LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
January 18/19

Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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Bible Quotations For today
Whoever is from God hears the words of God. The reason you do not hear them is that you are not from God
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 08/46-50: “Which of you convicts me of sin? If I tell the truth, why do you not believe me? Whoever is from God hears the words of God. The reason you do not hear them is that you are not from God.’The Jews answered him, ‘Are we not right in saying that you are a Samaritan and have a demon?’Jesus answered, ‘I do not have a demon; but I honour my Father, and you dishonour me. Yet I do not seek my own glory; there is one who seeks it and he is the judge.

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News published on January 17-18/19
Israeli Strategists Warn of War With Iran, Syria, Lebanon
Berri-Hariri Row over Libya’s Absence from Beirut Summit
Aoun: We Won't Leave Baabda or Allow Anyone to Seize Control of Lebanon
Arab Summit Schedule Kicks off With Growing List of Absentees
Economic Summit's Preparatory Session Kicks Off Today
Abul Gheit Meets Aoun, Hails 'Successful' Economic Summit
Report: U.S. Blamed for Attempts to ‘Thwart’ Beirut Summit
Franjieh against Govt. Veto for Those who Want It 'against Rest of Christians'
Report: Foreign Ministry ‘Invites’ Syria to Summit Opening
Franjieh against Govt. Veto for Those who Want It 'against Rest of Christians'
Report: Foreign Ministry ‘Invites’ Syria to Summit Opening
Lebanese Army Finds Man who Crossed from Israel in Tyre
Israel Seeks UNIFIL Help on 'Man who Crossed into Lebanon'
Ibrahim Says No Longer Involved in 'Govt. Initiative'
How Pressing Is Lebanon's Financial Challenge?

Litles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on January 17-18/19
In last 24 hours, over 2,000 evacuated from final Syria ISIS holdout
US to Purchase Iron Dome Batteries from Israel
‘Sexual Bribery’ Scandal Threatens Israeli Justice Minister
Int’l Crisis Group: Iraq Likely Theater of US-Iran Tension
Iran Vows to Keep Military Forces in Syria
Western Condemnation after Failed Iran Satellite Launch
Algeria: Arab-Amazigh Dispute over Using Arabic Alphabet for Berber Languages
UK PM May Reaches Out to Rivals in Brexit Deadlock
Yemen Govt., Rebels Meet to Hammer Out Major Prisoner Swap

Titles For The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on January 17-18/19
How Pressing Is Lebanon's Financial Challenge/Reuters/ Thursday 17th January 2019
Analysis/In First, Arab Countries Admit Israel Into a Regional Alliance. But There Is a Price/Ora Coren/Haaretz/January 17/19
Pompeo Takes US Anti-Iran Message to Gulf Arab States/Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat/January 17/19
For The Sake of The Stockholm Agreement/Salman Al-dossary/Asharq Al Awsat/January 17/19
New Delhi Must Uphold "Zero Tolerance" for Terrorism/Jagdish N. Singh/Gatestone Institute/January 17/2019
Arafat and the Ayatollahs/Tony Badran/Tablet/January 17/19
Pompeo’s tour provokes differing reactions inside Iran/Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Arab News/January 17/19

Latest LCCC English Lebanese & Lebanese Related News published on January 17-18/19
Israeli Strategists Warn of War With Iran, Syria, Lebanon
Vienna - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019/Based an intensive strategic assessment at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, dozens of researchers, along with retired generals and intelligence chiefs, concluded that Israel was facing a real challenge, represented by a so-called “first North war” in which Iran, Syria and Hezbollah will align along the front extending from the Golan Heights till Ras al-Naqoura. A group of researchers, including General Amos Yadlin, the executive director of Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies, and former head of Israeli military presented their annual comprehensive assessment on Israel’s security situation to President Reuven Rivlin. The report will also be submitted to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other officials. The findings indicated that despite Israel being a militarily strong country with very good national immunity, it was facing difficult challenges. The report pointed to the presence of conditions that allow war to be fought for the simplest of reasons. According to the report, the Israeli government has determined that Iran poses the biggest and most serious challenge, as it has not abandoned its nuclear plans on one hand, and is seeking to establish its influence in several countries in the region through proxies such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, Shiite militias in Syria and Iraq, Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip. If war breaks out, Israel will be fighting on several fronts, especially taking into account the relations between Syria, Iran and Hezbollah, as well as Iran’s increasing influence in Lebanon, the report emphasized.

Berri-Hariri Row over Libya’s Absence from Beirut Summit
Beirut - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019/Libya’s absence from the Arab Economic Summit in Beirut has stirred a new political row between Speaker Nabih Berri and Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri. In a speech before the Arab Private Sector Forum at Beirut’s Union of Arab Chambers, Hariri expressed regret over Libya’s decision not to attend the Arab high-level meeting, saying: “I am very pleased to see among the audience many brothers dear to my heart and to the heart of Lebanon, Lebanon that will continue to thrive through the ones who love it, and they are many among us today.”“This is an occasion to express my deep regret over the absence of the Libyan delegation from this meeting and to emphasize that the relationship between brothers must remain above any offenses,” he added. Berri responded promptly in a statement issued by his press office. “The regret, all of this regret, should not be for the absence of the Libyan delegation, but for the absence of the ‘Lebanese delegation’ in facing the great offense to Lebanon committed almost four decades ago,” in reference to the disappearance of Imam Moussa Sadr during an official visit to Libya in 1978. The row comes in parallel to another dispute between Berri and caretaker Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil, who expressed regret over the absence of Libya from the economic summit in Beirut, due to street tension in Beirut and the burning of the Libyan flag. On Sunday, Berri’s Amal movement supporters removed Libyan flags placed along Beirut’s seaside avenue, as part of Arab League preparations to welcome countries attending the two-day Arab Economic Summit set to be held on Saturday. On a different note, Hariri said in his speech that he hoped the summit would be successful and that the recommendations submitted by the Arab League would “be practical and enhance the living condition of citizens in Arab countries.”

Aoun: We Won't Leave Baabda or Allow Anyone to Seize Control of Lebanon
Naharnet/January 17/19/President Michel Aoun announced Thursday that he “will not allow anyone to seize control of Lebanon,” in a fiery speech during a lunch banquet. Telling the attendees a fictional story about a little girl and her father, who was a ship captain, Aoun added: “Do not be afraid: we will not abandon the ship and we will rescue all those on board.”“We are present here and we are not used to abandoning our responsibilities. During a previous era, we confronted tanks, warplanes and cannons and we were not scared. I was here in Baabda next to you,” the president said.“We will not leave Baabda and we will not allow anyone to seize control of Lebanon,” Aoun added.

Arab Summit Schedule Kicks off With Growing List of Absentees
Kataeb.org/Thursday 17th January 2019/The preparatory meetings leading up to the 2019 Arab Economic and Social Development Summit kicked off on Thursday, as the participating delegations gathered to set out and finalize the summit's agenda. A joint meeting of foreign ministers and relevant ministries will be held on Friday to discuss the summit’s agenda and start drafting the closing statement of the summit, to be called the Beirut Declaration. The fourth edition of the 2019 Arab Economic and Social Development Summit will culminate in a high-level meeting on Sunday. However, a few heads of state will be attending the summit, as many apologized for not taking part in the event after they had confirmed their presence previously. The list of absentees includes Egyptian President Abdul-Fatah Al-Sisi, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Qatar's Prince Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani and Kuwait's Prince Sabah Al-Jaber Al Sabbah. Syrian Ambassador to Lebanon Ali Abdul-Karim Ali revealed that he had been invited to the summit, but decided to not take part in it given the troubled ties between Damascus and the Arab League.

Economic Summit's Preparatory Session Kicks Off Today
Naharnet/January 17/19/A preparatory opening session for Beirut's Arab Economic and Social Development Summit will be held Thursday at the Phoenicia Hotel. The public session will bring together Arab heads of states and senior representatives. According to the National News Agency, the session will include speeches by the head of the Saudi delegation (chairmanship of the summit's 3rd edition), the head of the Lebanese delegation (chairmanship of the 4th edition), and the Arab League's general secretariat. The delegations were still arriving at the venue by 2:30 pm. Saudi Arabia's deputy finance minister Hamad bin Suleiman al-Bazeri had arrived in Lebanon earlier in the day. According to the Saudi ambassador to Lebanon, the kingdom's delegation will be led by Finance Minister Mohammed bin Abdullah al-Jadaan and will be comprised of officials from the finance and foreign affairs ministries. Yemen's deputy foreign minister Mohammed bin Abdullah al-Hadrami also arrived in Beirut on Friday. A lot of Arab countries have announced that their rulers will not attend the summit. Media reports said the summit will be attended by only four heads of states. And as Egypt said its prime minister will represent the country, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas apologized Wednesday for not being able to attend the summit and so did Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani. Libya has meanwhile decided to boycott the summit in protest at an “insult” addressed to its flag which was removed from a pole near the summit's venue and eventually burned at the hands of supporters of Speaker Nabih Berri's AMAL Movement. Threats were also addressed to the Libyan delegation and a number of Libyan businessmen were reportedly barred from entering Lebanon via Beirut's airport. Berri and AMAL have protested against the invitation of Libya in connection with the 1978 disappearance of AMAL founder Imam Moussa al-Sadr, a revered Shiite cleric. The former regime of slain Libyan leader Moammar al-Gadhafi is accused of kidnapping him. Berri and AMAL have argued that the new Libyan authorities have not exerted enough efforts to unveil his fate. Syria will not attend the summit seeing as its membership of the Arab League is still suspended.

