfilled munitions, devices and equipment" have been destroyed would cast some useful new light on who was responsible for the chemical attacks near Damascus last August.

Last month's report from UN inspectors implicated two types of munition in the August attacks. One was a type of rocket which seems to be unique to the Syrian conflict and which blogger Brown Moses has dubbed the UMLACA ("Unidentified Munition Linked to Alleged Chemical Attacks") and the other was a 140mm rocket thought to be a Soviet-made M14.

Since the Assad regime and Russia both deny that Syrian government forces were responsible for the August attacks, it's relevant to ask whether either type of munition has been declared to the OPCW as part of the government's stockpile.

If the answer is yes, it will be extremely difficult for anyone to continue blaming rebel fighters for the attacks. A negative answer, on the other hand, (assuming Syria has made a full declaration) would exonerate the regime.

Either way, it shouldn't be difficult to provide an answer – except that the OPCW may not be allowed to say. This is because the Chemical Weapons Convention includes an annexe on confidentiality which imposes strict rules on what may or may not be disclosed.

Among other things, it says:

Information shall be considered confidential if:

(i) It is so designated by the State Party from which the information was obtained and to which the information refers; or

(ii) In the judgement of the Director-General, its unauthorised disclosure could reasonably be expected to cause damage to the State Party to which it refers or to the mechanisms for implementation of this Convention

However, it also goes on to say:

Any information may be released with the express consent of the State Party to which the information refers.

So it appears from that the information could be made public if the Syrian government agreed. And if the Syrian government really had no part in the chemical attacks last August, why not seize this opportunity to prove it?"

Nobel Peace Prize 2013

Patrick Chappatte, Cagle Cartoons, Le Temps, Switzerland

THE US SAVES ISRAEL IN THE 1973 WAR

By Eric Margolis

"Forty years ago–6 October 1973 – Egyptian forces stormed the supposedly “impregnable” Israeli Bar Lev fortifications along the Suez Canal. Syrian forces advanced onto the Israel-occupied Golan Heights. 
In spite of scores of warnings, Israel was taken by surprise. Prime Minister Golda Meir and Defense Minister Moshe Dayan sneered at the Arabs as incompetent bunglers and could not imagine that the Syrians and Egyptians who had been quickly routed in the 1967 war could have the audacity to attack Israel.
Israeli armored units counterattacked with their usual panache. Israel’s air force, among the world’s best, pounced on the advancing Egyptians and Syrians. To their dismay, new, Soviet-supplied Sagger AT-3 anti-tank missiles and Egyptian infantry with shoulder-fired RPG missiles shattered Israel’s armored thrusts that rashly lacked infantry support.
New Soviet SA-6 and older SA-2 and SA-3 anti-aircraft missiles, and hundreds of AA guns, shot down almost 20% of Israel’s air force. On Golan, close to 1,000 Syrian tanks advanced.
As a veteran war correspondent, I had been able to inspect Egypt’s Suez Canal deployments, and both Syrian and Israeli positions on Golan. Both sides fought like lions. But Israel enjoyed major advantages: its superb air force, its highly-trained tank crews, and British and American tanks that were much superior to the Soviet T-54/55 or T-62’s of the Egyptians and Syrians.
On Golan, 100 Israeli Centurions held up close to 800 Syrians tanks. Using their deadly 105mm cannon, Israel’s tankers picked off advancing Syrian armor at ranges of over 3 kms.
Small Israeli forts on Golan played a key defensive role.
Israel’s defense of Golan was a second Thermopylae.
Eventually, overwhelming Syrian forces pushed almost to the
edge of the Golan Heights above the strategic B’not Ya’acov Bridge. Northern Israel lay exposed.
Then, mysteriously, Syria’s armored juggernaut halted. To this day the reason is uncertain. The Syrian high command may have been frightened of advancing into Israel, fearing its exposed flanks would be attacked (this was the French theory of allowing gaps in their defensive line to encourage the enemy to cross them and then be attacked on three sides).
I was told by Soviet military intelligence that the Syrian halt was caused by Moscow’s warning to Damascus that Israel was deploying its nuclear armed missiles to strike the advancing Syrians.
By contrast, Prof. Alon ben-Meir, a highly respected Israeli intelligence and military analyst who was there tells me that Israel would never use nukes so close to its populated areas. By why then does Israel reportedly still have nuclear land mines? Is this what Pulitzer-prize winner Seymour Hersh calls Israel’s “Sampson Option” ?
Or, it may be that Syria’s strongman, Hafez al-Assad, was confused, and fearful of losing his army. Syria’s plan was to retake Golan, not advance into Israel proper. Meanwhile, Israel was rapidly mobilizing its reserved armored units and rushing them up to Golan.
At the same time, a massive US military airlift was under way to resupply the Israelis who were critically low on missiles, bombs, spare parts and other war gear. President Richard Nixon authorized the air bridge that saved Israel on the 11th hour. Ironic since he was reputed to be an anti-Semite. Nixon and his foreign policy chief Henry Kissinger worried that failure to resupply Israel could cause the Republican Party to lose votes and funding.
The US aided Israel in another critically important way. A US SR-71 Blackbird Mach 3 recon aircraft and satellites spotted a yawning gap in Egypt’s lines that separated its two armies on the east side of the Canal. Israel’s brilliant Gen. Ariel Sharon exploited this gap, rushing his armor across the Suez Canal and destroying much of Egypt’s anti-aircraft guns and missiles on its west side that had been fending off the Israeli Air Force. Israel’s crossing the canal cut off Egypt’s two armies on the other side of the Canal.
Egypt and Syria fought ponderously as they were trained by Soviet advisors. Israel’s tank forced fought in the German style of lightening movement. In the end, both sides won victories: Egypt at least restored its pride by the daring Suez Canal crossing; Israel proved it could smash its Arab foes.
Israel went on to prosper and grow stronger. Egypt slides deeper into dictatorship and near total US influence."

