English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For August 14/2020
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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Bible Quotations For today
From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 12/42-48: “The Lord said, ‘Who then is the faithful and prudent manager whom his master will put in charge of his slaves, to give them their allowance of food at the proper time? Blessed is that slave whom his master will find at work when he arrives. Truly I tell you, he will put that one in charge of all his possessions. But if that slave says to himself, “My master is delayed in coming”, and if he begins to beat the other slaves, men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour that he does not know, and will cut him in pieces, and put him with the unfaithful. That slave who knew what his master wanted, but did not prepare himself or do what was wanted, will receive a severe beating. But one who did not know and did what deserved a beating will receive a light beating. From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded.”
 

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on August 13-14/2020
Lithuania recognizes Hezbollah as a terrorist organization
UNSC Meeting Sees US-French Dispute on UNIFIL Mandate
Report: World Wants Independents and Political Parties in New Govt.
Hale to Urge Govt. Reflecting 'People's Will' on Lebanon Visit
Erdogan Slams Macron's 'Show' in Lebanon
Hale Says FBI to Join Beirut Blast Probe
Lebanese Officials: Aoun’s Attempt to Bring Bassil Back to Cabinet Met with Rejection
US Sources Expect Washington to Impose Sanctions against Lebanon's Bassil for 'Enabling Hezbollah'
Lebanon Parliament Approves State of Emergency in Beirut
Parliament Backs Emergency Powers after Beirut Blast
Lebanese MPs meet for first time since blast, US envoy due in Beirut
Hardened Lebanese Merchants Battered by Beirut Blast
Judge Fadi Sawan Named Judicial Investigator in Port Blast Case
Iranian Foreign Minister Arrives in Beirut
Bassil Supports 'Clean Trial' over Port Blast, Welcomes Foreign Assistance
Geagea to Berri: Any Call for Majoritarian Democracy Blows Up Lebanese Formula
Lebanon's Tripoli Port Readies to Fill in for Blast-hit Beirut
UNESCO to Protect Lebanon as 60 Historic Buildings 'Risk Collapse'
Parliamentary Blocs Demand Intl Probe into Beirut Blast
'Gladiator' Star Pitches in to Rescue Blast-Hit 'Le Chef' in Gemmayzeh
Fourth Relief Plane Arrives from UAE
Why the army should be the focus of Lebanon’s protests/Khaled Abou Zahr/Arab News/August 13, 2020
Who killed Rafik Hariri?/Neville Teller/Jerusalem Post/August 13/2020
The Lebanese Revolt Reignited by the Big Explosion/Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al Awsat/August 13/2020
The Beirut Disaster: What A Fair Historian Might Say!/Hazem Saghieh/Asharq Al Awsat/August 13/2020
The Beirut Disaster Amid Two Legitimacies/Hussam Itani/Asharq Al Awsat/August 13/2020
A Grim Milestone on Covid-19 Could Be a Turning Point/Justin Fox/Bloomberg/August 13/2020
Abandoned by State after Explosion, Lebanese Help Each Other/Associated Press/Naharnet/August 13/2020

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on August 13-14/2020

Trump Hails 'Historic Peace Agreement' as UAE, Israel Agree to Normalize Ties
Sisi Welcomes UAE-Israel Deal, Halt to Annexation
Palestinians Call Israel-UAE Deal 'Treason,' Want Retraction
Senior Muslim Brotherhood Leader Dies in Prison
Turkish Banks Begin Charging for Foreign Currency Withdrawals
Turkish Banks Begin Charging for Foreign Currency Withdrawals
France Aims to Help SMEs With $3.5 Bln Aid
Jordan Closes Border with Syria over Spike in COVID-19 Cases
Concerns over Possible Second Wave of Pandemic in Egypt
Tension Casts Shadow over Libya's Sirte
Abandoned by State After Explosion, Lebanese Help Each Other
Iraqi Volunteers Help Coronavirus Patients at Home
Rights Groups Denounce 3-Years Jail Sentence Handed to Algerian Journalist
Tebboune Warns of ‘Counter-Revolution’ to Destabilize Algeria
Tunisia Faces 'Critical' Situation After Detecting 4 Coronavirus Hot Spots

Titles For The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on August 13-14/2020

The tyrants’ reach/Despots now threaten free speech even in free countries/Clifford D. May/The Washington Times/August 13/2020
U.S. Goes It Alone to Keep Weapons Out of Iran/Bobby Ghosh/Bloomberg/August/August 13/2020
Palestinians: Jews, Christians Are Our Enemy/Khaled Abu Toameh/Gatestone Institute./August 13/2020
Trump announces historic peace agreement between Israel and United Arab Emirates/Anne Gearan and Steve Hendrix/Washington Post/August 13/2020
Israel freezes Palestine annexation for UAE ties/The National/August 13/2020
Hoori or Whore? Islam’s ‘72 Virgins’ Yearn for ‘Martyred’ Muslims/Raymond Ibrahim//August 13/2020

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on August 13-14/2020

Lithuania recognizes Hezbollah as a terrorist organization
Sarah Chemla/Jerusalem Post/August 13/2020
People affiliated with Hezbollah have been banned from entering Lithuania for 10 years. The Lithuanian government announced on Thursday its recognition of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. “Having taken into consideration the information acquired by our institutions and partners, we may conclude that ‘Hezbollah’ uses terrorist means that pose a threat to the security of a significant number of countries, including Lithuania. We stand together with the United States of America, Germany, United Kingdom, Netherlands, as well as other countries that had reached the same conclusion,” said Lithuania's Foreign Minister Linas Linkevičius in a statement. “We appreciate the successful cooperation between the Lithuanian and Israeli national security agencies. We are thankful to these institutions for their significant work in helping ensure the safety of our citizens,” he continued. “It is important to note that we support peaceful people of Lebanon and their wish for their country to implement necessary reforms.”Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi spoke a few moments later with his Lithuanian counterpart, congratulating him on the Lithuanian government's decision.
I spoke with Lithuanian FM @LinkeviciusL and thanked him for the important decision to designate #Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. I call on all European countries to make similar decisions. Hezbollah's actions in Lebanon hold the entire Lebanese population hostage.
"Hezbollah is a terrorist organization that has controlled terror in large parts of Lebanon and turned them into Iranian-protected areas while taking Lebanese citizens, its economy and its political system hostage," Ashkenazi said.
"This is a courageous and important decision to maintain regional stability," he continued. "I call on all European countries to join the decision and understand that this is a dangerous and unstoppable terrorist organization that continues its attempts to carry out terrorist attacks around the world on Iran's mission and funding." He finished by thanking "the Foreign Ministry and the defense establishment who led the inter-agency activity to complete the move."Hezbollah-affiliated people have been banned from entering Lithuania for 10 years. The decision made by the Migration Department of the Republic of Lithuania was based on the information on the listed peoples’ activities within Hezbollah that posed a threat to Lithuanian national security interests. Lithuania recently provided 50,000 euros of humanitarian assistance to Lebanon, following the massive explosion in Beirut on August 4.

UNSC Meeting Sees US-French Dispute on UNIFIL Mandate
New York - Ali Barada/Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
France, backed by other countries in the Security Council, has firmly refused to respond to the US demands to introduce major changes to the mandate granted under UNSC Resolution 1701 to the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), or to reduce its troops, budget or period of operation, diplomatic sources told Asharq Al-Awsat. “The United States, supported in part by Britain, believes that the discussion should focus on reviewing the responsibilities, structure and financing of UNIFIL, in parallel with improving the performance and effectiveness of this international force,” according to a diplomat who attended the closed meeting held by the Security Council on Tuesday to discuss Resolution 1701 and the extension of UNIFIL’s mandate. US Ambassador Kelly Craft stressed the need for a new mandate. “The US has long reiterated publicly and privately that the status quo in Lebanon is unacceptable,” Craft said in a statement to The Associated Press after the meeting. “Now is the time to empower UNIFIL, end the long complacency, and enable the mission to fully achieve what it was set out to accomplish.”Another diplomat told Asharq Al-Awsat that the five permanent members of the Security Council, namely, the US, France, Britain, Russia and China, “held a meeting on Monday, during which a preliminary draft of the resolution was distributed.”The diplomat talked about wide differences between France and the US over the UNIFIL mandate’s renewal process. The US proposed “shortening the UNIFIL mission to six months,” as well as reducing the number and budget of the international troops. But France strongly rejected the proposal and affirmed its readiness “to introduce amendments to Resolution 1701 under Chapter VI.”Western diplomatic sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that France distributed to the rest of the four permanent members a draft-resolution aimed at extending UNIFIL’s mission, after including amendments to its mandate, allowing the forces to implement “more effectively” the provisions of UNSC Resolution 1701, especially with regards to preventing the presence of weapons and militants in its area of operations between the Blue Line and the Litani River. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had called on the members of the Security Council to renew the UNIFIL mandate for a period of 12 months, stressing the importance of preserving the force, which was first established in 1978 to oversee the withdrawal of Israeli forces following the first invasion of Lebanon. France is expected to circulate its draft-resolution to the rest of the member-states before the international forces’ mandate expires on Aug. 31.

Report: World Wants Independents and Political Parties in New Govt.
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 13/2020
The international community is pushing for a cabinet comprised of independents who could win the support of protesters, as well as representatives of top political parties to deter them from obstructing the government's work, a Western diplomatic source told AFP on Thursday. But feedback so far from Lebanon's top political players "has not been encouraging" with many of them dismissing pressure from the street "as not very strong," the source said. Officials do not appear to be making rapid progress toward naming a new cabinet, a process which could take months.
The president's office is yet to schedule binding parliamentary consultations to name a new premier. Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri on Thursday called on authorities "to speed up the process of forming a cabinet" that can spearhead reforms.

Hale to Urge Govt. Reflecting 'People's Will' on Lebanon Visit
U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale will arrive in blast-hit Lebanon Thursday for a three-day visit. A statement issued by the U.S. embassy said Hale will express his condolences to the Lebanese people for their losses as a result of the devastating explosion in Beirut on August 4. "He will reiterate the American government’s commitment to assist the Lebanese people in recovering from the tragedy and rebuilding their lives," the embassy said. "In meetings with political leaders, civil society, and youth, Under Secretary Hale will stress the urgent need to embrace fundamental economic, financial, and governance reform, ending endemic corruption, bringing accountability and transparency, and introducing widespread state control through functioning institutions," the embassy added. Hale will also underscore "America’s willingness to support any government that reflects the will of the people and is genuinely committed to and acting upon such a reform agenda."

Erdogan Slams Macron's 'Show' in Lebanon
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 13/2020
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday hit out at his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron for visiting Lebanon in the wake of its devastating blast in Beirut earlier this month, accusing him of "putting on a show.""Macron's concern is to bring back a colonialist structure. We don't have desires like that," he said, without directly criticizing France's plans in the region. Macron said on Wednesday France would strengthen its military presence in the Mediterranean region with the cooperation of European partners, including Greece. Longstanding tension between Turkey and EU member state Greece escalated when Ankara resumed energy exploration in the region off the Greek island of Kastellorizo on Monday. Turkey dispatched the research ship Oruc Reis accompanied by naval vessels, prompting Greece to send its own ships to the area to monitor Turkey's work. Erdogan told a meeting of his ruling party's provincial leaders that he wanted to resolve the emerging crisis "through dialogue and negotiations", accusing Athens of harbouring "ill-will."
 

Hale Says FBI to Join Beirut Blast Probe
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Visiting US Under Secretary for Political Affairs David Hale revealed on Thursday that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) will join Lebanon and other international investigators in the probe into the deadly Beirut Port blast. Hale said during a visit to Gemmayze, one of the impacted neighborhoods in Beirut, that the FBI will take part in the investigation at the invitation of Lebanese authorities. He said the participation in the probe is one of the ways the US is helping Lebanon in dealing with the aftermath of the August 4 explosion, which left 171 people dead. The blast has been blamed on a vast stock of ammonium nitrate left in a warehouse at the port for years despite repeated warnings. Hale, who arrived in Lebanon Thursday on a two-day visit, was briefed by young volunteers in Gemmayze on assistance to those whose homes were destroyed in the explosion. He is due to meet with Lebanese officials, religious figures and civil society members on Friday. Earlier Thursday a statement by the US Embassy said that Hale is expected to “reiterate the American government’s commitment to assist the Lebanese people in recovering from the tragedy and rebuilding their lives.”He will also stress the “urgent need” for embracing fundamental reforms, it said.

Lebanese Officials: Aoun’s Attempt to Bring Bassil Back to Cabinet Met with Rejection
Beirut - Mohamed Choucair/Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Lebanese President Michel Aoun has been seeking to promote the formation of a government of political figures that would pave the way for a comeback for his son-in-law Gebran Bassil, who heads the Free Patriotic Movement, senior officials said.In remarks to Asharq Al-Awsat, the officials, who were not identified, expressed surprise at Aoun’s attempt to bring Bassil back to the cabinet, after the resignation of Prime Minister Hassan Diab following the deadly bombing that rocked Beirut on August 4. Not only opposition figures rejected Aoun’s attempts, but also main parties within the so-called “March 8 alliance”, which favored the formation of a “national unity government that would exclude Bassil.”The same officials pointed out that Bassil has tried in vain to benefit from Hezbollah’s support and to promote Aoun’s proposal during his meeting on Monday with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and Hussein Khalil, the political aide to the Hezbollah chief. Aoun is no longer in a position that allows him to impose his own conditions, the officials said, adding that Bassil’s nomination of former Lebanese ambassador to the United Nations, Nawaf Salam, to head the government, was nothing but a maneuver aimed at extorting the leader of al-Mustaqbal Movement, former Premier Saad Hariri, who was the first to nominate Salam to head the previous cabinet and was met at the time with rejection from the FPM chief and Hezbollah. Asharq Al-Awsat learned that the schedule, which was set for Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry during his brief visit to Beirut, did not include a meeting with Bassil, although the latter had sought hard to get his share of the talks. The officials stressed that there was no reason for Bassil to meet with Shoukry as long as the Egyptian FM visited Aoun. According to the officials, the Egyptian foreign minister urged Lebanese politicians to benefit from Arab and international support, but was quoted as saying that there would only be humanitarian aid. He stressed that economic and financial support for Lebanon required major measures by Lebanese officials, mainly the implementation of reforms.

US Sources Expect Washington to Impose Sanctions against Lebanon's Bassil for 'Enabling Hezbollah'
Washington - Elie Youssef/Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
The US administration is preparing to impose anticorruption sanctions against prominent Lebanese politicians and businessmen in an effort to weaken Hezbollah’s influence in the aftermath of last week’s explosion in Beirut’s port, US officials said, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported. The blast, which killed more than 170 people and injured more than 6,000, has accelerated efforts in Washington to blacklist Lebanese leaders aligned with Hezbollah, the country’s dominant political and military force. The US officials see an opportunity to drive a wedge between Hezbollah and its allies as part of a broader effort to contain its force backed by Tehran, according to the report. Hezbollah has been part of Lebanese coalition governments for more than a decade and is the region’s most potent threat to Israel, which has bombed the group’s forces in Syria and Lebanon to prevent it from amassing advanced missiles.
The officials stressed that by sanctioning carefully selected people, they aim to shape the new government with two prime goals: compelling Lebanon’s political class to target endemic corruption that has eaten away at the country and ensuring that Hezbollah doesn’t retain its hold on government decisions. According to the report, one key Hezbollah ally some US officials want to sanction is Gebran Bassil, a former foreign minister and a son-in-law of Lebanon’s president, Michel Aoun. “Gebran Bassil should have been sanctioned years ago,” said Jeffrey Feltman, former US ambassador to Lebanon under President George W. Bush, in an email. “No one has done more to enable Hezbollah’s political (over)reach in Lebanon that he has, in giving an Iranian-funded Shia militia Christian cover,” he noted. The WSJ also cited people briefed on the discussions as saying that the US has been considering politicians and businessmen close to Bassil and others suspected of corruption, including some people close to Saad Hariri, who resigned as prime minister last October after weeks of largely peaceful antigovernment protests. A number of US officials said they want to move quickly so that the penalties can send a message that Lebanon has to change course as it seeks billions of dollars in international aid to rebuild Beirut.

