English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For January 29/2020
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

#elias_bejjani_news
 

The Bulletin's Link on the lccc Site
http://data.eliasbejjaninews.com/eliasnews21/english.january29.21.htm

News Bulletin Achieves Since 2006
Click Here to enter the LCCC Arabic/English news bulletins Achieves since 2006

Bible Quotations For today

Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer everyone.
Letter to the Colossians 04/05-10:”Conduct yourselves wisely towards outsiders, making the most of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer everyone. Tychicus will tell you all the news about me; he is a beloved brother, a faithful minister, and a fellow-servant in the Lord. I have sent him to you for this very purpose, so that you may know how we are and that he may encourage your hearts; he is coming with Onesimus, the faithful and beloved brother, who is one of you. They will tell you about everything here. Aristarchus my fellow-prisoner greets you, as does Mark the cousin of Barnabas, concerning whom you have received instructions if he comes to you, welcome him.”
 

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on January 28-29/2021

Ministry of Health: 3,497 new Coronavirus cases, 68 deaths
Lebanon Launches Registration Platform for COVID-19 Vaccination
Lebanese workers thrust into poverty, depression amid COVID-19 lockdown
Lebanon’s COVID-19 vaccination plan brings hope amid crisis
Amnesty Raps France over Weapons Used against Lebanon Protesters
Presidency Information Office: President Aoun requested meeting with Central Security Council to study security situation
President discusses work of Justice Ministry, other ministerial affairs with Minister Najem
Protester Dies of Wounds after Lockdown Protests
Tripoli protests turn deadly in crisis-hit Lebanon
Protesters, Security Forces Clash Anew in Tripoli
Lebanese man dies of wounds after lockdown protests
Clashes between protesters, security forces for third night in Lebanon
Slain Protester Laid to Rest after Night of Violent Clashes in Tripoli
Judge Aoun Sues BDL Governor, Others in 'Subsidized Dollar' Case
Syrian businessman Haswani denies links to Beirut port explosion: Report
Mustaqbal Slams 'Suspicious Hands' in Tripoli, Warns against 'Security Solution'
LF Stands by Tripoli Residents but Rejects 'Chaos, Sabotage'
Kuwaiti Red Crescent aid plane arrives in Beirut, Al-Qenaei reiterates country’s support to Lebanon
Judge Aoun presses job negligence charges against Salameh, Head of Banking Control Commission
The road to nowhere; tackling Lebanon’s smuggling operation/Rami Rayess/Al Arabiya/January 28/2021
Authorities are Brain Dead as Protests Resume in Lebanon/Hussam Itani/Asharq Al Awsat/January 28/2021
Arab Medical Apartheid - Where Is the Outrage?/Bassam Tawil/Gatestone Institute/January 28/2021

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on January 28-29/2021

Pope to Meet Top Shiite Cleric Sistani on Iraq Visit
New US secretary of state addresses Biden administration priorities, Iran deal
Iran dismisses US call to be the first to return to nuclear deal
US will not return to Iran deal before Tehran comes back into ‘full compliance’
Iran will ‘demolish’ Tel Aviv, Haifa if attacked by Israel, warns top IRGC commander
US will continue to work with Israel to advance regional peace: US Secretary of State
US flies B-52 bomber over Middle East to ‘deter aggression’ amid Iran tensions
Israel-Sudan signing ceremony in Washington in next three months, minister says
CENTCOM chief arriving in Israel for talks with Kochavi on Iran
Popular Rage Blankets Syria’s Sweida, Military Tensions Spike in Daraa
Russia opposed to widening scope of Iran nuclear deal if US rejoin
Turkey-Greece talks held in ‘very positive’ atmosphere, Ankara says

Titles For The Latest The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on January 28-29/2021

The Open University; meeting the challenge of distance learning in the COVID-19 age/Professor Agnes Kukulska-Hulme/Al Arabiya/January 28/2021
John Brennan's Dark Fantasies Become a Homeland Security Bulletin/Chris Farrell/Gatestone Institute/January 28/2021
US media has to win back public’s faith in post-Trump era/Zaid M. Belbagi /Arab News/January 28/2021
Iran’s regional chess game exposes US confusion/Nadim Shehadi/Arab News/January 28/2021
Will the Biden team tighten or unravel US-Saudi ties?/Simon Henderson/The Hill//January 28/2021
Are there pieces of Trump’s foreign policy worth keeping?/Dennis Ross/Juan C. Zarate/Los Angeles Times/January 28/2021

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on January 28-29/2021

Ministry of Health: 3,497 new Coronavirus cases, 68 deaths
NNA/Thursday 28 January 2021
The Ministry of Public Health announced 3,497 new Coronavirus infections, which raises the cumulative number of confirmed cases to 293,157.
68 Coronavirus-related deaths have been registered over the past 24 hours.
 

Lebanon Launches Registration Platform for COVID-19 Vaccination
Naharnet/Thursday 28 January 2021
Caretaker Minister of Health Hamad Hassan, and Information Minister Manal Abdul Samad, launched on Thursday the national platform for registration for the coronavirus vaccine, in a press conference held at the Ministry of Public Health.
The goal is to "deliver real information to the citizens, and we pray they respond to the government initiative to achieve societal immunity,” said Hassan. "Within two weeks, the number of beds in government hospitals will be 300, and this is a great achievement," he declared. "The law that has been promulgated is modern, and thus Lebanon is in the Legislative Council keeping pace with the latest innovations to protect society," Hassan went on, considering that "what has been accomplished on paper can only be made real through implementation on the ground, and this requires a commitment from all references to work on the principle of equality, outside of political, geographical and sectarian considerations.""The Ministry of Health will adopt the approved standards strictly," he affirmed. For her part, Abdul Samad noted that "the government has fulfilled its promise in terms of transparency and the right to access information. Unfortunately, the number of infections at present is large among [productive] citizens aged between 20 and 59." "Information and facts must be made accessible to all citizens so they can base their choice of whether or not to take the vaccine upon those facts," she said, stressing that media professionals are among the categories that should be prioritized in terms of vaccination. Abdul Samad also announced that "there will be a series of meetings with the media to launch a media plan to battle the coronavirus pandemic."

