English LCCC Newsbulletin For
Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For August 21/2020
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
#elias_bejjani_news
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Bible Quotations For today
Do not be
astonished, brothers and sisters, that the world hates you. We know that we have
passed from death to life because we love one another. Whoever does not love
abides in death
First Letter of John 03/11-22:”This
is the message you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one
another. We must not be like Cain who was from the evil one and murdered his
brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his
brother’s righteous. Do not be astonished, brothers and sisters, that the world
hates you. We know that we have passed from death to life because we love one
another. Whoever does not love abides in death. All who hate a brother or sister
are murderers, and you know that murderers do not have eternal life abiding in
them. We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us and we ought to
lay down our lives for one another. How does God’s love abide in anyone who has
the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?
Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.
And by this we will know that we are from the truth and will reassure our hearts
before him. whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts,
and he knows everything. Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have
boldness before God; and we receive from him whatever we ask, because we obey
his commandments and do what pleases him.”
Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials
published on August 20-21/2021
Earthquake strikes in Mediterranean Sea off Lebanon’s coast
MoPH: 1019 new coronavirus cases, 5 deaths
The Lebanese Parliament failed in Responding To The President's Letter
Israeli Strikes on Syria Kill 'Four Hizbullah Fighters'
Israeli Strikes on Syria Kill 'Four Hizbullah Fighters'
Aoun ups calls for urgent UN action to ensure Israeli violations not repeated
Aoun Urges U.N. to Act Quickly to Halt Israel's Violations
Report: Govt. Formation Reaching Dead End, Unless Aoun Shows Less Rigidity
Diab Orders U.N. Complaint against Israel over 'Dangerous' Aerial Violation
Report: Parties Convince Miqati to Postpone Resignation
Bassil: We wonder if our presence in the Parliament is still useful
Army chief meets UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon
Camille Chamoun to Nasrallah: Lebanon is not Iranian territory
Geagea: Nasrallah suggesting unrealistic solutions
UNRWA Urges Support for Palestine Refugees in Lebanon amid Dire Situation
Politics Berri condemns Israeli exploitation of Lebanese airspace to target
Syria
Gas Crisis Averted after BDL OKs Shipment Entry
Hezbollah’s decision to bring Iranian fuel tanker to Lebanon triggers new crisis
What do Lebanon and Afghanistan have in common in Western political
thought?/Ambassador Dr. Hisham Hamdan/August 20/2021
Lebanese politician in Beirut blast investigation under fire over daughter’s
wedding
Hezbollah, Taliban et consorts, ou les revers de la modernité dans l’islam
contemporain/Charles Elias Chartouni/August 20/2021
Titles For The Latest English LCCC
Miscellaneous Reports And News published on August 20-21/2021
Taliban Revenge Fears Grow in Afghanistan
US President Biden says he cannot promise what final outcome will be in
Afghanistan
Taliban seized control of Afghanistan, but a major challenge remains: Cash
Sombre mood across Afghanistan as Taliban are back at Friday prayers
US has 5,800 troops at Kabul airport to help with evacuations: Official
UAE agrees to hosting 5000 Afghan nationals evacuated on US flights from Kabul
Putin says world must prevent 'collapse' of Afghanistan
Who are the most influential Taliban leaders?
Taliban seize US war chest given to Afghan govt: Humvees, helicopters, drones,
guns
Al-Qaeda-linked groups in Syria, Yemen welcome Taliban victory
Merkel and Putin to Discuss Afghanistan, Other 'Big' Issues
Afghan President Latest Leader on the Run to Turn Up in UAE
Israel Announces Deal to Resume Qatari Aid to Gaza
Iraqi political forces rally to postpone elections
Regime Fire Kills 8 Children in Syria's Idlib in 2 Days
Titles For The Latest The Latest LCCC
English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on
August 20-21/2021
History Lesson - Biden is Obama 3.0 on Embracing Jihadists/Pete Hoekstra/Gatestone
Institute/August 20/2021
In Middle East, Taliban victory seen as sign of US unreliability/Hams Rabah/The
Arab Weekly/August 20/2021
Question: "What is repentance and is it necessary for salvation?"/GotQuestions.org/August
21/2021
The Latest English LCCC Lebanese &
Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on August 20-21/2021
Earthquake strikes in
Mediterranean Sea off Lebanon’s coast
Rawad Taha, Al Arabiya English/21 August ,2021
Reports from the European-Mediterranean Seismological center (EMSC) have shown
that a 3.3 magnitude earthquake has occurred 69 kilometers southwest of Beirut
in the Mediterranean Sea on Friday evening. No damages have been reported in
Lebanon. According to a research
by the American University in Beirut, even though the seismicity in Lebanon was
very low in the last century; Lebanon fault system is considered to be capable
of generating moderate to high earthquakes as it was mentioned by several
studies addressing Lebanon seismicity. “Lebanon is located over the massive
Levant fault, which is 1,200 kilometer-long and stretches from the Gulf of Aqaba
to Turkey. In Lebanon, this fault is divided into three major sections which
have already generated numerous devastating earthquakes characterized by a
magnitude above 7: among others, the 551 earthquake and tsunami which happened
over the Mount Lebanon thrust (at sea) and the 1202 earthquake which happened
over the Yammouneh fault,” the research added. The research said that even
though the seismicity recorded in recent years has only been moderate,
paleoseismic studies have shown that the faults linked to the Yammouneh one and
the Mount Lebanon Thrust could now rupture again.
MoPH: 1019 new coronavirus cases, 5
deaths
NNA/August 20/2021
Lebanon has recorded 1019 new coronavirus cases and five more deaths in the last
24 hours, as reported by the Ministry of Public Health on Friday.
The Lebanese Parliament failed in Responding To The
President's Letter
LCCC/August 21/2021
The Lebanese parliament held an urgent session yesterday. The session aimed to
look into the president's letter in which he call on the parliament to decide
what should be done to face the Central Bank's Governor decision to put a stop
for subsiding numerous imported items among which is financing the import
of oil with US dollars. The parliament ended its session without reaching a
decision and called for the formation of a news government and to fasten the
support card.
Israeli strikes on Syria target
Hezbollah sites, four militiamen killed
The Arab Weekly/August 20/2021
BEIRUT--Israeli air strikes on Syria have killed four pro-Iranian fighters
allied to the Damascus regime, a Britain-based war monitor said Friday. Syrian
state media earlier said its air defence system engaged “hostile targets” over
the capital Damascus late on Thursday. “The Israeli enemy launched an aerial
attack … targeting positions near Damascus and around the city of Homs,” a
military source told state news agency SANA. “Our air defence responded to the
missiles and shot most of them down.”The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights
said the Israeli missiles had targeted “arms depots and military positions”
belonging to the Lebanese Shia movement Hezbollah, in the Qarah area in the
northwest of Damascus province, near Homs province and the Lebanese border. The
strikes had killed four members of the Iran-backed Hezbollah group, the
Britain-based war monitor said. Lebanese media also earlier reported two
missiles had fallen in the Qalamoun region. The Israeli army rarely acknowledges
its strikes in Syria and a spokesperson told AFP it did “not comment on foreign
media information”. However, since the start of the war in Syria ten years ago,
Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes on Syrian territory, targeting
regime positions as well as allied Iranian forces and members of Hezbollah.
Israel regularly says it will not allow Syria to become a stronghold of its
sworn enemy Iran. The Syrian conflict, which began in 2011 with the regime’s
repression of pro-democracy protests, has grown increasingly complex over the
past decade, drawing in more and more parties.
According to the Observatory, the war has left nearly half a
million people dead.
Israeli Strikes on Syria Kill 'Four Hizbullah Fighters'
Agence France Presse/August 20/2021
Israeli airstrikes on Syria have killed four pro-Iranian fighters allied to the
Damascus regime, a Britain-based war monitor said Friday. Syrian state media
earlier said its air defense system engaged "hostile targets" over the capital
Damascus late on Thursday.
The Israeli enemy launched an aerial attack... targeting positions near Damascus
and around the city of Homs," a military source told state news agency SANA.
"Our air defense responded to the missiles and shot most of them down."The
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the Israeli missiles had targeted "arms
depots and military positions" belonging to Lebanon’s Hezbollah, in the Qarah
area in the northwest of Damascus province, near Homs province and the Lebanese
border.The strikes killed four members of the Iran-backed group, but it was not
immediately clear whether they were Syrian or Lebanese, the Britain-based war
monitor said. Lebanese media also earlier reported two
missiles had fallen in the Qalamoun region. The
Israeli army rarely acknowledges its strikes in Syria and a spokesperson told
AFP it did "not comment on foreign media information." However, since the start
of the war in Syria ten years ago, Israel has carried out hundreds of air
strikes on Syrian territory, targeting regime positions as well as allied
Iranian forces and members of Hizbullah. Israel
regularly says it will not allow Syria to become a stronghold of its sworn enemy
Iran. The Syrian conflict, which began in 2011 with the regime's repression of
pro-democracy protests, has grown increasingly complex over the past decade,
drawing in more and more parties.According to the Observatory, the war has left
nearly half a million people dead.
Aoun ups calls for urgent UN action
to ensure Israeli violations not repeated
NNA/August 20/2021
President of the Republic, General Michel Aoun, on Friday informed United
Nations Special Coordinator in Lebanon, Joanna Wronecka, that the Israeli
drones' violation of the Lebanese airspace last night was a new breach of
Lebanese sovereignty and Resolution 1701."This requires swift action by the
United Nations to ensure that such acts are put to a halt and never happen
again," the President said. "Tensions witnessed in the south on August 5 and the
airstrikes Israeli warplanes launched on southern villages for the first time
since 2006 have agitated the security situation following the repeated Israeli
attacks on Lebanon, which led to filing a complaint before the UN," he added.
Moreover, Aoun reiterated the necessity to abide by Resolution 1701, and hoped
that the UNIFIL mandate would be renewed on August 30 without change.
Turning to the government formation, the President briefed
his guest on the process development, stressing that meetings with the Prime
Minister-designate will continue. For her part,
Wronecka conveyed to her host the condolences of the UN chief for the victims of
the tragic incident in Akkar. She also hoped a new empowered government would be
formed soon to implement necessary reforms and address the urgent needs of the
people.
Aoun Urges U.N. to Act
Quickly to Halt Israel's Violations
Naharnet/August 20/2021
President Michel Aoun on Friday called on the United Nations to address Israel’s
violations of Lebanon’s airspace, hours after Israel carried out an airstrike on
Syria from Lebanon’s skies. Aoun voiced his remarks during a meeting in Baabda
with U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Joanna Wronecka.
“The Israeli aircraft’s violation of the Lebanese airspace overnight is a new
violation of Lebanese sovereignty and Resolution 1701, which requires swift
action by the U.N. to guarantee that it won’t be repeated and to put an end to
it,” the President told the U.N. coordinator. Israeli warplanes overflew Lebanon
at low altitude on Thursday night and missiles were reportedly seen crossing the
Lebanese airspace during an airstrike on the suburbs of the Syrian regions of
Damascus and Homs. The sounds of the fighter jets and missiles sparked panic in
the Lebanese capital and other Lebanese regions.
Lebanese media also reported two missiles fell in the Qalamoun region bordering
Lebanon. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor,
said that "Israeli missiles targeted arms depots and military positions of"
Hizbullah between Syria's Damascus and Homs.
Report: Govt. Formation Reaching Dead End, Unless
Aoun Shows Less Rigidity
Naharnet/August 20/2021
President Michel Aoun has hit out at Prime Minister-designate Najib Miqati,
accusing him of not wanting to form a government, according to a political
source. The source told Asharq
al-Awsatt newspaper, in remarks published Friday that Aoun is trying to hold
Miqati responsible for the delay in the government formation process.
Aoun had sent to Miqati, through the General Director of the Presidential Palace
Antoine Choucair, a list containing new names that had not been previously
presented nor discussed in their last meeting, according to the source,
The source added that "Miqati refuses to be a partner in obstructing the
government formation, and will not accept to form a government that contradicts
the French initiative and that is based on (the head of the Free Patriotic
Movement, Jebran) Bassil’s ambitions.”The source also remarked that "Miqati had
said many times that the government formation timeframe is not open-ended."
“Aoun is insisting on choosing partisans affiliated with Bassil to fill key
ministerial portfolios, including the energy portfolio,” the informed source
stated. According to the newspaper’s source, “the government formation is now
hitting a dead-end unless Aoun decides to be less rigid and to make way for the
selection of ministers who can restore the trust of the Lebanese and address the
international community that is refraining from helping Lebanon unless a reform
government is formed.”