Lebanon Parliament Approves State of Emergency in Beirut
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Lebanese lawmakers approved on Thursday a two-week state of emergency in Beirut declared by the government following the deadly port explosion that has reignited angry street protests. The state of emergency law will give the military exceptional powers to clamp down on protesters demanding the overthrow of a political elite widely held responsible for the devastating blast, human rights groups said. The government had already declared a two-week state of emergency on August 5, the day after the blast that killed 171 people and ravaged the heart of the capital. But as the measure lasts more than eight days, Lebanese law requires that it be approved by parliament, according to human rights watchdog The Legal Agenda. The state of emergency allows the army to close down assembly points and prohibit gatherings deemed threats to national security, and expands the jurisdiction of military courts over civilians. The army can also raid homes at any time and impose house arrest on anyone engaged in activities considered to threaten security, the watchdog said. This would give authorities legal cover to crack down on a protest movement that first emerged in October last year demanding deep-seated political reform. There has been widespread anger against authorities who allowed a large shipment of ammonium nitrate fertilizer to rot for years in a warehouse at the Beirut port. Prime Minister Hassan Diab's government stepped down on Monday after several ministers said they would quit over the explosion. Around 10 of parliament's 128 lawmakers have also handed in their resignations.

Parliament Backs Emergency Powers after Beirut Blast
Associated Press/Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 13/2020
Lebanon's parliament on Thursday approved a two-week state of emergency imposed by the government after last week's deadly port explosion that gives it legal authority to suppress resurgent protests. Calls had circulated on social media networks for protesters to prevent lawmakers from entering the session -- the first since the August 4 blast that ravaged swathes of the capital. But turnout was too low on Thursday morning, ahead of official visits by French Defenze Minister Florence Parly and David Hale, the top career diplomat at the U.S. State Department. Security forces outnumbered the dozen or so demonstrators who had gathered on a street near parliament's temporary venue, an AFP correspondent reported. Demonstrators tried to heckle tinted vehicles dashing to the debate but they could not stop it reaching a quorum. The colossal explosion that killed 171 people and wounded at least 6,500 others has rekindled calls for the ouster of Lebanon's decades-old political elite, many of whom are former warlords from the 1975-1990 civil war. There has been widespread anger against a political leadership which allowed a large shipment of hazardous ammonium nitrate fertiliser to rot for years in a port warehouse despite repeated safety warnings. An AFP investigation found that up until the day before the deadly blast, officials had exchanged warnings over the cargo, but did nothing despite experts' fears it could cause a major conflagration.
'Stop the criminals' -
As he presented his government's resignation on Monday, Prime Minister Hassan Diab blamed the blast on decades of corruption and official mismanagement.  Even President Michel Aoun, a symbol of the status quo, has acknowledged the need to "reconsider" the country's governance after the disaster.
Parliament on Thursday approved the resignation of seven lawmakers who had stepped down since last week over the blast. Attempts by officials to distance themselves from the political elite failed to convince many ordinary Lebanese, who saw nothing more then an exercise in buck-passing. "We are taking to the streets to stop the criminals from meeting," said one post on social media networks, calling for rallies on Thursday. "You have destroyed us! Leave!" said another. The government had already declared a two-week state of emergency the day after the explosion. But as the measure lasts more than eight days, Lebanese law requires that it be approved by parliament, according to The Legal Agenda, an NGO.
'Pretext'
The state of emergency allows the army to close down assembly points and prohibit gatherings deemed threats to national security, and expands the jurisdiction of military courts over civilians. The army can also raid homes at any time and impose house arrest on anyone engaged in activities considered to threaten security, human rights groups said. "Human Rights Watch is very concerned that the state of emergency would be used as a pretext to crack down on protests and snuff out the very legitimate grievances of a large segment of the Lebanese population," its Lebanon researcher Aya Majzoub said. Expanded jurisdiction of military courts is especially worrying as "military courts in Lebanon do not respect due process rights and violate international law," she told AFP. Parliament is required to approve the state of emergency eight days after it is imposed. But it wasn't clear if the body had technically extended the government decision for 15 days or simply imposed the state of emergency starting Thursday, said rights lawyer Nizar Saghieh.
"There is incredible chaos," Saghieh said. He said the state of emergency's only justification is to extend the power of the state and security agencies and "control the opposition.""We were waiting for the army to help in reconstruction not be an extension of power," he said. Lawmaker Simon Abi Ramieh protested that Parliament was convened to vote on the state of emergency while it was still in effect and called instead for forming a parliamentary committee to investigate the blast. "We are living in a state of institutional blunder," he said. "We are in a place and the Lebanese people are somewhere else. ... The public wants to know the truth behind the negligence that led to the explosion."Protests have rocked central Beirut on successive nights, leading to scuffles with security forces who have fired tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse the crowds.
The anger on the streets has reinvigorated a 10-month-old protest movement that had largely fizzled out in the face of the coronavirus pandemic and a worsening economic crisis. The explosion has also renewed calls by Lebanon's international partners for overdue reforms to shore up the deeply indebted economy.Hale, who is to arrive in Lebanon for a three-day visit, will "stress the urgent need to embrace fundamental economic, financial and governance reform", a statement said. "He will underscore America’s willingness to support any government that reflects the will of the people and is genuinely committed to and acting upon such a reform agenda," the statement added.
 

Lebanese MPs meet for first time since blast, US envoy due in Beirut
Reuters/August 13/2020
Senior US official David Hale is expected in Beirut later on Thursday to stress the urgent need for financial and governance reforms, ending endemic corruption and bringing transparency.Lebanese security forces deployed heavily in Beirut on Thursday, stopping protesters from reaching a conference center where MPs began meeting for the first time since the catastrophic chemicals explosion last week that killed 172 people. Senior US official David Hale is expected in Beirut later on Thursday to stress the urgent need for financial and governance reforms, ending endemic corruption and bringing transparency, among other messages, the US Embassy said. The Aug. 4 blast at a warehouse storing highly-explosive material in Beirut port injured some 6,000, left around 300,000 without habitable housing and wrecked swathes of the city, which was already in a deep financial crisis.
The authorities say the blast was caused by more than 2,000 tonnes of ammonium nitrate stored for years without safety measures. Roads to the UNESCO Palace on the southern outskirts of the capital, where parliament has met during the COVID-19 pandemic, were blocked with metal gates in anticipation of the protest by demonstrators furious at a political elite they blame for the blast. "They are all criminals, they are who caused this catastrophe, this explosion," said Lina Boubess, 60, a protester who was trying to reach UNESCO Palace. "Isn't it enough that they stole our money, our lives, our dreams and the dreams of our children? What more do we have to lose. They are criminals, all of them means all of them."As two cars with tinted windows passed through one of the barricades towards the UNESCO Palace, a small group of protesters hit the vehicles with Lebanese flags.
Others angry at the lawmakers said they had stayed away from the building in anticipation of the security cordon.
Some 30-40 people are still missing more than a week after the blast. Outrage at the explosion has fueled protests in which hundreds of people have been injured in confrontations between security forces and demonstrators. The government of Prime Minister Hassan Diab resigned earlier this week.
The parliamentary session started with a minute of silence. The agenda includes a discussion of a state of emergency declared by the government, said a senior political source. The resignation of eight MPs who quit after the blast are also expected to be confirmed.
But Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, a pillar of the sectarian elite, also "wants to give a political message - that the parliament exists - despite all this talk about early elections and the resignations of MPs," said the source.
Humanitarian aid has poured in but foreign countries have made clear they will not provide funds to help pull Lebanon from economic collapse without action on long-demanded reforms to tackle systemic graft, waste, mismanagement and negligence.
Authorities have estimated losses at $15 billion, a bill Lebanon cannot pay: it defaulted on its enormous sovereign debt in March, citing critically low foreign currency reserves.
The government's talks with the International Monetary Fund for a bailout had stalled. Politicians are in early consultations over forming a new cabinet, a complicated process in a country riven by political divisions and governed by a sectarian power-sharing system.
The government, which stays on in a caretaker capacity, came to office in January with backing from parties including the heavily armed, Iran-backed Shi’ite group Hezbollah, Lebanon’s most powerful party. Together with its allies, they have a majority of seats in parliament.
The United States proscribes Hezbollah as a terrorist group. US Under Secretary for Political Affairs Hale "will underscore America’s willingness to support any government that reflects the will of the people and is genuinely committed to and acting upon such a reform agenda," the US Embassy said.

Hardened Lebanese Merchants Battered by Beirut Blast
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Sleep Comfort survived Lebanon's 15-year civil war. But nothing could have prepared the high-end family furniture business for the Beirut port blast that destroyed swathes of the capital.
Employees barely escaped glass shards which flew across the showroom, located in one of the hardest-hit districts. In an instant, one-third of the furniture stock was lost and the factory gutted, incurring some $600,000 in losses.
"I am only here for my father otherwise I would have left," said chief sales manager Jad Ayoub, Reuters reported. "I would go anywhere."The biggest blast in Beirut's history killed at least 170 people, injured 6,000 and triggered protests against a political elite blamed for political turmoil and economic collapse. Homes and businesses were razed in the country's commercial heart. Authorities have said they will hold those responsible to account. The Aug. 4 explosion dealt a catastrophic blow to everyone from mechanics to major food importers, already struggling amid a financial crisis that hammered the currency and sent unemployment soaring. Beirut was built around its port, one of the region's busiest and for centuries a lifeline for Lebanon's merchant culture. The blast badly damaged it, and while some shipping lines say they are resuming visits to its container terminal, traders and business owners say they have no visibility on what goods survived or when imports can resume. "The government decided that anything in the port has to be analysed for ammonium nitrate residues ... Everything is at a standstill. There is nobody to answer us," said Hani Bohsali, general manager of Bohsali Foods SAL and president of Lebanon's food importers syndicate. He said the 52 companies in the Syndicate of Importers of Foodstuffs, Consumer Products and Drinks could suffer losses of no less than $50-60 million. "It is indeed a disaster. In case these goods were demolished (along with) a good part of my working capital, can I continue in the same volumes I used to before? Definitely not. Will the bank give me new credits? No, because of the financial crisis." Lebanon imports nearly 85% of its food. It defaulted on its foreign currency debt in March, citing critically low reserves.
The government, which quit this week over the blast, had launched talks with the IMF for a bailout but they were put on hold due to an internal row over the scale of financial losses.
Authorities have said initial estimates show $15 billion in damages, a bill Lebanon cannot pay. Insurance firms have taken a hit. Ghassan Saab, vice chairman of Fidelity, said the company has received 500 claims for property and motor damages as well as those from political unrest running into the hundreds of millions of dollars. "I doubt that all of the 60 insurance companies operating in Lebanon would survive the 2020 challenges which are the financial crisis, Covid-19 and the explosion," Saab said. "Definitely, the government resignation will help, but the government is not enough. Lebanon needs a complete reform to recover."According to Reuters, Foreign donors have linked any financial lifeline to the state to the enactment of long-demanded reforms.

Judge Fadi Sawan Named Judicial Investigator in Port Blast Case
Naharnet/August 13/2020
The Supreme Council of the Judiciary on Thursday agreed to the appointment of Judge Fadi Sawan as a judicial investigator in the port blast probe that will be handled by the Judicial Council. The Supreme Council agreed to caretaker Justice Minister Marie-Claude Najm’s suggestion to appoint Sawan following strenuous negotiations and controversy. According to the National News Agency, Sawan is expected to become in charge of the file on Friday.“He will begin interrogating the 19 detainees and will issue the necessary arrest warrants for them,” NNA added.

Iranian Foreign Minister Arrives in Beirut
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 13/2020
Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif arrived Thursday evening in Beirut for talks with Lebanese officials. The Iranian foreign ministry said Zarif will begin his meetings on Friday, following the massive blast that destroyed swathes of Beirut. Zarif is set to discuss the "latest developments following the recent devastating blast, ongoing Iranian aid and other bilateral issues," the foreign ministry said Thursday, without specifying which officials Zarif would meet. The massive explosion at Beirut's port on August 4 killed 171 people and injured 6,500. Zarif's visit will be the first by an Iranian official since the blast, and comes after a planned trip by First Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri was canceled. Jahangiri had been expected on Monday but the trip was called off after Lebanese prime minister Hassan Diab announced the resignation of his government, ISNA news agency reported. Iran wields huge influence in Lebanon through Hizbullah, which was strongly represented in the outgoing government and has an alliance with the party of President Michel Aoun.

Bassil Supports 'Clean Trial' over Port Blast, Welcomes Foreign Assistance
Naharnet/August 13/2020
Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil on Thursday said the FPM wants to “unveil the truth behind the port explosion.”“We want a swift probe and a clean trial for every negligent person or culprit as well as a fair verdict that does justice to the Lebanese people,” Bassil tweeted. “Down with overbidding, seeing as we welcome every support and assistance from friendly countries in order to expedite the investigation, increase its effectiveness and guarantee its transparency, and this is underway through the presence of foreign experts of several nationalities,” the FPM leader added.

Geagea to Berri: Any Call for Majoritarian Democracy Blows Up Lebanese Formula
Naharnet/August 13/2020
Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Thursday hit back at Speaker Nabih Berri over remarks the latter voiced during an emergency parliament session.
"Any call for majoritarian rule, even a veiled one, would blow up the Lebanese formula and the National Pact. We have enough problems and crises and we should not add to them a problem that is nonexistent at the moment,” Geagea tweeted.
Commenting on Berri’s remarks about “a conspiracy for resignations from parliament,” Geagea said: “That wasn’t a conspiracy but rather practicing of a a natural democratic right.”“Only early parliamentary elections can save us from the current situation,” Geagea went on to say. Berri had earlier in the day called for “an electoral law without regional or sectarian barriers.”

Lebanon's Tripoli Port Readies to Fill in for Blast-hit Beirut
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 13/2020
Lebanon's northern port city of Tripoli is readying its harbour to temporarily replace that of Beirut, which was levelled in last week's massive explosion, officials said Thursday. Tripoli port's capacity is smaller than the capital's, through which the vast majority of Lebanon's food and other imports used to transit.
A fire at Beirut port on August 4 caught a huge stockpile of ammonium nitrate, causing an explosion that devastated swathes of the city and killed at least 171 people.Immediately after the disaster, Lebanon's Supreme Defence Council ordered that the port of Tripoli be prepped for "import and export operations".
"The port of Tripoli can stand in for Beirut on a temporary basis, for the time it will take it to be operational again," Tripoli port director Ahmad Tamer told AFP. The smaller ports of Saida and Tyre can also contribute to the effort but their capacity is limited and does not allow for bigger vessels to dock.
Lebanon relies on imports for 85 percent of its food needs and the UN's World Food Programme has warned that the destruction of the main port could worsen an already alarming situation. Lebanon's economic collapse in recent months has seen it default on its debt, sent the local currency into free-fall and poverty rates soaring to near third world levels, all amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Tamer said seven ships that were on their way to Beirut on the day of the gigantic explosion immediately rerouted to Tripoli, where they unloaded their cargo. Tripoli had already undergone major upgrade works in order to accomodate increased traffic expected in connection with the reconstruction effort needed in neighbouring, war-ravaged Syria. Tamer said that before the explosion Tripoli port was only functioning at 40 percent capacity, processing two million tonnes of imports per year, with a capacity to absorb a maximum of five million tonnes. The port director said that he wanted to launch a plan to increase work at the port and hire more employees in order to process more than its current rate of 80,000 containers a year.

UNESCO to Protect Lebanon as 60 Historic Buildings 'Risk Collapse'
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 13/2020
The UN's cultural agency UNESCO vowed Thursday to lead efforts to protect vulnerable heritage in Lebanon after last week's gigantic Beirut port blast, warning that 60 historic buildings were at risk of collapse. The effects of the blast were felt all over the Lebanese capital but some of the worst damage was in the Gemmayzeh and Mar-Mikhael neighbourhoods a short distance from the port. Both are home to a large concentration of historic buildings. "The international community has sent a strong signal of support to Lebanon following this tragedy," said Ernesto Ottone, assistant UNESCO Director-General for Culture.
"UNESCO is committed to leading the response in the field of culture, which must form a key part of wider reconstruction and recovery efforts." Sarkis Khoury, head of antiquities at the ministry of culture in Lebanon, reported at an online meeting this week to coordinate the response that at least 8,000 buildings were affected, said the Paris-based organisation. "Among them are some 640 historic buildings, approximately 60 of which are at risk of collapse," UNESCO said in a statement. "He (Khoury) also spoke of the impact of the explosion on major museums, such as the National Museum of Beirut, the Sursock Museum and the Archaeological Museum of the American University of Beirut, as well as cultural spaces, galleries and religious sites."Even before the explosion, there had been growing concern in Lebanon about the condition of heritage in Beirut due to rampant construction and a lack of preservation for historic buildings in the densely-packed city. UNESCO said Khoury "stressed the need for urgent structural consolidation and waterproofing interventions to prevent further damage from approaching autumn rains."The explosion on August 4, which left 171 people dead, has been blamed on a vast stock of ammonium nitrate left in a warehouse at the port for years despite repeated warnings. Lebanon's government under Prime Minister Hassan Diab resigned this week following days of demonstrations demanding accountability for the disaster.