Lebanese workers thrust into poverty, depression amid COVID-19 lockdown
Mona Alami, Al Arabiya English/Wednesday 27 January 2021
Lebanon has extended its all-day lockdown until February to curb the spread of coronavirus. The lockdown, in place for nearly a month by February 8, is hitting daily wage and informal workers hard, who find themselves without resources and walking a fine line between life and death.
As COVID-19 cases spiraled out of control in Lebanon, the government enforced a lockdown from January 14 to 23. With daily infection rates remaining exceptionally high and COVID-19 death tolls spiking, the government decided to expand the total confinement for two more weeks until February 8.
“The impact of the lockdown has been brutal on daily wage and informal workers because of their already fragile situation. In Lebanon, 55 percent of the population is comprised of daily wage and informal workers with no social protection or regular contracts. If they do not work, they don’t earn any money. They have thus lost all source of income with the current lockdown,” said sociologist Dr Adib Nehme. Mona Saad, head of the Maarouf Saad Social and Cultural Foundation concurred, adding that the government had no plan in place to bring relief aid to daily wage workers, such as artisans, taxi drivers, waiters, sailors and others, during lockdown. “Unlike other governments, the Lebanese government maintains a reactionary approach to the COVID situation and no long-term plan,” she said. In the last few weeks, Lebanon has averaged 5,000 new COVID-19 cases per day, with deaths rising between 40-60 every day. The situation is no better in the country’s intensive care units, where the occupancy rate is close to saturation at 90 percent in most of the country and 100 percent in Beirut, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). In 2020 poverty among Lebanese had increased to 55 percent from 28 percent in 2018, while extreme poverty had tripled to 23 percent from 8 percent, according to UNICEF. For Syrian refugees, 91 percent of households were now living under the poverty line and 88 percent living in extreme poverty. Charbel a taxi driver said he hadn’t worked in over two weeks. “I can barely make ends meet. I used to be a mechanic, now I work as a taxi driver to sustain my family. With the lockdown I can’t provide anymore for them and rely on my in-laws for help,” he underlined. Competition for work was so high in recent weeks that a brawl between taxi drivers erupted last week at the Beirut airport over who would shuttle incoming travelers to their hotels.
The situation is compounded for daily wage workers in Palestinian camps. Oussama Oueity works as a painter. He makes less than $6 on a good day, which allows him to feed his family with some bread, rice and lentils, as well as buy medication for his son who suffers from a heart condition. With the lockdown, his family now sticks to a strict regimen of bread and rice. “I still give thanks to God that some of my clients and Fatah, the Palestinian organization give me a stipend that allows us to survive,” he points out. Inflation had already soared to 133 percent by October last year, with prices set to rise even further this year. Along with a crushing currency devaluation, the impact of these crisis will further increase the risk of more households falling into poverty. “If the lockdown continues for one or two more months, I will have to close my hair salon. The Lebanese pound devaluation combined with the COVID crisis has made our situation untenable. Unlike other countries, the Lebanese state has done nothing to support daily wage workers or small businesses during the lockdown,” said hairdresser David Checherian. Additionally, financial problems combined with the lockdown are putting pressure on people’s mental health. Thousands of Lebanese are suffering from extreme depression and looking for dangerous solutions to the economic depression, Nehme explained. “People are facing a slow death, they are resorting to increasing violence and this will eventually threaten the fabric of the country’s social security,” Saad added.

Lebanon’s COVID-19 vaccination plan brings hope amid crisis
Samar Kadi/The Arab Weekly/January 28/2021
BEIRUT--“I am still undecided about the vaccine. I fear that it might have side effects. I really don’t know what to do,” said Samira Abdel Malek. The 86-year-old falls within the first category of those eligible for the COVID-19 vaccination under a rollout plan which is expected to kick off in Lebanon in mid-February. While Abdel Malek is hesitant, Nada Sleiman, 59, is eager to be vaccinated despite mistrust in the government’s ability to carry out an effective and equitable vaccination process.
“As far as I am concerned I want to take the vaccine. But how can we trust a failed and unreliable government. I am not sure if the vaccine will be properly stored under the right temperature, or if after receiving the first dose, the second dose will be available and accessible,” Sleiman said. “Will the vaccines be distributed fairly and according to priorities? Will it be available to those who have connections only?” Sleiman asked, adding: “Nonetheless, I will register for vaccination… I have no other option.”Lebanon’s caretaker government announced on January 27 its COVID-19 vaccination strategy, which includes the launch of a registration platform to help people get the vaccine amid an unprecedented surge in the virus. The country has reached record-breaking numbers since the beginning of the year, recording over 5,500 confirmed new cases daily. Health professionals have called for an open, inclusive and transparent process to placate citizens’ worries given the privatisation and politicisation of the country’s health sector. The government has failed to provide a comprehensive strategy to manage the COVID-19 crisis, despite calls to inform people of decisions made to halt the virus’s spread and mitigate its impact on mortality and morbidity. Instead, people have been left guessing and outguessing their policymakers about their decision-making process. The first batch of Pfizer vaccines is expected to arrive by mid-February. Under the plan, priority categories for vaccination will include healthcare workers and people aged 75 and above. “The vaccine should be taken without hesitation,” said physician Dr. Ali Sabeh Aion.” It is the only means to protect ourselves otherwise we will be heading to a catastrophe.”
Stressing the need to act quickly, Aion said, “We fear further mutations of the virus over which the current vaccine might not be effective. That is why the vaccination process should be carried out without delay in order to contain and eventually eradicate the virus before more mutations occur.” The first dose provides between 30% and 50% immunity. This increases to up to 95% immunity once the full dose is administered. The World Bank said it will support the vaccination process by allocating $34 million, in its first operation to fund the procurement of COVID-19 vaccines. The fund will be used to purchase 1.5 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine supporting 750,000 people, and part of 1.7 million additional doses through the Covax programme benefiting 1.135 million people. “The World Bank will be supervising the vaccine rollout in the country as per the financing agreement with the government,” stressed Saroj Kumar Jha, regional director of the Mashreq Department (Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Jordan and Iran) at the World Bank.
Downplaying the risk of favouritism in vaccine administration, Kumar said: “One of the conditions we have in our support for the country on vaccine is that the rollout will follow WHO immunization allocation framework based on priorities.”“We will hire an independent vaccine monitor to see how the vaccination program is rolling out and to make sure that the Bank’s financing of vaccines and vaccination is carried out exactly as per the international standards,” Kumar told a Zoom press conference. The vaccination plan will include Lebanese and non-Lebanese living in the country, including Syrian and Palestinian refugees, he said. “We don’t want to exclude anyone because no one is safe till everybody is safe,” Kumar stressed. Lebanon has entered a strict, round the clock lockdown since January 14 after recording a 70% rise in infections within a week, one of the steepest increases in transmission worldwide. Beyond the human toll, the pandemic has exacerbated Lebanon’s economic crisis, its worst in recent history. Economists hope the vaccination drive will help give confidence to open up the economy and help start the country’s economic recovery.''

Amnesty Raps France over Weapons Used against Lebanon Protesters
Agence France Presse/Thursday 28 January 2021
Amnesty International on Thursday urged Paris to halt weapons sales to Lebanon, saying French-manufactured rubber bullets, tear gas grenades and launchers had been used to quell peaceful demonstrations. "France has for years been supplying Lebanese security forces with law enforcement equipment that they then used to commit or facilitate serious human rights violations," the group said in a statement. "We call on France to ensure that there are no further sales until the Lebanese authorities have acknowledged past violations," said Aymeric Elluin, advocacy officer on arms transfers at Amnesty International France. "Lebanese security forces are operating in a climate of impunity." French-manufactured rubber bullets, tear gas grenades and launchers have been used repeatedly since the start of an unprecedented anti-government protest movement in October 2019, according to the rights group. They were also used in 2015 to disperse protests over a waste management crisis that saw trash pile up across the capital, it added. Amnesty said its findings were based on analysis of more than 100 videos of protests in Beirut, as well as testimonies and medical records collected by researchers on the ground. It accused security forces of firing tear gas cannisters directly at protesters, as well as shooting rubber bullets at chest-level, sometimes from close range, between October 2019 and August 2020. This "excessive use of force" has led to serious injuries to the head, eyes and upper body, the group said. Security forces also used French-made armored vehicles, it added. Amnesty called the role of French law enforcement equipment in the crackdown on demonstrations "shameful". "There has been no effective investigation of the unlawful use of weapons, including those made in France, against peaceful protesters, and not a single security officer has been held to account by judicial authorities," Elluin said. French authorities said later Thursday that weapons exports were "subject to strict vigilance and examination on a case-by-case basis." "This is the case particularly in Lebanon, which is in the midst a severe economic, social and political crisis, and the stability of which is essential for the whole region," said a French foreign ministry spokeswoman, emphasizing Paris' commitment to "respect for the right to protest."The Amnesty statement came as a man died of a bullet wound sustained Thursday evening during clashes in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli.
Security forces have clashed every night since Monday with protesters angered by the combined impact of a severe economic crisis and a coronavirus lockdown.