Abul Gheit Meets Aoun, Hails 'Successful' Economic Summit
Naharnet/January 17/19/Arab League chief Ahmed Abul Gheit on Thursday expressed his “deep admiration” of the efforts that Lebanon has exerted to organize an Arab economic summit that kicks off Friday in Beirut, following controversy over the participation of some Arab countries in it. Abul Gheit was speaking after talks with President Michel Aoun in Baabda. “I thanked President Aoun for Lebanon's hosting of the economic summit and expressed to him my deep admiration for the Lebanese organization and the security measures that surpass all expectations,” the Arab official said. “The more I spend time here, even a single hour, the more I become more and more convinced that this summit is successful,” Abul Gheit went on to say. Controversy had surrounded the summit in recent days in connection with conflicting Lebanese stances over the participation of Libya and Syria. Libya has decided to boycott the summit in protest at an “insult” addressed to its flag which was removed from a pole near the summit's venue and eventually burned at the hands of supporters of Speaker Nabih Berri's AMAL Movement. Threats were also addressed to the Libyan delegation and a number of Libyan businessmen were reportedly barred from entering Lebanon via Beirut's airport. Berri and AMAL have protested against the invitation of Libya in connection with the 1978 disappearance of AMAL founder Imam Moussa al-Sadr, a revered Shiite cleric. The former regime of slain Libyan leader Moammar al-Gadhafi is accused of kidnapping him. Berri and AMAL have argued that the new Libyan authorities have not exerted enough efforts to unveil his fate. Syria, meanwhile, will not attend the summit seeing as its membership of the Arab League is still suspended.

Report: U.S. Blamed for Attempts to ‘Thwart’ Beirut Summit
Naharnet/January 17/19/Three state leaders have so far said they are unable to attend the Beirut summit scheduled this weekend, a move blamed by some on “a U.S. decision not to secure balanced participation in the summit,” al-Akhbar daily reported on Thursday. Libya has officially decided to boycott Beirut's upcoming Arab economic summit, a day after AMAL Movement supporters removed Libyan flags and addressed insults to Libya near the summit's venue. Apart from the meetings that begin today as a prelude to the summit in Beirut on January 19-20, this summit suffered a lot of “damage,” said the newspaper. Until last night, Lebanon was aware that the number of heads of state to attend “will not exceed four.”Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi apologized for attending. Egypt will instead dispatch its prime minister. Attributing information to Lebanon’s Presidency, the daily said “President Michel Aoun received a letter (on Wednesday) from his Palestinian counterpart apologizing for not being able to attend because he is going to be in New York to head the Group of 77 and China. The Palestinian prime minister, Rami Hamdellah will head the delegation instead.”The Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, did the same yesterday, according to al-Akhbar. Political sources linked his apology to the crisis of Libya's participation in the summit, to the visit of U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in the region, and an alleged American effort to “prevent” balanced participation in the summit as part of Washington's decision to “intensify pressure on Lebanon,” it added. The heads of Arab states who have reportedly confirmed attendance so far are: the Emir of Kuwait Sabah al-Jaber al-Sabah, Tunisian president Beji Qaid Al Sebsi, the Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, and Iraqi President Barham Salih. Libya's boycott of the summit, and the internal crisis that resulted from that, mainly the flag burning in particular, greatly influenced the participation of Arab leaders, unnamed sources concluded.

Franjieh against Govt. Veto for Those who Want It 'against Rest of Christians'
Naharnet/January 17/19/Marada Movement chief ex-MP Suleiman Franjieh reiterated Thursday his rejection of granting President Michel Aoun and the Free Patriotic Movement 11 ministers in the new government, or what constitutes a so-called one-third-plus-one veto power. “Hizbullah is clinging to the representation of the Consultative Gathering in the government and will not back down,” Franjieh tweeted. “We have not said that it (Hizbullah) is opposed to granting the President the one-third-plus-one veto power, but we, as a Christian group, are against granting the one-third-plus-one veto power for those who want to use it against the rest of Christians,” he added, clarifying remarks he voiced a day earlier during a Bkirki Maronite summit. Al-Joumhouria newspaper meanwhile reported that Franjieh has called on Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri to “cede a Sunni minister from his share to the Consultative Gathering if he is keen on granting the one-third-plus-one veto power to the President.”The Bkirki summit had witnessed bickering between Franjieh and FPM chief MP Jebran Bassil, who said that “the one-third-plus-one veto power would strengthen the country, the state institutions and the President.”Franjieh hit back, saying “the one-third-plus-one veto power will be used against the Lebanese Forces and Marada,” noting that Lebanon's confessional power-sharing “formula is not in danger.”“When the formula becomes in danger, we will all defend it,” he added.

Report: Foreign Ministry ‘Invites’ Syria to Summit Opening
Naharnet/January 17/19/In light of controversy over inviting Syria to Beirut’s economic summit, Lebanon’s foreign ministry, as part of “protocol rules,” has sent invitations to the accredited ambassadors including Syria to attend the opening of the summit this weekend, al-Akhbar daily reported on Thursday. The ministry has sent invitations to Syrian Ambassador to Lebanon, Ali Abdul Karim Ali, to accredited ambassadors, and several political, economic and social figures, it added. However, the daily said it is “unlikely” for the Syrian ambassador to attend the summit, adding that he might “apologize for attending in the next few hours.”An Arab Economic and Social Development Summit, or AESD, that Lebanon is hosting this weekend has been marred by controversy days before delegates arrive. The question of whether to invite Syria, whose membership in the Arab League was suspended in 2011, quickly became an issue.
Pro-Syrian groups led by Hizbullah have insisted that the Syrian government should be invited.

Lebanese Army Finds Man who Crossed from Israel in Tyre
Naharnet/January 17/19/The Lebanese Army on Thursday announced the arrest of a man who became the subject of sensational media reports for several days after he crossed the border from Israel into Lebanon in mysterious circumstances. “After continuous search operations by the army, a patrol from the Intelligence Directorate managed today to arrest the U.S. citizen Colin Emery after finding him hiding in one of Tyre's neighborhoods,” the army said in a statement. “He is suspected of having entered from the occupied Palestinian territories into Lebanon on January 15, 2019,” the army added. “He is being interrogated under the supervision of the relevant judicial authorities,” it said. Recent media reports have said that the man is a “Jewish American.”Lebanese TV networks had reported Tuesday that a man "wearing an Israeli military uniform" had entered “carrying a box” into the al-Raheb area in the Lebanese border town of Aita al-Shaab. “When he encountered residents of the town, he threw away the box and Hebrew-language identification papers before fleeing and he is still hiding in Lebanese territory in the al-Kharzeh area while Lebanese Army intelligence agents are still searching for him,” LBCI reported. Al-Jadeed reported that "two young men from Aita al-Shaab encountered a stranger in the town and they tried to ask him about his identity but he did not respond."
"At that point, one of them went to report him, which prompted him to flee, leaving behind some papers," al-Jadeed added. "The papers carry Hebrew writings and one of them indicate that he is a foreigner born in 1986," the TV network said.

Israel Seeks UNIFIL Help on 'Man who Crossed into Lebanon'
Naharnet/January 17/19/The Israeli army has asked the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) to assist its probe in the case of the mysterious man who breached the border fence and crossed into Lebanon several days ago. Lebanese TV networks had reported Tuesday that a man wearing an Israeli military uniform had entered “carrying a box” into the al-Raheb area in the Lebanese border town of Aita al-Shaab. “When he encountered residents of the town, he threw away the box and Hebrew-language identification papers before fleeing and he is still hiding in Lebanese territory in the al-Kharzeh area while Lebanese Army intelligence agents are still searching for him,” LBCI reported. Al-Jadeed reported that "two young men from Aita al-Shaab encountered a stranger in the town and they tried to ask him about his identity but he did not respond.""At that point, one of them went to report him, which prompted him to flee, leaving behind some papers," al-Jadeed added. "The papers carry Hebrew writings and one of them indicate that he is a foreigner born in 1986," the TV network said. The Israeli army later confirmed that it had detected a "breach" of the border fence, adding that it was investigating marks suggesting that a person might have crossed from Israel into Lebanon. Recent Lebanese media reports have claimed that the man is a Jewish American.

Ibrahim Says No Longer Involved in 'Govt. Initiative'
Naharnet/January 17/19/General Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim announced Thursday that he is no longer part of a presidential initiative aimed at resolving the government formation deadlock. Ibrahim voiced his remarks after talks in Ain el-Tineh with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri. Asked about the fate of the initiative, Ibrahim said: “Now we are discussing things other than the government.”And asked whether the initiative is still ongoing, the major general added: “I'm no longer involved at all in this issue.”Told that he has “contributed to the rift between the first and second presidencies in connection with the issue of the Libyan delegation's visas,” Ibrahim said: “The country's security is more important to me than anything else.”Media reports have said that General Security had prevented Libyan businessmen from entering Lebanon via Beirut's airport against the backdrop of controversy over Libya's participation in an Arab economic summit in Beirut that will kick off on Friday.