Parliamentary Blocs Demand Intl Probe into Beirut Blast
Naharnet/August 13/2020
The Democratic Gathering parliamentary bloc met Thursday and signed a joint petition with the Lebanese Forces, al-Mustaqbal bloc, and several independent MPs demanding international investigation into the colossal explosion in Beirut.
“For the sake of the victims of the explosion, and because we have no confidence in any local investigation, and for the sake of the truth, we launched today a parliamentary petition demanding an international investigation into the port explosion in coordination with the Lebanese Forces, al-Mustaqbal, and other MPs,” said leader of the bloc MP Taymour Jumblat. Jumblat chaired the Democratic Gathering meeting at his Clemenceau residence. The petition demands international investigation into the colossal explosion in Beirut that killed at least 171 and wounded more than 7,000 on August 4.

'Gladiator' Star Pitches in to Rescue Blast-Hit 'Le Chef' in Gemmayzeh
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 13/2020
Hollywood star Russell Crowe said Thursday that he donated funds to help rebuild a blast-hit Beirut restaurant on behalf of late food icon Anthony Bourdain, who loved its traditional dishes. The decades-old Le Chef restaurant, located in the heart of a trendy Beirut district, is a beloved neighborhood place renowned for its home-style cooking. It was blown to pieces by the August 4 explosion that killed 171 people, wounded at least 6,500 and ravaged swathes of Beirut. The Oscar-winning Crowe, best known for his role in the 2000 action film Gladiator, said on Twitter that he made the donation "on behalf of Anthony Bourdain"."I thought that he would have probably done so if he was still around," Crowe said of the celebrity chef and travel journalist who committed suicide in 2018. "Hope things can be put back together soon."Crowe's $5,000 donation was made on a GoFundMe page set up by fans of Le Chef, a restaurant popular with tourists as well as locals in the Gemmayzeh neighborhood that was among the hardest-hit by the explosion. The online fundraiser raised nearly $11,000 in less than 24 hours, just $2,000 short of its target. Le Chef is where Bourdain had his first meal when he and his crew where trapped in Lebanon for a week in 2006 because of a month-long war with Israel. It is featured in the highly-praised Lebanon episode of his 'No Reservations' series. "Really good food, very traditional," Bourdain says of the restaurant in the show, calling it a "nice mix" of old and new. It's a "good first meal in Beirut."

Fourth Relief Plane Arrives from UAE
Naharnet/August 13/2020
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has sent emergency medical assistance to disaster-hit Lebanon on Thursday, after the massive explosion in the port of Beirut that left more tha 171 dead and wounded at least 7,000 others and left many homeless. A UAE plane landed at Beirut’s Rafik Hariri International Airport early today. “An air relief bridge between Lebanon and the UAE will continue to provide assistance. This is the fourth plane coming into Lebanon within the last few days,” UAE Ambassador to Lebanon Hamad el-Shamsi said.
The UAE has also decided to sponsor the families who lost their breadwinner, and children whose parents have perished in the Beirut explosion. For his part, the Secretary General of the Red Cross George Kittaneh, pointed out that there is a long partnership between the Lebanese Red Cross and the Emirates Red Crescent, “we are conducting a survey to distribute relief,” he said. Moreover, an Algerian cargo plane landed at Beirut airport bringing medical and food aid from Algeria to Lebanon.

Why the army should be the focus of Lebanon’s protests
Khaled Abou Zahr/Arab News/August 13, 2020
The last century has seen the rags to riches Lebanese story repeated time and again for many of its emigrants. From all religions, they emigrated under the pressure of poverty, oppression or just because they were looking for bigger opportunities. They moved to a new country and became wealthy, with many turning out to be successful and influential personalities in their adopted communities. Their stories are sometimes even movie-worthy: Stories of sacrifice, resilience and courage. This not only applied to the Safras and Hayeks of the business world, but to every single Lebanese who has emigrated and works hard to keep supporting his or her family back in Lebanon.
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These men and women have built the Lebanon brand globally. They have been great ambassadors in helping each other and projecting a positive image of their community. They are successfully integrated in every continent and in all activities.
A successful Western businessman of Lebanese descent was once asked in an interview if he was planning on investing in and having activity in his country of origin. His answer was quite surprising but also revealing: He said that he was not smart enough to conduct business in Lebanon, stating that it demanded caution on too many angles and that it was too competitive. Most importantly he described the Lebanese — speaking in terms of business — as cannibals once they get back to their home country.
It was a correct assessment and still is. To survive famines, wars, colonization, civil wars, bombs, threats, and killings, the Lebanese have the DNA of a survivor. This DNA is what helps them become successful abroad. However, the Lebanese will to rebuild is becoming more a kind of insanity, as we repeat the same actions while expecting different results. The Lebanese keep rebuilding the real estate, but not the country itself, which is what really needs to be started again.
They have left untouched a more than century-old extractive system whose beneficiaries were formerly the Syrian regime and now Hezbollah. This continuity has made the will to survive a ruthless task. Success in Lebanon equates to 100 successes abroad. What the Syrian regime and its heir Hezbollah, along with the warlord structure, have kept going is a horrible system, one that is focused on extraction — it does not share, it only takes. It is a system where bribes and connections can get you out of a jail cell, while the opposite can land you in one. No one has ever thought of breaking it down, but rather focused on how to get into the higher echelons of it.
The political leadership and community heads are users, predators and cronies. They do not produce, they just take. If you want to understand Lebanon, just look at its trade and business. Who owns what? Who owns the banks that lent to the state and profited? Who sits on their boards? Who owns the businesses that benefit from the state? I am sure that you will quickly find out that businessmen affiliated with Hezbollah have joint ventures with other clan leaders in some key activities. I am confident that, if you look into their grown-up children’s activities, you will find them all in business together. A quick look at the beneficiaries of the Banque du Liban’s Circular 331 initiative to promote the tech sector would also prove interesting.
The broken system even instigated a massive corruption scheme with the high interest rates banks were paying out. No one questioned how the Lebanese banks would remain viable while offering such high rates. Most of their lending was to the government, reaching more than 70 percent of their total lending more than a decade ago. This meant that bankers and officials knew of the coming collapse.
It was not only a Ponzi scheme to keep the government and its beneficiaries going, but it was also a good way to stop anyone from asking too many questions — the miracle of the Lebanese banking system. The system was largely fueled by the deposits of hard-working Lebanese, who needed their money to support their families or create an extra income. As expected, it all came crumbling down, as did the entire country. But the extractors were able to exit before the collapse came.
Since the beginning of the crisis and the protests of October 2019, we have read many reports that perfectly describe the current situation, from Hezbollah’s role to French President Emmanuel Macron’s initiatives. We have been drowning in analysis. As I said, the Lebanese are gifted, so they have been able to describe the situation and condemn the ruling elite and the destructive Iranian proxy, but no one is coming forward with a concrete plan to build something new. The demands of the protesters are weak and superficial — they are like putting a new coat of paint on a crumbling building.
The demands of the protesters are weak and superficial — they are like putting a new coat of paint on a crumbling building. If we look at how things have changed, it only happened once the army shifted sides. I have many reservations on the inner structure of the army and the control Hezbollah might exert on it. However, I am confident that there are many serving men and women who cannot accept the continuous humiliation and extraction of the country’s wealth. These are the ones the protesters need to appeal to. I have written repeatedly that a new prime minister, president or election will not change anything, but that is what is happening.
Protesters should, therefore, no longer waste their time protesting dead institutions such as the current president, but instead should protest in front of the Lebanese Armed Forces, asking for their support. Stop throwing rocks and stones at dead institutions. Go ask for the action of the only institution that might be able to make a change. Ask for the creation of a new governing and legislative entity that will start to rebuild the entire structure of the country. Prosperity can only come through meritocracy and inclusiveness that will unleash the incredible talent of the Lebanese people in their own country, not in faraway lands.
The army’s answer will at the very least clarify once and for all where it stands. If it does not move with the people and create a direct counterbalance to Hezbollah and the ruling clans, then the next steps should be clear for all.
*Khaled Abou Zahr is the CEO of Eurabia, a media and tech company. He is also the editor of Al-Watan Al-Arabi.

Who killed Rafik Hariri?
Neville Teller/Jerusalem Post/August 13/2020
The Special Tribunal for Lebanon (the STL) was voted into existence by the UN Security Council in 2007 and formally established in 2009.
The wheels of justice, like the mills of God, are known to grind slowly, but the judicial process to determine who was guilty of the assassination of Lebanon’s one-time prime minister Rafik Hariri – and to bring the culprits to justice – has seemed interminable.
Just before noon on St. Valentine’s Day 2005 – February 14 – a motorcade swept along the Beirut seafront. In one of cars sat Hariri, returning home from a parliamentary session in central Beirut. As the line of vehicles reached the Hotel Saint Georges, a security camera captured a white Mitsubishi truck alongside the convoy. Seconds later, a massive explosion shook the city. In the midst of the carnage Rafik Hariri, along with 22 other people, lay dead. Some 200 were injured. The blast left a crater on the street at least 10 meters wide and two meters deep.
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Ten days later, then UN secretary general Kofi Annan sent a fact-finding mission to Beirut to discover who was responsible for the attack. In doing so he was certainly unaware that he was giving birth to what might be termed a new judicial industry – the Lebanon Inquiry process. The Special Tribunal for Lebanon (the STL) was voted into existence by the UN Security Council in 2007 and formally established in 2009. Now, if its elaborate website is anything to go by, it is comparable to some large commercial enterprise.
After 11 years, 415 court sittings and the testimony of no less than 297 witnesses, the STL announced that it would deliver its verdict on Friday, August 7. Three days before, on August 4, came the unprecedented and devastating explosion in Beirut. As a result, and out of respect to the victims, the STL announced that it would postpone delivering its verdict until August 18.
Operating on a budget of over $150 million, half of which is provided by the Lebanese government, the STL court, which consists of 11 judges – seven international and four Lebanese – sits in The Hague. Hearings are broadcast through the STL website. The tribunal runs its own public affairs office, which arranges briefings and interviews for journalists, providing them with press releases, court papers, photographs, audio-visual material, fact sheets and basic legal documents. In addition, located within the STL building is a media center whose facilities include Wi-Fi internet access, TV screens to follow the hearings and recording facilities in Arabic, English and French.
How ­– and more important perhaps, why – did this complex judicial operation emerge from Kofi Annan’s decision, immediately following the assassination, to send a small investigative team to Beirut?
That team spent a month attempting to get at the truth, but in the end, recognizing the logistical and political difficulties, submitted a report recommending an independent international inquiry. Kofi Annan followed the group’s advice. He assembled another, more highly-powered team of investigators. Six months later, its report concluded that the white truck seen on the security camera outside the Hotel Saint Georges had carried some 1,000 kg. of explosives. Since Hariri’s convoy contained jamming devices intended to block remote control signals, they concluded that the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber. The report cited a witness who said the bomber was an Iraqi, who had been led to believe that his target was then Iraqi prime minister Iyad Allawi.
THE REPORT concluded that top Syrian and Lebanese officials had been planning the assassination from as far back as mid-2004. Its findings were based on key witnesses and a variety of evidence, including patterns of telephone calls between specific prepaid phone cards that connected prominent Lebanese and Syrian officials to events surrounding the crime.
So already in 2005 the finger was pointing at Syria and its Hezbollah supporters inside Lebanon. In fact, Lebanese public opinion preempted this conclusion. Lebanon’s powerful neighbor Syria had been enforcing Big Brother control over Lebanese affairs for decades. Rafik Hariri had been actively seeking to loosen Syria’s oppressive grip and had become something of a thorn in the side of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Following Hariri’s assassination a massive protest was organized in Martyrs’ Square in the heart of downtown Beirut, denouncing the atrocity and demanding that Syrian troops be expelled from the country. This so-called Cedar Revolution caught the world’s attention. A diplomatic coalition was formed, with the United States, France, and Saudi Arabia at its helm. On April 26, 2005, after some three months of civil agitation, the last Syrian troops left Lebanon.
It took another four years of fact-finding by the UN International Investigation Commission (UNIIC) before sufficient additional and convincing evidence had been collected to enable the STL to be set up. Even so, largely because of blocking tactics employed by Hezbollah officials inside Lebanon, the five identified defendants were never apprehended and the trial has been held in their absence. They are: Salim Ayyash, Mustafa Badreddine, Hussein Oneissi, Sassad Sabra, and Hassan Merhi.
The trial of Ayyash, et al. began on January 16, 2014. In preparing the case the prosecution had carefully steered clear of accusations against Syria, trying to avoid a diplomatic confrontation with President Bashar al-Assad and Syria’s supporters. Subsequently, the STL permitted the prosecution to seek to expose Assad’s role in the assassination, and it soon became clear that the prosecution believed Assad wanted Rafik Hariri killed, and that he used Hezbollah and his own security apparatus to achieve his objective. Based on recent court proceedings, it seems likely that on August 18 al-Assad and Hezbollah will be facing a verdict of having planned and executed the murder of Rafik Hariri.
As a postscript, it should be noted that the announcement of the verdict is most unlikely to signal an end to the STL judicial enterprise. Under its terms of reference, either the prosecution or the defense can appeal the verdict, the sentence, or both. These particular wheels of justice are likely to be grinding on for a good few years yet. The writer is Middle East correspondent for Eurasia Review. His new book, Trump and the Holy Land: 2016-2020 will be published on August 28. He blogs at: www.a-mid-east-journal.blogspot.com