Diab Orders U.N. Complaint against Israel over
'Dangerous' Aerial Violation
Naharnet/August 20/2021
Caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab on Friday asked caretaker Foreign Minister
Zeina Akar to file an urgent U.N. complaint against Israel over its violation of
Lebanon’s airspace during the overnight strike on Syria. Diab said Israel
“violated Lebanese sovereignty and subjected the safety of civilian aviation and
the lives of Lebanese and foreign civilian passengers to a direct danger.”“The
Israeli enemy’s continued violation of Lebanon’s sovereignty represents a direct
threat to U.N. resolution 1701,” the caretaker PM added in a statement, calling
on the U.N. and the international community to “condemn the Israeli aggression
and take measures that preserve Lebanese sovereignty and protect U.N. resolution
1701,” Diab added. Akar also issued a statement condemning the violations and
saying the overflight sparked panic among Lebanese citizens. Israeli warplanes
overflew Lebanon at low altitude on Thursday night and missiles were reportedly
seen crossing the Lebanese airspace during an airstrike on the suburbs of the
Syrian regions of Damascus and Homs. The sounds of the fighter jets and missiles
sparked panic in the Lebanese capital and other Lebanese regions. Lebanese media
also reported two missiles fell in the Qalamoun region bordering Lebanon. The
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor, said that
"Israeli missiles targeted arms depots and military positions of" Hizbullah
between Syria's Damascus and Homs.
Report: Parties Convince Miqati to Postpone
Resignation
Naharnet/August 20/2021
The government formation process suffered a setback in recent days due to
President Michel Aoun’s keenness on having “a blocking one-third” and catering
to the “ambitions of Free Patriotic Movement chief MP Jebran Bassil,” informed
sources have said.“Hizbullah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah’s
declaration that the arrival of Iranian oil was imminent increased the
government formation complications… because the U.S. Caesar Act would be ready
to besiege Lebanon, which does not tempt anyone to form a government in such a
situation,” the sources told the Kuwaiti al-Anbaa newspaper in remarks published
Friday. The sources added that “Miqati was inclined to declare his resignation
prior to his 12th meeting with President (Michel) Aoun yesterday, but some sides
convinced him to postpone that until after today’s parliament session.”“Miqati
was preparing to visit President Aoun on Wednesday to finalize the cabinet
line-up, but amendments carried to him by Presidential Palace Director General
Antoine Choucair suggested that President Aoun and his presidential team were
seeking to obtain 10 ministers, not seven as they should, which prompted Miqati
to realize that this camp is still seeking to get a blocking one-third,” the
sources went on to say.
Bassil: We wonder if our presence in
the Parliament is still useful
NNA/August 20/2021
We wonder if our presence in the Parliament is still useful, or if it's time to
shorten the term of the House and hold early elections, MP Gebran Bassil told a
Parliament session at the UNESCO Palace on Friday.
"Everything that is going on is the result of vexatious politics, especially in
terms of the electricity dossier," the head of the Free Patriotic Movement
said."Central bank governor, Riad Salameh, made a unilateral decision. We are
days away from an explosion due to the fuel crisis," he added. For his part,
Speaker Berri rejected Bassil's threats of stepping down, saying: "No one can
threaten with resignations."
He also called for declaring a state of healthcare emergence to allow hospitals
to import heir medical and pharmaceutical needs, as well as for curbing medicine
cartels.
Army chief meets UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon
NNA/August 20/2021
Lebanese army chief, General Joseph Aoun, met Friday at his Yarze office with UN
Special Coordinator for Lebanon, Joanna Wronecka, with whom he discussed the
current situation on the local and regional scenes.
Camille Chamoun to Nasrallah: Lebanon is not Iranian
territory
NNA/August 20/2021
National Liberal Party Chief, Camille Chamoun, tweeted this evening in response
to Hezbollah Secretary-General’s address earlier today, saying: “"Sanctions are
more and more and perhaps war is on the doorstep. This is what we will reach if
Sayyed Nasrallah's words about the Iranian ship are true. No, Sayyed, Lebanon
has never been, nor will be an Iranian territory.”
Geagea: Nasrallah suggesting
unrealistic solutions
NNA/August 20/2021
Lebanese Forces' leader, Samir Geagea, said Friday that the solutions to the
fuel crisis proposed by Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah are
"unrealistic" and that they will yield unneeded results. "Amidst the prevailing
hardships and misery, we see some leaders such as Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah (...)
suggesting unrealistic and non-existing solutions that lead to the exact
opposite of what is needed currently," Geagea told Free Lebanon radio station.
"Eventually, if things turn out to be true and the Iranian ships reach Lebanon
at the market price, then we have ships off the Lebanese coast which are ready
to enter the country and require the market liberalization by Aoun, Diab, and
Ghajar," he added."The solution that the Iranian ships offer is already
available," he stressed.
UNRWA Urges Support for Palestine Refugees in
Lebanon amid Dire Situation
Naharnet/August 20/2021
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near
East (UNRWA) is “extremely alarmed by the rapid deterioration of the situation
in Lebanon and its effects on Palestine refugees,” it said in a statement.
“Between the economic and financial meltdown, COVID-19, the disastrous impact of
the Beirut Port explosion, and as the country plunges deeper into multiple
crises, Palestine refugees, one of Lebanon’s most vulnerable communities,
struggle ever harder to survive,” UNRWA warned. The crises that have accumulated
since 2019 have affected all segments of society in Lebanon, “drastically
impacting” the access of refugees in general -- and Palestine refugees in
particular -- to “sources of livelihoods,” the U.N. agency added. The
unprecedented depreciation of the local currency has slashed the purchasing
power of Palestine refugees as prices continue to increase dramatically, with
inflation surpassing 100 per cent. Poverty rates are soaring amongst vulnerable
communities, including Palestine refugees. “While the international community
and aid agencies struggle to fill the unprecedented needs in Lebanon, which is
now witnessing an acute shortage of fuel and goods, it is crucial to give
adequate attention to the extremely dire conditions that most Palestine refugees
in Lebanon live in, including Palestine refugees who have escaped the armed
conflict in Syria,” said UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini. UNRWA
remains the main provider of basic services, such as health, education and camp
improvement to over 210,000 Palestine refugees present in Lebanon. These include
about 28,000 Palestine refugees from Syria. A recent briefing paper by the
Lebanon Humanitarian INGO Forum gave a very somber description of the hardship
that Palestine refugees face in Lebanon, describing them as “slipping through
the cracks” of the service system in the country, despite the availability of
UNRWA basic services to them. Surveys conducted lately by UNRWA confirm that
employment opportunities, including as daily paid workers, of Palestine refugees
in Lebanon have become almost inexistent and that almost all Palestine refugees
are living below the poverty line. “As the U.N. and the broader aid community in
Lebanon is stretched to the limits in its attempts to support the people of
Lebanon, UNRWA calls on donors to support the response to the most urgent needs
of Palestine refugees. These include cash assistance, increased coverage for
health and medical services and ensuring that Palestine refugee children in
Lebanon go back to school,” the agency urged. “The situation in Palestine
refugee camps is highly volatile and young people in particular report a level
hopelessness that leaves few prospects for a dignified life,” said Lazzarini.
“It is extremely urgent to ensure adequate support to UNRWA to help ease the
extreme vulnerability that Palestine refugees in Lebanon are in,” he added.
Politics Berri condemns Israeli
exploitation of Lebanese airspace to target Syria
NNA/August 20/2021
House Speaker, Nabih Berri, on Friday condemned an airstrike the Israeli enemy
had carried out on Syria using Lebanon's skies. "Not
only is last night's Zionist exploitation of the Lebanese airspace sovereignty
and its usage once again as a podium to launch attacks on sisterly Syria --
threatening the safety of civil aviation from and to Rafik Hariri international
airport -- a blatant violation of (UN) resolution 1701, but also an unspeakable
hostility against both Lebanon and Syria," said Berri. "We call the
international community for a swift action to take the necessary measures to
curb the Israeli entity's acts of aggression towards Lebanon and the region," he
added.
Gas Crisis Averted after BDL OKs Shipment Entry
Naharnet/August 20/2021
The Syndicate of the Gas Filling Factories in Lebanon announced Friday that the
Banque du Liban has approved the entry of a ship carrying 5,000-ton of liquid
gas on Monday, August 23.The syndicate reassured the Lebanese that "this vital
substance will remain available in the coming days." Oil importing companies had
warned in a statement earlier on Friday that they “would not be able to supply
the market with cooking gas, starting next Wednesday, August 25, unless the
authorities take the appropriate measures.”The companies had also called on
authorities to “take the necessary measures quickly,” and “to agree on a price
for gas, so that importing companies can buy and distribute it.”
Hezbollah’s decision to bring Iranian fuel tanker to Lebanon triggers new
crisis
The Arab Weekly/August 20/2021
BEIRUT--The announcement by Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah that an Iranian
fuel tanker will soon reach Lebanon will further deepen the Lebanese crisis and
hinder Prime Minister-designate Najib Mikati’s attempts to form a cabinet,
analysts in Beirut say. Sources see Nasrallah as upping the ante and seeking to
challenge what remains of the Lebanese state. In so doing he would establish the
notion that his Iran-aligned party is tantamount to the whole of Lebanon.
Nasrallah enraged critics by saying that the Iranian tankers that will transport
fuel to Lebanon constitute Lebanese territory. He was slammed for trying to
consecrate Lebanon as an Iranian province.
Nasrallah’s statements triggered a violent response from
former Prime Minister and leader of the Future Movement, Saad Hariri, who said
he feared Lebanon could face fresh new sanctions and embargoes because of
Hezbollah’s move.
Hariri tweeted, “Is what we heard this morning about the arrival of Iranian
ships good news for the Lebanese or a dangerous announcement indicating that
Lebanon will be drawn into internal and external conflicts? Hezbollah knows that
the basis of the fuel crisis in Lebanon resides in deliberate smuggling of fuel
to serve the Syrian regime. The solution should be to stop the smuggling instead
of creating expectations of receiving Iranian fuel”. He added “The party also
knows that the Iranian support ships will bring with them additional risks and
sanctions to the Lebanese, similar to the sanctions to which Venezuela and other
countries have been subjected. “To consider Iranian
ships as constituting Lebanese territory represents the highest form of slight
to our national sovereignty and an unacceptable invitation to treat Lebanon as
if it were an Iranian province.”
He vowed that, “we will not, under any circumstances, be a cover for projects to
thrust Lebanon into absurd wars against the Arabs and the world.”Washington has
frequently imposed sanctions on Iranian entities and figures with ties to
Tehran. In May 2018, the United States re-imposed sanctions on Iran, after it
withdrew from an international agreement on Tehran’s nuclear programme.
Hariri added, “Yes, Iran is obstructing the formation of the
government. Otherwise, how can the Iranian state allow itself to violate
international laws and agree to send ships to Lebanon without the approval of
the Lebanese government? Are we in a country where Hezbollah wields all
ministerial portfolios, from health to the economy to defence, to ports and
public works and has the latitude anytime it wants to order medicines from Iran
and bring in Iranian ships loaded with diesel and gasoline and threaten to bring
them in by sea, land and in broad daylight, despite the will of the military and
security authorities.” He stressed that “Hezbollah will not have a permit to
hand Lebanon over to Iranian influence.”
Lebanese sources pointed out that Saad Hariri’s violent response to Nasrallah
contrasted with the total silence of President Michel Aoun, who has not said a
word about a move that poses great danger to the country, its economy and its
future as a whole. The head of the Lebanese Forces Party, Samir Geagea, blamed
Aoun for any consequences that might accrue from bringing in fuel tankers from
Iran. In a letter to Aoun, Geagea said, “You, Mr President, bear full
responsibility for what might happen to the country as a result of not freeing
the import of oil, medicine, and other items, while you are letting Hezbollah do
this by twisted and illegal means, which will expose Lebanon to a real
disaster.”
Nasrallah revealed Thursday that a fuel tanker will leave Iran and head towards
Lebanon within hours. “I announce that our first fuel tanker, which will set out
from Iran, has completed all the formalities and will sail within hours,” he
said.
He added, according to what was reported by Al-Manar channel, that “this tanker
will be followed by other tankers,” and warned against interception of the
vessel saying, “No one should be mistaken about our experience in wars, be they
military, economic or in the field of security.”
He thanked Iran for its support to Lebanon and said that “for 40 years, Iran has
not interfered in Lebanese affairs and our decision is in our hands.” Nasrallah
railed against the US embassy in Beirut, accusing it of “running the economic
and media war against Lebanon and standing behind the incitement.”
The Lebanese wait daily in long lines in front of fuel
stations to purchase petrol. The lengthy wait has sometimes
sparked deadly violence, while some service stations have
closed down completely. Many Lebanese resort to buying fuel on the black market.