How Pressing Is Lebanon's Financial Challenge?
Reuters/ Thursday 17th January 2019
Financial strains in Lebanon have been brought into focus by turbulence on markets where its dollar-denominated sovereign bonds suffered a heavy sell-off last week following comments by the finance minister about the public debt.
The bonds recovered this week on assurances the government is “absolutely not” planning to restructure the debt and is committed to paying its maturing debt and interest payments at predetermined dates. But the episode has added to debate about Lebanon’s debt sustainability after warnings from politicians, the IMF and World Bank over economic and financial conditions in a country that has suffered years of low economic growth. Lebanon’s factional politics has led to years of policy paralysis and obstructed reforms needed to boost investor confidence. More than eight months after an election, politicians have been unable to agree a new government.
WHAT ARE THE PROBLEMS?
Lebanon has one of the world’s biggest public debts compared to the size of its economy, largely generated through servicing existing debt and high state spending. It amounts to roughly 150 percent of GDP. The World Bank has estimated that financial transfers to the state-owned power producer alone averaged 3.8 percent of GDP from 2008 to 2017. A public-sector wage increase in 2017 and higher interest rates have added to pressures on the budget deficit. Lebanon also has a current account deficit because it imports far more than it exports. Financing these two deficits has depended on critical financial transfers from its diaspora. But questions over this model have grown. “At the heart of concerns is the recent slowdown in remittance/deposit inflows, which have traditionally funded a large part (if not all) of Lebanon’s financing requirement,” Goldman Sachs said in a Dec. 3 analysis. The World Bank, in an October report, said Lebanon was exposed to significant refinancing risks. “Attracting sufficient capital, and in particular deposits, to finance significantly larger budgetary and current account deficits is proving challenging in light of slower deposit growth.” Lower oil prices have been seen by economists as a major cause of the slowdown, with many Lebanese working in oil-producing Gulf Arab states. Political instability and lower growth in Lebanon have also been cited as factors. Economic growth rates have fallen to between 1 and 2 percent from between 8 and 10 percent in the four years before Syria’s civil war began in 2011.
HOW URGENT IS THE SITUATION?
Central bank governor Riad Salameh said last month the banking sector was capable of financing the state’s foreign and domestic debt in 2019. The central bank’s net foreign assets stand at around $40 billion. The financial system has proven resilient through political crises, assassinations and war. The Lebanese pound peg against the U.S. dollar has been stable for over two decades. Often in the absence of effective government, the central bank has maintained stability using stimulus packages and unorthodox financial operations, made possible by large diaspora deposits into the banks. But since 2016, the slowdown in non-resident inflows prompted the central bank to embark on “financial engineering” to draw more dollars to its reserves. The World Bank and IMF have praised the central bank for a critical role. But the World Bank’s October report noted some central bank tools were becoming less effective and that Lebanon’s risk profile was rising sharply. Confidence is critical to encouraging the inflows upon which the system rests. This would be boosted if a new government was agreed and moved quickly towards making reforms of the power sector. This could unlock some $11 billion in funding pledged by foreign states and institutions last year for a capital-investment program.
WHERE DOES HEZBOLLAH FIGURE IN THIS?
The power wielded by the Iran-backed Lebanese Shi’ite group Hezbollah is at the heart of tension between Lebanon and Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia that once supported Beirut but have turned their attention elsewhere in recent years. Goldman Sachs noted that one cause of the slowdown in remittance and deposit growth was “the perceived reduced likelihood of external support in light of heightened tensions between Lebanon and the oil-rich Gulf countries”.The heavily armed group is listed as a terrorist group by the United States and fought a war with Israel in 2006. “We have warned for some time that if there was a fresh escalation of tensions with Gulf countries or Israel, that could lead to another period of capital flight that puts the dollar peg under pressure,” Jason Tuvey of Capital Economics said. The United States has tightened financial sanctions against Hezbollah, part of its wider effort to counter Iran. The Lebanese banking sector has been applying these measures and anti-money laundering legislation. Lebanon lobbied Washington in 2017 to balance its tough anti-Hezbollah stance with the need to preserve the country’s financial stability. Consequently, sanctions were altered enough to allay fears of major economic damage. The application of such measures may have weighed on some inflows to Lebanon, though it is difficult to know to what extent, Tuvey said.
CAN THE NEXT GOVERNMENT FIX THE PROBLEM?
Once Prime Minister-designate Saad al-Hariri manages to form a government, investors will be looking for follow-through on promises of reducing the budget deficit. But there are concerns that politics could get in the way of reforms once again. “Lebanese and international stakeholders agree that the budget deficit needs to narrow, but a credible, actionable plan for achieving this is still lacking and it remains unclear if political dynamics will allow for a concerted fiscal adjustment,” Fitch Ratings said.

Latest LCCC English Miscellaneous Reports & News published on January 17-18/19
In last 24 hours, over 2,000 evacuated from final Syria ISIS holdout
AFP, Beirut/Thursday, 17 January 2019/More than 2,000 people including dozens of ISIS fighters left the group’s final holdout in eastern Syria in the past 24 hours, a monitor said Wednesday. US-backed forces are waging a final assault on the area east of the Euphrates river and have provided buses to evacuate civilians and fighters trapped inside. “In total, 2,200 people have left in the last 24 hours, including 180 ISIS fighters,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. It said around 1,100 people, “mostly women and children as well as 80 ISIS members” had left in a convoy around noon on Wednesday. Report: Turkey to control buffer zone spanning 460 km in Syria’s north Travelling in private cars and buses provided by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), they were headed for camps run by the US-supported group, Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said. The SDF, backed by air strikes from a US-led coalition, in September launched an offensive to oust ISIS. Abdel Rahman said over 20,000 people have fled the area since the start of December, including Syria, Iraqi, Russian and Somali fighters. The United Nations said Friday that overall some 25,000 people have fled the violence over the last six months as the die-hard jihadists have battled to defend their dwindling bastions. Abdel Rahman said the outflow of evacuees had accelerated in recent days, with some 5,300 people including 500 ISIS fighters leaving since Friday, when the SDF-run evacuations started. Thousands of people had already fled on foot before that. The SDF has captured multiple districts in recent weeks, but ISIS still controls the village of Sousa, where the Kurdish-dominated force has been preparing for a final assault. US-led strikes against the militant group’s final positions intensified on Wednesday. That came after a suicide attack killed four US personnel in the northern town of Manbij, costing Washington its worst combat losses in the war-torn country since 2014 as it prepares to withdraw.

US to Purchase Iron Dome Batteries from Israel
Tel Aviv - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019/The United States is planning to buy two batteries of the Israeli-made Iron Dome missiles defense system, sources in Tel Aviv have said. The US military has asked Congress for $373 million to buy the two batteries and have them delivered by 2020, the sources said Wednesday. Washington rarely buy weapons systems from other countries, mostly due to national security considerations but also because the US normally has the technological advantage, Israel’s Ynetnews reported. “The batteries will include 12 launchers, two sensors, two battlement management centers and 240 interceptors,” it said. “While the Iron Dome batteries are stationed inside Israel's borders to defend its citizens from rockets fired from Gaza, the US plans to station the batteries abroad, to defend its troops in sensitive areas around the globe,” the report added. According to Ynet, the US military has for years been looking for a system that could protect its troops from rockets, cruise missiles, drones, mortar shells and other threats on the battlefield. “In the past, the US tried to build interception systems based on American-made air-to-air missiles—AIM-120 AMRAAM and AIM-9 Sidewinder—but the costs were too high, and these systems failed to meet all of the army's operational needs,” it said. “This led the Americans to decide to acquire the Iron Dome system from Israel,” the report added.

‘Sexual Bribery’ Scandal Threatens Israeli Justice Minister
Tel Aviv - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019/The results of a month-long investigation into corruption in Israel’s judicial appointment system were partially revealed in Tel Aviv on Wednesday. The case involves a number of magistrates, employees, and lawyers in the appointment of judges in exchange for sexual favors. One of the suspects is very close to Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked, who belongs to Israel’s far right. The official Hebrew radio revealed a month ago a corruption case linked to a judicial body, saying the Attorney General himself arrived in court, requesting an extended detention of suspects and imposing a gag order, an indication of the involvement of prominent figures. Israeli police have kept the investigation process away from the media spotlight, but the information on the appointment of a female judge in a magistrate court and an attempt to promote a judge by appointing him in one of the central courts, quickly began to make the rounds. Police arrested in the course of the investigation several suspects, one of whom is a lawyer. The others are a judge, a senior employee and a prominent Bar Association member. Two women, a magistrate and a lawyer were summoned along with a group of witnesses, and "documents and computerized materials" were seized during raids. Police allowed the public disclosure of some information on the case. They said investigations have been carried out with three suspects, a female judge in the magistrate court, and two lawyers, one of whom is the main suspect accused of having sexual relations with a female judge in exchange for helping her get appointed. Police are also investigating a lawyer, who is close to the main suspect and helped promote a judge. All members of the Judicial Appointments Committee for investigation are expected to be summoned. This includes Supreme Court President Esther Hayut and Shaked, who is considered a friend of the suspect. Attorney General Avichai Mendelblit has recused himself given his friendship with the main suspect. Israel Bar Association Head Effi Naveh is also reportedly expected to take a leave of absence over the scandal.