The Lebanese Revolt Reignited by the Big Explosion
Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al Awsat/August 13/2020
As mass protests reappear in a deeply-wounded Beirut, "occupied Lebanon" moves ever closer to the danger zone. The fact of the matter, however, is that there is nothing new about the background of the massive security "earthquake" that shook Lebanon on Tuesday, August 4.
Neither the government has ever surprised the Lebanese people with its subservience, spitefulness, and inefficiency, nor Hezbollah – which is Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) arm in the Arab Mashreq – has ever failed to remind the Lebanese of its sway, aggressiveness, arrogance and deep involvement in a project of regional sectarian hegemony.
Hezbollah’s Secretary-General appeared a few days ago, and totally denied any "knowledge of what goes on in Beirut Port", and any connection of his party with the huge explosion(s), which has so far killed more than 200 and injured around 5,000 people. But even if the Secretary-General was saying the truth, past experiences with Hezbollah do not encourage anyone to be convinced.
Below are some examples:
Hezbollah, which had always emphasized its "Lebanese" identity; decided one day to come clean. Its Secretary-General personally and candidly told the Lebanese public that “Hezbollah’s budget, salaries, expenses, food and drink supplies, weapons and missiles come from the Islamic Republic of Iran… our money, reserved for us, arrives not through banks but through the same way that we receive the missiles with which we threaten Israel”. This statement clearly means that the Lebanese government, its audit agencies, as well as political, military and security institutions, have no authority or control over the party’s affairs and dealings.
In the past, the party used to claim that it would never be dragged into the "alleys" of Lebanese internal politics. Yet, when the right opportunity came, it entered these "alleys’" and infiltrated various sects through its mercenary "puppets" with the clear intention of weakening, blackmailing, and subjugating its competitors and opponents. Furthermore, contrary to its solemnly-declared commitments, the party has led and financed "exclusionist" fronts, brought down cabinets, fomented cabinet crises which paralyzed Lebanon on more than one occasion.
For many years, Hezbollah insisted before the Lebanese that its weapons are exclusively kept to be used in "resisting" Israel, from the "occupied" south Lebanon to liberating Jerusalem.
The Lebanese, again, "convinced" themselves that this was true, despite the "Thank You Syria" mass show of support organized by Hezbollah for Al-Assad regime, only a few weeks after the assassination of Rafic Hariri and his colleagues. This actually, took place when that regime was widely seen by most of the Lebanese as the culprit. Then, as Western rumors began to link the party itself with the crime, it opposed the establishment of an international tribunal; and later on, refused to cooperate with it when the latter officially accused a number of the party’s fighters of murder.
In 2006, however, Hezbollah passed a major landmark in its disregard for the Lebanese government, when it launched an armed operation across "the Blue Line" marking the border with Israel. This operation ended with a disaster for Lebanon and led to Hezbollah’s de facto withdrawal from the area south of the Litani River. Such a withdrawal, realistically and morally, ended its "liberation" mission, for which Hezbollah alone was allowed to keep its weapons while all other Lebanese militias were disarmed.
What could be said here, is that in 2006 Hezbollah’s supporters were thankful to the Lebanese government for its brave backing, while the Israeli war machine was pounding the party’s strongholds in south Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs, as well as vast areas of the country.
But, a short time later, everything changed, and the party accused the government of "treason" and decided to lead a coup against it. Even worse, after relieving itself of the mission of "liberation", Hezbollah turned its weapon against its opponents inside Lebanon. Under the pretext of protecting itself against accusations that it controls the Rafic Hariri International Airport’s security, the party invaded west Beirut and attacked southern Mount Lebanon in its major internal war against the Sunni and Druze leaderships. This invasion took place after Hezbollah spectacularly managed to penetrate the Maronite Christians, through striking an "understanding" with its previous arch-enemy General Michel Aoun.
The policy of the "Carrot and Stick", adopted by Hezbollah with the Christians (namely the Maronites), the Sunnis and the Druze, achieved two aims:
1- Securing the party’s persistent and deep infiltration of the Lebanese state’s security and political institutions.
2- Laying the foundation of its coup against the "Taif Accords", when the party and its allies "occupied" central Beirut and besieged the Government Headquarters (the Grand Serail) for 18 months between late October 2006 and late May 2008.
The "occupation" of central Beirut ended with an agreement reached by the Lebanese leaders in the Qatari capital Doha, and resulted in the election of the Army Chief General Michel Sleiman. Practically, the strategic political aim of the "Doha Agreement" - based on a balance of power tilted in favor of Hezbollah – was to undermine the constitutional legitimacy of the "Taif Accords". But soon enough Hezbollah and Aoun conspired against the "agreement' when they brought down Saad Hariri’s coalition cabinet by withdrawing their ministers.
Through president Sleiman’s term, and thanks to its excessive power and its infiltration of non-Shiite communities, the pro-Iran party succeeded in extending its influence throughout the state security apparatus and key government positions; one thing, however it failed to achieve was to sideline the president
This is why the relations steadily deteriorated after Sleiman insisted on upholding the "Baabda Declaration" based on the outcome of the National Dialogue sessions called by and presided on by president Sleiman.
Finally, there was a rift that led to Hezbollah openly sponsoring Aoun as its presidential candidate; which again disrupted the country’s political life as Hezbollah and its allies regularly boycotted the presidential election meetings so the necessary two-thirds quorum is never reached.
After a lengthy impasse, Dr. Samir Geagea, the leader of the Lebanese Forces Party, and Aoun main rival, withdrew his candidacy and declared his support for Aoun. This development left Saad Hariri and Walid Jumblatt in no position to challenge Christian unanimity, so they followed Geagea’s lead, securing the presidency for Hezbollah’s candidate.
Aoun’s presidency secured under clear political imbalance in the Lebanese scene, and during Hezbollah’s "unauthorized" involvement in the Syrian war, proved once and for all that the "Hezbollah statelet" was now stronger than the Lebanese state.
Indeed, ever since Aoun took over, the party took full control of the political and security decision-making processes, leaving to Aoun a free hand in securing government appointments for his and Hezbollah’s Sunni and Druze supporters and henchmen, while marginalizing their political opponents.
Just after the explosion that devastated Beirut, several contradictory security pronouncements and "sourced claims" were made; mostly either incredulous or intentionally misleading to protect an employee here or a customs officer there.
Throughout, the big picture was absent. It was intentionally absent because there was no benefit to claim responsibility; especially for Israel, which is already carrying out a silent "war of attrition" against Iran, whether in Iran itself or on Syrian soil.
On the other hand the Lebanese know too well, from Hezbollah itself, that it possesses a formidable arsenal of heavy weapons; and are almost sure its depots are not in Mozambique!

The Beirut Disaster: What A Fair Historian Might Say!
Hazem Saghieh/Asharq Al Awsat/August 13/2020
If one of us were to role play and become a historian, what might this historian say about the Beirut disaster?
At first, after shedding light on the disaster’s humanitarian and economic dimensions, he would situate it in the particular Lebanese context during which it took place. He will find that it crowned a bankrupt approach for managing politics and the economy, and it took place a few months after a colored revolution that had tried and failed to push corrupt political class aside. He will also emphasize that the aforementioned class was represented, at the time of the crisis, by its worst faction and most inane and unappealing, namely, the Aounists, who promised a “strong reign” and then ended up overseeing the weakest period of governance the country had known in its hundred years of existence.
As a footnote at the bottom of the page, the historian would add: It is true that Michel Aoun represented the majority of the frustrated Christians of the country when he became president, unlike the weak presidents who preceded him, but he seems to have ended up among them, because the residents of the capital’s most devastated areas (the port, Gemmayzeh, Mar Mikhael, Ashrafieh ...), Christian neighborhoods, hold him responsible for what happened to them.
The historian will surely comment about the symbolism in much of the people’s reactions. He will refer to the fact that the curse words that had been almost exclusively directed at Gebran Basil, the president’s son in law, were now being directed at the president himself. As for the biggest taboo that had been broken, it was the mock-hanging of Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nassrallah in the public square: until that moment, daring to mention Nasrallah had been a life-threatening debasement of sanctity. This was broken. "Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah" became just “one of them,” though he is the most dangerous among them. The historian will focus on this major transformation and its significance: Even those who exonerate Hezbollah of direct responsibility for the disaster realized, or most of them did, that the state’s collapse is founded on its abandonment of its monopoly on maintaining security, its most critical function, in favor of Hezbollah. It is with this division in particular where the path towards disintegration, the tragic climax of which we saw at the Port of Beirut, began. He will add, to remind his reader of the period which shortly preceded the blast, that Hezbollah had been the most prominent and effective protector, during the October Revolution, of the regime responsible for the disaster.
However, our historian will leave us with two unresolved questions: On one hand, will the Lebanese manage to produce a cross-sectarian political force that can in turn create an alternative form of governance, thereby preventing Lebanon from ending itself as a nation and a state? On the other hand, do the Lebanese understand that, until further notice, the most powerful thing they possess is what remains of their friendships with the rest of the world, friendships that they ought, from here on out, to avoid wasting away with “resistances” and getting involved in conflicts that they do not have the capacity for?
In another footnote, on another page, the historian will add that the disaster showed the truth in what had been said, decades ago, by a Lebanese politician who saw that "Lebanon's strength lies in its weakness."
It may have been noticed that the historian does not mention the prime minister, Hassan Diab, or his ministers, nor does he refer to the government’s fate or the early resignations of some of its ministers. Furthermore, the Lebanese disaster has a regional context as well, a context that the historian calls “a succession of regional tragedies”: It came after two disastrous regional developments that induce nothing but deep sense of pessimism: In Syria, since 2011, its ruler, Bashar al-Assad, has been capably killing his people and displacing them on a massive scale. That experience demonstrated how little value human life held especially since it did not hamper the persistence of Assad’s presidency, and no accountability is forthcoming.
In Iraq and Syria, starting from 2013-2014, ISIS has been present. It seized vast territory in both countries and established an unprecedentedly barbaric regime. The movement has been dealt with major and fundamental military defeats, but the causes that brought it to life have not yet been addressed. It continues to be dealt with, in its ups and downs, as a mere military event. This, in general, is bad news. Its negative implications may be limited if aid is obtained to restore some of what had collapsed in Beirut and relieve some of the victims' families pain. However, it raises issues for Lebanon, and thus for the region as well, which remain to be contemplated and addressed. As for the conclusion that our historian presents in the form of a question, it is the following: "How long will the lives of the people in this region remain cheap, how long will they continue to be killed by oppressive regimes and petty leaders who rely on kinship and sectarian ties and keep their citizens preoccupied with major ideological conflicts meant to further undermine the value of their lives?"

The Beirut Disaster Amid Two Legitimacies
Hussam Itani/Asharq Al Awsat/August 13/2020
Lebanon’s tyrants have not grasped the gravity of what happened in Beirut. They did not feel the blast that blew through bedrooms and livelihoods of thousands of Lebanese, nor the avalanche of broken glass, debris and pieces of wood that rained down on the Lebanese and their children, who had been oblivious to the crime of mythical proportions that had been prepared for them.
They did not care about the hundreds who had been killed, not that the victims are not numbers, but fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, and loved ones to people who are not of lesser importance than the corrupt officials. A child no older than three years of age was amongst the victims. They did not care about the thousands who were injured in the blast, and who will carry these injuries with them for the rest of their lives or their suffering at the gates of the overcrowded hospitals that had been damaged by the blast, with hundreds bleeding heavily for hours before they could receive the care they needed.
They dealt with the victims with criminal carelessness, leaving dozens of those who had still been alive under the rubble, without rushing to deploy cranes and heavy machinery to save them, as any authorities with a minimal degree of moral fortitude, sense of responsibility or merit. Because of politicians’ neglect and the withering away of the institutions that are meant to deal with such situations, dozens of those who had been missing died before the rescue teams arrived. Many firefighters and civil defense personnel, who had not been informed of the dangers of the mission they had tasked with, were added to the list of casualties as they tried to contain the fire that caused the massive explosion.
Alternatively, perhaps this oligarchy grasped and felt but nonetheless approached the calamity exclusively from the standpoint of its direct interests: How can I benefit from reconstruction? How do we share the aid that might arrive? Who will rebuild the wheat silo? Who will renovate the apartments? What profits will each of us reap after the bodies of the victims are collected and the widows and orphans stop wailing? It is no secret that Lebanese politicians, without exception, control the contracting and construction sectors, and they can steal everything that may come from international or Arab donors unless the aid goes directly to the victims, without going through the cave of the corrupt state.
A similar approach is being taken on the political front; the group that controls the Lebanese, hurried, as soon as Hassan Diab’s government resigned on the evening of Monday, August 10, to search for an alternative cabinet. The names and stances that were announced and leaked indicate an exact replication of the old methods that this group has been following to stamp its authority for decades: representation of the main sectarian factions and blocs in Parliament, taking the regional and international balance into account, in the hope of “convincing” the world that the disasters that these people brought down on the majority of the Lebanese population are being dealt with.
In fact, the plan of the "political class", which has taken a step up, going from corruption to outright criminality, is merely to reproduce its hegemony over the state. For they believe that Western countries will agree to this approach, based on what French President Emmanuel Macron said as he visited Beirut and during the international conference of assistance and support for Beirut on August 9. The fact is, French and European positions lean toward keeping the political scene as it is, without serious change that may lead - if they failed - to the collapse of the last remaining pillars of state authority.
This poses a major problem: do Lebanese politicians still represent the majority of citizens? Do they, then, still have the representative legitimacy that allows them to speak for the people, and form the next government, in the same shape and form that the Lebanese have already tried and suffered from?
The Lebanese political system, it seems, lacks any mechanisms that would allow for accountability. It is but an amalgamation of small dictatorships, each of which monopolizes it group’s representation, speaking for it and supposedly advancing its interests. They persist in doing so, without any sensitivity to the changes that have been taking place on the streets since October 17. This is especially true for the illegitimately-armed faction that supports this regime and has repeatedly reiterated, leaving no room for doubt or hesitation, that it will prevent peaceful democratic change by force, even if further loss of life and destruction are required.
Accordingly, Lebanon is home to two forms of legitimacy that have no links between them: popular legitimacy, which the October 17 uprising speaks for and which was reiterated in the most recent demonstrations mourning for the victims of the explosion on Saturday, August 8. It also demonstrated that its deep crisis persists amid its failure to formulate a program and produce real leadership that challenges the corrupt junta and the representative legitimacy it claims. The representatives sit comfortably in their seats, deeply reassured by the absence of an alternative that could hold them accountable, drag them to the courts and prisons, and rightfully hang them on the gallows.
Two forms of legitimacy in crisis coexist, with the second not recognizing the legitimacy of the first and unable to become a serious and weighty political force capable of negotiating and imposing its conditions, on territory that is shrinking and between corpses that are multiplying and houses that are collapsing.
There is nothing in this scene but the taste of bitterness, a rotten smell and the sound of owls.

A Grim Milestone on Covid-19 Could Be a Turning Point
Justin Fox/Bloomberg/August 13/2020
The US has reached a landmark of sorts in its so far not very successful battle with the virus that causes Covid-19. Most Americans now know someone who has been infected.
This is according to tracking surveys conducted by Navigator Research, a polling project with ties to various left-leaning groups. Given what we know about the spread of the disease from other sources, it sounds about right. Although it is sad news, it may also mark something of a positive turning point. More than anything else, the key to keeping Covid-19 under control seems to be taking it seriously, and knowing someone with the disease can do a lot to focus a person on the risks it poses. That it had to come to this is of course tragic. A key enabler of the spread of the coronavirus, especially in affluent countries with the resources to stop it, has been an inability to imagine that what happened somewhere else might happen closer to home. Italians saw what transpired in China, and failed to act on the early signs that they might be next. New Yorkers saw what was going on Italy and the mayor and governor concluded that, well, this isn’t Italy. Political leaders in the U.K. saw what was going on in Continental Europe and New York and seemed to think their compatriots could just tough it out, before belatedly changing course.
Within countries, though, an outbreak in one region usually did translate into rapid changes in behavior everywhere else. This was true at first even in the sprawling, polarized US, where the actions of some on-the-ball state and local officials, President Donald Trump’s sudden (and, it turns out, temporary) conversion from coronavirus doubter to grudging supporter of tough measures to stop it and a sort of generalized public freak-out together kept the epidemic from going national in the spring. This success didn’t last. One reason was of course the impatience of the president, who after his own coronavirus task force issued a reasonable set of recommendations for safely reopening the country, promptly goaded states to ignore them. Given that much of the US had barely been touched by the disease, though, it was always going to be a struggle to persuade people outside of hard-hit areas to take it seriously and stick with practices like social distancing or mask-wearing for long. This is proving to be the case elsewhere as well — the northeastern Spanish region of Aragon, which saw only modest spread of Covid-19 in March and April, is now the epicenter of a summer resurgence. But it’s especially true in the US, which has been beset for a while now by an epidemic of distrust and disinformation that seemingly makes it really hard for people in, say, suburban Tulsa to imagine themselves in the shoes of New Yorkers (and vice versa!).
In April, I got into extended email discussions with a couple of readers from outside New York who said they didn’t know anyone with Covid-19 and were clearly dubious of my assertions that I did. Allegations that the disease was a sinister hoax or nearly harmless coursed through social media. Even in the mainstream media and academic research, the deadliness of New York’s epidemic was often ascribed to conditions unique to the big city (such as density and heavy reliance on public transportation) or to the nursing-home policies of Governor Andrew Cuomo.
Some things about New York’s Covid experience clearly were unique, and the outbreaks cropping up all over the Sun Belt this summer have generally been slower moving and (so far) less deadly. But they’ve also been much more widespread — to the point that most Americans now know someone who has or has had Covid-19. Almost all Americans, meanwhile, now live in communities where substantial numbers of people have been infected with the coronavirus, meaning they’re increasingly likely to hear about the disease from local news sources that they trust more than national outlets.
State and local politicians are of course affected by these changing realities, too, making previously reluctant ones more likely to endorse measures to slow the disease’s spread. But the changes in individual attitudes seem to be at least as important as the government mandates. Here’s a chart of restaurant traffic in Arizona since the state began allowing indoor dining again on May 11.
The number of new confirmed coronavirus cases started to rise sharply in Arizona in late May. By late June, the state’s outbreak appeared to be spiraling out of control, with more than 3,000 new cases a day and the percentage of tests coming back positive blowing past 20%. On June 29, Governor Doug Ducey closed bars, gyms and theaters and strongly urged (but did not mandate) the wearing of face masks, and on July 9, he restricted indoor dining at restaurants to 50% of capacity. But as the chart makes clear, behavior had begun changing well before then, as Arizonans saw reports of rising case loads on the local news and learned of friends who had contracted the disease. In the process, they began to slow the epidemic: The number of new cases reported peaked on July 1, meaning that new infections likely peaked a week or more before that. There are still too many infections and too high a positive-test percentage to say things are under control, but they are headed in the right direction, for now at least.
The big Covid-19 outbreaks in Florida and Texas appear to have peaked, too, but those states have not yet seen as big a decline in cases as Arizona. That may be in part because their populations are dispersed over many metropolitan areas and media markets, meaning that the local cycle of learning to take Covid seriously has to happen over and over again. Two-thirds of Arizona’s population resides in and around Phoenix, making the process a lot simpler.
I realize this isn’t the only possible explanation for current trends in coronavirus data. Hundreds of thousands of Arizonans (possibly more than a million) have now recovered from and are for the time being most likely immune to Covid-19, and this is surely helping to slow the disease’s spread. But the fact that local outbreaks around the world have subsided at very different infection rates (as measured by subsequent antibody surveys) points to behavior changes and public policy being in most cases the more important drivers.
Covid-19 is usually not fatal, and may be getting less so over time. It’s not unstoppable either. But when people think that it doesn’t exist, or isn’t coming anywhere near them, or is practically harmless, or is going away soon, it has a nasty way of becoming a big, big problem. We’ve now reached a point where most Americans have a personal link to the disease, which makes such denial a lot harder. That may turn out to be some good bad news.