The fuel crisis has impacted several sectors, including hospitals, bakeries,
communications and grocery stores. The crisis was caused by the inability of the
Electricité du Liban to provide energy to all regions of the country, leading to
the increase of power rationing to less than two hours per day. There is no
longer enough diesel for private generators to make up for the hours of power
outages. Nasrallah’s statements came at a time when
Prime Minister-designate Najib Mikati is facing new difficulties in forming his
government. After news of an imminent breakthrough, Mikati clashed again with
Aoun over the distribution of ministerial portfolios, hence further delaying the
selection of a cabinet, despite the fact that a year has already passed since
the resignation of the current caretaker government, headed by Hassan Diab. It
has been three weeks since Mikati was tasked with forming a government,
succeeding Saad Hariri, who because of irreconcilable differences with President
Aoun over the make-up of the cabinet, stepped down nine months after being given
the same task.
What do Lebanon and Afghanistan have
in common in Western political thought?
Ambassador Dr. Hisham Hamdan/August
20/2021
The developments of the situation in Afghanistan concern the media circles in
Lebanon and the world. In our country, the analysts presented their vision on
these developments. Still, most of these opinions did not discuss the link
between them and Lebanon in the American and Western intellectual strategy.
When I was Lebanon's ambassador to Mexico, I participated in an international
conference of the Global Environment Fund. I noticed that Lebanon was in the
Fund's divisions into one group that included it with Afghanistan. I did not
understand this link that prompted the Fund to include Lebanon and Afghanistan
in a particular group. But I saw in that an indicator that we should not ignore.
I asked the foreign minister at the time, Minister Bassil, and his
administration about this matter. As usual, I did not receive any response. I
thought carefully and concluded that the reason must be technical and have
aspects related to the prevailing reality in the two countries, which has
similar decisive effects on the environmental role of the Fund in each of them.
Of course, what unites Lebanon and Afghanistan is the tyranny of uncontrolled
weapons, especially the militias that form mini-states outside the state's
authority in them. They possess advanced weapons and are more potent than the
Government. They created chaos and bribed or threatened and terrorized the
politicians. All of this prevents any environmental action from achieving its
sustainable goal. In Afghanistan, the Taliban extended its hegemony over the
general process in the country and ended up seizing power. As for Lebanon, the
mercenaries of Iran, grouped in an unauthorized political party named
"Hezbollah," bribed top officials, including the president of the Republic. The
party compromised all Lebanon's leaders who either became obedient or silent.,
However, the element of external interference in Afghanistan is not uniform.
Also, international concerns are entirely different from the case of Lebanon.
The Americans seized Afghanistan, dealing with it according to their economic,
political, and other interests. Several external powers, influence Lebanon
including the United States, the Russian Federation, Turkey, Iran, France,
Syria, and Israel. Afghanistan is a country with its own culture, its history,
different wealth, and its different geographical location. In this regard, there
is nothing in common between it and Lebanon, and it is entirely wrong to
establish a link between the two countries in American and Western political
thought.
American affairs experts considered the US military withdrawal as a defeat for
the United States. Some experts do not describe the decision to withdraw as a
defeat. They believe that the confusion that the administration experienced upon
the withdrawal marked the procedure as defeat. I do not consider that the
American withdrawal is a defeat for the interests of the United States, but
rather a failure for the American political thought, which, in reality,
constitutes the greatest threat to the American interests themselves in the long
run. American leaders refuse to acknowledge the United Nations' role in
confronting crises and human rights violations that threaten international peace
and security in the world. American political thought betrayed Presidents
Wilson, Roosevelt, and Truman. They betrayed Their commitments to the Charter of
the United Nations. And instead, they turned to the imperialist, expansionist
approach interfering and directing world affairs and preventing the Security
Council from making decisions that do not serve their goals and interests.
President Wilson did not oppose Lenin when he said that all colonial countries
should be liberated, but rather addressed the US Congress, saying: "The days of
conquest and expansion are over." The Anglo-Saxon American Congress defeated him
and prevented him from joining the League of Nations and realizing his hopes.
On the other hand, American leaders addressed free countries meeting in San
Francisco in 1945 to create the United Nations. California Governor Earl Warren,
in his welcoming speech, outlined the idea of the conference. He said: "We know
that our future is linked to the future of the world, where the term 'good
neighborliness' has become a global concept. We have learned that understanding
each other's problems is The greatest guarantee of peace. And this true
understanding comes only as a result of free consultation. This conference is
evidence in itself of the new concept of good neighborliness and unity, which
must be recognized in world affairs."
President Truman greeted the participants, including Lebanon, and said: "The
Charter of the United Nations that you have just signed is a solid structure
upon which we can build a better world. History will honor you for that. Between
victory in Europe and the final victory in this most destructive war, you have
won the victory on the war itself. With this pact, the world can look forward to
a time when all men will be worthy of being allowed to live in dignity as free
people." Then-President Truman pointed out that the Charter would only work if
the people of the world were determined to make it work and said, "If we fail to
use the principles of the Charter, we will betray all who have died so that we
meet here freely and securely to create it. If we seek to use it selfishly—for
the benefit of anyone nation or Any small group of nations - we would be equally
guilty of this betrayal.
President Truman was telling the rulers of the United States after him that the
United States had no right to impose its culture on the world, but rather it
should help in imposing the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations and
international law to confront violations of universally recognized human rights,
which threaten international peace and security, as well as to achieve progress
and prosperity for all peoples. Unfortunately, political thought in America
today has become subject to the influence and interests of lobbyists.
This raises a question about the interests of the American pressure groups in
Afghanistan and Lebanon. First, the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Iranian party
in Lebanon agree with the American lobby organizations to keep the United
Nations out of these two countries. Therefore, Afghanistan and Lebanon remain
prey to the men of money and commerce. Perhaps the Afghan people do not have
human wealth that would allow them to help them reach the United Nations and
impose their role on the American pressure bodies and American political
thought. Still, Lebanon possesses an enormous human wealth, and it is shameful
that this wealth cannot remove it from the game of these bodies and money men.
I appeal to the Lebanese American citizens to wake up to this factor of strength
for our country. You can establish an equal effective pressure force. Lebanon's
cultural, economic, and legal interests are the same as the American people and
lobbying bodies (the lobby). There will be no problem gaining their support for
our fight to redeem our sovereignty, freedom, and independence. I repeat the
call for the revolutionaries in Lebanon to double the pressure on the Maronite
Patriarchate and the spiritual leaders to play their role in this regard.
Sermons are not enough. A shift to work in decision-making countries and
institutions is required.
Lebanese politician in Beirut blast
investigation under fire over daughter’s wedding
Arab News/'August 21, 2021
BEIRUT: A Lebanese former minister wanted for questioning over his alleged
involvement in the August 2020 Beirut blast has sparked anger for requesting
anti-riot police to guard his daughter’s wedding. A leaked Internal Security
Forces’ (ISF) document showed Youssef Fenianos had asked for the security
presence at the church where his daughter gets married on Saturday in case of
political demonstrations. The document, published by
VDL (Voice of Lebanon) news website, said the ISF agreed to dispatch two
anti-riot units to Fenianos’s hometown of Ehden in northern Lebanon. The request
provoked fury in Lebanon because Fenianos is being investigated over the
explosion last year that killed more than 200 people. There is also widespread
anger at the ruling class, which is seen as corrupt and responsible for the
country’s economic collapse. Lebanon is now crippled by widespread power black
outs and fuel shortages. Fenianos was accused on social media of disrespecting
the blast victims’ families and using his political influence to protect the
wedding from protests. The massive explosion took
place when 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate was detonated by a fire at Beirut
Port. The chemical had been stored at the site for more than seven years without
proper safety precautions.
Fenianos, a former public works and transportation minister, was one of three
MPs and former ministers charged by the blast’s investigating judge Tarek Bitar.
The charges include “negligence” and “possible intent to
murder” because they were aware of the ammonium nitrate “and did not take
measures to spare the country the risks of an explosion.”Local media reported
that a relative of Fenianos posted on Facebook an alleged death threat addressed
to one of the victim’s relatives who was expected to protest at the wedding. The
post is believed to have been addressed to William Noon, whose firefighter
brother died in the Beirut Blast. Commenting over the incident, famous Lebanese
actress and producer, Carine Rizcallah said when the person in charge becomes
afraid of his people and asks for protection from the people “then he’s finished
politically and that’s the case of most Lebanese politicians.”Popular TV
presenter Nabila Awad posted the security document on her twitter and commented
“Shameless! Shameless and licentious!”Fenianos was scheduled for questioning by
judge Bitar on Friday but police said they had been unable to reach him at his
office or residence due to blocked roads and could not deliver the subpoena due
to fuel shortages. Al Janoubia news said Bitar has
rescheduled a session to question Fenianos.
A civil society activist told Arab News that the demonstration at the wedding
was discussed within four to five WhatsApp groups used by protesters.
“The aim was to deliver a message to Fenianos that nobody is
above the law and he cannot carry on with his life as if nothing has happened …
let him appear before the investigating judge, testify and clear his name,” the
activist, who asked not to be named, said. The ISF said the decision to dispatch
anti-riot units to the wedding was taken to prevent “public disorder and unruly
behavior.”“Following a chain of social media posts about some activists’ intent
to demonstrate during the celebration, which could eventually lead to acts of
public disorder, ISF decided as part of its mission and duty to maintain public
order to dispatch anti-riot units,” the statement said. An ISF senior officer,
who requested anonymity, confirmed to Arab News that the decision was a
“standard procedure that ISF implements in similar situations and incidents and
there’s nothing political behind it.” The incident is
the latest in which politicians’ extravagant family wedding plans have sparked
public anger as the country continues towards meltdown.
Last month, the luxurious wedding of the daughter of former
Hezbollah MP Nawwar Al-Sahili circulated online, stirring dismay as many people
have seen the life savings evaporate in the crisis.
Hezbollah, Taliban et consorts, ou
les revers de la modernité dans l’islam contemporain
Charles Elias Chartouni/August
20/2021
Indépendamment des contextes propres aux deux mouvements millénaristes* inspirés
par le khomeinisme et le wahhabisme, ils répercutent chacun à son propre niveau
les crises systémiques propres aux sociétés musulmanes, les eschatologies
politiques qu’ils ont générées, les pathologies mentales qui leur servent de
levier, et les paradoxes d’un monde écartelé entre des croyances et des impasses
induites par une modernité faillie. Loin de constituer des cas sui generis, ces
mouvements relèvent d’une typologie qui a été abondamment étudiée dans le cadre
des anthropologies post-coloniales. Les traits communs répertoriés: la
sécularisation de l’eschatologie et le salut par le politique, le retour à un
état présumé de pureté originelle et le virage vers la terreur, le mythe du
monde renversé …. Ces mouvements sont les produits de la modernité dans la
mesure où ils reproduisent ses contradictions, ses promesses faillies, ses
échecs et apories, et leurs politiques effectives ne font que manifester les
anomies propres à des sociétés où le corpus islamique est instrumentalisé comme
caution à des pratiques de terreur et de criminalité qui viennent s’ajouter à
l’actif déjà lourd des structures sociales éclatées.
Ce qui est inquiétant dans le cas des sociétés politiques de l’islam
contemporain, c’est la prédominance de ce récit idéologique et la mise en place
des verrouillages qui contribuent à l’installation des totalitarismes
idéologiques et des glacis stratégiques, et fournissent des prétextes
idéologiques à l’ensauvagement, et à la création d’un contexte approprié à
l’éclosion des psychoses collectives et de la haine de l’autre comme revers de
la haine de soi. L’échec patent de ces mouvements, tant au niveau de la
gouvernance et du rapport au reste du monde, (je ne dirais pas aux autres États,
parce que ces mouvements ne peuvent en aucun cas se reconnaître dans les notions
d’État de droit et instituer des rapports inter-étatiques) se laisse compenser
par les enfermements idéologiques, le règne de la terreur, l’anomie sociale, et
l’accès au reste du monde par la voie de la criminalité organisée et des actions
terroristes étayées par la jurisprudence islamique.
Les effondrements consécutifs de l’ordre géopolitique, socio-économique et
normatif requièrent une approche méthodologique et stratégique qui s’articule
sur la base d’un continuum qui aide à comprendre les enjeux et définir les
politiques conséquentes. Toute approche politique qui ferait l’économie de ces
causalités complexes et enchevêtrées, finirait par échouer et multiplier les
effets pervers d’une méthodologie étriquée. Ces mouvements totalitaires ne
peuvent survivre que moyennant des contextes de crise, des rééditions de
scénarios de guerre froide, un ordre géopolitique en état d’implosion, des
sociétés en état de dislocation diffuse (Afghanistan) ou de simulation continue
de crises (Liban), la différence entre les deux cas de figure tenant au fait que
les deux contextes géopolitiques ressortent à des temporalités sociales décalées
et leurs registres politiques propres. L’extension des aires névralgiques dans
cette partie du monde rend plus que jamais impérative la mise au point des
politiques d’endiguement, de stabilisation et de mise en œuvre des réformes
structurelles et des coalitions qu’elles requièrent. L’emboîtement des vides
stratégiques n’étant plus gérable, le temps est désormais à la mise en œuvre
d’un nouvel ordre régional qui mettrait fin aux nihilismes qui se succèdent et
aux dystopies meurtrières qui leur servent de récit.