Int’l Crisis Group: Iraq Likely Theater of US-Iran Tension
Baghdad - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019 /The International Crisis Group (ICG) has warned that Iraq could turn into the main battlefield of confrontation between the United States and Iran. Iraq could bear the brunt if conflict intensifies between Tehran and Washington, the think-tank said in a study released Wednesday. ICG, which researches ways to prevent war, interviewed officials around the world including from Iran for an extensive report on the state of the 2015 denuclearization accord between Tehran and major powers. The ICG said Iran would likely continue to comply with the deal, seeing itself as holding the moral high ground and capable of waiting out US President Donald Trump, who faces a re-election battle next year. Trump has withdrawn the United States and ramped up economic pressure aimed at isolating Iran. The study said that Tehran's calculations could change if its oil exports, which stood at 3.8 million barrels a day in 2017, fall below 700,000, a level that could trigger hyper-inflation and intensify domestic protests which for now appear manageable. If Iran decides to retaliate against the United States, the report said that Tehran may find its most attractive option to be to employ its proxies around the Middle East, a path that would be murky enough to avoid a strong European reaction. The report quoted a senior Iranian national security official as saying that the likeliest theater was Iraq, where militias from the Shiite majority have close ties with Tehran. "Iraq is where we have experience, plausible deniability and the requisite capability to hit the US below the threshold that would prompt a direct retaliation," the official was quoted as saying, according to Agence France Presse. Iran is also deeply involved in Syria and Lebanon, but the two countries are especially fragile and Tehran could lose its gains, the official said. Iran has limited assets in Afghanistan, while stepping up support for Houthi rebels in Yemen would hurt Saudi Arabia more than the United States, the official said. The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that Trump's hawkish national security advisor, John Bolton, asked for military options to strike Iran after an Iranian-linked group launched a mortar attack in September on Baghdad's "Green Zone," the protected area where the US embassy is located. The US says its embassy was the target. No one was hurt and demonstrators also ransacked the Iranian consulate in Basra during the wave of protests over economic conditions in Iraq.

Iran Vows to Keep Military Forces in Syria
London - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019/Iran will keep military forces in Syria, the head of the elite Revolutionary Guards said on Wednesday, defying Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s threats that they might be targeted if they do not leave the war-torn country. Netanyahu said on Tuesday that Israeli forces would continue to attack Iranians in Syria and warned them "to get out of there fast, because we will continue with our resolute policy". Rebuffing the threats, Major General Mohammad Ali Jafari, the Revolutionary Guards top commander, was quoted as saying by the semi-official ISNA news agency that "Iran will keep all its military and revolutionary advisers and its weapons in Syria."Jafari called Netanyahu's threats "a joke", and warned that the Israeli government "was playing with (a) lion's tail.""You should be afraid of the day that our precision-guided missiles roar and fall on your head," he said.

Western Condemnation after Failed Iran Satellite Launch
London - Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019/France on Wednesday condemned a failed Iranian satellite launch that it said used technology applicable to long-range missiles, hours after the United States accused Tehran of posing a missile threat. “The Iranian ballistic program is a source of concern for the international community and France,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Agnes von der Muhll said. Paris urged Tehran to stop all ballistic tests which are not in line with UN resolutions. It was the latest in a string of French comments expressing irritation at Iran’s ongoing ballistic missile program despite attempts over the last two years by France and other European powers to open talks on the subject with Iranian authorities. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday accused Iran of posing a missile threat after Tehran defied his warnings and tried to put the satellite into orbit.
Pompeo renewed his charge that the launch defied UN Security Council resolution 2231 of 2015, which endorsed an international agreement, from which the United States has withdrawn, on ending Iran's nuclear weapons. "In defiance of the international community & UNSCR 2231, Iran's regime fired off a space launch vehicle today," Pompeo tweeted. "The launch yet again shows that Iran is pursuing enhanced missile capabilities that threaten Europe and the Middle East," he wrote. The reaction was relatively muted for a member of President Donald Trump's administration, which has ramped up pressure for months on Iran in hopes of crippling its economy and scaling back its influence in the region, Agence France Presse said. The United States and Israel say Iran can use technical know-how from satellite launches to develop long-range missiles, an opinion not shared by all Western experts.
Iran's telecommunications minister said the country successfully launched the Payam satellite but that it failed to be placed into orbit. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said that Iran’s action in launching satellite is not against international law. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday ignored the US and European warnings, saying Iran will be ready for a new satellite launch in a few months' time. Rouhani was quoted by state media as saying that Iran had "achieved great success in building satellites and launching them. That means we are on the right track. "The remaining problems are minor, will be resolved in a few months, and we will soon be ready for a new launch," he said.

Algeria: Arab-Amazigh Dispute over Using Arabic Alphabet for Berber Languages
Algeria – Bouallam Ghemraseh/Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 17 January, 2019/Algeria’s Supreme Islamic Council, considered the country’s highest state-run religious authority, triggered nationwide controversy over its bid to inscribe the Berber languages in Arabic letters. Amazigh tribes, which pushed for their languages’ recognition as official, voiced their strong objection to their dialects being written in Arabic letters, saying they wish for Latin inscriptions to substitute the original Tifinagh letters. Earlier this week, Council Chairman Bouabdellah Ghlamallah, in a speech given in the predominantly Amazigh Tizi Ouzou Province, stressed the need to revive and develop the Berber languages by writing it in Arabic, which he cited as a “source for pride”. Fighting back against the demand for Latin alphabets taking over the Berber languages, Ghlamallah blasted the Amazigh tribes for not placing their languages’ best interest at heart, saying the only way forward for the language is through the adoption of Arabic alphabets. Ghlamallah, nevertheless, reaffirmed that the final decision will be made by the Algerian Academy of Amazigh Language, according to the constitutional amendment ratified on February 7, 2016. Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika ordering the establishment and empowerment of the Academy and the adoption of the Amazigh New Year as a national and official holiday in early 2018 was seen in two different lights, one of which triumphs the longstanding struggle of Amazigh tribes gaining recognition as an essential part of the Algerian culture, and another that views it as a political move by the president to rally support for a fifth term. A sharp dispute, often ideological, has long stoked differences between Berbers, the aboriginal inhabitants of t North Africa, who persistently fought for teaching Amazigh throughout the country’s educational system, and Arab Algerians who insist on the prevalence of Arabic as the sole official language used in government affairs. Some Berbers are actively involved in separatist movements calling for the independence of the tribal region. Despite the Algerian political echelon promoting Arabic, it fails to act upon its preaching as most government departments and companies are adopting French.

UK PM May Reaches Out to Rivals in Brexit Deadlock
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/January 17/19/British Prime Minister Theresa May faces deadlock Thursday over a new Brexit plan, after narrowly surviving a no-confidence vote sparked by the crushing defeat of her EU withdrawal deal. With the clock ticking, May has appealed to opposition leaders to meet for cross-party talks before she presents an alternative proposal to parliament on Monday. But her opponents have set out a list of demands for cooperating -- including ruling out the possibility that Britain would leave the EU in March without any deal at all. The embattled leader conceded the divorce terms she struck with the EU had been roundly rejected, after MPs delivered the heaviest government defeat in parliament in modern British political history on Tuesday - 432 votes to 202. "Now MPs have made clear what they don't want, we must all work constructively together to set out what parliament does want," May said in a televised address to the nation on Wednesday evening, after winning a no-confidence vote triggered by the opposition Labour party. She set out a schedule of cross-party talks that began immediately with meetings with the Scottish nationalist, Welsh nationalist and the pro-EU Liberal Democrat leaders. "We must find solutions that are negotiable and command sufficient support in this House," she had told parliament earlier. But opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said he would only meet May if she could "remove clearly, once and for all the prospect of the catastrophe of a no-deal Brexit". May said she was "disappointed" by Corbyn's decision and stressed that "our door remains open". On Wednesday evening her spokesman said the possibility of a "no deal" was still on the table. Ian Blackford of the Scottish National Party (SNP) said his party would only participate if she were prepared to consider delaying Brexit, ruling out a "no deal" and the option of holding a second referendum.
May has flatly rejected a second vote.
- Late-night talks -
The prime minister is working to the tightest-possible deadline as Britain prepares to leave the bloc that for half a century defined its economic and political relations with the rest of the world. Her defeat sparked warnings from European leaders that the prospect of "no deal" had increased, with the potential for huge economic disruption on both sides of the Channel. May must return to parliament on Monday with a Plan B that she and her team intend to negotiate with various MPs through the weekend. Her offer to meet with the opposition "rings hollow without evidence of her readiness to compromise on the substance of Brexit", the Guardian newspaper said, pushing for a "menu of options" to be presented to parliament. Meanwhile the Daily Telegraph warned that parliament "may be planning a betrayal". "After two-and-a-half years, Plan B is to let parliament take over," the Telegraph said. "At least it is a plan; but is parliament capable of delivering on the referendum result, or is this the start of a great betrayal of that vote?"
- Divorce delay? -
May survived the no-confidence vote Wednesday thanks to the support of members of her Conservative Party and its Northern Irish allies in the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). But more than a third of the Conservatives and all 10 DUP members of parliament voted against her Brexit arrangements on Tuesday -- each for their own reason. May will therefore tread carefully as she tries to win over opposition lawmakers -- many of whom want to remain in the EU -- while also attempting to appease more hardened Brexit-backing coalition partners. She stuck to two key principles on Wednesday: limiting EU migration and pursuing an independent trade policy. Both points rule out Labour hopes of membership of an EU customs union or its single market. Yet she also hinted at the possibility of delaying Brexit. May said the EU would allow this "if it was clear that there was a plan that was moving toward an agreed deal". EU officials have said extending the negotiating period could be possible until the newly elected European Parliament meets in July. On Thursday, the pound edged up against the dollar with dealers optimistic that Britain will not leave the EU without a deal in place, despite May's exit plan being thrown out by MPs.
Blurred lines
European leaders have repeatedly said they will not reopen the draft withdrawal agreement sealed at a special Brussels summit in December. French President Emmanuel Macron suggested the EU might be willing to tweak a few minor points -- but only if they did not alter the bloc's existing position on trade and borders. "We won't, just to solve Britain's domestic political issues, stop defending European interests," he said. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said there was time for talks as long as London could present a clear and united position.
And Irish Prime Leo Varadkar added "that if the United Kingdom were to evolve from its red lines on the customs union and on the single market, that the European Union could evolve also".