Presidency Information Office: President Aoun requested meeting with Central Security Council to study security situation
NNA/Thursday 28 January 2021
In clarification of what MTV reported this evening that the President of the Republic, General Michel Aoun, disagreed to call the Supreme Defense Council to a meeting to discuss the current security situation, the Information Office in the Presidency of the Republic indicates that President Aoun requested the convening of the Central Security Council to study the security situation in the country through field reports prepared by the concerned security forces, and in light of proposals and procedures that these forces conclude, and the necessary action be taken.—Presidency Press Office

President discusses work of Justice Ministry, other ministerial affairs with Minister Najem
NNA/Thursday 28 January 2021

President of the Republic, General Michel Aoun, met Justice Minister, Marie-Claude Najem, today at Baabda Palace, and deliberated with her the work of her Ministry and courts, in light of the current lockdown measures, resulting from Corona-pandemic spread. The meeting also addressed various ministerial affairs, including forensic audit in Central Bank accounts, public administrations and institutions, in addition to the issue of financial aid which is distributed to poor families. -- Presidency Press Office
 

Protesters Target Tripoli's Political Barons
Agence France Presse/Thursday 28 January 2021
Angry crowds gathered outside the Tripoli homes of some of Lebanon's top politicians on Thursday, torching rubbish and smashing surveillance cameras as rage grows over the government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
"We want to burn down all their houses the way they burned our hearts," said Omar Qarhani, an unemployed father of six. "Let any politician dare to walk on the streets of Tripoli." The impoverished northern city has seen four days of clashes between security forces and residents outraged by curfew measures they say are destroying their livelihoods. The pandemic has added to the misery of Lebanon's worst financial downturn since the 1975-1990 civil war and stoked simmering anger against a political class seen as corrupt and incompetent. That rage spilled onto Tripoli's streets on Monday, and on Thursday the violence claimed its first victim -- Omar Tayba, who had sustained a bullet wound during the previous night's clashes. The city's political barons include some of Lebanon's richest men, but Qarhani said they have done almost nothing to help. "They have shamed this city," said the 42-year-old, as around 100 demonstrators clamored outside the house of a prominent Tripoli politician nearby. With more than half of its population below the poverty line, Tripoli was at the forefront of a nationwide protest movement that erupted in October 2019 to demand deep-rooted reforms of Lebanon's nepotistic, sectarian political system.
'Humiliation'
Demonstrations across the country had petered out as the coronavirus pandemic spread. A massive August 4 explosion at Beirut's port saw even the most die-hard of activists retreat from the streets. But rallies broke out again this week in Tripoli after authorities extended until February 8 a total lockdown meant to stem one of the world's steepest surges in Covid-19 infections. On Thursday, a procession of army jeeps followed as demonstrators, many in full face masks, walked through neighborhoods, dragging metal barricades and tipping over dumpsters to block the street. Outside the house of top Tripoli politician MP Faisal Karami, protester Adnan Abdullah vented his anger against the city's ruling elite.

"We target the homes of politicians because they are the reason for the situation," said the 42-year-old. "Our leaders have been the same for 30 years. They ruined the futures of our youth and led our country to ruin." Outside the house of MP Samir al-Jisr, another key political figure, demonstrators started a fire that was quickly put out by security forces. Protesters responded by chanting: "Why are you protecting them?"Tensions have steadily escalated in Tripoli since Monday and security forces have deployed reinforcements across the city. Protesters on Wednesday night lobbed stones, fireworks, and Molotov cocktails at security forces who responded with tear gas and rubber bullets, in clashes which left 226 people wounded. Adnan al-Hakim, a 19-year-old demonstrator, was limping outside al-Jisr's house on Thursday, a bloody bandage wrapped around his face. He said he had been hit in the leg by a rubber bullet and bludgeoned in the face -- but he remained defiant. "We are obliged to take the streets to secure our rights," he said. He cursed the city's politicians. "They are forcing us to live in humiliation. We can't take it anymore," he said.

Protester Dies of Wounds after Lockdown Protests
Agence France Presse/Thursday 28 January 2021
One of the protesters injured overnight in the Tripoli clashes with security forces succumbed to his wounds on Thursday, the National News Agency reported. Overnight clashes erupted between security forces and protesters angered by the combined impact of a severe economic crisis and a coronavirus lockdown. Omar Tayba sustained a bullet wound late Wednesday when protests in the northern city of Tripoli turned violent for the third night running, his brother Ahmad told AFP. "My brother was in Tripoli watching the protests when he was hit," he said. "He was transferred to hospital and died this morning. The 29-year-old man, who was employed in a bakery, became the first fatality -- reported also by local media -- of the protests that erupted earlier this week in Tripoli.  According to the National News Agency, a total of 226 people received treatment Wednesday night. Tripoli was already one of Lebanon's poorest areas before the coronavirus pandemic piled new misery onto a chronic economic crisis. Many of its residents have been left without an income since Lebanon imposed a full lockdown earlier this month in a bid to stem a surge in Covid-19 cases and prevent its hospitals from being overwhelmed. A round-the-clock curfew is in force nationwide and grocery shopping is restricted to home deliveries -- a service that is often unavailable in poorer areas. Authorities have extended the lockdown by two weeks to February 8.

Tripoli protests turn deadly in crisis-hit Lebanon
The Arab Weekly/Thursday 28 January 2021
A 30-year-old man died overnight from his wounds after the clashes injured scores of people, residents and local media said.

BEIRUT/TRIPOLI--A Lebanese man was killed in Tripoli on Thursday in clashes between security forces and protesters angry that a strict lockdown has left them with no means to survive the economy’s collapse. Witnesses and local media said riot police fired live bullets as protesters tried to storm the northern city’s government building. A 30-year-old man died overnight from his wounds after the clashes injured scores of people, residents and local media said. A security source said the protester had been hit by a bullet. Security forces fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters who threw stones, hurled Molotov cocktails and lit a car on fire, witnesses and police said. The police did not immediately respond to a question on whether live rounds had been fired and a protester was killed. Media footage showed sparks hitting the ground, apparently from ricocheting bullets, and the sound of gunfire.
“People are tired. There’s poverty, misery, lockdown and there’s no work… Our problem is the politicians,” said Samir Agha at the protest before the unrest. It marked the third straight night of violence in one of Lebanon’s poorest cities, after the government imposed a 24-hour curfew this month to curb a COVID-19 outbreak that has killed more than 2,500.

Extra hardship on the poor
Aid workers warn that with little to no aid, the lockdown is piling extra hardship on the poor, now more than half the population. Many rely on daily wages. Human Rights Watch called for an investigation into the protester’s death on Thursday. “The government neglected the needs of Tripoli’s people and used brute force…when they demanded a better life,” researcher Aya Majzoub said. State media said the clashes had wounded 226 protesters and police. Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces said hand grenades were thrown, including at a patrol, injuring at least nine officers. They pledged to respond with “full severity and decisiveness.” The Red Cross said rescuers took 35 people to hospitals, which are fighting high COVID-19 infection levels even as they cope with damage from the huge August explosion at Beirut port. With many ICU wards full, caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab said on Wednesday the lockdown was necessary.
Frustration with ruling class
Lebanon’s financial meltdown, which crashed the currency, poses the greatest risk to its stability since the 1975-1990 civil war. The Lebanese currency has crashed, losing over 80% of its value. Banks have imposed controls on withdrawals and transfers to protect dwindling foreign reserves. Unemployment and inflation have skyrocketed and tens of thousands have been thrown into poverty. While the protests are ostensibly against the lockdown measures, they reflect growing anger over authorities’ inaction and negligence in the face of the country’s meltdown. A power struggle between the president and prime minister-designate and fighting over cabinet seats has blocked the formation of a new government, crucial to enacting reforms that would unlock foreign financial assistance. The government resigned in August, following the massive explosion at Beirut port that killed over 200 people and wounded thousands. Lebanon’s ruling class has faced rising popular anger since protesters took to the streets in October 2019 in the largest-ever nationwide protests in the country. Demonstrators accused them of mismanaging and robbing the country of its resources and driving it into poverty.
The protests later died down, in part because of the pandemic but also because the political class held on to power and divisions emerged among the demonstrators.