US arms halt to Egypt largely 'symbolic'

"Cairo (AFP) - By suspending military aid to Egypt, Washington is pressing Cairo to end the bloodshed on the streets but its largely "symbolic" act is unlikely to have a concrete impact, analysts say.
They say the "half-measured" move reflects the lack of a clear US foreign policy on Egypt, where a political crisis since strongman Hosni Mubarak was toppled in 2011 has worsened after the July 3 ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi.
On Wednesday, Washington suspended deliveries of major military hardware and cash assistance of $260 million to the Egyptian military, which ousted Morsi in a coup.
The decision will stop deliveries of big-ticket items such as Apache helicopters, F-16 fighters, M1A1 Abrams tank parts and Harpoon missiles.
Washington says the suspension will remain in place until Egypt moves towards an elected and "inclusive" democratic civilian government.
"The political impact of this decision is more important than the material impact on the ground," said Hassan Nafaa, professor of political science at Cairo University.
"By postponing the military aid, the US administration is putting pressure on the Egyptian adminstration to change its policy (towards supporters of Morsi) but that will not happen."
Islamists and members of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood have been the target of a brutal government campaign since a deadly August 14 assault by security forces on two pro-Morsi protest camps in Cairo.
More than 1,000 people have been killed across Egypt since then, and over 2,000 Islamists have been detained. Morsi too has been held at an unknown location since his ouster.
Washington has repeatedly called for an end to the bloodshed that has rocked Egypt since Morsi's ouster as his supporters, who reject the new military-installed interim government, regularly clash with security forces.
On Sunday, at least 57 people were killed, most of them in Cairo, when Morsi's Islamist supporters battled security forces.
Days after the August 14 crackdown, US President Barack Obama said that "our traditional cooperation cannot continue as usual when civilians are being killed in the streets."
Obama had ordered his national security team to review the total $1.5 billion in annual US aid to Egypt
Egypt said it would not succumb to the latest US move which came as an Egyptian court set November 4 for the start of Morsi's trial for inciting the murder of protesters outside his presidential palace last December.
"It is a flawed decision in terms of content and timing and raises serious questions over the United States' readiness to provide strategic support to Egypt's security programmes," Egypt's foreign ministry said.
Egypt, traditionally a key US ally in the Arab world, said it "will continue to take decisions regarding its domestic affairs with full independence and without foreign pressure".
US Secretary of State John Kerry tried to appease Egypt on Thursday, saying Washington's move was not a "withdrawal from our relationship" with Cairo or "severing of our serious commitment to helping the government" on the transition to democracy.
For analysts, Washington's decision is the latest example of a short-sighted policy towards Egypt with no significant impact.
"This is a short-term measure divorced from any broad strategy. There is no need to read much into it. But the fact is that this US adminstration lacks a clear foreign policy," Shadi Hamed, director of research at Brookings Doha Center, told AFP.
He said that the decision would not force Egypt's military to look elsewhere for its future arms needs as "you can't overnight overhaul your military systems."
"But what it shows is that this symbolic move is adopted by a cautious US administration which has no bold measures for the Middle East. It leaves a lot of questions unanswered," Hamed added.
'Only bothered about Israel's security'
Hisham Kassem, an independent political analyst, said Washington's decision also showed that the United States was concerned only about Israel's security.
"Washington is sending a message that Obama is only bothered about Israel's security and not of Egypt," he said.
Kassem referred to the fact that the United States will continue to offer Cairo assistance aimed at securing Egypt's borders and for bolstering "counter-terrorism, proliferation, and security in Sinai," which neighbours Israel and Gaza.
The 1978 Camp David peace accords between Israel and Egypt have until now been a cornerstone of Washington's military aid to Egypt.
Israel had reportedly asked Washington to maintain military aid to Egypt.
"What we are seeing is a fickle short-term policy initiative. A time will come when the Americans would have to find a back door for the position they took on Egypt," said Kassem."