Yemen Govt., Rebels Meet to Hammer Out Major Prisoner Swap
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/January 17/19/Yemeni government and rebel representatives met in Jordan on Thursday for a second day to thrash out the details of a major prisoner exchange, a U.N. source said. The swap, which could involve up to 15,000 detainees from both sides, was agreed in principle as a confidence-building measure ahead of peace talks in Sweden last month. But the details were left to afterwards as U.N. mediators focused on brokering breakthrough truce deals for the aid lifeline port of Hodeida and the battleground third city of Taez. The talks in the Jordanian capital Amman come as international donors meet in Berlin to set up a fund to support the fledgling peace process in Yemen. Representatives of the United Nations, which brokered the swap agreement, and the International Committee of the Red Cross, which will supervise its implementation, are taking part in the Amman talks. During a first day of talks on Wednesday, the warring parties met separately with the mediators and submitted lists of prisoners they want to see released. On Thursday, they were expected to meet face-to-face to hammer out the details of its implementation.The new meetings come after the U.N. Security Council on Wednesday unanimously approved the deployment of up to 75 monitors to oversee the truce in Hodeida, which has largely held despite delays in the agreed withdrawal of combatants.
International support fund
In Berlin, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas pledged 4.5 millions euros as the opening contribution to the new peace process support fund. "In Yemen, a humanitarian catastrophe threatens to unfurl if we do not manage to bring this conflict to a definitive end," Maas said. "The important thing right now is to seize this small but real opportunity and work to ensure that international support for the peace process is as constructive and resilient as possible."The truce in the largely rebel-held Red Sea port city was the centerpiece of a series of breakthrough agreements brokered by the United Nations in Sweden last month in what is widely seen as the best chance yet of ending the devastating four-year civil war. But in a sign that much work still needs to be done before formal peace negotiations can begin, U.N. envoy Martin Griffiths said last week that he had postponed until February a planned second round of talks between the two sides. In an interview with Deutsche Welle radio on Wednesday, Griffiths said he was guardedly optimistic. He said he had been pleasantly surprised that the truce had held in Hodeida so far despite the "currently very weak" U.N. monitoring.
He said he was "keeping his fingers crossed" that would continue while the new observer mission is put in place. The Yemen conflict has killed some 10,000 people since a Saudi-led military coalition intervened in support of the beleaguered government in March 2015, according to the World Health Organization. Human rights groups say the real death toll could be five times as high. The war has pushed 14 million Yemenis to the brink of famine in what the United Nations describes as the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on January 17-18/19
Analysis/In First, Arab Countries Admit Israel Into a Regional Alliance. But There Is a Price
تحليل سياسي بقلم اورا كورين من الهآرتس: الدول العربية تقبل بدخول اسرائيل كحليف اقليمي ولكن بثمن
Ora Coren/Haaretz/January 17/19
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/71167/ora-coren-haaretz-in-first-arab-countries-admit-israel-into-a-regional-alliance-but-there-is-a-price-%d8%aa%d8%ad%d9%84%d9%8a%d9%84-%d8%b3%d9%8a%d8%a7%d8%b3%d9%8a-%d8%a8%d9%82%d9%84%d9%85-%d8%a7/
Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum, which counts Egypt, Jordan and Palestinian Authority as members, could serve as level to pressure Israel and interfere with domestic energy development
The announcement this week that many of the countries of the East Mediterranean, including Israel, agreed to set up a forum to create a regional gas market is a landmark development for Israel. It not only creates a framework for developing the region’s energy, but it marks the first time Israel has been admitted to a regional grouping that will give it official status in the Arab world. The Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum, announced on Monday after a meeting in Cairo, aims to “create a regional gas market that serves the interests of its members by ensuring supply and demand, optimizing resource development, rationalizing the cost of infrastructure, offering competitive prices and improving trade relations, among other goals,” Egypt’s Petroleum Ministry announced. Besides Israel, the group includes Egypt, Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority. The statement said that other Eastern Mediterranean countries may join the forum later, a hint that Lebanon may become a member.
The forum is part of efforts to transform the region into a major energy hub. But from Israel’s point of view it also marks a major geopolitical win in its efforts to become an accepted member of the Middle East, where it has been all but isolated for the past 70 years.
Yuval Steinitz, the first Israeli energy minister to visit Egypt since the 2011 uprising that ousted President Hosni Mubarak, said as much in an interview with Reuters on the meeting’s sidelines. “Israel exporting natural gas to the Arab world and also to Europe — this is something that sounded like a dream or a fantasy just 10 or 15 years ago,” he boasted.
In fact, Israel has already begun integrating itself into the regional gas market. In September, Israel and Egypt bought a 39 percent stake in the EMG pipeline, paving the way for a landmark $15 billion natural gas export deal to begin this year. It is also exporting gas to Jordan and to the PA. As well, the forum’s terms will offer Israel some protection from unilateral moves by member states that hurt its energy interests, such as Egypt’s 2012 decision to end a contract to supply Israel with natural gas. That protection is important to Israel as its gas exports to Jordan and the PA are not politically popular in the Jordanian and Palestinian streets.
However, membership in the forum also entails a number of disadvantages for Israel.
For one, it could be used as a way of pressuring Israel politically, although it would be done indirectly and quietly since the forum’s mandate is limited to energy issues. In particular, the PA could exploit its membership in the organization to undermine Israel’s growing political and security cooperation with Egypt.
The forum and its members’ committee on ensuring supply could pressure Israel into allowing development of the Gaza Marine offshore gas field, which lies outside Hamas-ruled Gaza.
In a controversial move at the time, Ehud Barak, when he was Israeli prime minister, ceded rights to the gas. However, after British Gas discovered 30 billion cubic meters of reserves there in 2000, Israel blocked development out of concern that profits from the gas could flow to terrorist organizations.
Another problem is the forum’s potential to tie Israel’s hand vis-a-vis future gas development. Egypt is angling to be the hub of the emerging regional market, which would make it the most powerful member of the group.
But many people in the Israeli energy industry say Israel shouldn’t countenance that position and should ensure its independence by, among other things, developing its own capacity for exports. For instance, Israel could build terminals to liquefy natural gas rather than send the gas to Egyptian LNG plants.
The idea of an Israeli LNG facility hasn’t been the subject of serious discussion by Israel, but if it did it might well run up against Egyptian claims that such a facility violates the terms of the forum, leading to a call for Israel’s expulsion.
The forum could also give Cairo a say in the proposed 2,000-kilometer (1,243-mile) East Med pipeline, which will stretch from Israel and Cyprus into Greece and Italy to export Israeli and Cypriot gas to Europe. Steinitz told Reuters this week that he expected to sign a construction deal for the pipeline “in a few weeks’ time.”
The pipeline is not a sure thing due to the cost and engineering challenges it proposes, but Egypt may leverage the forum to demand that all Israeli gas bound for Europe go through its LNG plants rather than via the pipeline.
Egypt’s interest in the forum is clear – to ensure its status as the most influential player. But Israel must ensure that the geopolitical gains it is getting don’t cause it to ignore its economic interests.
https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/business/in-first-arab-countries-admit-israel-into-a-regional-alliance-but-there-is-a-cost-1.6849030