Abandoned by State after Explosion, Lebanese Help Each Other
Associated Press/Naharnet/August 13/2020
In the southern Lebanese town of Haris, a newlywed couple is living in one of Safy Faqeeh's apartments for free. He's never met them before, and they aren't on a honeymoon. Their apartment in Beirut was wrecked when last week's massive explosion wreaked destruction across the capital.
Faqeeh is one of hundreds of Lebanese who have opened their homes to survivors of the Aug. 4 blast. The explosion, which was centered on Beirut's port and ripped across the capital, left around a quarter of a million people with homes unfit to live in. But they have not had to crowd into collective shelters or sleep in public parks.
That's because in the absence of the state, Lebanese have stepped up to help each other. Some have let relatives, friends and neighbors stay with them. Others like Faqeeh extended a helping hand even farther, taking to social media to spread the word that they have a room to host people free of charge.
The couple saw Faqeeh's offer on Facebook for a free apartment he owns in Haris, some 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Beirut. They can stay as long as they need to, the 29-year-old Faqeeh said, and he has a second apartment available for anyone else in need. "This is not help, it is a duty," he said.
When he was a teenager, Faqeeh's family home was damaged in the 2006 war between Israel and Hizbullah, and they had to stay in a house in Tripoli, clear on the other end of Lebanon. Now he's paying it forward. "We have experienced several wars and they (people) hosted us," Faqeeh said.
The help that Lebanese are giving goes beyond a place to stay. Armed with helmets and brooms, hundreds of volunteers have circulated through Beirut's heavily damaged neighborhoods, cleaning up people's homes and doing free basic repairs, often enough to enable the residents to stay there.
The explosion left entire blocks in shambles, with streets blanketed in broken glass, twisted metal, broken brickwork. Yet within days, some streets were clean, the debris neatly sorted in piles. That was thanks to volunteers, often using social media to organize where to target.
In some places, they were sweeping streets and hauling away wreckage while security forces or soldiers stood nearby, watching.
That has only reinforced for Lebanese their government's failure to provide basic services, much less respond to the disaster. Many already blame the government and the broader ruling elite's incompetence, mismanagement and corruption for the explosion. Authorities allowed 2,750 tons of explosive ammonium nitrate to sit in a warehouse at the port unmonitored for seven years, despite multiple warnings of the danger, until it exploded when touched off by a fire. The blast killed more than 170 people, injured thousands and wreaked chaos across the city.
The government almost completely left the public on its own to deal with the aftermath. Outside the demolished port, there have been no government clean-up crews in the streets and little outreach from officials to help beyond promises of compensation to those whose homes or businesses were damaged.
The list of services people are offering keeps expanding. It now includes free glass for cars damaged in the blast, free maintenance of electrical appliances and free cosmetic surgery for people with face injuries. On Facebook, a group called Rebuild Beirut quickly sprung up. Its volunteers are working at full speed, helping clean up homes and link survivors with donors who will cover the expenses of repairs.
The individual acts of solidarity have been even more striking because Lebanon was already in the middle of a worsening economic crisis that has thrown hundreds of thousands into poverty and left households and businesses with little or no excess cash. "I am so proud of the Lebanese people," said Kim Sacy, a 19-year-old university student. "There is no state, there is nobody, there is nothing … we are the ones doing everything in the field."Sacy is studying at a French university and was supposed to be on a program in Sweden this year but the coronavirus pandemic grounded her in Lebanon. She was outside Beirut driving home when the blast took place. She didn't feel the explosion but when she reached her neighborhood of Achrafieh, she found it shattered. "This is where I lived my whole life," she said.
Sacy's family home was damaged, but she still wanted to help others. "It is not important. I consider myself lucky," she said. "It is the people who make the home." She said some of her family members were injured in the blast but are doing fine now. Sacy began collecting food and other items to give to those in need. Around 25 families have reached out to her to donate, some she knows, but half are strangers. For the past week, she has been circulating around Beirut in her car to pick up donated furniture, first aid kits, bed sheets and kitchen utensils that she gives to a local non-governmental organization to distribute. When not doing that, she has been cleaning in the streets, including cleaning a fire station.
The self-help spirit has roots in the long civil war, when central authority collapsed and Lebanese had to depend on themselves to get by. In more recent years, waves of anti-government protests have emphasized volunteerism and civic duty — boosted by social media that made connections bypassing the state easier. The shock of the explosion and the trauma of seeing loved ones injured or a home wrecked has exacted an emotional burden on Beirutis — especially with financial woes already weighing on people.
The Beit Insan well-being center is offering free services to help people overcome the trauma that the blast may have caused. It is also encouraging people with money to "pay it forward" and cover costs for people to get psychological help.
"We know since all the events that have been happening, that less and less people have money for mental health," said Dr. Samar Zebian, co-founder and co-director of the center. "We are a social business."

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on August 13-14/2020
Trump Hails 'Historic Peace Agreement' as UAE, Israel Agree to Normalize Ties
Associated Press/Naharnet/August 13/2020
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday that the United Arab Emirates and Israel have agreed to establish full diplomatic ties as part of a deal to halt the annexation of occupied land sought by the Palestinians for their future state.
The announcement makes the UAE the first Gulf Arab state to do so and only the third Arab nation to have active diplomatic ties to Israel. Trump tweeted a statement from the countries, acknowledging the deal. He then told reporters in the Oval Office that it was "a truly historic moment."
"Now that the ice has been broken I expect more Arab and Muslim countries will follow the United Arab Emirates," he said. The recognition grants a rare diplomatic win to Trump ahead of the November election as his efforts to see an end to the war in Afghanistan have yet to come to fruition while efforts to bring peace between Israel and the Palestinians have made no headway. For Israel, the announcement comes after years of boasting by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that his government enjoys closer ties to Arab nations than publicly acknowledged. Netanyahu has sought to build settlements on lands sought by the Palestinians and embraced a Trump proposal that would allow him to annex large parts of the occupied West Bank while granting Palestinians limited autonomy in other areas. For the UAE, home to skyscraper-studded Dubai and the rolling, oil-rich sand dunes of Abu Dhabi, it further burnishes its international campaign to be seen as a beacon of tolerance in the Middle East despite being governed by autocratic rulers. It also puts the UAE out first in a regional recognition race among neighboring Gulf Arab states. And for the Palestinians, who long have relied on Arab backing in their struggle for independence, the announcement marked both a win and setback. While Thursday's deal halts Israeli annexation plans, the Palestinians have repeatedly urged Arab governments not to normalize relations with Israel until a peace agreement establishing an independent Palestinian state is reached. A joint statement from the U.S., the UAE and Israel was issued immediately after Trump's tweet. It said delegations would meet in the coming weeks to sign deals on direct flights, security, telecommunications, energy, tourism and health care. The two countries also will partner on fighting the coronavirus pandemic.
"Opening direct ties between two of the Middle East's most dynamic societies and advanced economics will transform the region by spurring economic growth, enhancing technological innovation and forging closer people-to-people relations," said the statement by Trump, Netanyahu and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the day-to-day ruler of the UAE. It said the leaders had a three-way call discussing the deal.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo praised the deal. "This is a remarkable achievement for two of the world's most forward leaning, technologically advanced states, and reflects their shared regional vision of an economically integrated region," he said in a statement. "It also illustrates their commitment to confronting common threats, as small - but strong - nations."He added: "Blessed are the peacemakers. Mabruk and Mazal Tov."Netanyahu tweeted an Israeli flag with a short message in Hebrew: "Historic Day." Among Arab nations, only Egypt and Jordan have active diplomatic ties with Israel. Egypt made a peace deal with Israel in 1979, followed by Jordan in 1994. Mauritania recognized Israel in 1999, but later ended relations in 2009 over the Israel's war in Gaza at the time.
In addition to Trump, the main U.S. mediators for agreement were the president's senior advisor and son-in-law Jared Kushner, special Mideast envoy Avi Berkowitz and David Friedman, the U.S. ambassador to Israel.
The UAE is a U.S.-allied federation of seven sheikhdoms on the Arabian Peninsula. Formed in 1971, the country like other Arab nations at the time did not recognize Israel over its occupation of land home to the Palestinians.
"Arab oil is not dearer than Arab blood," the UAE's founding ruler, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, once pronounced when agreeing to an oil boycott over U.S. military support to Israel in the 1973 Mideast war.
The UAE relied on white-collar Palestinians in creating its nation. Over time, it maintained its stance that Israel allow the creation of a Palestinian state on land it seized in the 1967 war.
But in recent years, ties between Gulf Arab nations and Israel have quietly grown, in part over their shared enmity of Iran and Lebanon's Hizbullah. Prince Mohammed also shares Israel's distrust of Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood and the militant group Hamas that holds the Gaza Strip.
The UAE's state-run WAM news agency acknowledged the deal, framing it as not just a move that helps the UAE and Israel, but one that also carries benefits for the Palestinians.
It remains unclear what prompted Israel and the UAE to make the announcement now. In June, the United Arab Emirates' ambassador to the U.S. warned in an Israeli newspaper op-ed that Israel's planned annexing the Jordan Valley and other parts of the occupied West Bank would "upend" Israel's efforts to improve ties with Arab nations. The agreement gives Netanyahu a domestic boost at a time when Israel's shaky coalition government is plagued by infighting and facing the possibility of early elections in the coming months. Netanyahu has seen his popularity plummet as the country grapples with a renewed coronavirus outbreak and skyrocketing unemployment as the result of earlier lockdown measures. Netanyahu also delivered a valuable diplomatic achievement to his good friend, Trump, ahead of U.S. elections.
Still, by dropping the annexation plan Netanyahu may be hedging his bets ahead of a possible change in the White House. Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has made clear that he would oppose any moves by Israel to unilaterally redraw the Mideast map and annex lands sought by the Palestinians.
Netanyahu also risked criticism inside his own hard-line Likud Party, whose members strongly supported annexation. Netanyahu appears to be betting that Likud members - and the small, but influential settler movement - will agree the peace agreement delivers more benefits than unilateral annexation. Opinion polls have shown that annexation is not a high priority for the vast majority of the Israeli public.
Abandoning its annexation plan changes little on the ground. Israel already holds overall control of the West Bank and continues to expand its settlements there, while granting the Palestinians autonomy in a series of disconnected enclaves. Some 500,000 Israelis now live in the rapidly expanding West Bank settlements. Next year, Israel will take part in the UAE's delayed Expo 2020, the world's fair being hosted by Dubai. A secret synagogue also draws practicing Jews in Dubai. The UAE also has announced plans to build the Abrahamic Family House in Abu Dhabi, which will house a mosque, a church and a synagogue.Israelis traveling with Western passports routinely enter the UAE without a problem, though one still can't make a phone call between the two countries. Israelis also work in Dubai's gold and diamond trade as well.
Emirati officials also have allowed Israeli officials to visit and the Israeli national anthem was played after an athlete won gold in an Abu Dhabi judo tournament. Israel also has a small mission representing its interests at the International Renewable Energy Agency in Abu Dhabi.

Sisi Welcomes UAE-Israel Deal, Halt to Annexation
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi welcomed on Thursday an agreement between the United Arab Emirates and Israel on normalizing ties that includes an Israeli agreement to halt further annexation of Palestinian lands.
"I followed with interest and appreciation the joint statement between the United States, United Arab Emirates and Israel to halt the Israeli annexation of Palestinian lands and taking steps to bring peace in the Middle East," Sisi said on Twitter. "I value the efforts of those in charge of the deal to achieve prosperity and stability for our region."The joint statement said delegations would meet in the coming weeks to sign deals on direct flights, security, telecommunications, energy, tourism and health care. The UAE and Israel will also partner on fighting the coronavirus pandemic. “Opening direct ties between two of the Middle East's most dynamic societies and advanced economics will transform the region by spurring economic growth, enhancing technological innovation and forging closer people-to-people relations,” said the statement. “As a result of this diplomatic breakthrough and at the request of President Trump with the support of the United Arab Emirates, Israel will suspend declaring sovereignty over areas outlined in the President’s Vision for Peace and focus its efforts now on expanding ties with other countries in the Arab and Muslim world.” “The United States, Israel and the United Arab Emirates are confident that additional diplomatic breakthroughs with other nations are possible, and will work together to achieve this goal,” it added.

Palestinians Call Israel-UAE Deal 'Treason,' Want Retraction
Associated Press/Naharnet/August 13/2020
A spokesman for the Palestinian president is condemning the deal to establish full diplomatic ties between Israel and the United Arab Emirates. Nabil Abu Rdeneh said on Thursday the agreement amounts to "treason." He says the Palestinians demand that it be retracted.The remarks come after President Mahmoud Abbas convened a meeting of his top leadership in response to news of the deal, which would see Israel suspend its plans to annex parts of the West Bank.

Senior Muslim Brotherhood Leader Dies in Prison
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
A senior leader of the Muslim Brotherhood died Thursday in an Egyptian prison where he was serving multiple sentences including on terror-related charges, his lawyer said. Essam al-Erian, 66, was arrested in 2013 following the ouster of former president Mohamed Morsi on the back of mass protests against his brief rule. "The authorities notified me of his death, and I informed his family to arrange for receiving his body (for burial)," lawyer Abdelmoneim Abdelmaqsood told AFP. "It was a natural death," he added. Egyptian media reported that Erian died of a heart attack following an argument with a fellow inmate. Erian was the vice president of the Brotherhood's political wing, the now-dissolved Freedom and Justice party. He was sentenced in multiple cases on charges including incitement to violence, murder and espionage. Authorities placed Erian on their terror blacklist, a designation that has allowed them to freeze his assets. According to AFP, Morsi himself died in custody in June 2019, after falling ill during a court hearing.

Turkish Banks Begin Charging for Foreign Currency Withdrawals
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Some Turkish banks have begun charging a fee to withdraw foreign currencies in cash, bankers said on Thursday, after a slide in the lira to record lows last week. The central bank this month classified such withdrawals as one of the transactions for which banks could charge. Turks have been buying hard currencies since a currency crisis in 2018. As the lira has declined again in recent weeks, the amount held soared to $213 billion at the end of July, raising concerns that banks could find themselves short if there was a run on foreign banknotes. Some banks have begun charging for withdrawals above a certain amount, and others are still working out their strategy, Reuters quoted bankers as saying. "It has gradually started across the sector," said one banker, adding that all banks were likely to follow suit. The BDDK banking watchdog last year set a one-day settlement delay for individual purchases of more than $100,000 in foreign currency.

Turkish Banks Begin Charging for Foreign Currency Withdrawals
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Some Turkish banks have begun charging a fee to withdraw foreign currencies in cash, bankers said on Thursday, after a slide in the lira to record lows last week. The central bank this month classified such withdrawals as one of the transactions for which banks could charge. Turks have been buying hard currencies since a currency crisis in 2018. As the lira has declined again in recent weeks, the amount held soared to $213 billion at the end of July, raising concerns that banks could find themselves short if there was a run on foreign banknotes. Some banks have begun charging for withdrawals above a certain amount, and others are still working out their strategy, Reuters quoted bankers as saying. "It has gradually started across the sector," said one banker, adding that all banks were likely to follow suit. The BDDK banking watchdog last year set a one-day settlement delay for individual purchases of more than $100,000 in foreign currency.