*Voir, Charles Chartouni, le messianisme politique, une étude
paradigmatique, Annales de Sociologie et d’Anthropologie,
Vol.5,1994, FLSH-Université St.Joseph.
The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous
Reports And News published on August 20-21/2021
Taliban Revenge Fears Grow in Afghanistan
Agence France Presse/August 20/2021
The Taliban are going house-to-house searching for opponents and their families,
according to an intelligence document for the U.N. that deepened fears Friday
Afghanistan's new rulers were reneging on pledges of tolerance. After
routing government forces and taking over Kabul on Sunday to end two decades of
war, the hardline Islamist movement's leaders have repeatedly vowed a complete
amnesty as part of a well-crafted PR blitz. Women have also been assured their
rights will be respected, and that the Taliban will be "positively different"
from their brutal 1996-2001 rule. But with thousands of people still trying to
flee the capital aboard evacuation flights, the report for the United Nations
confirmed the fears of many. The Taliban have been conducting "targeted
door-to-door visits" of people who worked with U.S. and NATO forces, according
to a confidential document by the UN's threat assessment consultants seen by AFP.
The report, written by the Norwegian Center for Global Analyses, said militants
were also screening people on the way to Kabul airport. "They are targeting the
families of those who refuse to give themselves up, and prosecuting and
punishing their families 'according to Sharia law'," Christian Nellemann, the
group's executive director, told AFP."We expect both individuals previously
working with NATO/US forces and their allies, alongside with their family
members to be exposed to torture and executions."
'Lives under threat'
The Taliban have denied such accusations in the past and have several times
issued statements saying fighters were barred from entering private homes. They
also insist women and journalists have nothing to fear under their new rule,
although several media workers have reported being thrashed with sticks or whips
when trying to record some of the chaos seen in Kabul in recent days. During
their first stint in power, women were excluded from public life and girls
banned from school. People were stoned to death for adultery, while music and
television were also banned. The United States invaded Afghanistan and toppled
the group in 2001 following the September 11 attacks for providing sanctuary to
Al-Qaeda. A video posted online by a high-profile woman journalist this week for
a government-run television station offered a different reality to the Taliban's
new image of tolerance.
"Our lives are under threat," Shabnam Dawran, an anchor in state-owned
broadcaster RTA, said as she recounted being barred from the office. "The male
employees, those with office cards were allowed to enter the office but I was
told that I couldn't continue my duty because the system has been changed," she
said.
Opposition
There have been isolated signs of opposition to the Taliban in parts of
Afghanistan this week. Small groups of Afghans waved the country's black, red
and green flags in Kabul and a handful of suburbs on Thursday to celebrate the
anniversary of Afghanistan's independence -- on occasion in plain sight of
patrolling Taliban fighters. "My demand from the international community... is
that they turn their attention to Afghanistan and not allow the achievements of
20 years to be wasted," said one protester. Taliban fighters fired guns to
disperse dozens of Afghans in Jalalabad who waved the flag on Wednesday. Russia
also emphasized on Thursday that a resistance movement was forming in the
Panjshir Valley, led by deposed vice-president Amrullah Saleh and Ahmad Massoud,
the son of a slain anti-Taliban fighter.
"The Taliban doesn't control the whole territory of Afghanistan," Russian
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said. In the Panjshir Valley northeast of Kabul,
Ahmad Massoud, the son of Afghanistan's most famed anti-Taliban fighter Ahmed
Shah Massoud, said he was "ready to follow in his father's footsteps."
"But we need more weapons, more ammunition and more supplies," Massoud wrote in
the Washington Post. Tens of thousands of people have tried to flee Afghanistan
since the Taliban swept into the capital. The United States said Thursday that
it had airlifted about 7,000 people out of Kabul over the past five days. Chaos
erupted at the airport this week, as frantic Afghans searched for a way to leave
the country. An Afghan sports federation announced a footballer for the national
youth team had died after falling from a U.S. plane he desperately clung to as
it took off.
US President Biden says he cannot promise what final
outcome will be in Afghanistan
Rawad Taha, Al Arabiya English/20 August ,2021
US President Joe Biden said that he cannot promise what the final outcome will
be in Afghanistan. “We are closely monitoring any potential terrorist attacks in
or near Kabul Airport," Biden added. Biden pledged that every American who
wanted to would be evacuated from Taliban-ruled Aghanistan, with about 13,000
brought home so far. “We will work to evacuate any American who wants to leave
Afghanistan, this was the fastest evacuation in history by the United States. We
are working with NATO to coordinate evacuations from Afghanistan,” Biden added.
Biden said that the US is in contact with the Taliban regarding the evacuations.
“We made it clear to the Taliban that any attacks or disruption of the
evacuation would be met with force,” the US president added. “There is no
indication that US citizens are being blocked by Taliban from reaching Kabul’s
airport,” biden added. Biden said that the US will work on providing safe
evacuation for Afghans who might be targeted because of their association with
the US. “We’re going to do everything, everything that we can, to provide safe
evacuation for our Afghan allies and partners,” Biden said Biden added that the
adminstration will consider using US troops to help get evacuees to Kabul
airport. The US president reaffirmed that Afghanistan will not be a base for the
threat of the United States. Biden added that the US will continue its mission
to fight terrorism in Afghanistan.
Taliban seized control of Afghanistan, but a major
challenge remains: Cash
The Associated Press/20 August ,2021
The Taliban face a frontal challenge in cementing control of Afghanistan: Money.
Despite their dominant military blitz over the past week, the Taliban lack
access to billions of dollars from their central bank and the International
Monetary Fund that would keep the country running during a turbulent shakeup.
Those funds are largely controlled by the US and international institutions, a
possible leverage point as tense evacuations proceed from the airport in the
capital of Kabul. Tens of thousands of people remain to be evacuated ahead of
the United States’ Aug. 31 deadline to withdraw its troops from the country. But
the Taliban also do not currently have institutional structures to receive the
money — a sign of the challenges it might confront as it tries to govern an
economy that has urbanized and tripled in size since they were last in power two
decades ago. The shortfall could lead to an economic crisis that would only fuel
a deeper humanitarian one for the roughly 36 million Afghans expected to stay in
the country. “If they don’t have jobs, they don’t get fed,” said Anthony
Cordesman, who advised the US government on Afghan strategy and works at the
Center for Strategic and International Studies. “The Taliban has to find an
answer.”
The stranded funds are one of the few potential sources of pressure that the US
government has over the Taliban. But Cordesman added, “To have a pressure point,
you have to be willing to negotiate in ways the Taliban can accept.”
As of now, the Taliban government cannot access almost all of the Afghanistan
central bank's $9 billion in reserves, most of which is held by the New York
Federal Reserve. Afghanistan was also slated to access about $450 million on
Aug. 23 from the International Monetary Fund, which has effectively blocked the
release because of a “lack of clarity” regarding the recognition of a new Afghan
government.
While the money would make it easier for the Taliban to govern, government
officials have indicated that it's unclear who would be the points of contact
within Afghanistan on financial issues. President Joe Biden conceded that he
doesn't know whether the Taliban want to be part of the broader global economy —
which means it might be comfortable going without any funds. “I think they’re
going through sort of an existential crisis about do they want to be recognized
by the international community as being a legitimate government,” Biden told ABC
News Wednesday. “I’m not sure they do.”
Even if the Taliban could get money from the IMF, Douglas Rediker, a fellow at
the Brookings Institution, said the process “would take, I think, months at the
earliest, if at all.” But he also anticipates that the United States would find
a way to block the release of any money through the IMF system. “The US still
retains a lot of political heft in the global, political and economic systems to
twist some arms,” Rediker said. “The Taliban are not going to be popular.”
When the Taliban last ran Afghanistan two decades ago, the average Afghan
survived on less than a dollar a day. Per capita gross domestic product has
increased nearly three-fold during the war, according to the World Bank.
Afghanistan gained mobile phones, Coca-Cola and Airbnb listings — all of which
need access to global economic institutions. The war effort also left the
country highly dependent on trade with imports of $8 billion annually, almost 10
times more than what was being exported.
The extent of the problem could be seen at the shuttered Afghan money exchange
market. Currency trading stopped Sunday when the Taliban took control of Kabul.
Without the ability to exchange or the backing of dollars flowing into the
country, the value of the Afghan currency could collapse, inflation could
accelerate and the mix of violence and chaos could be prolonged. Aminullah Amin,
a currency changer, said Friday there are concerns about looters and the
structure of the new government. That sense of insecurity felt by Afghans would
flow through the economy like a virus.
“We have not decided to reopen the markets yet.” said Amin, who witnessed the
looting of a district police headquarters in northern Kabul after the seizure of
the capital by the Taliban. Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid on Thursday
reaffirmed that the group wants good relations with other countries and will not
allow Afghanistan to be a base for attacks. But he said the Taliban would not
tolerate any threat to “our principles and our independence.” Laurel Miller,
director of the Asia program at the Crisis Group, an international think tank,
said Afghanistan remains “a very poor country suffering a complex set of
humanitarian issues and challenges.” The Taliban still have access to revenue
streams that sustained the insurgency, but that won’t be enough for a
centralized government that can assert fuller control on the country. The
movement has to balance its image globally with maintaining support among their
own rank-and-file, the ultraconservative Muslim fighters who brought them to
power.
“There are reasons to think that when push comes to shove the internal
dimensions of this are going to be prioritized over the external dimensions,”
Miller said.
The Taliban could have more success with other nations eager to project
influence in the region. China wants stability in Afghanistan and also maintains
close relations with neighboring Pakistan, which itself has long worked to shape
events there. A 2010 US government report estimated that Afghanistan contained
about $1 trillion worth of metals and minerals, including lithium and rare
earths that are valuable in an increasingly computerized world. “I think a real
question mark in the financial picture is what is China going to do,” Miller
said.
Sombre mood across Afghanistan as Taliban are back at Friday prayers
AFP/20 August ,2021
Gunmen flanked an Islamic scholar as he delivered a fiery speech Friday to a
packed Kabul mosque at the most important prayers of the week -- the first since
the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan five days ago. The preacher rallied the
faithful at the Abdul Rahman Mosque with a history lesson on how Afghans had
beaten the British empire, the Soviet Union and now the United States on the
battlefield. “Afghans have once again shown collective pride,” he said, adding
“Afghans by nature are a brave nation”.Sermons at Friday prayers are usually
coordinated by the government to deliver thinly veiled or overt political
messages on national unity and other topics. Friday prayers at the Abdul Rahman
Mosque in Kabul on August 20, 2021. (AFP) Following the Taliban's return to
power last weekend, Friday's prayers were closely scrutinized for any message
the hardline Islamist movement was trying to impart. The Taliban have been
trying to project a softer image compared to the reputation they earned during
their first incarnation that ended in 2001. Then, shops, schools, government
offices and even traffic came to a halt for Friday prayers -- and anyone tardy
as the muezzin called the faithful risked a lashing across the back of the legs.
The gunmen flanking the scholar at Abdul Rahman mosque Friday cut imposing
figures as the congregation knelt on the floor -- some men fidgeting with rosary
beads. Several other attendees filmed the proceedings with their mobile phones.
At mosques across the capital the overarching theme appeared to be an appeal for
Afghans to give the new regime a chance: instead of fleeing the country, help
rebuild it, was the message. Hundreds attended the Hazarat Mostafa mosque in the
western suburbs of Kabul where the local Imam made no mention of the Taliban and
focused mostly on traditional Koranic verses. He did, however, touch briefly on
the tragic scenes at the airport -- where thousands are desperately trying to
enter in the hope of getting an evacuation flight out. “Those with weak faith
are running after or hanging from American planes. They should stay and build
their country,” the Imam said. The United States has flown in thousands of
troops to Kabul's airport in a desperate effort to evacuate Afghans who worked
for US interests during the 20-year occupation that was due to end by August 31.
One attendee at Hazarat Mostafa mosque noted many present were starting to grow
beards -- which the Taliban insisted all men did two decades ago.“There were
some Taliban among the crowd, but they were quiet and peaceful,” he said. The
Taliban insist they will continue to rule according to Islamic principles, but
just how strictly they are interpreted remains to be seen.