Pompeo Takes US Anti-Iran Message to Gulf Arab States
Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat/January 17/19
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s Middle East tour brings to mind the sport of hurdling, as he tries to overcome obstacles while eyeing the last objective: Confronting Iran. The list of hurdles grows long: The Kurds, Turks, Syrians (both the government and fighting factions), Israelis, Iraqis, Saudis and Qataris. However, Pompeo left the region before completing the list. How can Iran — America’s main political millstone in the Middle East — be beleaguered without forcing it out of Syria, wearing down its influence in Iraq, defying it in Lebanon, using Israeli air power to pressure it, preventing Turkey from opening up to it, thwarting Qatar from cooperating with it, and persuading Saudi Arabia to produce more oil to meet the world’s needs without resorting to Iran’s oil?
These are the tasks entrusted to Pompeo, and truth be told, he did very well despite the numerous contradictions, objections and even flip-flops from his president, Donald Trump. Pompeo managed to put forward a big project in difficult conditions that angered Tehran: He even announced that Poland will host an international conference on Iran in mid-February.
His purpose is clear: To build a huge international coalition against Iran of more than 70 countries. Tehran is confident that US efforts are doomed to fail, because almost all of Washington’s partners have rejected a policy submitted by the White House that aims to isolate Iran by re-imposing sanctions. This has made President Hassan Rouhani assume that the US is isolated when it comes to dealing with Iran.
Pompeo’s unprecedented efforts have come a long way in putting forth measures and actions against Iran. Tehran is absolutely right to worry, especially since European governments have found themselves in an awkward position in the past two months after receiving more data about Iranian operations that killed two opposition members, and a foiled bomb attack against an Iranian opposition rally near Paris last June.Add to this the failure of Europe’s appeasement of Iran, and Brussels’ justifications in continuing to enforce the nuclear deal. The Iranian regime has not changed. It is still a wicked and dangerous regime that poses a great threat to the entire world, not only to Saudis, Bahrainis, Syrians and Yemenis. The odds of the success of the conference in Poland are high, especially, in light of recent events in Europe, Syria, Iraq and Yemen that have changed the convictions of many countries, and reduced the number of those defending Tehran. A big challenge, however, awaits Pompeo in trying to build a strong alliance against Iran — including the six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member states along with Egypt and Jordan — while also calming regional tensions. This is an almost impossible quest that requires him to adopt a different way of thinking and forge bilateral and multilateral brainstorming sessions.

For The Sake of The Stockholm Agreement
Salman Al-dossary/Asharq Al Awsat/January 17/19
A few days ago, the Houthis targeted a celebration of the Yemeni army with an Iranian-made drone carrying 30 kilograms of explosives that detonated in the air above the main podium of senior guests, killing six people and wounding 18 Yemeni soldiers, who were parading in front of a number of high-ranking military leaders. The attack constituted a serious turning point in the peace deal reached in Stockholm in mid-December but was not the only violation committed by the Houthis since the cease-fire began in Hodeidah. There were around 500 recorded violations, not to mention their breach of commitments made in Sweden by failing to meet the final withdrawal dates from the port of Hodeidah set by the United Nations. Moreover, no consensus was reached over the confidence-building measures. This puts the one-month-old Stockholm Agreement on the verge of collapse, in the wake of the Houthis’ intransigence and their failure to implement the commitments, which they had approved and agreed upon in front of the international community.
Houthis’ obstinacy is not something new. Since the first day of their coup against the legitimacy in September 2014, they have demonstrated their unwillingness to be a tool of peace. More than 75 agreements were forged between the Yemeni army and the Houthis during the six wars between them, without the rebels being able to abide by at least one of them.
This was confirmed by a “minister” in the Houthis’ illegitimate government, Hassan Zaid, who said that his group’s approval of the Stockholm Agreement was a “strategic error”, claiming that Houthis have lost many arguments of humanitarian aspect that they were using in their favor in the corridors of the international community and the United Nations, adding that attention is now shifted towards the group’s intransigence and its refusal to implement the agreement. The key problem facing any pending solution to the Yemeni crisis is the soft handling by the United Nations of Houthis’ behavior in their violation of any peace deal and their repeated undermining of all previous agreements. As long as there are no costs for these violations, what will force the Houthis, and their Iranian sponsor, to accept any peace agreement?!
Houthis’ violations of the Stockholm Agreement pose another serious threat to the credibility of the peace process, which is always stalled by their behavior. While the United Nations is taking clear steps towards the peace deal, it gives up its role in naming the side impeding this process.
In the event of the collapse of the current agreement, the credibility of the UN will be very weak. Without the international community and the UN asserting that the Houthis are the intransigent and manipulative side of what has been agreed upon in Sweden, the Yemeni crisis will further deteriorate, and all efforts to bring peace will fail. Chaos will persist and Yemen will become a source of insecurity to the Arab world, under the consent of the international community and the United Nations.
For the sake of the fragile ceasefire agreement, and to avoid that the crisis returns to point zero, the international community must intervene to stop Houthis’ abuses and to assert that the rebels are responsible for violating the peace agreement. Then the United States must intervene - as the main sponsor of the Stockholm talks - and allow the Yemeni army to complete its plans to liberate Hodeidah and all other cities by force of arms. What cannot be achieved through peace can only be attained by war.

New Delhi Must Uphold "Zero Tolerance" for Terrorism
Jagdish N. Singh/Gatestone Institute/January 17/2019
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13537/india-tolerance-terrorism
Engaging in "dialogue" with the separatists and the Taliban makes little sense. Neither group has demonstrated any faith in the values of modern civilization and democracy. Contrary to claims on the part of Jammu and Kashmir separatists and Pakistan -- that India never offered "unconditional dialogue," and has been rejecting Islamabad's peace overtures -- it is actually Pakistan's propaganda against Indian society that is responsible for the violence in Kashmir.
In fact, according to a 2017 Indian Intelligence Bureau report, Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence paid separatist leaders Rs 80,000,000 (approximately $1.2 million) to fuel unrest in Kashmir. These leaders include Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Asiya Andrabi, both of whom are reported to have links to Hizbul Mujahideen, a J&K separatist group that in August 2017 was designated by the U.S. State Department as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.
New Delhi's soft approach to the J&K separatists can only serve to embolden extremist forces. The Modi government also needs to refrain from extending any goodwill gestures to the Taliban -- a junior partner of Qaeda that aims to establish an Islamic caliphate in the Indian subcontinent, including in Jammu and Kashmir.
The current administration in Washington, like that in Jerusalem, grasps that all of the above radical groups have "common political targets -- the United States, India and Israel." Rather than risk being seduced by the false notion that it is possible to negotiate with terrorists, India would do well to reach out to its main democratic allies: the U.S. and Israel.
New Delhi's soft approach to the Jammu and Kashmir separatists can only serve to embolden extremist forces. The Modi government also needs to refrain from extending any goodwill gestures to the Taliban -- a junior partner of Qaeda that aims to establish an Islamic caliphate in the Indian subcontinent. Pictured: Srinagar, the largest city of Kashmir. (Image source: KennyOMG/Wikimedia Commons)
When the Narendra Modi-led government came to power in India with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in May 2014, the public hoped that a peaceful resolution would be reached over the strife-torn northern state of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K).
A key element of the BJP's platform had been a policy of "zero tolerance towards terrorism." Yet, since Modi's election, the situation in J&K -- which has been the focus of a long-standing conflict between India and Pakistan, with minority Hindus fleeing Islamist violence in 1990 -- has worsened. No Hindu has returned to the Kashmir Valley during Modi's premiership, and the number of Indian civilians and security personnel killed in attacks by Pakistani militants has increased. In fact, during the four-year period between 2014 and 2018, 75 more Indian soldiers and other security personnel were killed in J&K than during the previous five years (219, compared to 144).
Disturbingly, New Delhi's response to these assaults seems to be appeasement -- reaching out to separatist leaders in India and to the Taliban in Pakistan.
Emerging from a meeting in September 2018 of the Central Zonal Council in Lucknow, Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh told reporters:
"I think the [Kashmir] matter will be resolved. We are ready to talk to everyone. As far as terrorism is concerned, all security agencies are working in coordination."
Two months later, in November 2018, New Delhi sent a delegation of two former officials to the Moscow Peace Conference on Afghanistan, which was also attended by the Taliban.
Four months after that, in early January 2019 -- while addressing India's upper house of parliament, the Rajya Sabha -- Singh said that the government was prepared to engage in an "unconditional dialogue" with the leaders of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC).
The problem is that the APHC was established in 1993 to further Kashmiri separatism and promote Pakistan's claim on J&K.
"A perception was being created that BJP doesn't want to talk to Hurriyat," Singh said. "And then we asked people to go there (Kashmir) and have talks with them (Hurriyat). And when the all party delegation went there to talk, the doors were shut for them."
Engaging in "dialogue" with the separatists and the Taliban makes little sense. Neither group has demonstrated any faith in the values of modern civilization and democracy. Contrary to claims on the part of J&K separatists and Pakistan -- that India never offered "unconditional dialogue," and has been rejecting Islamabad's peace overtures -- it is actually Pakistan's propaganda against Indian society that is responsible for the violence in Kashmir. In fact, according to a 2017 Indian Intelligence Bureau report, Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) paid separatist leaders Rs 80,000,000 (approximately $1.2 million) to fuel unrest in Kashmir. These leaders include Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Asiya Andrabi, both of whom are reported to have links to Hizbul Mujahideen, a J&K separatist group that in August 2017 was designated by the U.S. State Department as a Foreign Terrorist Organization. Hizbul Mujahideen has been at the forefront of jihad against Hindus in Kashmir.
Although Geelani and other separatist leaders recently warned supporters "not to get swayed by the Islamic State ideology" -- after youths entered J&K's largest mosque waving ISIS flags -- and to reject attempts to link the Kashmir struggle with global jihad, it would be naïve to trust them. Both the J&K separatists and ISIS have been associated with al Qaeda. In addition, when the U.S. killed Osama bin Laden, Geelani asked imams to pray for the "martyr" who fought against "U.S. oppression."
New Delhi's soft approach to the J&K separatists can only serve to embolden extremist forces. The Modi government also needs to refrain from extending any goodwill gestures to the Taliban -- a junior partner of al Qaeda that aims to establish an Islamic caliphate in the Indian subcontinent, including in J&K.
On January 8, Shivshankar Menon, former Indian National Security Advisor, told a gathering of the Indo-American Friendship Association that New Delhi should not be worried about a possible withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan. "Have you ever seen an Afghan terrorist?" he said. "You see Pakistani terrorists. Our problem is Pakistan, not Afghanistan."
This is short-sighted when one considers the global connections between Iran and the Taliban, and that Kashmir and Kabul have been "closely knitted together through a tangled web of terrorist networks."
The current administration in Washington, like that in Jerusalem, grasps that all of the above radical groups have "common political targets -- the United States, India and Israel." Rather than risk being seduced by the false notion that it is possible to negotiate with terrorists, India would do well to reach out to its main democratic allies: the U.S. and Israel.
**Jagdish N. Singh is a senior journalist based in New Delhi.
© 2019 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.