France Aims to Help SMEs With $3.5 Bln Aid
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
The French government's economic recovery plan, which will be unveiled later this month, will entail 3 billion euros ($3.5 billion) in aid for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), the Sud Ouest reported citing Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire. "A lot of the SMEs were in good financial health before the crisis, and will have the means to pay back their debts. But for some others, debt is a major topic which we want to tackle head-on," Le Maire told the regional paper in an interview published on Thursday. He said the French state could also use instruments such as convertible bonds to help boost smaller firms' finances. Le Maire, who is drafting a recovery plan worth more than 100 billion euros, is expected to present it on Aug. 25. The package is aimed at helping the euro zone's second-biggest economy recover from the impact of the coronavirus crisis. Data in July showed that the French economy contracted by a post-war record of 13.8% during the second quarter. ($1 = 0.8472 euros)
 

Jordan Closes Border with Syria over Spike in COVID-19 Cases
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Jordan’s Minister of Interior Salama Hammad ordered the closure of Jaber border crossing with Syria for a week. The decision, effective as of Thursday, comes upon the recommendation of a government committee tasked to run borders and airport affairs. Hammad said the crossing will be closed and its situation will be assessed to ensure the safety of civilians and staff, state-run Petra news agency reported.
This comes after a number of coronavirus infections were recorded among the staff at the crossing. Over the past two days, Jordan recorded 25 COVID-19 cases, most of which were detected among arrivals at the border. The committee asserted the need to complete all procedures to clear all goods at the crossing before its closure. It also tasked Health Minister Saad Jaber to take the necessary health and preventive measures to isolate workers at the Jaber Border Crossing, in cooperation and coordination with the relevant authorities. Also, Prime Minister Omar Razzaz announced that local virus infections had reached 25, adding that the increase in the number of COVID-19 cases since Wednesday evening is a “worrisome development” and a source of concern. Razzaz pointed out that the source of the infection must be verified, as the majority were recorded at the Jaber Border Crossing, noting that authorities must take immediate measures to prevent the virus from spreading. The PM hoped to overcome this pandemic and the second wave that many countries in the world and the region are facing, calling upon Jordanians to take this issue seriously. As of Monday, Jordan recorded 1,283 virus cases including 1,189 recoveries and 11 deaths. Also, 66 persons are still receiving treatment in two specialized hospitals.

Concerns over Possible Second Wave of Pandemic in Egypt
Cairo - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Egypt’s coronavirus cases have dropped slightly despite concerns over a second wave of infections. Officials have stressed that fighting the pandemic remains a top priority but that the people should respect social distancing measures.
Egypt’s Ministry of Health and Population announced Tuesday that 1,109 people recovered from the coronavirus and were discharged from hospitals, bringing the total number of recoveries to 54,888. It stated that 24 patients died and 168 new people tested positive for the COVID-19 disease, increasing the tally of registered cases in Egypt to 95,834 with 5,059 deaths. The authorities have been demanding the people to wear masks in public and respect health ministers. In a related measure, the Egyptian Ministry of Interior has taken legal action against 1,198 public transport drivers for not wearing masks. In another context, the Supreme Council of University Hospitals held a meeting to discuss efforts exerted by university hospitals to receive and treat COVID-19 patients. Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research Khaled Abdel Ghaffar called for honoring hospital staff who have lost their lives from complications caused by COVID-19. He also urged earmarking university hospitals with funds to treat coronavirus patients. Abdel Ghaffar underscored the importance of conducting an assessment two weeks from now and taking necessary precautions for any possible wave of infections in the winter. The ministry was ordered to prepare a plan to deal with the possible second wave by benefiting from the expertise of medical staff in various university hospitals in terms of dealing with patients and using treatment protocols.

Tension Casts Shadow over Libya's Sirte
Cairo - Khalid Mahmoud/Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
A resumption of military clashes in the Libyan city of Sirte this week came as deputies loyal to the Government of National Accord launched a new political initiative that rejects any role for Libyan National Army (LNA) commander Khalifa Haftar in the political process. Asaad Shartaa, spokesman for a council formed by defected members of the Libyan parliament, said during a press conference Tuesday that the initiative seeks to achieve a comprehensive national reconciliation on condition that those who have committed crimes against Libyans would not go unpunished. On the battlefield, the GNA forces revealed no movements at Wadi Bai, which is deemed a strategic region on the Sirte and Jufra line. However, a military source reported to pro-LNA Libyan Arab News Agency (LANA) that the army conducted aerial sorties against “hostile targets” in Wadi Bai and Abu Nujaym, southeast of Misrata. Remarkably, Minister of Interior of the Libyan Interim Government Ibrahim Bushnaf ordered the General Administration of Central Support to secure the city. This came after Chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee of the Libyan House of Representatives (HoR) Issa al-Oraibi approved a proposal made by Speaker of the east-based Libyan parliament Aguila Saleh to place Sirte under the protection of the Ministry of Interior. Further, Libyan Foreign Minister Mohamed Sayala held discussions with Italian Ambassador to Libya Giuseppe Buccino on the possibility of activating the Libyan-Italian treaties and the issue of migrants. The meeting mainly dealt with Libyan-Italian treaties, particularly with regard to the highway linking Ras Ajdir and Musaid. In a related development, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) announced that 141 migrants were intercepted at sea and taken back to Libya.
Migrants intercepted at sea by the Libyan coast guard in 2020 numbered 6,989, IOM said, while 123 died and 180 went missing.

Abandoned by State After Explosion, Lebanese Help Each Other
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
In the southern Lebanese town of Haris, a newlywed couple is living in one of Safy Faqeeh´s apartments for free. He´s never met them before, and they aren´t on a honeymoon. Their apartment in Beirut was wrecked when last week´s massive explosion wreaked destruction across the capital.
Faqeeh is one of hundreds of Lebanese who have opened their homes to survivors of the Aug. 4 blast. The explosion, which was centered on Beirut´s port and ripped across the capital, left around a quarter of a million people with homes unfit to live in. But they have not had to crowd into collective shelters or sleep in public parks. That´s because in the absence of the state, Lebanese have stepped up to help each other. Some have let relatives, friends and neighbors stay with them. Others like Faqeeh extended a helping hand even farther, taking to social media to spread the word that they have a room to host people free of charge. The couple saw Faqeeh´s offer on Facebook for a free apartment he owns in Haris, some 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Beirut. They can stay as long as they need to, the 29-year-old Faqeeh said, and he has a second apartment available for anyone else in need. "This is not help, it is a duty," he said. When he was a teenager, Faqeeh's family home was damaged in the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah, and they had to stay in a house in Tripoli, clear on the other end of Lebanon. Now he´s paying it forward. "We have experienced several wars and they (people) hosted us," Faqeeh said. The help that Lebanese are giving goes beyond a place to stay. Armed with helmets and brooms, hundreds of volunteers have circulated through Beirut´s heavily damaged neighborhoods, cleaning up people´s homes and doing free basic repairs, often enough to enable the residents to stay there.
The explosion left entire blocks in shambles, with streets blanketed in broken glass, twisted metal, broken brickwork. Yet within days, some streets were clean, the debris neatly sorted in piles. That was thanks to volunteers, often using social media to organize where to target. In some places, they were sweeping streets and hauling away wreckage while security forces or soldiers stood nearby, watching.
That has only reinforced for Lebanese their government´s failure to provide basic services, much less respond to the disaster. Many already blame the government and the broader ruling elite´s incompetence, mismanagement and corruption for the explosion. Authorities allowed 2,750 tons of explosive ammonium nitrate to sit in a warehouse at the port unmonitored for seven years, despite multiple warnings of the danger, until it exploded when touched off by a fire. The blast killed more than 170 people, injured thousands and wreaked chaos across the city.
The government almost completely left the public on its own to deal with the aftermath. Outside the demolished port, there have been no government clean-up crews in the streets and little outreach from officials to help beyond promises of compensation to those whose homes or businesses were damaged.
The list of services people are offering keeps expanding. It now includes free glass for cars damaged in the blast, free maintenance of electrical appliances and free cosmetic surgery for people with face injuries. On Facebook, a group called Rebuild Beirut quickly sprung up. Its volunteers are working at full speed, helping clean up homes and link survivors with donors who will cover the expenses of repairs.
The individual acts of solidarity have been even more striking because Lebanon was already in the middle of a worsening economic crisis that has thrown hundreds of thousands into poverty and left households and businesses with little or no excess cash. "I am so proud of the Lebanese people," said Kim Sacy, a 19-year-old university student. "There is no state, there is nobody, there is nothing ... we are the ones doing everything in the field." Sacy is studying at a French university and was supposed to be on a program in Sweden this year but the coronavirus pandemic grounded her in Lebanon. She was outside Beirut driving home when the blast took place. She didn´t feel the explosion but when she reached her neighborhood of Achrafieh, she found it shattered. "This is where I lived my whole life," she said. Sacy's family home was damaged, but she still wanted to help others. "It is not important. I consider myself lucky," she said. "It is the people who make the home." She said some of her family members were injured in the blast but are doing fine now. Sacy began collecting food and other items to give to those in need. Around 25 families have reached out to her to donate, some she knows, but half are strangers. For the past week, she has been circulating around Beirut in her car to pick up donated furniture, first aid kits, bed sheets, and kitchen utensils that she gives to a local non-governmental organization to distribute. When not doing that, she has been cleaning in the streets, including cleaning a fire station.
The self-help spirit has roots in the long civil war, when central authority collapsed and Lebanese had to depend on themselves to get by. In more recent years, waves of anti-government protests have emphasized volunteerism and civic duty - boosted by social media that made connections bypassing the state easier. The shock of the explosion and the trauma of seeing loved ones injured or a home wrecked has exacted an emotional burden on Beirutis - especially with financial woes already weighing on people. The Beit Insan well-being center is offering free services to help people overcome the trauma that the blast may have caused. It is also encouraging people with money to "pay it forward" and cover costs for people to get psychological help. "We know since all the events that have been happening, that less and less people have money for mental health," said Dr. Samar Zebian, co-founder and co-director of the center. "We are a social business."

Iraqi Volunteers Help Coronavirus Patients at Home
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
A group of Iraqi volunteers launched an initiative to deliver oxygen cylinders and medical supplies to coronavirus patients who are being treated at their homes, as the total number of deaths reached 5588 in the country. The 15-members team of volunteers focuses on distributing free oxygen cylinders and medical supplies to patients in Najaf. The head of the volunteer team, Mustafa Kashif al-Ghata, explained that after the oxygen crisis in al-Nasiriyah city and the subsequent oxygen crises in all governorates, the group decided to work on finding a solution. They launched a campaign to distribute oxygen free of charge in Najaf after receiving calls from citizens in need, said Ghata, adding that now they are working on the issue of blood plasma which is known to speed up the recovery process. The volunteers wear full protective clothing and carry large oxygen cylinders to deliver them to the homes of patients recovering from COVID-19. Haidar al-Khalidi is one of the coronavirus patients who were asked to receive treatment at his home. He spent only three days in the hospital before doctors asked him to leave his bed for another critically ill patient who needed it more.
Khalidi said it was not an issue and the doctor wrote him a list of medicines before he left home. Khalidi told Reuters that the hospital is full of patients with no vacancies, noting that even the emergency wards are full and people have started to sleep on the floor. The General Director of Najaf Health Directorate, Salem al-Hamidawi, reported that hospitals can no longer accommodate the increasing numbers of coronavirus patients. Hamidawi noted that it would be very difficult to provide hospital beds for 2,000 patients at once, explaining that patients with mild symptoms are isolated in other wards and all severe cases that need respiratory devices remain in hospitals. The Iraqi Health Ministry reported Wednesday 3,441 new cases in the day, bringing the total nationwide infections to 160,436. It also reported 57 fatalities during the day, raising the death toll to 5,588, while 2,439 more patients recovered, bringing the total number of recoveries to 114,541.

Rights Groups Denounce 3-Years Jail Sentence Handed to Algerian Journalist
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
A number of Tunisian organizations called upon the Algerian judiciary to release journalist Khaled Drareni who was sentenced to three years in jail. The 35 organizations, including the National Syndicate of Tunisian Journalists and the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights (FTDES), issued a statement expressing growing concerns over the repeated harassment cases, prosecutions, and arrests that targeted a number of Algerian journalists, bloggers and activists over the past months. The statement warned that this verdict is cruel and violates international standards for trial, urging authorities to cancel the sentence which aims to silence Drareni and all journalists. It also saw that the ruling sends a negative message about the new Algerian authority, despite its pledges to establish a better climate for freedom of press and expression. The organizations renewed absolute solidarity with the Algerian journalist, affirming adherence to his right to work freely, and demanding his immediate release. Drareni, 40, editor of the Casbah Tribune news site and correspondent for French-language channel TV5 Monde, was arrested on charges of "inciting an unarmed gathering" and "endangering national unity" after covering demonstrations by the "Hirak" protest movement. On March 7, Drareni was about to take pictures of demonstrators when police arrested him and took him to a security center in Algiers’ eastern suburb. Meanwhile, a group of Algerian journalists started an online petition that collected more than 1750 signatures calling for Drareni’s immediate release, stressing that he does not belong in jail.

Tebboune Warns of ‘Counter-Revolution’ to Destabilize Algeria
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune warned of a ‘counter-revolution’ that aims to undermine the process of rebuilding the country and stir instability through implementing unknown agendas. In his speech at the opening of the government-governors meeting, the president said that the campaign launched to hold negligent officials to account will continue. In this context, Tebboune revealed that a figure smuggled millions of dollars abroad, possibly hinting at imprisoned businessman Ali Haddad. According to the Algerian president, data showed that 80 percent of citizens are satisfied with the current security situation in the country, and its neutral positions from Libya and Syria. The president rejected demands for a transitional phase and asked members of the government and governors to prepare for the referendum on a draft revision of the Constitution so that it becomes "consensual”.
Days earlier, Tebboune said the country was targeted by corrupt forces and warned of citizens falling prey to criminals. He highlighted commitment to consultations to avoid social tension, especially that Algeria witnessed suspicious and violent incidents during the holiday season.

Tunisia Faces 'Critical' Situation After Detecting 4 Coronavirus Hot Spots
Tunis- Al Mongi Al Saidani/Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 13 August, 2020
The Tunisian Ministry of Health revealed that four hot spots of coronavirus infections were recorded in Kairouan, Gabes, Medenine, and Sousse, raising fears of the spread of cases locally. Director of the National Observatory of New and Emerging Diseases Nissaf Ben Alaya said the epidemiological situation was critical. “We spotted during the past two weeks different hot spots in Kairouan, Gabes, Médenine, and Sousse,” the director said according to TAP. Control and testing were stepped up in these regions and specific measures were taken to contain the pandemic. Ben Alaya highlighted the need to comply with health protocols put in place in various sectors and ensure the regular disinfection, urging citizens to show a sense of responsibility and adopt precautionary measures. Meanwhile, the head of the quarantine committee at the Health Ministry, Mohamed al-Rabhi, revealed that 1,500 rooms have been prepared to receive patients that contracted the coronavirus, stressing that the authorities were preparing for an "uncomfortable" epidemic situation. On Tuesday, Tunisian authorities decided to tighten the anti-coronavirus restrictions on arrival from France, Belgium, and Iceland starting Aug. 15. The decision, issued during a ministerial session, also stated that all travelers coming to Tunisia from the three countries must present a negative PCR test for the coronavirus 72 hours before the trip, adding the arrivals will be subject to self-isolation. The government also made wearing masks compulsory in several areas such as airports, Tunis railway stations, La Goulette port, hospitals, private clinics, and supermarkets, as well as boosting control in closed leisure spaces. The Ministry of Health reported 21 new cases of COVID-19, bringing the total number of confirmed cases in the country to 1,738. “Following a total of 976 lab tests, 23 cases tested positive, of which 21 were new cases, including 18 local cases and three imported cases, and two were previously confirmed cases still infected with this virus,” the ministry in a statement. A total of 1,272 patients have recovered in Tunisia while 52 deaths were reported, according to the statement.