“Let us see what happens,” said shopkeeper Wahid at a smaller mosque elsewhere
in the city.
US has 5,800 troops at Kabul airport to help with evacuations: Official
Reuters/ 20 August ,2021
There are currently about 5,800 US troops at the airport in Kabul to help with
evacuation efforts, a US official said on Friday. US Defense Secretary Lloyd
Austin has ordered about 6,000 troops to Kabul, a number that is expected to be
reached in the coming days. NATO on Friday called on the Taliban to allow people
being evacuated to leave Afghanistan, and vowed that the allies would remain in
“close coordination” while operations continue. The joint declaration by NATO’s
30 member countries was made following an emergency videolink conference of
their foreign ministers to discuss evacuation efforts and the next steps to
take.
UAE agrees to hosting 5000 Afghan nationals evacuated on US flights from Kabul
Rawad Taha, Al Arabiya English/20 August ,2021
The United Arab Emirates has agreed to host 5000 Afghan nationals evacuated from
Afghanistan on their way to third countries, according to a statement released
by Emirates News Agency WAM. The UAE’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and
International Cooperation announced that, following a request from the US, it
would host the Afghans on a temporary basis, after which time they would travel
on to other nations. The statement added that the evacuees will travel to the
UAE from the Afghan capital of Kabul on US aircraft in the coming days. “The
humanitarian gesture follows the UAE’s recent facilitation of dozens of flights
carrying hundreds of foreign citizens from Afghanistan, including diplomats and
support staff from a range of nationalities and non-governmental organizations
to UAE airports. The UAE has also facilitated the evacuation of approximately
8500 foreign nationals utilizing its aircraft and airports from Afghanistan,”
the statement added. Sultan Mohammed Al Shamsi, Assistant Minister of Foreign
Affairs and International Cooperation for International Development Affairs at
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, said the UAE is
always seeking peaceful, multilateral solutions, and is keen to continue its
work alongside its international partners to advance efforts to assist the
Afghan people during this time of uncertainty. US President Joe Biden said in a
speech at the White House that the US will work on providing safe evacuation for
Afghans who might be targeted because of their association with the US. “We’re
going to do everything, everything that we can, to provide safe evacuation for
our Afghan allies and partners,” Biden said
Putin says world must prevent 'collapse' of Afghanistan
AFP/20 August ,2021
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday called on the global community to
prevent the "collapse" of Afghanistan following the Taliban takeover. "The
Taliban movement control almost the entire territory of the country," he told a
televised press conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the Kremlin.
"These are the realities and it is from these realities that we must proceed,
preventing the collapse of the Afghan state," he added. Both leaders said
Afghanistan figured prominently during the outgoing German leader's final
working visit to Russia. Putin also criticised the "irresponsible policy" of
imposing "outside values" on war-torn Afghanistan. "You cannot impose standards
of political life and behaviour on other people from outside," Putin said. The
Russian president also highlighted the importance of preventing "terrorists"
from entering neighbouring countries from Afghanistan, including "under the
guise of refugees". Moscow has been cautiously optimistic about the new
leadership in Kabul and is seeking contact with the militants in an effort to
avoid instability spilling over to neighbouring ex-Soviet states. The Kremlin
has in recent years reached out to the Taliban -- which is banned as an
"extremist" group in Russia -- and hosted its representatives in Moscow several
times, most recently last month. ---
Who are the most influential Taliban leaders?
Bloomberg/20 August ,2021
For decades the Taliban’s leadership structure has been in the shadows: Even
before the US invasion in 2001, little was known about how the group operates
beyond the names of a few top leaders. Now the militants are trying to recast
themselves in a more moderate mold: promising amnesty for their enemies, vowing
to build an inclusive government with various ethnic groups, keep terrorist
groups off Afghan soil and allowing women to work within the bounds of Shariah
law. Those are all among conditions for the US and its allies to recognize the
group as the legitimate new rulers of Afghanistan. The Taliban’s senior
leadership includes many Mujahideen fighters who were once trained by the US
during the Cold War to battle against the invading Soviet Union forces in the
1980s. The Sunni group’s membership is drawn largely from the majority ethnic
Pashtun population most dominant in the southern part of the country.
Here are seven of the most influential men in the organization:
Haibatullah Akhundzada, Supreme Commander
Born in 1961, Akhunzada became the Taliban’s third supreme commander – the
highest rank in the organization – after the US killed his predecessor in a 2016
drone strike. He is more known as a religious leader than a military commander,
and maintains a low profile. Akhunzada hasn’t been seen in public since he
became the Taliban’s top leader, and few photos of him are available. His last
public statement came in May to mark Eid al-Fitr, a holiday marking the end of
Ramadan.
Abdul Ghani Baradar, Deputy Leader
The Taliban’s deputy leader is the main public face of the Taliban who will
likely head the next government. He was closely associated with Osama bin Laden
and co-founded the Taliban along with Mullah Mohammad Omar, the one-eyed cleric
who was the group’s first supreme leader. Baradar was captured in the Pakistani
port city of Karachi in 2010 in a joint operation with US Intelligence, and
Zalmay Khalilzad – the US special envoy for Afghanistan – reportedly helped
secure his release in 2018 ahead of peace talks with the Trump administration.
Baradar lived in Doha, Qatar, where the Taliban has a political office, until
his return on Tuesday to the southern city of Kandahar, the group’s birthplace.
As the Taliban’s diplomatic leader, he signed a peace deal with the Trump
administration in February 2020 that laid out the roadmap for the withdrawal of
US and NATO forces from Afghanistan. He also met Chinese Foreign Minister Wang
Yi earlier this month in Tianjin.
Sirajuddin Haqqani, Leader of Designated Terrorist Group
The leader of the Haqqani Network, a US-designated terrorist organization,
became the second deputy Taliban leader after the groups merged around 2016. He
is believed to move between Afghanistan and Pakistan, and is said to oversee
finances and military assets across the two countries. It’s unclear how the US
will treat the Haqqani Network as part of ongoing negotiations with the Taliban.
His brother, also a key Taliban leader, was captured by US forces in Bahrain in
2014 and transferred to Bagram prison before being released in a prisoner
exchange four years later.
Mohammad Yaqoob, Founder’s Son
Yaqoob is the son of Taliban founder Mullah Omar, and was once considered a
contender for the group’s top job because of his lineage. Few details are known
about him. News reports suggest that he was educated in a seminary in
neighboring Pakistan and now lives in Afghanistan. He is believed to supervise
the group’s military activities along with Sirajuddin Haqqani.
Abdul Hakim Haqqani, Top Negotiator
Believed to be close to Supreme Commander Akhunzada, Haqqani heads the Taliban’s
negotiating team in charge of the peace talks with the former US-backed
government. He also heads a senior council of religious scholars.
Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanikzai, Key Diplomat
Unlike many of the group’s leaders, Stanikzai speaks fluent English and traveled
the world extensively as deputy foreign minister when the militants last
controlled power in Afghanistan. In 1996, he visited Washington on a failed
mission to convince the Clinton administration to acknowledge the Taliban’s
government. He has also led delegations to China to meet government officials,
according to a Reuters report. Stanikzai is also Abdul Hakim Haqqani’s deputy
negotiator on talks with Afghan government officials.
Zabihullah Mujahed, Main Spokesman
Mujahed earlier this week addressed the Taliban’s first press conference in
Kabul, and is likely to play a significant role in conveying the group’s message
to the international community. During 20 years of war, he communicated with
journalists only over the phone or via text messages. The media interaction on
Aug. 17 was the first time he was seen in public.
Taliban seize US war chest given to Afghan govt: Humvees,
helicopters, drones, guns
Reuters/20 August ,2021
About a month ago, Afghanistan's ministry of defense posted on social media
photographs of seven brand new helicopters arriving in Kabul delivered by the
US. “They'll continue to see a steady drumbeat of that kind of support, going
forward,” US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters a few days later at
the Pentagon. In a matter of weeks, however, the Taliban had seized most of the
country, as well as any weapons and equipment left behind by fleeing Afghan
forces. Video showed the advancing insurgents inspecting long lines of vehicles
and opening crates of new firearms, communications gear and even military
drones. “Everything that hasn't been destroyed is the Taliban's now,” one US
official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told Reuters. Current and
former US officials say there is concern those weapons could be used to kill
civilians, be seized by other militant groups such as ISIS to attack
US-interests in the region, or even potentially be handed over to adversaries
including China and Russia. President Joe Biden's administration is so concerned
about the weapons that it is considering a number of options to pursue. The
officials said launching airstrikes against the larger equipment, such as
helicopters, has not been ruled out, but there is concern that would antagonize
the Taliban at a time the United States' main goal is evacuating people. Another
official said that while there are no definitive numbers yet, the current
intelligence assessment was that the Taliban are believed to control more than
2,000 armored vehicles, including US Humvees, and up to 40 aircraft potentially
including UH-60 Black Hawks, scout attack helicopters, and ScanEagle military
drones. “We have already seen Taliban fighters armed with US-made weapons they
seized from the Afghan forces. This poses a significant threat to the United
States and our allies,” Representative Michael McCaul, the top Republican on the
US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, told Reuters in an email.
‘More like trophies’
The speed with which the Taliban swept across Afghanistan is reminiscent of ISIS
militants taking weapons from US-supplied Iraqi forces who offered little
resistance in 2014. Between 2002 and 2017, the United States gave the Afghan
military an estimated $28 billion in weaponry, including guns, rockets,
night-vision goggles and even small drones for intelligence gathering. But
aircraft like the Blackhawk helicopters have been the most visible sign of US
military assistance, and were supposed to be the Afghan military' biggest
advantage over the Taliban. Between 2003 and 2016 the United States provided
Afghan forces with 208 aircraft, according to the US Government Accountability
Office (GAO). In the last week, many of those aircraft were most useful for
Afghan pilots to escape the Taliban. One of the US officials said that between
40 and 50 aircraft had been flown to Uzbekistan by Afghan pilots seeking refuge.
Even before taking power in Kabul over the weekend, the Taliban had started a
campaign of assassinating pilots. Some planes were in the United States for
maintenance and will stay. Those en route to Afghan forces will instead be used
by the US military to help in the evacuation from Kabul. Current and former
officials say that while they are concerned about the Taliban having access to
the helicopters, the aircraft require frequent maintenance, and many are
complicated to fly without extensive training. “Ironically, the fact that our
equipment breaks down so often is a life-saver here,” a third official said.
Retired US Army General Joseph Votel, who oversaw US military operations in
Afghanistan as head of US Central Command from 2016 to 2019, said most of the
high-end hardware captured by the Taliban, including the aircraft, was not
equipped with sensitive US technology.
“In some cases, some of these will be more like trophies,” Votel said.
Fighting at night
There is a more immediate concern about some of the easier- to-use weapons and
equipment, such as night-vision goggles. Since 2003 the United States has
provided Afghan forces with at least 600,000 infantry weapons including M16
assault rifles, 162,000 pieces of communication equipment, and 16,000
night-vision goggle devices. “The ability to operate at night is a real
game-changer,” one congressional aide told Reuters. Votel and others said smalls
arms seized by the insurgents such as machine guns, mortars, as well as
artillery pieces including howitzers, could give the Taliban an advantage
against any resistance that could surface in historic anti-Taliban strongholds
such as the Panjshir Valley northeast of Kabul. US officials said the
expectation was that most of the weapons would be used by the Taliban
themselves, but it was far too early to tell what they planned to do - including
possibly sharing the equipment with rival states such as China. Andrew Small, a
Chinese foreign policy expert at the German Marshall Fund of the United States,
said the Taliban was likely to grant Beijing access to any US weapons they may
now have control over. One of the US officials said it was not likely China
would gain much, because Beijing likely already has access to the weapons and
equipment. The situation, experts say, shows the United States needs a better
way to monitor equipment it gives to allies. It could have done much more to
ensure those supplies to Afghan forces were closely monitored and inventoried,
said Justine Fleischner of UK-based Conflict Armament Research. “But the time
has passed for these efforts to have any impact in Afghanistan,” Fleischner
said.