Arafat and the Ayatollahs
طوني بدران: عرفات والملالي
Tony Badran/Tablet/January 17/19
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The PLO’s greatest single contribution to the Iranian Revolution was the formation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, but the Palestinian leader’s involvement with Iran didn’t end there
When Yasser Arafat arrived in Tehran on Feb. 17, 1979, the first “foreign leader” invited to visit Iran mere days after the victory of the revolution, he declared he was coming to his “own home.” There was some truth in Arafat’s flowery words. Having developed and nurtured a decade’s worth of relationships with all the major forces, from Marxists to Islamists, which had toppled the shah, he had good reason to feel like the victory of the revolution was in some part his own.
Although the heady days of February 1979 would soon give way to tensions, the Palestinians were integral to both the Islamic Revolution and to the formation of the Khomeinist regime. For Arafat, the revolutionary regime in Iran carried the promise of gaining a powerful new ally for the Palestinians. In addition, Arafat saw a chance to play the middleman between Iran and the Arabs, and to encourage them to eschew conflict with each other in favor of supporting the Palestinians in their fight against Israel. Yet it soon became clear that Arafat’s double fantasy was unattainable, and would in fact become quite dangerous to the Palestinian cause.
The relationship between the Iranian revolutionary factions and the Palestinians began in the late 1960s, in parallel with Arafat’s own rise in preeminence within the PLO. After the Iranian government crackdown of 1963, opposition groups resolved to adopt guerrilla tactics against the shah. By the end of the decade, Iranian opposition factions had made contact with Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) representatives in regional states including Qatar, and also Iraq, where Ayatollah Khomeini had been living since 1965. Marxist Iranian guerrilla organizations looking to receive training soon found their way to PLO camps in Jordan and South Yemen.
Yet after the defeat of the Arab armies in the 1967 war, and a string of PLO terror spectaculars made Arafat a media star, the PLO itself suffered a major military and political defeat in 1970, when it tried to take over Jordan. The Hashemite Kingdom then defeated and expelled Palestinian military organizations, in what became known as Black September.
One country afforded the defeated Palestinians the ability to operate freely under Arab cover, in the form of the Cairo Agreement of 1969. That country was Lebanon. Because the PLO’s position in the tiny country was unmatched anywhere else in the Arab world during the 1970s, Lebanon became the site where the major part of the Iranian revolutionaries’ encounter with the Palestinians played out.
Even before Lebanon’s own system collapsed, and the country plunged into civil war, fueled in part by Palestinian weapons and ambitions, the country had become a training ground for revolutionaries from all over the world, and a magnet for cadres of the main Iranian revolutionary factions, from Marxists to theocrats and everything in between. Leftist Palestinian groups, like the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), worked with Leftist Iranian factions, like the Marxist Fadaiyan-e Khalq and small Communist groups. Arafat’s Fatah organization worked with everyone. Coordinating these activities was Arafat’s right-hand man and Fatah’s chief military commander, Khalil al-Wazir, also known by his nom de guerre, Abu Jihad.
The number of guerrillas that trained in Lebanon with the Palestinians was not particularly large. But the Iranian cadres in Lebanon learned useful skills and procured weapons and equipment, which they smuggled back into Iran. A 1977 U.S. intelligence assessment noted the “quantity and sophistication of the weapons available to the terrorists,” which included “assault rifles, armor-piercing rifle grenades and possibly mortars, which allows them considerable flexibility in their tactics.” But guerrilla tactics carried out by Iranian leftist groups did not have any major success or even prominence in the revolutionary struggle within Iran before its very final phase. These tactics, however, would come into play in the transitional period following the collapse of the Pahlavi regime.
The three main Iranian opposition factions operating in Lebanon were: the Liberation Movement of Iran (LMI), often described as Islamic modernists; the Islamic-Marxist Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK); and the Islamist devotees of Ayatollah Khomeini. But the fact that the PLO worked with all of them didn’t mean that Arafat held them all in the same regard. The PLO did not develop any serious relationship with the LMI, for instance, which was aligned in Lebanon with the Iranian-Lebanese Shiite cleric Musa Sadr, who had fallen out with the Palestinians.
The PLO did establish close working ties with the Khomeinist faction. Three figures in particular from that camp were active in Lebanon, working closely with the PLO. Mohammad Saleh Hosseini, who was active in Iraq where he made contact with Fatah before coming to Lebanon in 1970; Jalaleddin Farsi, an Islamic activist and teacher who would run for president in 1980 as the Khomeinist faction’s candidate (before disclosure of his Afghan origin disqualified him); and Mohammad Montazeri, son of senior cleric Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri, and a militant who had a leading role in developing the idea of establishing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps once the revolution was won.
The Lebanese terrorist and PLO operative Anis Naccache, who coordinated with these three Iranian revolutionaries, has given an account of the relationship. In it, he talks about his Khomeinist allies’ fear of a coup, after their victory, as the impetus behind the creation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)—and he takes personal credit for the idea. Naccache claims that Jalaleddin Farsi approached him specifically and asked him directly to draft the plan to form the main pillar of the Khomeinist regime.
The formation of the IRGC may well be the greatest single contribution that the PLO made to the Iranian revolution. While it is also true that after the revolution, Montazeri asked Arafat to send Fatah fighters to Iran to directly train the new IRGC recruits, that effort did not see the light due to opposition from LMI figures in the provisional government. Reports of a massive Palestinian presence in Iran more generally would appear to be wildly overblown. While both the Palestinians and their enemies might fantasize about the PLO exerting a major independent influence inside Iran, there is no evidence that those fantasies ever approached fact.
The key battleground on which Palestinians and Iranians actually met was Lebanon. Khomeinist operatives in Lebanon were hostile to the LMI and their ally Musa Sadr, whose relationship with the Palestinians had turned antagonistic. The mutual hostility of Khomeinists and Palestinians towards Sadr led in 1978 to the Lebanese Shiite cleric’s murder in Libya—a country with whose leader, Muammar al-Qaddafi, the Khomeinists had established ties, with help from the Palestinians.
Arafat’s lieutenant, Ali Hassan Salameh, explained to the late CIA officer Robert Ames that Sadr was supposed to meet top Khomeini aide, Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti, to iron out differences under Qaddafi’s auspices in Tripoli. Sadr arrived, but Beheshti never did. Instead, according to Salameh, Beheshti asked Qaddafi to detain Sadr, whom he described as a Western agent. More importantly, Beheshti would also characterize Sadr as “a threat to Khomeini.”
Back in Lebanon, Sadr’s circles pointed the finger specifically at Arafat allies, Jalaleddin Farsi and Mohammad Saleh Hosseini. According to these circles, Hosseini told an official from Sadr’s Amal movement, “your friend isn’t coming back.”
In addition to liquidating Sadr, Libya was an important source of funding for Khomeini as well as for the MEK. It also would prove to be a useful ally with the breakout of war between the newborn Islamic Republic and Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, which presented itself as the sword of the Arabs against the Persians and sought to crush its expansive-minded revolutionary neighbor.
The interfactional alliances and murderous rivalries that played out in Lebanon foreshadowed the power struggle that took place in the two-year transitional period following the triumph of the revolution, as the Khomeinists moved to consolidate their grip on power.
Arafat understood that the Khomeinists had the largest capacity for popular mobilization among the revolutionary forces inside Iran. But being Arafat, he always looked to keep multiple channels open while trying to leverage contradictory relationships. Following the revolution itself, he maintained his ties to the MEK, which in 1979-1981 was locked in a violent fight with the Khomeinist faction. That had now coalesced in the Islamic Republic Party (IRP), which dubbed itself Hezbollah, or the Party of God.
Hani Fahs, a Lebanese Shiite cleric who worked with Fatah as a liaison with the Iranians, explained that Arafat saw continuing his relationship with the MEK as a way to “poke” at the new Iranian regime if he wanted something or if he was upset at them. Shaking down Arab states was an established method for Arafat, one he thought he could replicate with Iran.
It’s also been noted that as the new Iranian regime launched operations to suppress the Kurdish insurgency in 1980, the defense minister at the time, Mostafa Chamran, who had spent time in Lebanon and was a close ally of Musa Sadr, recognized in the insurgency some of the same guerrilla tactics he saw the Palestinians and their allies use against Sadr’s Amal militia in Lebanon.
Yet Arafat’s continued ties to the MEK as it fought a bloody battle with the IRP, and his attempts to stick his nose in domestic Iranian affairs, did not amuse Khomeini, who had no patience for the Palestinian chief’s juggling act, and saw his actions as threats. Attempts by the PLO to overstep its boundaries within the Iranian political sphere were quickly shut down, in ways that were often not subtle.
Fahs relays a relevant anecdote of how he once offered his opinion during a conversation Mohammad Saleh Hosseini was having with Jalaleddin Farsi about Iranian foreign affairs, only to be put in his place by Hosseini, who curtly informed Fahs that he had no business weighing in on Iranian matters.
To be sure, Fahs was but a lowly apparatchik. Nevertheless, this attitude extended to Arafat himself, and to his lieutenants. In fact, as a 1980 CIA memo explained, PLO offices in Iran were closely monitored. The new regime would not allow Arafat and his Palestinians to become the tail that wagged the Khomeinist dog.
It wasn’t only Arafat’s attempt to play politics inside Iran that soured his relationship with Khomeini. From the get-go, Arafat also tried to cash in on his ties with the new regime by attempting to mediate the 444-day U.S. Embassy hostage crisis. Arafat’s meddling angered Khomeini, and further increased his suspicions of the Palestinian leader. When Arafat sent one of his top aides, Abu Walid (Saad Sayel), to Tehran to mediate, at the Americans’ request, Khomeini refused to receive him.
The Iraq-Iran war only deepened the PLO chairman’s predicament. Arafat could not side with Iran and condemn Iraq. That would risk losing the support of the Arabs, especially the wealthy Gulf states, which helped sponsor Saddam by paying him blackmail, and also provided the lion’s share of direct and indirect funding though bribes, payoffs, and remittances for the PLO’s own operations.
Again, Arafat tried to mediate. Khomeini, busy fighting a war in which half a million soldiers are estimated to have died, a majority of whom were Iranian, didn’t even bother to receive him this time. If Arafat thought he could ride two horses at once, balancing Iran against the Arabs, he was quickly disabused of that notion.
By the end of 1981, Arafat had very clearly lost favor in Tehran. To make things worse, two of his closest Iranian allies, Mohammad Montazeri and Mohammad Saleh Hosseini, would be assassinated that year—the former in an MEK bombing, the latter by Iraqi agents in Beirut. By then, the IRP had consolidated its grip on power within Iran and sidelined rival factions.
Likewise, within Lebanon, the dominant Iranian revolutionary faction—Hezbollah—had already begun cloning itself within its host country. Khomeini lieutenants like Hosseini had used connections with Fatah to recruit new cadres of Lebanese Shiite youth (among whom was a young man named Imad Mughniyeh) to their own banner. These recruits received military training in Fatah’s camps, but became part of a separate Khomeinist formation which was named after its Iranian progenitor.
In 1982, the PLO would be routed in Lebanon by the IDF, and was forced to withdraw its leadership under American protection to Tunis. By then the Iranians had already set up their own alternative structure to the PLO within Lebanon, formally known as Hezbollah.
Arafat would have one last dance with Iran before his death. After launching the Second Intifada against Israel, Arafat reached out to Iran for weapons. He purchased a freighter, the Karine A, in Lebanon, and the Iranians loaded it with 50 tons of weapons. Hezbollah commander Imad Mughniyeh played an integral role in the operation. The IDF intercepted the ship in January 2002.
Arafat’s fantasy of pulling the strings and balancing the Iranians and the Arabs in a grand anti-Israel camp of regional states never stood much of a chance. However, his wish to see Iran back the Palestinian armed struggle is now a fact, as Tehran has effectively become the principal, if not the only, sponsor of the Palestinian military option though its direct sponsorship of Islamic Jihad and its sustaining strategic and organizational ties with Hamas.
By forging ties with the Khomeinists, Arafat unwittingly helped to achieve the very opposite of his dream. Iran has turned the Palestinian factions into its proxies, and the PLO has been relegated to the regional sidelines.
https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/278896/arafat-and-the-ayatollahs