The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on August 13-14/2020

The tyrants’ reach/Despots now threaten free speech even in free countries
Clifford D. May/The Washington Times/August 13/2020
Frederick Douglass called freedom of speech “the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down. They know its power.”
Back in the day, tyrants could gag those they ruled, but in free nations people were free, their rights protected. Once Alexander Solzhenitsyn arrived in America, once Natan Sharansky was in Israel, the Kremlin could silence them no more.
Today, tyrants are increasing their reach, attempting, not without successes, to restrict speech everywhere.
What brings this to mind: As a congressional staffer, a scholar at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), and Director for Countering Iranian Weapons of Mass Destruction at the U.S. National Security Council, Richard Goldberg has for years been making the case for a “maximum pressure” sanctions campaign on the rulers of the Islamic Republic of Iran in response to their illicit nuclear weapons program, sponsorship of terrorism, and domestic oppression.
So last week Iran’s rulers announced they were “sanctioning” Mr. Goldberg, who is now back at FDD. A year ago, they “sanctioned” FDD in general, and, by name, FDD’s Mark Dubowitz, a recognized expert on the Tehran regime, and international economic statecraft, calling them “the designing and executing arm of the U.S. administration” on Iran policy.
Since FDD isn’t contemplating opening an office in Tehran, and no FDD employees plan on vacationing in Shiraz anytime soon, such sanctions may appear symbolic. But they carry a threat. This was made explicit in the statement accompanying the 2019 designations: “[T]his measure will be without prejudice to any further legal measures that the other administrative, judicial or security institutions and organizations may take in order to counter, prosecute or punish” FDD.
How serious is this threat to “punish” (which led to bipartisan condemnation, including from Trump, Obama, Bush and Clinton administration officials)?
According to the U.S. State Department, the theocratic regime’s overseas “campaign of terror has included as many as 360 targeted assassinations” in more than 40 countries. “Iran leverages its well-earned reputation for extrajudicial killings to try to silence civil society through death threats against activists, dissidents, and journalists.”
One definition of war: the use of violence to impose one’s will on others. It is within that context that such murders should be viewed. Iran’s rulers won a pivotal battle back in 1989 when Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for the killing of Salman Rushdie, British author of “The Satanic Verses.”
One can only imagine how differently history might have unfolded had the response of free nations been robust; had they, for example, recalled their ambassadors from Tehran and sent the regime’s envoys packing. Instead, only the UK broke diplomatic relations, and only for about a year.
The tyrants of the world learned a lesson. A report by the British Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament, about which I wrote last month, estimates that 14 Russian dissidents have been murdered on British soil over recent years.
The rulers of North Korea and China have found nefarious ways to limit speech critical of them, intimidating and manipulating what we might otherwise consider powerful and independent individuals in Hollywood, professional sports, and the news media.
The crime for which Tehran has found Mr. Goldberg, Mr. Dubowitz and FDD guilty is “economic terrorism against the interests” of the Iranian government and citizens of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In part, this is an attempt to strike a blow for a false moral equivalence. Tehran has long been designated by the U.S. – Republican and Democratic administrations alike – as the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism.
One example: According to the French government, the Iranian intelligence ministry was behind a 2018 plot to bomb a large gathering of Iranian opposition supporters in Paris. “This extremely serious act envisaged on our territory could not go without a response,” read a rare joint statement from France’s interior, foreign and economy ministers. In truth, their response – e.g. freezing the assets of two suspected Iranian intelligence operatives – barely amounted to a slap on the wrist.
More to the point: Equating the murder of dissidents with the imposition of economic sanctions on murderers is risible. The U.S. has a right – as does any nation – to decide with whom it will and will not maintain commercial relations. As for other countries and the corporations based in those countries, they are free to choose to do business with America or with those who vow “Death to America!” Establishing that they may not do both hardly qualifies as terrorism.
This raises an interesting policy question. For decades, it was widely believed that treating tyrants as respected “stakeholders” in the “international community,” trading with them, providing them aid, welcoming their participation into international organizations, and getting them to sign multilateral treaties would put them on a path to liberalization. That belief, we now know – or should now know – was misplaced.
Perhaps the free nations of the world might consider an alternative: building their own international communities based on comprehensive free trade agreements, while leaving the rogue regimes to manage on their own.
Disabusing ourselves of the comforting notion that commerce and engagement are transformative also should make clear why it is essential that free nations maintain defensive capabilities and mutual defense alliances sufficient to deter adversaries. Bellicose regimes we cannot deter, we will need to defeat. (How do the isolationists and “restrainers” not get this?)
Finally, we should always support, as much as we can, those fighting for freedom and human rights in foreign lands, in the hope that sooner or later they emancipate themselves. “The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.” Frederick Douglass said that, too.
*Clifford D. May is founder and president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and a columnist for the Washington Times. Follow him on Twitter @CliffordDMay.

U.S. Goes It Alone to Keep Weapons Out of Iran
Bobby Ghosh/Bloomberg/August/August 13/2020
Having burned bridges with Europe, the Trump administration will have to get by without even a little help from America’s friends.
The foreign-policy chickens are coming to the White House to roost, as the U.S. makes its final, doomed effort to extend a United Nations arms embargo on Iran.
Having needlessly antagonized European leaders from the start of his presidency, Donald Trump cannot now rely on them to back the U.S. in any effort to prevent the Islamic Republic from acquiring powerful new weapons.
It will be up to the Europeans to do the right thing. But that would require them to set aside their grievances, many of them legitimate, against the Trump administration — which is improbable. Germany, France and Britain will more than likely back, whether by acclamation or acquiescence, the efforts of China and Russia to sell tanks, missiles and fighter jets to the theocrats of Tehran after the embargo expires in October.
This would be the diplomatic equivalent to cutting one’s nose off to spite one’s face. The European leaders will in effect be acting as unpaid agents for Chinese and Russian weapons makers, since their own arms producers will still feel constrained by American sanctions. In exchange for betraying their principles, they’ll merely enjoy a measure of schadenfreude: the sight of the Trump administration’s humiliation in the Security Council.
Despite the watering-down of the American draft resolution on extending the 13-year-old arms embargo, it is all but certain to be rejected. The first version, laden with rhetoric condemning the regime in Tehran, required other countries to join the U.S. in sanctioning individuals and entities, as well as interdicting cargo to and from Iran. The new text simply calls for the weapons ban on Iran to be extended “until the Security Council decides otherwise,” arguing this is “essential to the maintenance of international peace and security.”
The climb-down may buy some votes in the council, but it is not certain U.S. Ambassador Kelly Craft can secure the nine votes needed to force Russia and China to exercise their vetoes. Even if she does so, it will be the hollowest of victories.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo cannot rely on European support for his next gambit: an attempt to reimpose U.S. sanctions that were eased when Iran signed the 2015 nuclear deal with the world powers. Known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, the deal allows participants to “snap back” sanctions — including the weapons ban — if they judge Iran to be in contravention of the terms.
But the other signatories, including the Europeans, are loath to allow this. They argue that the U.S. forfeited its right to trigger a snap-back in 2018, when it pulled out of the JCPOA.
At the time, the Trump administration argued — correctly — that the JCPOA was deeply flawed: Its restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program expire too soon, and it does nothing to restrain Tehran’s other menacing activities, such as the sponsorship of terrorism and proxy militias across the Middle East, and the development of ballistic missiles.
Since then, Trump and Pompeo have made little effort to sell this argument to the Europeans, choosing instead to demand their deference. All the while, the president and his officials have attacked their closest allies over a host of other issues, ranging from trade terms to NATO dues.
Small wonder, then, that the Europeans are disinclined to help the U.S. at the Security Council. They argue that a sanctions snap-back would kill the JCPOA — a specious objection since the deal is already dead, and Iran is in breach of its terms.
Having burned its own bridges with Europe, the Trump administration might have used intermediaries to make its case, and the most obvious candidates would have been the Arab states that have the most to fear from an Iran with easy access to Chinese and Russian arms. But here, too, its efforts amounted to too little, too late. The Gulf Cooperation Council last week issued a statement calling on the Security Council to extend the embargo — but by then, the cause was already lost.
With the Council unlikely to extend the weapons ban, and the chances of a snap-back looking slim, the main hope of denying Iran access to sophisticated arms may rest on the threat of American sanctions against weapons manufacturers. Of course, the threat would be more potent if accompanied by European sanctions as well. But the Trump administration will have to get by without even a little help from America’s friends.

Palestinians: Jews, Christians Are Our Enemy
Khaled Abu Toameh/Gatestone Institute./August 13/2020
The prospect of Jews praying inside a synagogue in an Arab country seems to worry Palestinian Muslim figures more than the killing and wounding of thousands of Muslims and Christians in last week's huge explosion at the port of the Lebanese capital of Beirut.
Against this Palestinian hostility toward Jews, Christians, and peace with Israel, it is important that a new group called The Arab Council for Regional Integration, launched in London last year, is seeking to build a spirit of partnership that knows no borders between Jews and Arabs.
Such groups offer hope to those seeking peace and coexistence between Jews, Christians, and Arabs, and represent a counterforce to Muslim extremists who have nothing to offer their people but misery and bloodshed.
By rejecting the medical aid from the UAE -- aimed at helping to prevent the spread of the coronavirus pandemic -- the Palestinians have scored another own-goal in demonstrating the depth of their ingratitude toward those who wish to assist their people. By coming out against interfaith tolerance and the building of a synagogue in an Arab country, the Palestinians are again proving that the conflict with Israel is not about borders or checkpoints, but about the very right of Jews, Christians or Israel to exist.
By rejecting the medical aid from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) -- aimed at helping to prevent the spread of the coronavirus pandemic -- the Palestinians have scored another own-goal in demonstrating the depth of their ingratitude toward those who wish to assist their people. Pictured: A cargo plane operated by Etihad Airways, carrying medical aid from the UAE for Palestinians, prepares to land at Israel's Ben Gurion Airport on June 9, 2020. The Palestinian Authority rejected the shipment because the Palestinians "refuse to be a bridge [for Arab countries] seeking to have normalized ties with Israel." (Photo by Jack Guez / AFP via Getty Images)
For the past few years, Palestinians have been waging a campaign to stop Jews from visiting Jerusalem's Temple Mount/Noble Sanctuary, a place sacred to both Muslims and Jews. The Palestinian Authority, Hamas and other Palestinian groups continue to portray the visits as "violent incursions by extremist Jewish settlers," even though many of the visitors are not extremists and do not live in settlements.
The Temple Mount, where the First and Second Jewish Temples once stood, is the holiest place in the world for the Jewish people. The Palestinians, however, deny any Jewish historic and religious connection to the Temple Mount and harass Jews who, as tourists, visit the site.
The Palestinians are now saying that have a problem not only with Jews touring the Temple Mount, but with those who wish to pray inside a synagogue in an Arab country, namely the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
A multifaith complex that includes a synagogue is currently being built in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the UAE. "A church, mosque and synagogue will share a collective space for the first time, serving as a community for inter-religious dialogue and exchange, and nurturing the values of peaceful co-existence and acceptance among different beliefs, nationalities and cultures," the committee overseeing construction of the complex said in a statement.
The prospect of Jews praying inside a synagogue in a faraway Arab country seems to worry Palestinian Muslim figures more than the killing and wounding of thousands of Muslims and Christians in last week's huge explosion at the port of the Lebanese capital of Beirut. Instead of calling on Muslims to mobilize their efforts and resources to help the residents of Beirut after the tragedy, Palestinian Muslim leaders have found the time to condemn the UAE for its intention to allow Jews to pray inside a synagogue. These leaders are opposed not only to the presence of synagogues in an Arab country, but churches too.
In response to reports that Jews will soon hold their first prayer at the UAE synagogue, a group called The Palestinian Congregation of Khulafa e-Rashideen (The Rightly Guided Successors of Prophet Mohammed), accused the UAE of acting in violation of the Koran and the Hadith (a collection of traditions containing sayings of Prophet Mohammed that constitute the major source of guidance for Muslims apart from the Koran) by displaying "loyalty" to Jews and Christians.
The group reminded the rulers of the UAE of the Koranic verse that says:
"O you who believed, do not take the Jews and Christians as allies. They are [in fact] allies of one another. And whoever is an ally to them among you – then indeed, he is [one] of them. Indeed, Allah guides not the wrongdoing people. 'So you see those in whose hearts is disease hastening into [association with] them, saying, We are afraid a misfortune may strike us.' But perhaps Allah will bring conquest or a decision from Him, and they will become, over what they been concealing within themselves, regretful." (Surah Al-Ma'idah [5:51-52)
The Palestinian group expressed outrage that Muslims' money is being directed and used to open places of worship for Jews and "Crusaders" and warned that allowing Jews to pray in an Arab country is a betrayal of Islam. "These accelerated steps towards seeking the friendship of Jews and normalization with the Zionists in its various forms disregards the feelings of Muslims," the group argued. They also emphasized that Islam, the Koran and the Hadith all "confirmed the continuous hostility of the Jews towards the [Muslim] believers until the Day of Judgement."
To support their argument, the Palestinian Muslim group cited the Hadith that says:
"The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say: O Muslim! There is a Jew behind me, so kill him."
This is not the first time that the Palestinians have come out against an Arab country for displaying tolerance toward Jews or allegedly promoting normalization with Israel. Recently, the Palestinian Authority rejected a medical aid shipment from the UAE because it was sent through Israel's Ben Gurion Airport. The PA explained that it rejected the shipment because the Palestinians "refuse to be a bridge [for Arab countries] seeking to have normalized ties with Israel."
By rejecting the medical aid from the UAE -- aimed at helping to prevent the spread of the coronavirus pandemic -- the Palestinians have scored another own-goal in demonstrating the depth of their ingratitude toward those who wish to assist their people. By coming out against interfaith tolerance and the building of a synagogue in an Arab country, the Palestinians are again proving that the conflict with Israel is not about borders or checkpoints, but about the very right of Jews, Christians or Israel to exist.
For years, the world has also been witnessing Muslim massacres that are "close to genocide" of Christians in North Africa and Southeast Asia.
Against this Palestinian hostility toward Jews, Christians, and peace with Israel, it is important that a new group called The Arab Council for Regional Integration, launched in London last year, is seeking to build a spirit of partnership that knows no borders between Jews and Arabs.
The group, whose declared goal is to support every effort to strengthen peace, coexistence, and reconciliation as well as integration among the countries of the region, published a video explaining the dangers facing Arabs who seek peace with Israel: "Accused of treason, thrown in prison, branded as criminals, accused of collaboration, and executed."
Such groups offer hope to those seeking peace and coexistence between Jews, Christians, and Arabs, and represent a counterforce to Muslim extremists who have nothing to offer their people but misery and bloodshed.
The Palestinian extremists who are now condemning the UAE for building a synagogue and a church undoubtedly consider Arab peacemakers as traitors who deserve to die.
These extremists are unmoved by the large number of Palestinians infected with Covid-19. They are unmoved by the economic crisis in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They are unmoved by the thousands of homeless, wounded, and dead Arabs in Lebanon. What does move Palestinian extremists -- deeply enough to sacrifice the wellbeing of all Palestinians everywhere -- is the thought of a Jew being permitted to pray in a synagogue or at the Temple Mount.
Khaled Abu Toameh, an award-winning journalist based in Jerusalem, is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at Gatestone Institute.
© 2020 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

الرئيس ترامب يعلن عن التوصل إلى اتفاق سلام بين دولة الإمارات ودولة إسرائل وبذلك تصبح الإمارات ثالث دولة عربية تعترف بإسرائيل بعد مصرر والأردن وتوقع معها معاهدات سلام