Al-Qaeda-linked groups in Syria, Yemen welcome
Taliban victory
The Arab Weekly/August 20/2021
LONDON--The Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan following two decades of US
occupation risks emboldening jihadists worldwide as al-Qaeda-connected groups in
Syria and Yemen have already welcomed the Taliban’s victory, in a sign they
could be emboldened to ratchet up their activities in the period to come. The
rapid ousting of the Western-backed Afghan government by the Taliban, who lost
control of Afghanistan in the US-led invasion two decades ago, will provide
jihadists with an example of how patience and careful strategy can pay off, even
after the defeat of ISIS in Syria and Iraq, experts say. It is also especially
symbolic coming just ahead of the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001
attacks on the United States carried out by al-Qaeda under Osama bin Laden and
planned from Taliban-ruled Afghanistan where he had taken refuge. “The Taliban’s
victory will give jihadist groups worldwide a major boost. It makes them believe
that they can expel foreign powers, even major military powers like the United
States,” Colin Clarke, director of research at the New York-based Soufan Centre
think tank, said. “I expect to see a major propaganda blitz culminating on the
20-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. This will improve morale for jihadis
from North Africa to Southeast Asia,” he added. Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi, a fellow
at George Washington University’s Programme on Extremism, said that the example
of the Taliban’s patience would convince jihadists around the world to keep
fighting, despite the existing hostility between the Afghan fundamentalists and
ISIS. “The Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan is something that actually
emboldens jihadists everywhere although the ISIS is not necessarily happy about
it.”“When groups see the Taliban celebrating victory, I think it convinces them
that if they just keep fighting, eventually those they are fighting will
collapse, whether it’s in Somalia or West Africa. “Eventually they just hope the
powers backing these governments they fight will withdraw.”
Cheers in Yemen, Syria
Al-Qaeda’s Yemeni branch on Wednesday congratulated the Taliban on their
takeover of Afghanistan and vowed to continue its own military campaigns. “This
victory and empowerment reveals to us that jihad and fighting represent the
(Islamic law)-based, legal and realistic way to restore rights (and) expel the
invaders and occupiers,” al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) said in a
statement. “As for the game of democracy and working with simple pacifism, it is
a deceptive mirage, a fleeting shadow and a vicious circle that starts with a
zero and ends with it,” said the statement carried by SITE Intelligence group,
which monitors jihadist networks worldwide.
The Taliban had sheltered al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden during its rule from
1996 until 2001, when US-led forces toppled it in response to the September 11
attacks. However, last week Taliban fighters took control of the capital Kabul
at the climax of a lightning offensive. The United States considers AQAP the
most dangerous branch of al-Qaeda’s global network and has carried out drone
strikes against its fighters in Yemen since soon after the 9/11 attacks. But on
Sunday, AQAP fighters in Yemen’s central governorate of Bayda and southern
province of Shabwa celebrated the Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan with
fireworks and by firing gunshots in the air. The hardline Sunni Muslim group has
taken advantage of Yemen’s war since 2014 between the internationally-recognised
government and the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, bolstering its presence in
southern Yemen. An al-Qaida-linked group in Syria has also congratulated the
people of Afghanistan for the “dear victory” achieved by the Taliban. Hayat
Tahrir al-Sham, or the Levant Liberation Committee, compared the Taliban’s
control of much of Afghanistan with the early Muslim conquests. The group, also
known as HTS, is the most powerful faction in rebel-held parts of northwest
Syria. Over the past months it has been working on improving its image by
distancing itself from extremist ideology. Some of the founding members of the
group, which used to be known as the Nusra Front, include Arab commanders who
were close to Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan. Many of them were killed in US
drone attacks in Syria over the past years. In 2017, Brett McGurk, then top US
envoy for the coalition battling the Islamic State group, said that Syria’s
northwestern province of Idlib had become the largest al-Qaida haven since
Afghanistan in bin Laden’s days. In a statement released late Wednesday, HTS
said “no matter how long it takes, righteousness will end up victorious.” It
added: “Occupiers don’t last on usurped lands no matter how much they harm its
people.” HTS said it hopes that insurgents in Syria will be also victorious by
learning from the experience of the Taliban to remove the government of
President Bashar Assad, its adversary in the country’s ten-year conflict.
Benefits to al-Qaida, ISIS
Al-Qaida’s propaganda arm Al-Thabat has already welcomed the Taliban takeover of
Afghanistan, saying that “Muslims and Mujahideen in Pakistan, Kashmir, Yemen,
Syria, Gaza, Somalia and Mali are celebrating the liberation of Afghanistan and
the implementation of Sharia within it.”The relationship between the Taliban and
ISIS has always been more ambiguous and the ISIS branch in Afghanistan and
Central Asia, the Islamic State Khorosan Province (ISKP), was set up by Taliban
defectors. But analysts say that despite ideological differences with the
Taliban, ISIS will also profit from the collapse of the Afghan state and find
Taliban-controlled Afghanistan fertile ground for its operations. “Mr. Q”, a
Western expert on ISIS who publishes the results of research under a pseudonym
on Twitter, counted 216 ISKP attacks between January 1 and August 11, compared
with 34 in the same period last year. “This makes Afghanistan one of the most
dynamic ISIS provinces,” he said. “Everything is not directly linked to the
American withdrawal, but the victory of the Taliban also galvanises the ISKP.”
He said that, beyond fratricidal hatreds, there was a convergence of objectives
between ISIS and the Taliban. “ISIS regularly states that Westerners cannot stay
forever” in the region. In this regard, the triumph of the Taliban “legitimises
their way of doing things”. And the chaos that could ensue in the months and
years following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan risks providing a breeding
ground for all jihadist groups, who thrive on instability. “The collapse of the
Afghan army is eerily reminiscent of what we saw in Iraq in 2011,” when
jihadists began an insurgency that would eventually see the capture of cities
like Mosul, said Clarke. “I’m worried the same situation will unfold here in
Afghanistan, with the rise of both ISIS and the resuscitation of Al-Qaeda,” he
said, using another acronym for the
Merkel and Putin to Discuss Afghanistan, Other 'Big' Issues
Associated Pres/August 20/2021s
German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Vladimir Putin are set to
hold talks in Moscow on Friday amid the crisis unfolding in Afghanistan and as
Russia's treatment of opposition politician Alexei Navalny and Ukraine remain a
source of ongoing tension between the two leaders' countries.
Other challenging issues that are certain to play a role in the meeting are a
gas pipeline between Russia and Germany opposed by the United States, the
repression of dissent in Belarus, and allegations that the Belarusian government
has channeled migrants into Latvia, Lithuania and Poland with the aim of
destabilizing the European Union. Merkel's visit to Moscow comes as the
chancellor is nearing the end of her almost 16-year-long leadership of Germany.
She and Putin, who has served as Russia's president or prime minister since
2000, managed to maintain a line of communication over the years despite their
many political differences. However, the personal relationship between the two
has deteriorated since 2014, when Russia annexed Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula and
backed separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine, and as a result of other
authoritarian actions by Moscow. Friday's talks in Moscow will "surely be about
the big outstanding international questions," Merkel spokesman Steffen Seibert
told reporters in Berlin earlier this week. "Obviously Afghanistan. Furthermore,
the conflict in eastern Ukraine, for the solution and settlement of which Russia
could do much more." "Belarus, a country, a dictator, who goes against his own
people in the worst kind of way and on whom the Russian leadership has influence
as we believe," Seibert added as he listed possible talking points. Merkel is
heading to Russia on the anniversary of Navalny falling gravely ill while on a
plane flying over Siberia on Aug. 20, 2020. At his wife's insistence, the
opposition leader was transferred for medical treatment to Germany, where
officials said tests revealed he had been poisoned with a Soviet-developed nerve
agent. Navalny, who is Putin's most outspoken critic, spent five months in
Germany recovering and blamed the poisoning on the Kremlin. Russian authorities
have rejected the accusation.
Upon his return to Russia in January, Navalny was immediately arrested and
jailed. A month later, he was ordered to serve 2½ years in prison for violating
the terms of a suspended sentence from a 2014 embezzlement conviction that he
dismissed as politically motivated.
"This still unsolved case is putting a very severe burden on the relationship to
Russia," Seibert said. "Mr. Navalny is wrongfully imprisoned." Russia's Foreign
Ministry released a lengthy statement Wednesday about "the Navalny case,"
charging that actions by "Germany and its allies" over the past 12 months
indicated "a planned provocation aimed at discrediting Russia in the eyes of the
global community and at damaging its national interests." The ministry accused
Berlin of failing to provide evidence that would support their "brazen
allegations" that Navalny was poisoned with a nerve agent. It said Germany left
legal requests from Russian law enforcement without any "meaningful answers" and
instead played "bureaucratic ping-pong" with Moscow. Merkel, 67, who grew up in
communist East Germany and is fluent in Russian, has always stressed that
relations with Russia can only improve through dialogue. Her visit to Moscow
will be one of her last trips abroad as chancellor since she is not running in
Germany's national election next month. Putin, 68, who has been in power for
more than 20 years, is Russia's longest-serving leader since Soviet dictator
Josef Stalin. Under communism in the 1980s, he worked for the Soviet's
intelligence service KGB in East Germany. Despite his and Merkel's years of
experience as leaders and with each other, experts are skeptical Friday's
meeting will improve the ties between Germany and Russia. "Russia has become an
authoritarian regime," Stefan Meister, a political analyst with the German
Council on Foreign Relations told The Associated Press. "It is no longer
interested in improving relations with the west."The deterioration of relations
between the two countries is mirrored in the worsening of the personal
relationship of their longtime leaders, Meister said. "Mrs. Merkel, as an East
German and with her background, right from the start understood better than her
predecessors how Russia works and how Putin operates. There always was a
matter-of-fact relationship...based on respect," Meister said, adding that all
changed with the beginning of armed hostilities in eastern Ukraine.
"The big break was the Russia-Ukraine conflict," Meister added.
Fighting between Russia-backed separatists and government forces in eastern
Ukraine erupted after Russia's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimea and has left
more than 14,000 dead. Efforts to negotiate a political settlement under the
2015 Minsk agreements brokered by France and Germany have stalled, and the EU
has imposed sanctions against Russia for failing to live up to its peace
commitments in Ukraine. Merkel plans to travel back to Berlin on Friday night
and to head to Kyiv on Sunday to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelenskyy. Another topic of discussion with Putin will likely be the nearly
finished Nord Stream 2 pipeline that will carry natural gas from Russia to
Germany. The project has angered the United States and some European countries,
but the U.S. and Germany announced a deal last month to allow its completion.
Critics say the pipeline threatens European energy security, heightens Russia's
influence and poses risks to Ukraine and Poland in bypassing both countries.
Regarding Belarus, Merkel earlier this week accused President Alexander
Lukashenko of a "hybrid attack" against the EU by encouraging migrants to cross
the borders into Lithuania, Latvia and Poland in retaliation to the EU's
sanctions against Belarus. Merkel said she would raise the topic with Putin.
Belarus depends heavily on Russian energy supplies and Moscow has authorized
loans to prop up the country's beleaguered economy.
Afghan President Latest Leader on the Run to Turn Up in UAE
Associated Press/August 20/2021
Afghanistan's president, driven out by the Taliban, is the latest leader on the
run to turn up in the United Arab Emirates. Others who found refuge here include
Spain's disgraced former king and two Thai prime ministers. In nearby Qatar,
meanwhile, the Taliban's political leaders have been given refuge for years.
Qatar and the UAE have much in common, despite their sharp political
differences. The two Gulf Arab states have close security partnerships with the
United States and both have taken in political fugitives and exiled leaders on
the run. The skylines of Doha, Abu Dhabi and Dubai offer an array of stunning
high-rise towers and opulent five-star hotels. Man-made coastlines provide
reclusive, palatial waterfront properties — plenty of options for political
exiles looking for privacy and a place to park their money. But most
importantly, these cities built by vast underground reserves of oil and gas
provide near-guaranteed security to controversial, once powerful figures.
Iris-scanning technology at the airport, untold numbers of security cameras, and
widespread surveillance helps ensure protection — as does an autocratic grip on
power. It's perhaps why Afghan President Ashraf Ghani surfaced in Abu Dhabi
after the Taliban swept into Kabul on Sunday and why the Taliban's political
leaders have for years resided in Qatar. The UAE announced late Wednesday it had
accepted hosting Ghani and his family, citing humanitarian grounds — even as
members of his own government slammed the Afghan president for his escape from
Kabul.
Over the past year, Qatar has hosted talks between the Taliban and the Afghan
government, and before that, between the Taliban and the United States as
Washington hashed out the terms of its withdrawal from Afghanistan and an end to
its 20-year war. Top Taliban political leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar
returned to Afghanistan this week from his residence in Qatar.