Pompeo’s tour provokes differing reactions inside Iran
د. ماجد ربيزاده/جولة بومبيو تثير ردود فعل متباينة داخل إيران
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Arab News/January 17/19
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Many Iranian politicians, state-controlled TV outlets and Persian newspapers dedicated a significant amount of time to covering or commentating on the recent Middle Eastern tour by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, which included visits to Egypt, Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Oman.
One of the crucial topics at the top of Pompeo’s agenda was laying out the US vision toward the Islamic Republic. The points he made about the Iranian regime during a speech at the University of Cairo were a total contradiction to those delivered by the previous administration.
The Iranian policy carried out by President Barack Obama concentrated on cooperating and engaging with the Iranian leaders in order to promote peace and stability in the Middle East. Obama famously stated in his 2009 speech, titled “On a New Beginning,” that: “Rather than remain trapped in the past, I’ve made it clear to Iran’s leaders and people that my country is prepared to move forward.”
This caused the US to substantially shift its Iran stance and pursue a series of unprecedented appeasement policies, which included the nuclear deal and the lifting of four rounds of UN Security Council sanctions. There was also the shipment of millions of dollars of cash to Tehran in exchange for prisoners; looking the other way when the Iranian people rose up against the theocratic establishment and sought democracy during the Green Movement; and secret agreements, including the revelation that the Obama administration issued a license to let Iran sidestep US sanctions so it could convert $5.7 billion of frozen funds through an American bank.
Unfortunately, the costly results of such policies were that the hardliners in Iran gained more power and Tehran became more aggressive and destructive in the Middle East. As billions of dollars began flowing into Iran’s treasury thanks to the nuclear agreement, the regime substantially expanded its influence in several countries, including Yemen, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon, increased its funding and weaponry assistance to its militia and terror groups, heightened its anti-American policies, and advanced its ballistic missile objectives.
From the perspective of the Iranian leaders, economic or political concessions mean weakness, not diplomatic accomplishments.
Pompeo, however, made it clear that Washington is not intending to counter Iran’s malignant activities with appeasement policies. Instead, Pompeo declared: “We fostered a common understanding with our allies of the need to counteract the Iran regime’s revolutionary agenda. Countries increasingly understand that we must confront the ayatollahs, not coddle them.”
The reaction in Tehran has been mixed. Some Iranian politicians, specifically the hardliners, have shown signs of concern and believe that the moderates failed to counter the US and effectively advance Iran’s interests. The hardline Etemad newspaper issued a warning in an article titled “Pompeo is visiting nine countries in the region with the objective of countering Iran.”
Another reason for the hardliners’ concern is the possibility that a united front may be established against Tehran. This would create an economic stranglehold that would force the Iranian government to concentrate on its domestic agenda. Last week, the EU appeared to have shifted its Iran policy in light of Dutch revelations about two assassination plots. It imposed sanctions on the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence, as well as on Saeid Hashemi Moghadam, the deputy intelligence minister.
Unlike the hardliners, Iran’s moderates seemed to dismiss Pompeo’s visit and announcements as a collection of words rather than tangible actions.
The subsequent US plans have also added to the hardliners’ fears. The US attempted to urge the EU to join Washington and Middle Eastern countries in order to counter Tehran’s activities. Washington is also planning to hold a conference in Poland to focus on how to counter Iran. The conference will include dozens of countries from around the world.
Nevertheless, unlike the hardliners, Iran’s moderates seemed to dismiss Pompeo’s visit and announcements as a collection of words rather than tangible actions. For example, Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif mocked Pompeo’s speech by saying: “Best for the US to just get over loss of Iran.” And: “Reminder to host/participants of anti-Iran conference: Those who attended last US anti-Iran show are either dead, disgraced, or marginalized. And Iran is stronger than ever.”
From the moderates’ perspective, if the current US administration has failed to set up a united front against Iran after two years of being in power and after withdrawing from the nuclear deal, it is less likely to succeed in the coming years.
But, more importantly, President Hassan Rouhani and Zarif are attempting to score a victory by showing the hardliners, specifically Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, that they have succeeded at scuttling US objectives and promoting Iran’s revolutionary ideology.
Finally, following Pompeo’s visit to the region, Iran will most likely react by escalating its defiance and violations of international laws.
*Dr. Majid Rafizadeh is a Harvard-educated Iranian-American political scientist. He is a leading expert on Iran and US foreign policy, a businessman and president of the International American Council. Twitter: @Dr_Rafizadeh