Protesters, Security Forces Clash Anew in Tripoli
Naharnet/Thursday 28 January 2021
A new round of clashes broke out Thursday afternoon in Tripoli between security forces and demonstrators protesting dire economic conditions aggravated by the coronavirus lockdown. The protesters staged several attempts to storm Tripoli's serail, the main governmental building in the city, prompting security forces to fire tear gas from rooftops. They later managed to remove a part of the metallic gate of the building. In the evening, the protesters heavily hurled Molotov cocktails and stones at security forces protecting the serail. The Internal Security Forces meanwhile said that a "military hand grenade" landed inside the premises of the serail, lightly injuring an ISF member. Security forces had earlier fired tear gas to disperse protesters in the city’s al-Nour Square. Thursday's clashes between protesters and security forces injured more than 40 people, according to the National News Agency, adding to the more than 300 wounded since confrontations started this week. Earlier in the day, demonstrators staged angry demos outside the residences of Tripoli politicians Samir al-Jisr, Mohammed Kabbara, Ahmed Fatfat and Faisal Karami, where they set trash bins on fire and vandalized security cameras and plants. The scope of the protests in Tripoli, now in their fourth day, appeared to be widening even as the nation grapples with both the pandemic and the worst economic crisis in Lebanon's history. Overnight clashes in the city had left at least one person dead and 220 others injured. Frustrations have boiled over in Tripoli amid deteriorating living conditions and strict coronavirus lockdown measures. The violence marks a serious escalation in protests that began Monday and are still ongoing until the moment. The protesters have denounced the extended shutdown that exacerbated already dire conditions amid the unprecedented economic and financial crisis. Tripoli, Lebanon's second largest city and the most impoverished, has been a center for demonstrations and rioting against Lebanon's political class. A demo was meanwhile organized outside the Interior Ministry in Beirut in solidarity with Tripoli’s protesters. Another rally organized by the Lebanese Communist Party was also staged at Beirut's Riad al-Solh Square.

Lebanese man dies of wounds after lockdown protests
AFP, Tripoli/Thursday 28 January 2021
A man died of his wounds Thursday in Lebanon after clashes between security forces and protesters angered by the combined impact of a severe economic crisis and a coronavirus lockdown. Read the latest updates in our dedicated coronavirus section. Omar Tayba sustained a bullet wound late Wednesday when protests in the northern city of Tripoli turned violent for the third night running, his brother Ahmad told AFP. “My brother was in Tripoli watching the protests when he was hit,” he said. “He was transferred to hospital and died this morning.
The 29-year-old man, who was employed in a bakery, became the first fatality -- reported also by local media -- of the protests that erupted earlier this week in Tripoli. According to the National News Agency, a total of 226 people received treatment Wednesday night. Tripoli was already one of Lebanon’s poorest areas before the coronavirus pandemic piled new misery onto a chronic economic crisis. Many of its residents have been left without an income since Lebanon imposed a full lockdown earlier this month in a bid to stem a surge in Covid-19 cases and prevent its hospitals from being overwhelmed. A round-the-clock curfew is in force nationwide and grocery shopping is restricted to home deliveries -- a service that is often unavailable in poorer areas.Authorities have extended the lockdown by two weeks to February 8.

Clashes between protesters, security forces for third night in Lebanon
Reuters/Wednesday 27 January 2021
Lebanese security forces clashed for the third night with protesters in Tripoli angry about a coronavirus lockdown, with witnesses and local media reporting that riot police fired live bullets as protesters tried to storm the city’s government building. Security forces fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters who threw stones, hurled Molotov cocktails and lit a car on fire, a witness and police said. Dozens were wounded. The police did not immediately comment on whether live rounds had been fired. Reuters footage showed sparks hitting the ground, apparently from ricocheting bullets, and the sound of gunfire. It marked the third night of violence in a row in one of Lebanon’s poorest cities, where protesters railed against a strict lockdown that they say has left them with no means to survive the country’s economic collapse. The government imposed a 24-hour curfew earlier this month in a bid to curb a raging COVID-19 outbreak that has killed more than 2,500 people. Aid workers warn that with little to no aid, the lockdown piles extra hardship on the poor, now more than half the population. Many rely on daily wages. The financial meltdown, which crashed the currency, poses the greatest risk to Lebanon’s stability since its 1975-1990 civil war. “People are tired. There’s poverty, misery, lockdown and there’s no work... Our problem is the politicians,” said Samir Agha at the Tripoli protest before clashes erupted on Wednesday night. The Red Cross said rescuers treated at least 67 people for injuries and took 35 others to hospital. The state news agency said 226 protesters and police were wounded. Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces wrote in a tweet that “hand grenades” were thrown and injured nine officers. They pledged to respond to rioters with “full severity and decisiveness.” Earlier on Wednesday, caretaker Prime Minister Hassan Diab said the lockdown was necessary to contain the virus. He acknowledged that government aid was not enough to cover needs but said it would help “reduce the burdens.” The COVID-19 response has also triggered anger in Beirut, where infections reached some of the region’s highest levels and many ICU wards are full. The surge has overwhelmed hospitals, already struggling with dollar shortages and some damaged by an August port explosion. Diab’s cabinet resigned over the huge blast that devastated much of Beirut and killed 200 people.