The role the UAE and Qatar have played as hosts to wanted politicians and top
figures gives them potential leverage — political chips that can be played or
held for a later date. "Qatar has positioned itself as the go-to mediator with
the Taliban. It was a risky bet, especially considering the optics with the
wider public, but it paid off," said Cinzia Bianco, Gulf research fellow at the
European Council on Foreign Relations. "Now, Qatar is well-positioned to be the
first contact point for regional and international players who want to explore
the possibility of engaging with the Taliban ... without compromising
themselves," she added. The Taliban's capture of Kabul was so swift that by
nightfall the same day, gun-toting Taliban commanders were seated at Ghani's
desk in the presidential palace. Meanwhile, thousands of Afghan citizens and
foreigners are still scrambling to flee the country. Just this week, a senior
U.S. military commander met face-to-face with the Taliban in Doha to negotiate
the safe passage of thousands of people wanting to leave Afghanistan,
underscoring the crucial role Qatar is playing amid the muddled U.S. exit. The
UAE and Qatar are also staging grounds for key U.S. military operations. Qatar's
al-Udeid Air Base hosts some 10,000 American troops. Americans also fly out of
the al-Dhafra Air Base near Abu Dhabi. "Each country is positioning itself in
the best way possible to pursue its interests in this crisis," said senior
Mideast adviser at Crisis Group, Dina Esfandiary. She says that while Qatar's
bet as "regional mediator" seems to have paid off, it remains to be seen how it
will work out in the long term. For its part, the UAE aims to show its ally the
United States that it too is a reliable partner, she said. From his new base in
the UAE, Ghani released a video statement Wednesday, for the first time since
escaping Kabul. He made a point of mentioning he was forced to leave Afghanistan
"with one set of traditional clothes, a vest and the sandals" he was wearing.
To live in the UAE, however, he'll need a lot more than that. The country's cost
of living is as sky-high as its towers, even if some support is offered.
Afghanistan's ambassador to Tajikistan accused Ghani on Wednesday of stealing
$169 million from state coffers and said he'd call for his arrest via Interpol.
Russia's embassy in Kabul alleged that Ghani fled Kabul with four cars and a
helicopter full of cash. He had so much money he couldn't fit it all, and left
cash lying on the tarmac, Russia's state news agency RIA Novosti quoted the
embassy spokesperson as saying. The AP could not independently verify the
claims. The Western-backed Afghan government he presided over has long been rife
with corruption. Ghani joins a roster of high-profile exiles who've sought
shelter in the UAE in past years. Some have resided in Abu Dhabi, others in the
UAE's commercial and tourism hub of Dubai. Siblings and former Thai prime
ministers, Thaksin Shinawatra and Yingluck Shinawatra — the former ousted in a
military coup amid charges of corruption, the other fleeing a criminal
conviction — are among them. For years before her return to Pakistan where she
was assassinated in 2007, so did ex-Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
Another ex-Pakistani prime minister, Pervez Musharraf, maintains his base as
Dubai. He was sentenced at home to death for treason, a sentence that a high
Pakistani court later annulled. Others include former Spanish King Juan Carlos,
who is facing financial probe; Palestinian figure Mohammed Dahlan, who was
banished by his party and sentenced to prison, and Ahmed Ali Abdullah Saleh, the
eldest son of Yemen's longtime leader who was also assassinated.
Israel Announces Deal to Resume Qatari Aid to Gaza
Agence France Presse/August 20/2021
Israel has announced a "new mechanism" for Qatari humanitarian funds to reach
Gaza, with money transferred directly to individuals by the United Nations,
ending a stalemate over the urgently needed aid. Qatari support is seen as a
crucial lifeline for impoverished Palestinians living in the Israeli-blockaded
enclave. Prior to conflict in May between Israel and Gaza's Hamas rulers, the
flow of funds from Qatar was considered vital to maintaining relative calm
between the Jewish state and the Islamists. In a statement Thursday, Israeli
Defense Minister Benny Gantz said Israel would no longer accept the "status quo"
that preceded May's 11 days of hostilities.He said an aid distribution system
that saw fuel for Gaza purchased by UN officials with Qatari money had been
replaced. "Under the new mechanism, financial aid will be transferred to
hundreds of thousands of Gazan people by the UN directly to their bank accounts,
with Israel overseeing the recipients," Gantz said. He said Israel was also
negotiating with the Palestinian Authority, which controls the occupied West
Bank, on the establishment of "an alternative mechanism for the transfer of
funds (to Gaza) under their supervision". Qatar's envoy to Gaza, Mohammed al-Emadi,
said his country's support to the enclave would be channeled through the UN's
World Food Program, initially benefiting an estimated 100,000 families. Most of
Gaza's roughly two million people rely on some form of humanitarian aid. Israel
has maintained a tight blockade on the territory since 2007, the year Hamas took
power. During this year's conflict, Palestinian armed groups in Gaza led by
Hamas launched thousands of rockets at Israel, which hit Gaza with hundreds of
air strikes. Days after a ceasefire ended the fighting, Qatar pledged $500
million for Gaza's reconstruction, but that aid had been on hold. Sources
familiar with the new arrangement said the money will first be transferred to
Qatar's U.N. bank account in New York, then to Ramallah in the West Bank, and
from there will be sent to Gaza. Israeli-approved recipients in Gaza will be
issued UN credit cards to withdraw the funds, the sources said. Qatar will
transfer an initial block of $10 million to the U.N. from next week under the
new arrangement, which has been approved through the end of the year, according
to the sources.
Iraqi political forces rally to postpone elections
The Arab Weekly/August 20/2021
BAGHDAD--Iraqi sources told The Arab Weekly Thursday that the country’s
parliamentary elections slated for October 10 could be postponed due to a u-turn
of some political forces. These forces, the sources said, used to support the
idea of holding early polls before they changed their mind. Local Iraqi media
had earlier reported that April 21, 2022 was proposed as an alternative date for
holding the elections. The proposal, according to Iraqi media, was floated
during a meeting late Tuesday in Baghdad, with the presence of the
representatives of some political forces that were described as “balanced and
influential.” The sources, who spoke to The Arab Weekly on condition of
anonymity, revealed that some Shia parties attributed their volte-face to the
recent decision of the Sadrist movement to boycott the polls.
Some of those who attended Tuesday’s meeting in Baghdad believe that the Sadrist
movement, led by powerful Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, should be given an
opportunity to reconsider its decision. In this regard, they fear that a boycott
by Sadrists could end up creating a challenge to the legitimacy of the electoral
process, and so to that of the future government. A boycott by Sadrists, some
political forces say, would mean the abstention of a large segment of the Iraqi
society, given Sadr’s popularity among Shias.A former Iraqi MP, however, lashed
out at those calling for the postponement of elections, questioning the
significance of the Sadrist movement’s boycott as a justification. In this
regard, he argued that the Sadrists’ boycott was just a cover for the concerns
for Shia forces and parties about failing to secure enough votes to control the
future political scene in the country.
Powerful Shia political parties and figures, the former MP said, do not want the
elections to be held at a time when public resentment is still palpable in the
country. These forces are concerned they would become the subject of a punitive
vote by Iraqis, which would lead to the loss of the influence they have
maintained for eighteen years. According to a source quoted by the Rudaw Media
Network, the meeting on Tuesday witnessed the submission of another proposal to
dissolve the current parliament on February 22, 2022. The mandate of the current
parliaments is supposed to end in 2022, but Iraq’s political parties had decided
to hold early elections after massive popular protests toppled the previous
government of Adel Abdul-Mahdi in late 2019. Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi
and President Barham Salih have insisted so far on holding elections on time.
The idea of postponing elections was floated long before the Baghdad meeting on
Tuesday, garnering the support of many political forces in the country at the
time. The Sadr-backed Sairoon Alliance was among the latest political groupings
to demand a postponement of elections, according to MP Bader Saegh al-Zayadi,
who considered that a boycott by Sadrists would affect the legitimacy of the
whole process, stressing that “the elections cannot be held on October
10.”Zayadi noted that other parties had announced their intention to boycott the
elections, at a time when the government and the international community insist
on holding inclusive polls, with the participation of all political parties.
Zayadi was referring to the recent decision of the National Dialogue Front led
by Sunni politician Salih al-Mutlaq, who expressed his concern about fraud, in a
repeat of what happened during the 2018 elections.
Earlier in July, the Iraqi Platform, led by former prime minister Ayad Allawi,
announced they too were dropping out of the race. Wael Abdel Latif, deputy head
of the Iraqi Platform party, said that with the presence of armed factions
threatening the lives of activists, there is no room for fair elections. The
electoral law in its current form may lead to internal war between those armed
groups, he added.
The Iraqi National House, a new party formed by a group of Tishreen (October
movement) protesters, also withdrew from the elections for the same reasons.
There is widespread apprehension among Iraqi political parties and forces about
the possible outcome of the October 10 elections. Shia political parties, which
were fervently denounced by protesters in their own strongholds in central and
southern Iraq, are particularly concerned. Sunni political forces are also
fretting about the upcoming elections amid a steep decline in their popularity
in Sunni regions in the west and north of the country. The Sunni population in
the country’s west and north is still reeling from the cost of war against ISIS,
having to deal with poor services and a slow reconstruction pace.
Regime Fire Kills 8 Children in Syria's Idlib in 2 Days
Agence France Presse/August 20/2021
Syria regime shelling has killed eight children and a woman in the country's
last major rebel bastion of Idlib in just two days, a war monitor said Friday.
Artillery fire early Friday morning on the village of Kansafra in the
northwestern stronghold killed four children from the same family, the
Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. An AFP correspondent saw
the father cry over the bodies of three of the children at a cemetery. The
remains of a fourth were then brought along, and buried in haste as shelling
started up again in a neighboring area. A day earlier, in the nearby village of
Balshun, artillery fire by pro-Damascus forces killed four children and the
mother of three of them, the Observatory reported. The Idlib region is home to
nearly three million people, two-thirds of them displaced from other parts of
the country during the decade-long civil war. It is dominated by Syria's former
Al-Qaeda affiliate, but rebels and other jihadists are also present. A ceasefire
deal brokered by regime ally Russia and rebel backer Turkey has largely
protected the region from a new government military offensive since March 2020.
But regime forces have stepped up their shelling on the southern edges of the
bastion since June. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad took the oath of office for
a new term last month, vowing to make "liberating those parts of the homeland
that still need to be" one of his top priorities. Syria's war has killed around
half a million people since starting in 2011 with a brutal crackdown on
anti-government protests.
The Latest LCCC English analysis &
editorials published on
August 20-21/2021
History Lesson - Biden is Obama 3.0 on Embracing Jihadists
Pete Hoekstra/Gatestone Institute/August 20/2021
Biden is following in Obama's ill-fated footsteps. In fact, Biden's foreign
policy is so unoriginal that you could almost describe the "Biden Doctrine" --
as more and more left-wing pundits are calling it -- as "Obama on steroids."
The Biden administration must... Refuse with absolute consistency to work with
radical Islamist groups. Exceptions to this rule must be limited to cases of
absolute and immediate necessity. Never trust and always verify, verify, and
verify.
Send powerful messages of support to Taiwan, Ukraine, Israel and our allies in
Asia such as Japan and Australia especially. These are the partners most at risk
because of Biden's failure in Afghanistan, and his inadequate responses to China
and Russia, our other greatest adversaries.
Make it clear, now that the U.S. is at a much greater risk than just a few weeks
ago, that any attack against the U.S. will be met with the harshest response.
President Joe Biden is following in Barack Obama's ill-fated footsteps. In fact,
Biden's foreign policy is so unoriginal that you could almost describe the
"Biden Doctrine" -- as more and more left-wing pundits are calling it -- as
"Obama on steroids."
"Rommel, you magnificent bastard, I read your book!" An unforgettable line from
the classic movie Patton. George C. Scott, in the title role as the legendary
General George Patton, is surveying the battlefield from his command post. He
senses that his U.S. forces will rout the Germans, led by the brilliant Field
Marshal Erwin Rommel, in this pivotal World War II tank battle in Tunisia. Why
would the Americans be blessed with victory? In large part because Patton,
himself a military genius, took the time to thoroughly study Rommel's book on
battlefield tactics and strategy during the previous war, World War I. Patton
believed in the value of knowing his history, learning from his adversaries and
avoiding the mistakes of his predecessors.
I truly wish President Joe Biden were interested in learning from history.
Tragically, however, the pattern is becoming more pronounced every day: instead
of learning from the mistakes of the Obama administration, many of them, by the
way, his own mistakes as Obama's vice president, Biden is following in Obama's
ill-fated footsteps. In fact, Biden's foreign policy is so unoriginal that you
could almost describe the "Biden Doctrine" -- as more and more left-wing pundits
are calling it -- as "Obama on steroids."
As the disaster in Afghanistan sadly illustrates, it is especially Biden's
"doctrine" in the Middle East that is nothing other than Obama on steroids, more
like a super-charged Obama 3.0 than even Obama 2.0.
Upon taking office approximately seven years after 9/11, Obama wanted to forget
the lessons of that terrible September day. He fundamentally changed America's
perspective on the challenges and threats to our national security, especially
in the Middle East and North Africa region. He embraced many groups and
individuals that the U.S. had previously shunned because of their links to
radical jihadist movements and theology.