Egypt: Boat sinking underlines wider tragedy for refugees from Syria

"Today’s shipwreck off the coast of Alexandria that drowned at least 12 people, many believed to be refugees from Syria, highlights the crushing life-and-death decisions facing many who fled to Egypt to escape Syria’s armed conflict, Amnesty International said.

The organization is due to launch a briefing next week on the plight of refugees from Syria in Egypt, and currently has a delegation on the ground researching the situation.

“Our research has shown how the backdrop to today’s terrible boat accident is a much wider tragedy. Refugees from Syria are compelled to risk life and limb yet again in Egypt after facing arbitrary arrests, detentions and increased hostility,” said Sherif Elsayed-Ali, Amnesty International's Head of Refugee and Migrants' Rights.

“Refugees from Syria have fled the depths of despair to seek safety in Egypt. But instead of providing shelter and hope for a new life, the Egyptian authorities’ actions are compelling many refugees from Syria into life-threatening situations, including entrusting their lives to smugglers in order to make the perilous journey across the Mediterranean Sea.”

According to media reports, at least 100 people were rescued from today’s shipwreck and taken to a naval base and then to a police station in Alexandria. It is unknown what will happen to them next.

A second boat carrying migrants from Tunisia to Italy also reportedly sank off the coast of the island of Lampedusa today.

The shipwrecks come just a week after another tragic sinking off the coast of Lampedusa in Italy, in which more than 100 migrants and asylum-seekers – mainly Eritreans and Somalis – were killed when the overcrowded vessel carrying them sank after reportedly catching fire."

In US military aid to Egypt, business as usual

Exclusive data show that a steady stream of American military equipment continued to flow after the military coup

Al-Jazeera

An Army bulldozer and a Humvee breach barricades erected by supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi as riot police clear Cairo's Mustafa Mahmoud Square on Aug. 14.