Slain Protester Laid to Rest after Night of Violent Clashes in Tripoli
Associated Press/Thursday 28 January 2021
Mourners in Tripoli on Thursday laid to rest a 30-year-old killed during violent confrontations the previous night between protesters and security forces, the latest unrest as the nation grapples with both the pandemic and the worst economic crisis in Lebanon's history. More than 220 others were injured in the clashes in Tripoli as frustrations boiled over amid deteriorating living conditions and strict coronavirus lockdown measures. The violence marked a serious escalation in protests that began Monday and continued for three straight days into Wednesday night, denouncing the extended shutdown that exacerbated already dire conditions amid the unprecedented economic and financial crisis. Tripoli, Lebanon's second largest city and the most impoverished, has been a center for demonstrations and rioting against Lebanon's political class. Dozens of young men have been taking part in the nightly protests, throwing rocks at security forces and in some cases torching vehicles. On Wednesday, protesters repeatedly tried to break into the municipal building. Some lobbed “hand grenades” at security forces, the Internal Security Forces said. The ISF responded with water cannons, volleys of tear gas and finally, live ammunition. The National News Agency said 226 people were injured in the confrontations, including 26 policemen. One 30-year-old man, Omar Taibi, died of his wounds, it said. The Red Cross said it transported 35 injured to hospitals in the city. On Thursday morning, security forces brought reinforcements and put up barbed wire around the municipal building, known as the Serail. Two torched cars stood nearby. Shops and cafes were open and traffic appeared normal on the streets in clear defiance of the government's lockdown measures. Maher Atiyeh, a 39-year-old cafeteria employee, stood looking at the wreckage of his torched car. He said as the rioting picked up Wednesday night, he got a call from police asking him to come and remove his car, parked near the municipal building. "I didn't make it in time, they burned my car," he said, wearing a red baseball cap and red mask. Atiyeh said there's real suffering in Tripoli, the poverty is real, but added he was against protesters' violence. "They should protest peacefully, not like this. The country is destroyed, people are hungry and such violence only hurts us more," he said. Dozens of mourners, most of them without masks, took part in the funeral of Taibi, whose body was carried in a coffin wrapped in green cloth. Gunfire rang out as some of the men fired into the air in a traditional expression of grief. The government has imposed a nearly month-long nationwide lockdown and round-the-clock curfew that lasts until Feb. 8, amid a dramatic surge in coronavirus infections. The measures come on top of a crippling economic and financial crisis that preceded the pandemic in this small country of nearly 5 million people and over 1 million refugees.
The Lebanese currency has crashed, losing over 80% of its value. Banks have imposed controls on withdrawals and transfers to protect dwindling foreign reserves. Unemployment and inflation have skyrocketed and tens of thousands have been thrown into poverty. About half of the population is now below the poverty line. While the protests are ostensibly against the lockdown measures, they reflect the growing anger over authorities' inaction and negligence in the face of the country's meltdown. The cash-strapped government has done very little to compensate or help the poorest sectors of society cope with the lockdown measures. "We are not allowed to work. We stay at home, we beg to get bread," said Rabie Alkheir, a taxi driver. The 55-year-old said if he misses a day of work he misses providing a proper meal for his family. "Our lawmakers are not taking care of us, we are dying," he added. Meanwhile, a power struggle is taking place between the president and prime minister-designate. Fighting over Cabinet seats has blocked the formation of a new government, which is crucial to enacting reforms that would unlock foreign financial assistance. The government resigned in August, following the massive explosion at Beirut port that killed over 200 people and wounded thousands.
The troubles have piled up since, including the recent surge in coronavirus cases largely blamed on a decision to relax lockdown measures during the holidays. Some 80,000 expatriates traveled to the country to celebrate Christmas and New Years with family and friends.
Jan Kubis, the U.N.'s special coordinator for Lebanon, said the violence in Tripoli is yet another message to the political elites to form an effective government without further delay. "People cannot tolerate anymore this free-fall to abyss," he tweeted.
Hospitals in Lebanon are now overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients, reporting near full occupancy in intensive care-unit beds. Oxygen, ventilators and medicine are in short supply. Nearly 290,000 infections have been recorded since last February and 2,553 deaths amid record-breaking COVID-19 daily fatalities. Lebanon's ruling class has faced rising popular anger since protesters took to the streets in October 2019 in the largest-ever nationwide protests in the country. Demonstrators accused them of mismanaging and robbing the country of its resources and driving it into poverty. The protests later died down, in part because of the pandemic but also because the political class held on to power and divisions emerged among the demonstrators.

Judge Aoun Sues BDL Governor, Others in 'Subsidized Dollar' Case
Agence France Presse/Thursday 28 January 2021
A Lebanese judge on Thursday referred Central Bank chief Riad Salameh to judicial investigation over his mishandling of a foreign currency scheme meant to stem skyrocketing food prices, a judicial source said. "Mount Lebanon general prosecutor Ghada Aoun has referred to judicial investigation central bank chief Riad Salameh and head of the central bank's Banking Control Commission, Maya Dabbagh, on charges of professional negligence and breach of public trust," the source told AFP. The decision came after Aoun found cracks in a central bank scheme meant to sell dollars to food producers and importers at a subsidized rate to curb inflation, the source said. "The dollars did not all end up in the right place," with some reaching money exchangers who then profited by selling them on the black market, the source added. The Lebanese pound had been pegged to the dollar at 1,500 since 1997 but the country's worst economic crisis in decades has seen its value plunge by more than two thirds on the black market. The dizzying devaluation has led to soaring food prices in a country where more than half of the population lives below the poverty line. In May, authorities said the central bank would provide dollars to support the import of basic foods and related raw materials. Aoun last month questioned Salameh, his aides and several money exchangers to determine whether the subsidized dollars reached their target. "The sum of money that went into the pockets of money exchangers and financial institutions exceeds five million dollars," the judicial source said. Michel Mekattaf, a top foreign currency exporter and Abdul Rahman al-Fayyed, a money exchanger, have also been referred to investigation over the same case. Salameh is the subject of a separate probe by Swiss authorities into large money transfers he allegedly made out of Lebanon despite tight banking controls. The veteran central bank chief, who has come under fire over the country's financial downturn, has denied all allegations brought against him.

Syrian businessman Haswani denies links to Beirut port explosion: Report
Reuters, Damascus/Thursday 28 January 2021
Syrian businessman George Haswani denied any links on Wednesday to last year’s explosion that killed 200 people in Beirut, telling Reuters that he knew nothing about a company linked to the purchase of the fertilizer that exploded in the port. Haswani was named by Reuters and other media outlets this month after it emerged that a company he owned, Hesco Engineering and Construction Company Ltd, maintained its corporate register at the same London address as British firm, Savaro Ltd. The Mozambican firm that ordered the fertilizer, FEM, has said it ordered the shipment through Savaro. Speaking to Reuters at his Damascus home, Haswani said he had employed the same Cypriot agency, Interstatus, to register his company that also registered Savaro, and the agent had shifted the location of the registers to the same address on the same day.
But he said he knew nothing about Savaro, and suggested any links between it and his own company were purely a coincidence arising from using the same agent. As previously reported, Reuters could not determine whether Haswani had any involvement with Savaro. “I don’t know what other companies are registered by this Cypriot company, five or three or 70 or more,” Haswani said. “It is a fabricated media whirlwind,” Haswani told Reuters of reports suggesting he might have been implicated in the blast. “We don’t know Savaro and we hadn’t heard about them before this.” Interstatus did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. The boss of Interstatus, Marina Psyllou, is listed in Savaro’s registration documents as Savaro’s owner and sole director, but has denied being the firm’s true owner. She told Reuters last week that the firm’s beneficial owner was someone else, whom she declined to identify. She has said Savaro was a dormant company that had never conducted business. Haswani said he had not been contacted by any investigators from Lebanon or any other country in relation to the blast, and that he would soon file a legal case in Paris against media reports linking him to it. “I am living my life normally and laughing because I am someone who knows well that I have nothing to do with this matter at all,” Haswani said. “Why would I worry?”

Mustaqbal Slams 'Suspicious Hands' in Tripoli, Warns against 'Security Solution'
Naharnet/January 28/2021
Al-Mustaqbal Movement announced Thursday that there are “suspicious hands that are working on plunging Tripoli into chaos” despite “the rightful scream that reflects the reality of social suffering in popular neighborhoods.” In a statement, Mustaqbal said there is information confirming “the presence of a suspicious matter that reminds of the era of security chaos and the armed clashes that used to erupt at the request” of certain parties. Noting that “a lot of stances over the past hours have confirmed the presence of partisan and political parties and local dignitaries that exploited citizens’ pain and funded groups some of which came from outside Tripoli,” the Movement criticized the performance of some security agencies. “They turned a blind eye to practices that breach security and laws or refrained from supporting security forces at the right time,” Mustaqbal alleged. “This negligence raises suspicions and question marks over the premeditated objectives behind the sabotage operations that targeted private and public property in the city,” it added. The Movement however stressed that “a security solution for the social crisis” is not possible, emphasizing that “the vast majority of Tripoli’s sons will not be dragged into this vile plot.”