Trump announces historic peace agreement between Israel and United Arab Emirates
Anne Gearan and Steve Hendrix/Washington Post/August 13/2020
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/89459/%d8%a7%d9%84%d8%b1%d8%a6%d9%8a%d8%b3-%d8%aa%d8%b1%d8%a7%d9%85%d8%a8-%d9%8a%d8%b9%d9%84%d9%86-%d8%b9%d9%86-%d8%a7%d9%84%d8%aa%d9%88%d8%b5%d9%84-%d8%a5%d9%84%d9%89-%d8%a7%d8%aa%d9%81%d8%a7%d9%82-%d8%b3/
President Trump on Aug. 13 announced a peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and said the United States is a party to the agreement.
President Trump announced a peace agreement Thursday between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, a historic step that makes the Persian Gulf state only the third Arab country to open diplomatic relations with the Jewish nation and halts Israel’s controversial plans to annex parts of the West Bank.
Representatives of both countries will meet soon to begin signing agreements, a joint statement said.
“HUGE breakthrough today! Historic Peace Agreement between our two GREAT friends, Israel and the United Arab Emirates!” Trump tweeted.
Speaking in the Oval Office, the president said the United States is a party to the agreement, helping to get the two countries talking as part of the Middle East peace effort led by his adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner.
The United States was also part of efforts to normalize Israel’s relations with Egypt and Jordan decades ago.
Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Ron Dermer, tweeted shortly after Trump’s announcement. He praised UAE leader Mohammed bin Zayed, who is often known by his initials.
“A great day for peace! Israel commends the courage of MBZ for the historic decision of the UAE to join Egypt (1979) and Jordan (1994) in making peace with Israel. Israel deeply appreciates all @POTUS Trump has done to make this breakthrough possible,” Dermer wrote.
At a previously unannounced session in the Oval Office, Trump told reporters that the atmosphere between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and bin Zayed during a recent secret conversation “was like love.”
Israel’s West Bank annexation stalls, for now, amid pandemic and political distractions
Trump said that he has lowered tension in the Middle East, although his withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal has led other nations to accuse the United States of raising tensions rather than lowering them.
“I’ve kept us out of war,” Trump said.
Netanyahu was due to speak in Israel later Thursday, and Trump has planned a news conference for late afternoon in Washington.
Trump administration to end Iran deal waivers in a blow to Obama-era pact
Palestinian leaders had no immediate official response to the announcement, and sources in the West Bank said it appears that many were caught flat-footed by the turn of events.
“I’m getting the picture that no one was consulted,” said an official with the Palestine Liberation Organization who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak to the media. “No one knows anything.”
That such a potentially consequential deal could be reached without the involvement of the Palestinians raised long-standing fears that Gulf State Arabs were ready to work toward better business and political relations with Israel without gaining meaningful concessions. If it turns out that Netanyahu has agreed to give up annexation plans, that would be welcome, this official said. But a major peace deal should do more than take that one plan off the table.
“What the Arab Emirates did was precisely what we were afraid the Europeans would do, which is to give a gift to Israel without addressing any of the things they do to the Palestinian people,” the official said. “What I assume we are going to see, once again, is an Arab country coming out of it with something for themselves.”
Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum in the Gaza Strip condemned the plan as well.
“The declaration of normalization between Israel and the UAE is a free reward for the occupation for its crimes and violations against the Palestinian people.”
After recent tensions, Israel offers aid for devastated Beirut
Israeli Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi issued a statement congratulating Netanyahu and welcoming the announcement.
“The news of normalization of relations with the United Arab Emirates is important and opens the door to future agreements,” Ashkenazi said.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, traveling in Europe, spoke to reporters.
“I was just part of a conversation between the president, Prime Minister Netanyahu and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed from the United Arab Emirates, where they announced something we’ve been working on for quite some time, which is the normalization of relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates,” Pompeo said.
A White House signing ceremony would take place eventually, Pompeo said. Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton held such ceremonies when Israel normalized relations with Egypt and Jordan.
“We hope this provides a good foundation for building out on the vision for peace that the president has laid out,” Pompeo said.
Most of the focus on Kushner’s plan has been on its vision for economic betterment but limited autonomy for the Palestinians, and Palestinian opposition to the Trump effort has foreclosed negotiations between Israel and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
But the larger aim of Kushner’s plan was always to forge a new economic partnership between Israel and many of its neighbors, especially Sunni Arab states that shared the U.S. and Israeli view of Iran as an enemy.
*Hendrix reported from Jerusalem.

Israel freezes Palestine annexation for UAE ties
The National/August 13/2020

إسرائيل تجمد مشروع ضم الأراضي الفلسطينية مقابل علاقات مع دولة الإمارات
The move is a 'huge breakthrough' says President Donald Trump
Israel will halt all annexation of Palestinian territories in exchange for establishing diplomatic ties with the UAE, the countries announced on Thursday.
The agreement, known as the Abraham Accord, came in a joint call between Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
In a joint statement, the US expressed its commitment to Middle East security in addition to further developing military co-operation with the UAE.
"HUGE breakthrough today! Historic Peace Agreement between our two GREAT friends, Israel and the United Arab Emirates," Mr Trump tweeted.
“This deal is a significant” step towards peace in the Middle East, Mr Trump told reporters at the White House.
The statement says that UAE and Israeli officials will meet “in the coming weeks” to sign bilateral agreements.
Israel will halt all annexation of Palestinian territories in exchange for establishing diplomatic ties with the UAE, the countries announced on Thursday.
The agreement, known as the Abraham Accord, came in a joint call between Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
In a joint statement, the US expressed its commitment to Middle East security in addition to further developing military co-operation with the UAE.
"HUGE breakthrough today! Historic Peace Agreement between our two GREAT friends, Israel and the United Arab Emirates," Mr Trump tweeted.
“This deal is a significant” step towards peace in the Middle East, Mr Trump told reporters at the White House.
The statement says that UAE and Israeli officials will meet “in the coming weeks” to sign bilateral agreements.
“This historic diplomatic breakthrough will advance peace in the Middle East region and is a testament to the bold diplomacy and vision of the three leaders and courage of the United Arab Emirates and Israel to chart a new path that will unlock great potential in the region," the joint statement said.
"This normalisation of relations and peaceful diplomacy will bring together two of America’s most reliable and capable regional partners."
Sheikh Mohamed also spoke about the move on Twitter. "During a call with President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, an agreement was reached to stop further Israeli annexation of Palestinian territories," he wrote.
"The UAE and Israel also agreed to co-operation and setting a roadmap towards establishing a bilateral relationship."
There was no time limit to the halt of annexation, but it aims to lead to a final negotiated settlement to the long-running conflict. Thursday’s agreement does not change the UAE’s view of the peace process and it remains committed to the Arab peace plan of a negotiated two-state solution with East Jerusalem as the capital of an independent Palestinian state.
Israel will halt all annexation of Palestinian territories in exchange for establishing diplomatic ties with the UAE, the countries announced on Thursday.
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Full text: Joint statement of US, Israel and UAE
https://www.thenational.ae/world/gcc/full-text-joint-statement-of-us-israel-and-uae-1.1063399

The agreement, known as the Abraham Accord, came in a joint call between Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
In a joint statement, the US expressed its commitment to Middle East security in addition to further developing military co-operation with the UAE.
"HUGE breakthrough today! Historic Peace Agreement between our two GREAT friends, Israel and the United Arab Emirates," Mr Trump tweeted.
“This deal is a significant” step towards peace in the Middle East, Mr Trump told reporters at the White House.
The statement says that UAE and Israeli officials will meet “in the coming weeks” to sign bilateral agreements.
“This historic diplomatic breakthrough will advance peace in the Middle East region and is a testament to the bold diplomacy and vision of the three leaders and courage of the United Arab Emirates and Israel to chart a new path that will unlock great potential in the region," the joint statement said.
"This normalisation of relations and peaceful diplomacy will bring together two of America’s most reliable and capable regional partners."
Sheikh Mohamed also spoke about the move on Twitter. "During a call with President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, an agreement was reached to stop further Israeli annexation of Palestinian territories," he wrote.
"The UAE and Israel also agreed to co-operation and setting a roadmap towards establishing a bilateral relationship."
There was no time limit to the halt of annexation, but it aims to lead to a final negotiated settlement to the long-running conflict. Thursday’s agreement does not change the UAE’s view of the peace process and it remains committed to the Arab peace plan of a negotiated two-state solution with East Jerusalem as the capital of an independent Palestinian state.
While there was no detail on the timeline for establishing diplomatic outposts, the agreement will allow travel between the two countries, trade – including of technology and goods – and co-operation in areas such as food security, climate change and energy, the statement explained.
Diplomatic missions will be established in the future.
In recent months, UAE officials have been vocal in warning Mr Netanyahu against plans to annex much of the West Bank and Jordan valley.
UN, Arab and European officials warned that the annexation would effectively end any hope of a two-state solution with an independent Palestine that has East Jerusalem as its capital.
The move, agreed between Mr Netanyahu and Benny Gantz of the Blue and White party in a power-sharing agreement earlier this year, did not take place on July 1 as planned.
On June 12, UAE Minister of State and Ambassador to the US Yousef Al Otaiba wrote a letter to the Israeli people in Hebrew published in Israel’s largest daily Yedioth Ahronoth.
Mr Al Otaiba warned Israel that annexation would be a major impediment to Israel’s hope of establishing ties with the Arab world.
“Annexation will certainly and immediately upend Israeli aspirations for improved security, economic and cultural ties with the Arab world and with UAE,” Mr Al Otaiba wrote.
While Israel and the UAE have never had official ties until now, there have been gradual steps leading to Thursday’s call. The UAE has hosted Israeli athletes and officials at international conferences. Israel will attend the delayed 2020 Expo next year and has an office at the International Renewable Energy Agency in Abu Dhabi.
Other Gulf nations, including Qatar and Oman, have ties with Israel, but the only Arab states with full diplomatic relations are Jordan and Egypt following peace agreements in 1994 and 1979.
Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Co-operation, said the UAE-Israel accord was "a major breakthrough in Arab-Israeli relations" that "opens new horizons for peace and stability in the region".
"The United Arab Emirates has secured Israel's commitment to halting the annexation of Palestinian territories in order to sustain efforts to achieve a two-state solution," UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Dr Anwar Gargash, said shortly after the announcement of the deal.
"This decisive freeze on the annexation of Palestinian territories is a significant diplomatic achievement and comes in furtherance of the UAE’s belief that establishing normal relations with Israel will enable it to play a direct and constructive role in enhancing the region’s security and stability."
Dr Gargash added the UAE was calling for a return to direct negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians "as the sole parties capable of reaching a permanent and sustainable solution to this conflict".
"The UAE seeks to build upon previous regional and international efforts aimed at reaching a solution to this conflict in reflection of the UAE's multilateral approach to sensitive regional issues," he said.
"The United States played a key role in this pragmatic step by the UAE, affirming its continued commitment to the Arab Peace Initiative and the rights of the Palestinian people to establish a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital."
Donald Trump's son-in-law and the face of the administration's Middle East peace plans, Jared Kushner, praised the US president's leadership.
"The president, like with all things, urged us to take an untraditional approach. You can’t solve problems that remain unsolved by doing it the same way the people before you have tried and failed," he told reporters.

Hoori or Whore? Islam’s ‘72 Virgins’ Yearn for ‘Martyred’ Muslims
Raymond Ibrahim//August 13/2020
According to a July 22, 2020 article on PMW:
Since the Palestinian Authority started its terror campaign—the second Intifada—in 2000, it has been promising terrorist Martyrs that as Muslims they will be rewarded in Paradise with 72 Dark-Eyed Virgins. The promises are given in religious lessons, statements by political figures, and poems and music videos, while funeral notices are worded as “wedding” announcements.
As a recent example, the article cites a Palestinian music video that “reminds viewers that death as a ‘Martyr’ is really a ‘wedding’ to the 72 Virgins of Paradise.” Another video shows a Palestinian cleric brainwashing young children with dreams of “martyrdom” and subsequent “marriage to the Dark Eyed Virgins of Paradise”—even as the children, who appear oblivious to his words, scream “Allahu Akbar!”
Who are these “dark-eyed virgins in paradise” who “yearn”—as another Palestinian figure phrased it—for martyrs, for those Muslims who, in the Koran’s words, “slay and are slain” (9:111)?
The proper Arabic term for these entities is hoor al-‘ayn, commonly known by the English transliteration hoori (also “houri”). They are supernatural, celestial women—“wide-eyed” and “big-bosomed,” says the Koran (56:22, 78:33)—created by Allah for the express purpose of sexually gratifying his favorites in perpetuity. (Whether or not the English word “whore” is etymologically connected to the Arabic hoori is ultimately a moot point as they both seem to serve the same function.)
One of the canonical hadiths—a statement attributed to Muhammad that mainstream Islam acknowledges as true—which all jihadi organizations regularly invoke, has Muhammad saying:
The martyr [shahid, one who dies fighting for Islam] is special to Allah. He is forgiven from the first drop of blood [that he sheds]. He sees his throne in paradise…. And he will copulate with seventy-two hooris. [See also Koran 44:54, 52:20, 55:72, and 56:22.]
While the hooris may invoke images of scantily-clad genies and/or other wild tales from the Arabian Nights to the Western mind—and thus be dismissed as “fairy tales” with no capacity to inspire anyone—the fact is, desire for these immortal concubines has driven Muslim men to acts of suicidal terror, past and present, as recorded in both Muslim and Western historical sources.
“As for religious enthusiasm and ardour for the holy war,” writes historian Marius Canard, “it is certain that numerous Muslims were moved by this sentiment…. There are numerous accounts describing combatants going to their deaths with joyful heart, seeing visions of the celestial hoori who is calling to them and signaling to them.”
Indeed, the hooris are depicted as being ever present on the fields of jihad, beckoning their would-be lovers to rush to their embraces by engaging in wild acts of “martyrdom.” This is evident from the West’s first major military encounter with Islam, the fateful Battle of Yarmuk (636). There, one Muslim came upon a fallen comrade “smitten on the ground, and I watched as he lifted his fingers to the sky. I understood he was rejoicing, for he saw the hooris.” Another Arab chieftain told his men that a headlong charge against the “Christian dogs” is synonymous with a “rush to the embraces of the hooris!”
“The Muslim preachers did not cease to encourage the combatants [at Yarmuk]: Prepare yourselves for the encounter with the hooris of the big black eyes,” explains a medieval Persian historian. “And to be sure, never has a day been seen when more heads fell than on the day of the Yarmuk.”
Nearly a millennium later, on the night before the sack of Constantinople in 1453, the Ottoman Turks also invoked the hooris to kindle the men’s fighting spirit. Wandering “dervishes visited the tents, to instill the desire of martyrdom, and the assurance of spending an immortal youth amidst the rivers and gardens of paradise, and in the embraces of the black-eyed virgins [hooris].” At the pivotal battle of Mohacs in 1526, seventy thousand Muslim invaders—described as devotees of “jihad and martyrdom,” eager for “a perpetually happy life” with “the hooris”—defeated the hitherto mighty kingdom of Hungary, built a massive pyramid of heads, and returned to Constantinople with one hundred thousand slaves.
From the start, Western observers have corroborated the mesmerizing effects of the hoori’s siren call. Marco Polo (d.1324) explained why after assassinating their target the hashashin (whence the English word “assassin”) or Nizari Ismailis, a Shia sect, would not flee but wait to be hacked down by their victim’s guards or men: They were eager to enter “paradise, where every species of sensual gratification should be found, in the society of beautiful nymphs [hooris].”
In an eighth-century “interfaith dialogue” between Caliph Omar II and Emperor Leo III, the latter wrote: “We [Christians] do not expect to enjoy there [heaven] commerce with women who remain forever virgin,” for “we put no faith in such silly tales engendered by extreme ignorance and by paganism.” But “for you who are given up to carnal vices, and who have never been known to limit the same, you who prefer your pleasures to any good, it is precisely for that reason that you consider the celestial realm of no account if it is not peopled with women” for sex, a reference to the hooris.
If Muslims, particularly of the Salafi persuasion—virtually all jihadis are Salafis—venerate and seek to emulate the world of early Islam, it should come as no surprise that the hooris are still working their magic, above and beyond the opening anecdotes concerning Palestinian indoctrination.
For instance, Naa’imur Rahman, a Muslim man from north London, who was “found guilty of plotting to blow up the gates of Downing Street and assassinate Theresa May…was motivated by the idea of being met by virgins in paradise after the attack, the court heard.” During discussions with an undercover officer, Rahman said that he was eager to “take her [May’s] head off, yeah”:
I want to go to jannah [heaven] when I’m doing it. I don’t want to come back. I want them to kill me, but I just want to do my thing before I’m killed…. [I’ve been] thinking a lot about hur al ayn [hooris]… In sha allah [god willing] I meet them soon.
Prior to the battle for Mosul in late 2016, the Islamic State’s “caliph,” Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, said: All [who die fighting], without exception, will enter paradise as martyrs. Moreover, you will enter paradise with four more hooris than other martyrs. For just as you stand by me now, so will they stand by you—or under you, or above you—so that you might forget what will happen to you by way of violence, death, and degradation in this war.
All this is a reminder that the Muslim mindset and the motivations behind the jihad are many and multifaceted—and even include those who disbelieve in Allah and the afterlife altogether. Regrettably, few in the West seem to understand this. Thus a French reporter who infiltrated and spent time with the Islamic State said “I never saw any Islam. No will to improve the world,” only “suicidal” men looking forward to being “martyred” on, as they explained it to him, their “path to paradise,” where “women [hooris] are waiting for us.”
Until such time that Western secular minds stop projecting their own exclusively materialistic paradigms onto jihadis and start understanding Islam’s paradigms and motivations on their own terms, the West will continue to ignore the oldest and simplest advice concerning warfare: “know your enemy.”
Historical quotes in this article were taken from and are sourced in the author’s book, Sword and Scimitar: Fourteen Centuries of War between Islam and the West.