AFP/Getty Images

 

"In the months between Egypt’s July 3 military coup and the Obama administration’s announcement on Wednesday that it would suspend some military assistance to Egypt, nearly 2,000 tons of critical U.S. military equipment continued to flow to Egyptian ports, according to shipping data obtained by “Fault Lines.”The data, commissioned by Al Jazeera from TransArms, a Chicago-based research center that tracks arms shipments, show that, aside from a delay in one comparatively small delivery of four F-16 fighter jets, the shipping of crucial equipment to Egypt — including vehicles used for crowd control — never ceased.
From July 3 to Sept. 24, the last date for which data were available, eight ships left New York, Baltimore and Norfolk, Va., bound for the Egyptian cities of Damietta and Alexandria, where they unloaded defense equipment covered by laws that require State Department approval. The cargo included combat vehicles, various missile systems, and spare parts and support equipment for F-16s, AH-64 Apache helicopters, C-130 transport planes, M109 howitzers, M1A1 Abrams tanks and other items.
Humvees and heavy earth-moving equipment made by Caterpillar also sailed during this time. Both these kinds of vehicles were among those used by Egyptian security forces when they violently dispersed supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi from Cairo’s Rabaa al-Adawiya and Nahda squares on Aug. 14. Hundreds were killed in what Human Rights Watch described as the “most serious incident of mass unlawful killings in Egypt’s modern history.” Though the type of equipment is the same, it is difficult to confirm whether the vehicles used against protesters in August were shipped after the coup, because Egypt has been receiving such vehicles for years.
“The U.S. law says it in plain language. When there’s a military coup, aid should be suspended. Instead, what we have here is a signal to the Egyptian military that says, ‘Full speed ahead,’” said Frank Jannuzi, deputy executive director of Amnesty International USA.
Washington had appeared to be fumbling for the right response to Morsi’s removal and the subsequent violent crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood and other supporters. The administration declined to call his ouster a military coup, saying such a determination would not be in the interests of the United States. Doing so would have triggered a law forbidding military assistance to governments installed by coups.
In July the administration announced that it would delay the delivery of four F-16s, which Jannuzi called a “minuscule slap on the wrist,” and a day after the Aug. 14 mass killings, President Barack Obama called off the biennial U.S.-Egyptian military exercise known as Bright Star.
On Wednesday the Obama administration announced it would hold back on delivering certain big-ticket items: M1A1 tanks, F-16s, Apache helicopters and Harpoon missile systems. Equipment used for counterterrorism and security in the Sinai would continue to flow to Egypt, as would spare parts and funds for military training. A majority of Americans support cutting off the aid on account of the violence, according to a poll by the Pew Research Center......

Since January, more than 11,000 tons of military equipment and hardware have been shipped to Egypt. This likely includes military sales between the Defense Department and Egypt as well as a small amount of direct commercial sales between defense contractors and the Egyptian government. The amount of military hardware shipped to Egypt during the first nine months of 2013 was almost double the 6,500 tons delivered in all of 2012......"

At least two dozen killed after boat capsizes near Lampedusa

(Cartoon by Kap, Cagle Cartoons, La Vanguardia, Spain)

Fresh tragedy occurs in the same waters where last week more than 300 migrants travelling from north Africa lost their lives

The Guardian, Friday 11 October 2013


"At least 27 people died on Friday after their boat capsized near the Italian island of Lampedusa, a fresh tragedy to occur in the waters where last week more than 300 migrants travelling from north Africa to southern Europe lost their lives.
As divers continued to search for corpses following last Thursday's disaster, the Maltese prime minister Joseph Muscat told journalists in the island's capital, Valletta, that 27 people – including at least three children – had been pulled from the water following the capsizing about 60 miles south-east of Lampedusa.
Although near the Sicilian island, the boat was in international waters where Malta is responsible for search and rescue operations.
Earlier, Italian navy spokesman Marco Maccaroni told the Associated Press that at least 221 people had been saved from the capsized vessel – a figure which represented a large proportion of the approximately 250 people believed to have been on board......"

Al-Jazeera Video: صورة الإعلام المصري خلال مائة يوم مضت

"مع الإطاحة بالرئيس محمد مرسي في الثالث من يوليو/تموز الماضي أطيح أيضا بمبادئ التنوع والتعددية في وسائل الإعلام المصرية، لا سيما التلفزيونية منها. في البدء أَغلق الحكامُ الجدد قنوات فضائية عدة ومنعوا أخرى من العمل. "

Al-Jazeera Video: حديث الثورة - السيسي يطلب تحصينه كوزير للدفاع

U.S. Officials Say Libya Approved Commando Raids

N Y Times

"WASHINGTON — The Libyan government in recent weeks tacitly approved two American commando operations in its country, according to senior American officials, one to capture a senior militant from Al Qaeda and another to seize a militia leader suspected of carrying out the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the United States diplomatic mission in Benghazi.