LF Stands by Tripoli Residents but Rejects 'Chaos, Sabotage'
Naharnet/January 28/2021  
The Lebanese Forces on Thursday voiced support for Tripoli’s impoverished residents while stressing its rejection of “sabotage” and any attacks on security forces. “Why is the government not performing its responsibilities towards its people, especially daily workers,” the LF’s Tripoli department announced in a statement. “Negligence towards our people in Tripoli is protracted and continuous, even under the burden of the coronavirus pandemic,” the LF added. Expressing its sympathy with “people’s social plight amid the disastrous financial crisis,” the LF emphasized its adherence to “public order.” “We reject everything related to chaos and sabotage. Peaceful assembly is a right but sabotage is prohibited,” the LF said, stressing its “categorical rejection” of “harm against security forces, whose role represents the only remaining pillar to preserve stability.” A protester was killed and 226 people were injured in overnight clashes in Tripoli. Dozens of young men have been taking part in the nightly protests, throwing rocks, firecrackers and Molotov cocktails at security forces and in some cases torching vehicles. On Wednesday, protesters repeatedly tried to break into the municipal building and the Internal Security Forces said several “military hand grenades” were lobbed at security forces. The ISF responded with water cannons, volleys of tear gas and live ammunition.

Kuwaiti Red Crescent aid plane arrives in Beirut, Al-Qenaei reiterates country’s support to Lebanon
NNA/January 28/2021  
The Kuwaiti Embassy in Lebanon said in a statement on Thursday that "a Kuwaiti Red Crescent aid plane has arrived at Rafic Hariri International Airport in Beirut, as a gift from the Kuwaiti people to its Lebanese brothers.” The Kuwaiti relief plane was received under the supervision of Kuwaiti Ambassador to Lebanon, Abdel-Aal Al-Qenaei, represented by Counselor Abdullah Al-Shaheen, and other embassy staff. In a statement to the Kuwait News Agency (KUNA), Al-Qenaei said that "the plane was loaded with medical aid and urgent health supplies provided by the Kuwaiti Red Crescent Society (KRCS) to the Lebanese Red Cross, as per the needs mentioned in a list that the Red Cross had earlier sent to the Kuwaiti Red Crescent."The Kuwaiti diplomat also stressed his country's keenness to "support the relief and humanitarian efforts made by Kuwait’s Lebanese brothers, especially in the face of the Coronavirus pandemic.” In turn, head of the Kuwaiti Red Crescent Society in Lebanon, Dr. Musaed Al- Anzi, explained to KUNA that the aid plane had been dispatched in response to a humanitarian call from the Lebanese Red Cross in support of Kuwait’s Lebanese brothers in their efforts to combat the Coronavirus. He affirmed "the KRCS’s permanent readiness to provide all the humanitarian support needed to the Lebanese people, especially amid the prevailing critical economic and health conditions."As for the relief operations coordinator at the Lebanese Red Cross, Youssef Boutros, he highly appreciated the "rapid response of the Kuwaiti Red Crescent Society", noting the Kuwaiti "humanitarian efforts in supporting Lebanon in various circumstances."

Judge Aoun presses job negligence charges against Salameh, Head of Banking Control Commission
NNA/January 28/2021  
General Prosecutor in Mount Lebanon, Judge Ghada Aoun, has pressed charges against Governor of the Central Bank, Riad Salameh, and the Head of the Banking Control Commission, in the crimes of job negligence and breach of trust, the NNA correspondent said.

The road to nowhere; tackling Lebanon’s smuggling operation
Rami Rayess/Al Arabiya/January 28/2021
Lebanon cannot control its borders.
Smuggling of goods and people has been active from Lebanon into Syria since the adoption of Cesar law in June 2020. Damascus has been put under sanctions and Syrians now lack basic necessities, such as fuel and flour.
It could be said that Lebanon has moved into an era of losing sovereignty of its border. Smugglers control almost 124 illegal passages between Lebanon and Syria throughout the land border stretching over 340 km.
There are five legal border points between the two countries, but the Syrian regime has been reluctant to demarcate its borders with Lebanon for decades. With pieces of land intertwined there are often no boundaries or security checkpoints.
A national television network broadcast a report revealing that almost $400 million worth of fuel is smuggled into Syria annually. Going by the black market rate for the dollar exchange to the Lebanese Lira, twenty liters of fuel in Lebanon are worth almost $3. In Syria, it is worth more than $13, that’s of course, if there is any. The Syrian government has announced it will only allow 40 liters of petrol for a car per week due to scarcity of fuel. This has led to long queues of cars in front of gas stations.
The reason why Lebanon still has relatively reasonable oil prices is because the Central Bank is applying a cabinet decision to subsidize fuel.
Banking sources in the Central Bank claimed that smuggling now costs the government over $4 billion annually, amounting to almost $20 billion since 2015.
The subsidizing policy by the Central Bank was put into practice several months ago with the aim of reducing growing inflation following the crash of the local currency’s value to the US Dollar. The policy includes subsidizing flour to maintain the price of bread and medicine. The smuggling activity has concentrated on fuel, but other subsidized goods might be smuggled into Syria too.
The Higher Defense Council overseen by the President of the Republic, Michel Aoun, includes the incumbent PM, a number of ministers and high ranking security officials has taken several decisions to cease all smuggling activities across the borders.
Including the confiscation of smuggled goods, and the arrest of people and networks involved in these illegal activities, it’s unfortunate that none of this has happened. The status quo remains today.
Hezbollah controls many of those illegal passages. Extending support to the Syrian Regime is a basic pillar in the organization’s policies. It has been involved in Syrian affairs since 2011, after the popular uprising.
Almost a year later, explicitly saying it would send paramilitaries into Syria to protect holy places from extremist groups. Tehran followed suit. Both Iran and its executive arm in Lebanon, Hezbollah, cannot accept the downfall of the Assad Regime in Syria. This would cut off a route from Tehran through Iraq and Syria into Lebanon.
Lebanon’s official position seems weaker than that announced. With Aoun, as President and a Hezbollah ally, little change is expected.
Yet, there are certain passages that could easily be put under state control. There should be a firm political position, not based on exceptions and to introduce change in smuggling activity to put an end to it.
If smuggling does not end, it becomes another reason for Lebanon’s economic misery.
Lebanon’s ailing economy continues its free fall. With the cabinet formation confronting additional complications, and the French Presidential initiative withering away, little hope remains for the Lebanese people.
In short, smuggling from Lebanon to Syria has to stop immediately or else the situation will deteriorate further. Lebanon cannot afford to finance the economies of itself, and that of Syria. This is self-destruction, and political suicide.
 