In June 2009, during his first visit to the Middle East, Obama gave a major
speech in Cairo. Many may not remember what he said, but they will never forget
the symbolism of having leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in the audience
sitting in prominent positions. Many governments in the region consider the MB
to be a terrorist organization. At the very least, the MB has a history of
engaging in violent activities. It is decidedly anti-Western and anti-American.
Many MB members are known terrorist leaders, and radical Islamist ideology is
widespread in the MB.
Less than two years later, the Obama administration supported the Arab Spring as
it rocked the Middle East. As part of its naïve -- and ahistorical --
utopianism, the Obama administration tolerated the overthrow of Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak, because he was an autocrat. Mubarak was certainly far
from an ideal ruler, but he was an ally of the U.S. and a powerful force against
radical Islamism and jihadist terrorism. In a region full of sworn enemies of
Israel and the United States, Mubarak maintained full diplomatic relations with
Israel.
When Mubarak fell, Egypt came under the control of the Muslim Brotherhood. It
didn't turn out well. Roughly two years later the MB-backed government, which
was rapidly proving to be fully as authoritarian and anti-democratic as its
worst enemies feared, was itself overthrown.
This scenario repeated itself in Libya when Obama allied with the radical groups
that wanted to overthrow Gaddafi. I had met with Gaddafi three times. His
history of totalitarian leanings, support of terrorism and government-sponsored
terrorist acts was awful. By 2004, however, he was willing to come in from the
cold. Realizing it was in his own best interests, Gaddafi credibly told me and
other American officials that he would pay reparations to those who died in the
downing of Pan Am 103, dismantle his entire nuclear weapons program, and work
with the U.S. to fight the threat from radical jihadists. After the U.S., under
George W. Bush, renewed diplomatic ties with Libya in June 2004, Gaddafi set
about fulfilling the pledges he'd made.
Under Obama that all changed. Ignoring the hard lessons of recent Middle East
history again, Obama supported the efforts of radical groups to overthrow
Gaddafi. By August of 2011 Gaddafi was gone.
And we all know what happened then. In 2012, U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and
two other Americans were killed in Benghazi by the Libyan terrorist group Ansar
al-Sharia. Also, secret shipments of arms were sent from Libya to the rebels in
Syria who were attempting to overthrow the government of Bashar al-Assad. Some
of the groups receiving arms from Libya, with at least the tacit support of the
Obama administration, became the core of what the world would come to know as
ISIS.
As if all that weren't enough, Libya lacks a functioning government to this day,
ten years after Gaddafi was toppled with Obama's help.
Obama's record in Iran is arguably worst of all. In pursuit of a flawed nuclear
deal, Obama lifted sanctions on the radical regime of the mullahs, the largest
state sponsor of terrorism in the world, with proxies wreaking havoc in Lebanon,
Iraq and Yemen, to name just the most blatant examples. As I write this, Lebanon
has sunk into chaos, a failed state. Hezbollah continues to threaten Israel. A
devastating war drags on in Yemen. A revitalized, violently anti-American Iran
is the dominant power in Iraq. And Biden wants to revive Obama's foolish nuclear
deal.
We see it now most clearly in Afghanistan: like Obama, Biden is effectively
siding with the jihadists. The results are predictably the same: disaster. We
may never know if Biden made some sort of implicit deal with the Taliban.
Personally, I believe that the administration had at least an understanding with
the Taliban. Biden probably thought he could limit the damage, but was then
double-crossed by his jihadist negotiating partners. The people of Afghanistan,
as we are seeing, will suffer significantly. The U.S. will be at greater risk
from reinvigorated radical jihadist movements, not only the Taliban itself but
also al-Qaeda and ISIS, who might well now have a new home base in a
Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
I don't know if Biden cares about history, but he certainly doesn't understand
it. At any rate, he's reading from the failed playbook of his predecessor Obama.
How can he change course? Here are three must-do steps to implement right now.
The Biden administration must:
1. Refuse with absolute consistency to work with radical Islamist groups.
Exceptions to this rule must be limited to cases of absolute and immediate
necessity. Never trust and always verify, verify, and verify.
2. Step up personal engagement with our allies at the highest level. This must
be done by the president himself, not just by the secretary of state or the vice
president. Our allies' confidence in America, and specifically this president,
has been shaken severely.
3. Send powerful messages of support to Taiwan, Ukraine, Israel and our allies
in Asia such as Japan and Australia especially. These are the partners most at
risk because of Biden's failure in Afghanistan, and his inadequate responses to
China and Russia, our other greatest adversaries.
4. Make it clear, now that the U.S. is at a much greater risk than just a few
weeks ago, that any attack against the U.S. will be met with the harshest
response.
To take these steps in a noticeable and credible manner will not be easy,
especially given the skewed worldview of the Biden administration and its
progressive base. But it must try. And as Americans, we must all help where we
can. Republicans and Democrats must come together to send a message of unity to
respond to this international crisis of confidence.
The alternative is not pretty, as we are already seeing. To paraphrase Patton,
we've already read the Obama playbook that Biden has been following so far.
America didn't like it then, and it won't like it now.
*Pete Hoekstra is a former Representative in Congress from Michigan. He served
as the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. More recently he was U.S.
Ambassador to the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
© 2021 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.
In Middle East, Taliban victory seen as sign of US
unreliability
Hams Rabah/The Arab Weekly/August 20/2021
AMMAN--Across the Middle East, the Taliban’s rapid seizure of power in
Afghanistan has been seen by some as a signal that players in the region can no
longer depend on diminishing US power. While the Taliban’s ability to retake
ground from foreign forces was welcomed by anti-Western factions, the group’s
advance has also triggered concerns that the country could once more become a
haven for Arab extremists. Fighting to expel foreign forces since being
overthrown in 2001, the Taliban seized Kabul on Sunday after a lightning
offensive as US-led Western forces withdrew.
In the Middle East, where the United States has long been the dominant outside
power, although its involvement has receded since it drew down forces in Iraq,
events in Afghanistan could prompt states to forge new or parallel alliances,
analysts said.
“What happened in Afghanistan reinforces the conviction of numerous Arab regimes
that the US role in the Arab and Islamic world … is regressing,” said Mohammad
Abu Rumman, a Jordanian analyst and former minister.
“It is time to reduce dependence on Washington in the strategic realm,” Emirati
analyst Abdulkhaleq Abdulla wrote in The National. Western policy and military
interventions have sparked resistance movements for decades in the Middle East
and some welcomed the retreat of foreign forces. The Houthi movement in Yemen
and Lebanon’s Hezbollah, both aligned with Iran, put out statements drawing
attention to what they called US failure and humiliation. Hezbollah said the
American withdrawal should serve as a lesson to US-aligned groups in Lebanon not
to depend on Washington as an ally.
“In order not to fight on behalf of anyone, he (US President Joe Biden) accepted
bearing a historic and humiliating defeat in Afghanistan,” Hezbollah leader
Hassan Nasrallah said during a Tuesday night sermon. Hamas, the Palestinian
militant group that controls the Gaza Strip, congratulated the Taliban and the
Afghan people. Gazans were pleased about the Taliban’s advance, which offered
encouragement to Palestinians living under Israeli occupation, said Mohamed
Dadar, a 28-year-old in Gaza City.
Expressions of concern
Sheikh Ahmed Bin Hamad al-Khalili, the Grand Mufti of Oman, which has a
long-standing policy of neutrality, welcomed the victory over “aggressor
invaders”. However, reactions were tempered by concern over resurgent militancy
in Afghanistan, where before 2001 many Arab fighters were trained under Taliban
rule for insurgencies back home. “We are scared of their return,” said
23-year-old Jordanian Taqi Abdelsamad, citing past jihadist violence in Syria
and Iraq. Several groups aligned with al-Qaeda have welcomed the Taliban’s
success. The Taliban’s capture of Kabul could accelerate a trend of jihadists
heading for Afghanistan, said Jordanian analyst Abu Rumman, who is an expert on
Islamist groups. “This could encourage in my estimation the morale of thousands
of jihadists who crumbled after Daesh (Islamic State) disintegrated, so they
believe that things are not so bad.”However, he added that the Taliban would
treat newly-arriving jihadists with caution because of a peace deal that led the
withdrawal of US forces in Afghanistan. Others expressed dismay at the return to
power of a group with a hardline religious agenda.“We should all unite to
prevent this from happening because it is unacceptable for this to happen to the
rights of women and anyone in the Arab and Islamic world,” said Sarah Nawas, a
student in the Syrian capital, Damascus. A Taliban spokesman has suggested that
the group will impose laws more softly than during their harsh 1996-2001 rule.
In Iraq, the Taliban’s advance brought back for some, painful memories of the
seizure of swathes of Iraqi territory by Islamic State in 2014. “I really
sympathise with them (the Afghan people) because I have been through this
situation before,” said Khalid al-Rawi, a musician from Mosul, Islamic State’s
Iraqi stronghold before it was driven out in 2017.
Question: "What is repentance and is it necessary for
salvation?"
GotQuestions.org/August 21/2021
Answer: Many understand the term repentance to mean “a turning from sin.”
Regretting sin and turning from it is related to repentance, but it is not the
precise meaning of the word. In the Bible, the word repent means “to change
one’s mind.” The Bible also tells us that true repentance will result in a
change of actions (Luke 3:8–14; Acts 3:19). In summarizing his ministry, Paul
declares, “I preached that they should repent and turn to God and demonstrate
their repentance by their deeds” (Acts 26:20). The full biblical definition of
repentance is a change of mind that results in a change of action.
What, then, is the connection between repentance and salvation? The book of Acts
especially focuses on repentance in regard to salvation (Acts 2:38; 3:19; 11:18;
17:30; 20:21; 26:20). To repent, in relation to salvation, is to change your
mind regarding sin and Jesus Christ. In Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost
(Acts chapter 2), he concludes with a call for the people to repent (Acts 2:38).
Repent from what? Peter is calling the people who rejected Jesus (Acts 2:36) to
change their minds about that sin and to change their minds about Christ
Himself, recognizing that He is indeed “Lord and Christ” (Acts 2:36). Peter is
calling the people to change their minds, to abhor their past rejection of
Christ, and to embrace faith in Him as both Messiah and Savior.
Repentance involves recognizing that you have thought wrongly in the past and
determining to think rightly in the future. The repentant person has “second
thoughts” about the mindset he formerly embraced. There is a change of
disposition and a new way of thinking about God, about sin, about holiness, and
about doing God’s will. True repentance is prompted by “godly sorrow,” and it
“leads to salvation” (2 Corinthians 7:10).
Repentance and faith can be understood as two sides of the same coin. It is
impossible to place your faith in Jesus Christ as the Savior without first
changing your mind about your sin and about who Jesus is and what He has done.
Whether it is repentance from willful rejection or repentance from ignorance or
disinterest, it is a change of mind. Biblical repentance, in relation to
salvation, is changing your mind from rejection of Christ to faith in Christ.
Repentance is not a work we do to earn salvation. No one can repent and come to
God unless God pulls that person to Himself (John 6:44). Repentance is something
God gives—it is only possible because of His grace (Acts 5:31; 11:18). No one
can repent unless God grants repentance. All of salvation, including repentance
and faith, is a result of God drawing us, opening our eyes, and changing our
hearts. God’s longsuffering leads us to repentance (2 Peter 3:9), as does His
kindness (Romans 2:4).
While repentance is not a work that earns salvation, repentance unto salvation
does result in works. It is impossible to truly change your mind without that
causing a change in action. In the Bible, repentance results in a change in
behavior. That is why John the Baptist called people to “produce fruit in
keeping with repentance” (Matthew 3:8). A person who has truly repented of his
sin and exercised faith in Christ will give evidence of a changed life (2
Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 5:19–23; James 2:14–26).
To see what repentance looks like in real life, all we need to do is turn to the
story of Zacchaeus. Here was a man who cheated and stole and lived lavishly on
his ill-gotten gains—until he met Jesus. At that point he had a radical change
of mind: “Look, Lord!” said Zacchaeus. “Here and now I give half of my
possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will
pay back four times the amount” (Luke 19:8). Jesus happily proclaimed that
salvation had come to Zacchaeus’s house, and that even the tax collector was now
“a son of Abraham” (verse 9)—a reference to Zacchaeus’s faith. The cheat became
a philanthropist; the thief made restitution. That’s repentance, coupled with
faith in Christ.
Repentance, properly defined, is necessary for salvation. Biblical repentance is
changing your mind about your sin—no longer is sin something to toy with; it is
something to be forsaken as we “flee from the coming wrath” (Matthew 3:7). It is
also changing your mind about Jesus Christ—no longer is He to be mocked,
discounted, or ignored; He is the Savior to be clung to; He is the Lord to be
worshiped and adored.