The Qaeda leader, Nazih Abdul-Hamed al-Ruqai, was captured by American commandos in Tripoli on Saturday in a raid that the United States had hoped to keep secret, but that leaked out to the news media. The operation has been widely denounced by Libyan officials, who have called it a kidnapping and said they had played no role in it.

While American officials expected that the Libyan government would claim that it had known nothing about the operation, news of the raid has raised concerns that the suspect in the Benghazi attacks, Ahmed Abu Khattala, has now been tipped off that the United States has the ability to conduct an operation in Libya......"

Syria: Executions, Hostage Taking by Rebels

Planned Attacks on Civilians Constitute Crimes Against Humanity

Human Rights Watch

"(New York) – Armed opposition groups in Syria killed at least 190 civilians and seized over 200 as hostages during a military offensive that began in rural Latakia governorate on August 4, 2013, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. At least 67 of the victims were executed or unlawfully killed in the operation around pro-government Alawite villages.
The 105-page report, “‘You Can Still See Their Blood’: Executions, Indiscriminate Shootings, and Hostage Taking by Opposition Forces in Latakia Countryside,” presents evidence that the civilians were killed on August 4, the first day of the operation. Two opposition groups that took part in the offensive, the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham and Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar, are still holding the hostages, the vast majority women and children. The findings strongly suggest that the killings, hostage taking, and other abuses rise to the level of war crimes and crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said.
“These abuses were not the actions of rogue fighters,” said Joe Stork, acting Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “This operation was a coordinated, planned attack on the civilian population in these Alawite villages.”......"

Al-Jazeera Cartoon

General Sisi and his followers are condemning Egypt to greater turmoil

Tires burn as Egyptian Muslim brotherhood and supporters of ousted president Mohamed Morsi clash with riot police in Cairo on 6 October. Photograph: Mohammed Abdel Moneim/AFP/Getty Images

 

The US decision to stop military aid is not enough to stem the escalating violence. Terrorist attacks on civilians could be next

 