Authorities are Brain Dead as Protests Resume in Lebanon
Hussam Itani/Asharq Al Awsat/January 28/2021
Under the weight of the crisis in living conditions facing citizens, Lebanon’s squares witnessed protests and demonstrations once again amid the state’s resignation from its duties and its adoption of policies of procrastination, deferral and disregard the country’s economic and political collapses as it drowns in its factions’ disputes and quarrels.
Tripoli, the most impoverished city on the Mediterranean according to international reports, was the natural place for the Lebanese’ return to the streets after conditions in the north became intolerable. Deprivation borders on literal hunger amid a total lockdown imposed by the ravaging spread of the coronavirus. This is the authorities’ latest failure, and it comes after they had failed to put a plan to contain a disease that claims tens of people and destroys the health of thousands daily.
The coronavirus pandemic has exacerbated the crisis in living conditions and left hundreds of thousands of those with low incomes, who buy their bread with their daily wages, vulnerable to an ordeal that has not been seen in Lebanon since the famine of the 1st World War; that is, a year before Grand Liban was established. The struggle to put food on the table during the mandatory lockdown, with its draconian measures and financial punishments, a lockdown which was not accompanied by the provision of financial compensation to those harmed by the measure or a search for ways to lighten its burden, has revealed another side of the meaning of the political system’s collapse. Rather, it speaks to the naivety of the officials in charge of its executive, legislative and judicial branches and their blindness to the bigger picture of the domestic and foreign situations. It shows that they cannot see that the corpse of Lebanon, as a country and political system, is rotting under the watch of an indifferent world preoccupied with its anxieties, which range from absorbing the epidemic’s losses to containing political crises moving across the planet.
News published by Asharq Al-Awsat about President Michel Aoun looking into extending his term, which was denied by presidential palace sources, speaks volumes about the ruling clique’s inability to come up with a single novel idea outside the context of clinging to Aoun and his allies maintenance of their positions. Everything else, from addressing the successive disasters that hit the country, or pushing the investigation into the blast of the Beirut Port to its conclusion, are matters that mean nothing to this group of power-hungry rulers and those who support them, justify their mismanagement, and stand in the way of toppling them in the streets, as happened after the 17th of October. What concerns them is getting rid of the Taif Agreement and changing the framework of governance such that more failures and subordinates can be brought to power.
More significantly, extending Aoun’s term means maintaining the current parliament and using the pretext of the inability to hold legislative elections. Aoun and those who stand behind him would thereby continue to use Lebanon as a bargaining chip in the forthcoming US-Iranian negotiations, whereby this devastated country would play the role of defending Iran’s nuclear program. From it, Iran’s rockets would be launched if its interests are threatened, as numerous Iranian generals have stated.
All of this is happening amid floundering attempts to contain the coronavirus pandemic and the skyrocketing inflation of the price of essential goods. The government decided to subsidize these goods with the Central Bank’s hard currency reserves. And perhaps once a month, we hear news about the Central Bank’s reserves drying up and the caretaker government leaning towards “guiding” subsidies at times and canceling them at others, a step which would threaten broad segments of Lebanese society’s ability to secure their livelihood. As media outlets loyal to the ruling parties put citizens in the picture and inform them that continuing to subsidize products for a limited forthcoming period cannot be done without depleting the Central Bank’s compulsory reserves, the state and its customs and security agencies ignore the scandal of the hundreds of trucks smuggling goods to Syria every day; whereby unknown- known factions inject fuel, food and hard currency into the veins of the Assad regime they are allied with.
In notorious Lebanese fashion, ignoring the widespread smuggling has come to resemble institutional military and security protection of the regime in Damascus. Indeed, there is a focus on the losses incurred by the public treasury because of the subsidies on basic commodities, while the complicit and corrupt officials do not dare point to the obvious irreconcilability between bearing the cost of supporting Bashar al-Assad and containing the ramifications of the collapsing domestic economy.
On the other hand, if a citizen who had sold his last remaining electronic appliance to buy bread and oil takes to the streets to protest because his children are hungry, he has lost hope, and his future has become bleak, the authorities, accompanied by their media arrive in their riot gear to clamp down on what they call a threat to security and agents of foreign powers or extremists sympathetic to ISIS. On the other hand, the regime has become so frail that its factions cannot agree on a framework to regulate the mechanisms of looting and dilute it as it had been doing for thirty years.
At this point, it may seem justified to demand that the authorities, with their various criminal parties and components, agree on quotas for their corruption and theft, as this could perhaps alleviate the suffering of the Lebanese who are waking up to a new nightmare every day. However, this demand would clash with the reality that authorities are brain dead and are no longer capable of saving themselves, even through more lying and deception.

Arab Medical Apartheid - Where Is the Outrage?
Bassam Tawil/Gatestone Institute/January 28/2021
Lebanese citizens have launched an online campaign that says that they have the right to be vaccinated before any foreigner living in the country. The term "foreigner" mainly refers to the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in Lebanon.
The campaign, which is being condemned by Palestinians and others as "racist" and "discriminatory," has evidently failed to attract the attention of all those individuals and organizations who are making false, libelous accusations against Israel. They do not care about this racist campaign because an Arab country, and not Israel, is discriminating against Arabs (the Palestinians).
Israel, in fact, has vaccinated more Palestinians than any Arab country.... Given that tens of thousands of Arab Israelis and residents of east Jerusalem have received the vaccine without any problem, means that Israel is the only country that actually has so far given the vaccine to Palestinians.
Lebanese citizens have launched an online campaign that says that they have the right to be vaccinated before any foreigner living in the country. The term "foreigner" mainly refers to the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in Lebanon. Meanwhile, Israel has vaccinated more Palestinians than any Arab country.
While Israel has been falsely accused by some international media outlets and human rights organizations of "refusing" to vaccinate Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip against COVID-19, no one seems to be paying attention to what is happening in Lebanon, an Arab country that has long been hosting hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, Syrians and other Arabs.
First, the 1995 Israeli-Palestinian Interim Agreement states that "powers and responsibilities in the sphere of health in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip shall be transferred to the Palestinian side."
According to the agreement, "the Palestinian side shall continue to apply the present standards of vaccination of Palestinians and shall improve them according to internationally accepted standards and shall continue the vaccination of the [Palestinian] population."
Second, the Palestinians said they had refused to accept vaccines from Israel, and that the Palestinian government was working to get the doses from the World Health Organization and companies around the world.
Third, despite the Palestinian denial, Israel recently acknowledged that it gave 100 vaccine doses to the Palestinians, with another delivery expected shortly.
Fourth, the Palestinian government announced that it has signed in the past few weeks agreements to purchase vaccines from four different companies.
Fifth, Israel recently facilitated the delivery of 5,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik vaccine to the Palestinians. The Palestinians were easily able to import it, as they said they preferred to do.
Sixth, Israel is in fact giving vaccines to Palestinians – those living in east Jerusalem and who, as holders of Israeli ID cards, enjoy access to the same healthcare system as Israeli citizens. (The majority of east Jerusalem Palestinians are residents, not citizens, of Israel).
All these facts have failed to convince anti-Israel journalists and organizations around the world that the Palestinian government, and not Israel, is responsible for obtaining vaccines for the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The Israel-haters are bringing up the issue of vaccines not because they care about the Palestinians, but because they seek to hold Israel responsible for Palestinian suffering that, as usual, is being caused by their own leaders.
The Palestinian leaders had a great deal of time to ask Israel to help them get vaccines. Instead of doing so, however, they announced in May 2020 that they had decided to sever all relations with Israel to protest Israeli government policies on settlements. In late 2020, the Palestinian leaders reversed their decision and decided to restore their relations with Israel. They had wasted precious time that could have been used planning how to get vaccines for the Palestinians.
Have any of these Israel-haters bothered to ask the Palestinian government why it has been so slow in obtaining vaccines from the vaccine-producing companies? Do they really expect Israel to send its soldiers into West Bank and Gaza Strip hospitals forcibly to give vaccines to the Palestinians?
While the debate about Israel's alleged responsibility for vaccinating the Palestinians, who are not (and do not wish to become) Israeli citizens is unfolding in the international media and other forums, the Israel-haters have apparently not heard about the controversy that erupted in Lebanon in the past few days.
Lebanese citizens have launched an online campaign that says that they have the right to be vaccinated before any foreigner living in the country. The term "foreigner" mainly refers to the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians living in Lebanon.
The campaign, which is being condemned by Palestinians and others as "racist" and "discriminatory," has evidently failed to attract the attention of all those individuals and organizations who are making false, libelous accusations against Israel. They do not care about this racist campaign because an Arab country, and not Israel, is discriminating against Arabs (the Palestinians).
A hashtag on Twitter titled "The Vaccine for Lebanese First," has drawn mixed reactions from Arabs.
"The Lebanese ruling party is lobbying against vaccinating non-Lebanese in Lebanon," remarked Twitter user Wael Kaafarani. "The World Health Organization should be aware of that and divert its support to non-governmental organizations such as the Red Cross in Lebanon."
Another social media user, Hani, wrote:
"It's very funny how Lebanese people are traveling to Dubai to get vaccinated, and the ones living abroad are getting the vaccine in whatever country they're in, but want to deny it to anyone of different nationality in their country (Lebanon)."
Also denouncing the call for prioritizing Lebanese in the vaccinations, Marianne Hassoun commented: "The hashtag is the epitome of pettiness and racism."
Several Lebanese, though, have come out in defense of the campaign.
"We as Lebanese have the full right to get vaccinated before any foreigner," remarked Amin Tohme on Twitter. "This is not racism, but it's called patriotism."
Another Lebanese, who calls himself "Lebanese Loyalist", wrote:
"This is not racism, simply logic. As a Lebanese taxpayer, I have the full right to take a vaccine I am paying for before any non-Lebanese citizen. My money, Lebanese money, brought the vaccine here. Not refugee money."
The Democratic Forum for Palestinian Journalists in Lebanon said that it was "surprised" by calls to limit vaccines to Lebanese citizens.
"Such calls only come from ignorant people who do not understand anything about the health strategies adopted to contain the coronavirus pandemic... This racism harms the image and reputation of Lebanon."
The campaign does not come as surprise to those familiar with Lebanon's apartheid policies and laws against Palestinians.
According to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), Palestinians in Lebanon do not enjoy several important rights. Palestinians cannot, for example, work in as many as 39 professions and cannot own property (real estate). Palestinian refugees, officially considered "foreigners" in Lebanon, are unable to acquire Lebanese citizenship. They also face restrictions accessing basic services, such as education and healthcare.
Those who are now attacking Israel over its purported responsibility for vaccinating the Palestinians living under the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, do not care about the Palestinians living in Lebanon. They do not care about the calls in Lebanon not to give vaccines to "foreigners," including Palestinians and Syrians.
Israel, in fact, has vaccinated more Palestinians than any Arab country. For the record, thousands of Palestinians from east Jerusalem, as well as Arab citizens of Israel, whom many in the international community call Palestinians, have received the vaccine in the past few weeks.
The same individuals and organizations that are attacking Israel refer to Arab citizens and residents of east Jerusalem as Palestinians. Given that tens of thousands of Arab Israelis and residents of east Jerusalem have received the vaccine without any problem, means that Israel is the only country that actually has so far given the vaccine to Palestinians.
The Palestinian Authority government, which has its own healthcare system, has so far given zero vaccines to its people in the West Bank. Hamas, which also has its own healthcare system, has so far given zero vaccines to its people in the Gaza Strip. Clearly, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas are too busy with other matters – for example, inciting and carrying out terrorist attacks on Israelis, including paying the families of terrorists for the bloody acts of their relatives – to deal effectively with the health care of their people. Instead, they are sitting and waiting for the international community to donate vaccines to them rather than making a serious effort to purchase the doses.
They join the anti-Israel journalists and organizations in ignoring the medical apartheid Palestinians are facing in an Arab country: Lebanon.
*Bassam Tawil, a Muslim Arab, is based in the Middle East.
© 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.
 