Jonathan Steele

The Guardian, Thursday 10 October 2013

"The Obama administration's decision to suspend some military aid to Egypt is a clear case of better late than never. Although an announcement was originally planned for August, its timing now is a warning to Cairo's military coup-makers that their repressive treatment of the opposition risks plunging Egypt into uncontrollable violence.
Troops again shot scores of peaceful Muslim Brotherhood protesters last weekend, and the next day unknown assailants struck a series of military and government targets in the most serious counterviolence since the coup. No one has taken responsibility for the attacks but it was predictable that General Abdul Fatah al-Sisi's refusal to relax the clampdown on the Brotherhood would provoke violence. In what other country in the world today is an elected president held for three months with no access to his family or lawyers? In what other country are demonstrators routinely shot without warning, not with birdshot or rubber bullets but live ammunition?
Egypt has not seen such brutal repression for decades. The last few years of Hosni Mubarak's rule now seem almost benevolent: in spite of tight overall control, demonstrations were more or less tolerated and the Brotherhood was allowed to run candidates for parliament as independents. Egypt's regime-influenced courts have started proceedings not just to ban the political party that the Brotherhood set up after 2011 but to outlaw the organisation and its social welfare network altogether. The Brotherhood's own record on human rights, during the year it had partial power in Egypt, was not good. It made little effort to rein in the police, whose abuses were one of the main complaints that led to the demonstrations in January 2011. Indeed, there were times when the Brotherhood was willing to encourage police thuggery against its opponents. Yet Mohamed Morsi's many failings cannot match, let alone justify, what has happened since the coup of 3 July this year.
Equally grim is the virtual absence of public criticism or peaceful protest from other sectors of Egyptian society other than the Brotherhood's supporters. The Twittersphere is still free for dissent and there have not yet been reprisals or arrests for posting anti-army comments there or on Facebook. The regime sees this as a useful safety valve. More significant is its flooding of the official press, the TV stations and the talkshows with grotesque smears of the Brotherhood and all its works, as well as of the few prominent non-Brotherhood figures who have spoken out, such as Mohamed ElBaradei. Primitive though the propaganda is, it has convinced an astonishing number of otherwise sensible Egyptians. As a result, politics have become almost completely polarised. The emotional tone of what passes for debate has never been more shrill, and the chances of eventual reconciliation look daily more flimsy.
Some Salafis have joined the Brotherhood's protests but the al-Nour party, which represented them in the last election, still wavers between support for the coup and silence. A few secular liberals mutter behind a comforting intellectual stance of "neither the Brotherhood nor the army", but unless this fence-sitting is abandoned in favour of open condemnation of today's main threat to civil liberties – which comes from the army – it is politically vacuous. The business community hunkers down and hopes for a few crumbs, even though the economy is in tatters and cannot live for ever off loans from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Tourism is dead and Monday's attacks near the Red Sea resorts, the first violence there for several years, will further delay its recovery.
Yet, far from contributing to stability, what General Sisi and his civilian followers are doing will only condemn Egypt to greater turmoil. As well as hitting the Red Sea area for the first time, this week's attacks also saw the first use of rocket-propelled grenades against government targets in central Cairo. If Iraq is any guide, the next stage will be terrorist violence against civilians through car bombs and suicide vests. General Sisi will probably put himself forward as a candidate for the presidency, exploiting the rise in violence to claim Egypt needs a new strongman. But what it really needs is a gradually recovering economy, social justice, a properly managed, non-abusive police force, a politically engaged citizenry, and the enabling environment of media pluralism, multi-party options and civic tolerance that are the true pillars of stability."

Canadian pair describe ordeal in Egyptian prison

John Greyson and Tarek Loubani were beaten and kept in cell crammed with prisoners before finally being released this week

Patrick Kingsley

theguardian.com, Friday 11 October 2013

 

 

The Canadian film-maker John Greyson and Canadian-Palestinian doctor Tarek Loubani, who were held for 50 days without charge in Cairo. Photograph: AP

"Shortly after arriving at Egypt's notorious Tora prison on 17 August, the Canadian film-maker John Greyson was beaten and kicked so hard that for the next week "there was a single bootprint perfectly etched on my back". His companion Tarek Loubani – a Canadian-Palestinian doctor – was subjected to the same brutal treatment. "We both went foetal to try to protect ourselves," remembers Greyson. "I was in pain for about a week."
It was not quite what Greyson and Loubani had envisaged when they arrived in Egypt two days earlier. The pair intended to remain only briefly in Egypt – their final destination was Gaza, where they planned to train and make a film about Palestinian doctors. Instead, they found themselves arrested during a crackdown on supporters of the ousted Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi, and spent the next 50 days detained without charge – most of it in a cramped jail cell shared with 36 other prisoners.
"There was no way you could sleep without touching your neighbour," said Greyson, of the conditions within their tiny three-metre-by-ten-metre cell. "You had to co-ordinate with them when you wanted to roll over."
It was a nightmare that lasted until the early hours of last Sunday, when Egyptian prosecutors finally let the pair leave prison. It followed a high-profile campaign for their release – featuring an 150,000-strong petition signed by Ben Affleck and Charlize Theron – and finally intervention from the highest level of the Egyptian government. But even then their ordeal was not quite complete. Still banned for several days from leaving the country's borders, they were only allowed to fly home to Canada on Friday.
"We've switched from Tora prison to Novotel prison," Greyson joked in an interview with the Guardian while the pair were still in diplomatic limbo on Thursday, "and it's mostly a step up."
Speaking to a newspaper for the first time since their release from Tora, the pair's testimony shines a rare light on the abhorrent conditions inside Egypt's notorious prisons and police jails.
When Greyson and Loubani arrived at Tora, warders purposely left the cramped truck they were in standing in the blazing Cairo sun so that the three-dozen men inside might overheat. One was on the point of a heat-induced coma before the truck's doors were finally opened.
Outside was just as frightening a scene: two lines of policemen armed with batons and electric cattle prods who, Loubani said, "stood there beating people as they went between them", Shortly afterwards the pair were given the further hazing that left Greyson with a bootmarked back. Loubani had received an earlier beating at a police station.
Conditions in their minute cell were appalling. The 38 detainees slept on concrete, with just one tap of water between them. "Medical care was absolutely deplorable," Loubani said. One prisoner arrived with a broken foot that went untreated for three weeks until it got so bad it had to be removed.
"This young guy with a 100% preventable problem ends up having to have his foot amputated," said Loubani, looking thin and pale after six weeks on a prison diet. "That was a theme again and again – people were not treated."
The pair were keen to emphasise the plight of their fellow detainees, who were also detained without charge and have still not been released. Many have seen their lives fall apart while inside prison. "One guy was arrested on what would have been his wedding day," said Greyson. "Another man missed his child's birth. A lot of people lost their jobs, and some lost their homes."
All the cell's occupants – including Greyson and Loubani – had been arrested in an arbitrary roundup in central Cairo on 16 August and accused of attacking a police station during a protest. Many of them had either been nowhere near the station or were not at the protest in the first place.
For their part, Greyson and Loubani were not even aware of the station's existence. They were simply travellers in transit, with a day to lose in Cairo – and attended the protest merely to bear witness. Once the demonstration fell victim to Egypt's fourth state-led massacre in six weeks, they put their skills to work at a nearby mosque that had quickly transformed into a field hospital. Greyson documented the wounded on camera, while Loubani treated them. He could tell from their precise injuries that the dead had been killed by trained marksmen.
After the flow of bodies "slowed to a trickle" several hours later, the pair left to find their way back to their hotel. Unfamiliar with Cairo, they got lost in an area where many of the streets had been blocked off by a disorientating series of walls aimed at protecting government ministries.
When they stopped to ask for directions at a police checkpoint, their nightmare began. An officer grew suspicious at Loubani's Palestinian accent (as the home of Hamas, an affiliate of Morsi's now-hated Muslim Brotherhood, Palestine has become tainted by association with the ousted president). Like hundreds of others that day in Cairo, they were then hauled into state custody for little reason other than police hysteria and paranoia.
"It's fair to say that of the mistakes I made, identifying myself so clearly as a Palestinian was one of the biggest," said Loubani, who admitted that the pair did not at that point "really understand the geographical context and the political context" of their situation.
They kept trying to emphasise that they were not interested in Egypt, but merely on their way to Gaza – something that only made their captors more angry. "The minute you say Gaza, they say Hamas," said Greyson.
Once inside Tora, the pair formed good bonds with most of their unlikely room-mates. Both held English lessons for anyone interested, Greyson drew pictures for anyone who asked, while Loubani acted as the cell's doctor. "They adopted us," said Greyson. "There's a shared trauma that comes with being arrested, being hotboxed together, beaten together."
Guilty or innocent, the Canadians said, "all of these people are being treated unfairly. They don't deserve the beating, the terrible conditions, the lack of medical care. Our biggest call is this: charge them or free them."
Greyson and Loubani were themselves finally freed on Sunday after Loubani's father flew to Egypt to personally campaign for the pair's release. Building on diplomatic efforts and a huge pressure campaign back home, Mahmoud Loubani met senior officials before eventually and unexpectedly finding himself on speaker-phone with Egypt's entire cabinet. Following the phone call, the pair's treatment markedly improved and a few days later, at 1.20am on Sunday, they were finally released.
"Ever since I was a kid, my father always would come out and get me if I was in trouble," Loubani laughed. "And that's what he did this time too."
As they fly back, the pair are bracing themselves for a media frenzy in Canada, where their plight became a cause célèbre. But their thoughts are still with those left inside. "We saw a lot of people get massacred, and have their rights trampled in jail," said Loubani. "Neither is acceptable."