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on January 28-29/2021

Pope to Meet Top Shiite Cleric Sistani on Iraq Visit
Agence France Presse/January 28/2021
Pope Francis is to meet top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani during the first-ever papal visit to Iraq in March, a senior Catholic cleric told AFP on Thursday. Louis Sako, patriarch of Iraq's Chaldean Catholic Church, said it would be a "private visit" between the two religious figures at Sistani's residence in the shrine city of Najaf, "without formalities." Sistani, 90, is never seen in public and rarely accepts visitors. The confirmation of the bilateral meeting comes weeks after other parts of the Pope's visit were set. Sako said he hoped the two figures would sign the document on "human fraternity for world peace," an inter-religious text condemning extremism. Pope Francis signed the document with the leading Sunni cleric Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the grand imam of Al-Azhar, in February 2019. Sako said the pope was hoping for endorsement from an influential Shiite cleric like Sistani. "He would represent the second major part of Islam signing on to this historic document," the cardinal told AFP. Pope Francis is set to be in Iraq from March 5 to 8 with an ambitious programme that will take round the country. In Baghdad, he will hold a mass at the Church of Our Lady of Salvation, where a deadly attack in 2010 left dozens of celebrants dead. He will also travel north to Mosul and the surrounding Nineveh plains, overrun by the Islamic State group in 2014, and the nearby Kurdish regional capital Arbil. Following his visit to Sistani, he will travel to the ancient city of Ur, where Abraham is said to have been born.
The Pope will hold an inter-religious prayer service there, to be attended by representatives of Iraq's various faiths -- Shiite and Sunni Muslim, Yazidi and Sabean, Sako said.
'A source of hope'
Iraq once counted more than 1.5 million Christians, but the community has been ravaged by successive conflicts. Following the US-led invasion of 2003, sectarian warfare prompted followers of Iraq's multiple Christian denominations to flee and attacks by IS in 2014 further hit all minority communities. Now, an estimated 400,000 Christians remain in Iraq, out of a total population of 40 million. Many have expressed hope that the Pope's visit will highlight the challenges facing the community, including prolonged displacement and little representation in government. "It will be a comfort and a source of hope," Sako said.
He said Christians were suffering from the weakness of the Iraqi state, compared to other armed actors and even tribes that were threatening the presence of minorities. "It's like the Middle Ages," said the cardinal. Much of Iraq is no longer experiencing active conflict but a twin suicide blast a week ago killed more than 30 people and wounded dozens more. The Pope condemned that attack as a "senseless act of brutality." But overall, Iraqis have been more concerned by a severe economic downturn prompted by the collapse in world oil prices and the coronavirus pandemic, which has caused thousands of deaths in the country over the past year. The spread of the virus appears to have slowed according to official numbers, and Pope Francis was recently vaccinated.

New US secretary of state addresses Biden administration priorities, Iran deal
Joseph Haboush, Al Arabiya English/January 28/2021
The new US Secretary of State Antony Blinken Wednesday laid out a preliminary list of priorities for the new administration under President Joe Biden, including reviewing last-minute decisions made under the previous administration. During his first news conference since being confirmed as secretary of state, Blinken touched on the most pressing issues for the US, including the threats from Russia, China and Iran. After his public remarks, statements from Blinken’s office said the top diplomat had separate phone conversations with his French, German and British counterparts where they discussed the threats from Moscow, Beijing and Tehran.
Afghanistan
One of the more noteworthy announcements made by Blinken was the decision to keep Zalmay Khalilzad as the US special envoy for Afghanistan. Khalilzad’s work was “vital,” Blinken said, adding that the new US administration would continue to review its policy in Afghanistan. This includes the agreement reached with the Taliban, Blinken said. Before leaving office, then-US Defense Secretary Christopher Miller announced that there were only 2,500 American troops left in Afghanistan. And ahead of starting the peace talks last year, authorities released more than 5,000 Taliban inmates as demanded by the group in the deal with Washington. In return, the Taliban agreed to give some security guarantees and participate in peace talks to end the country’s war. Under the landmark deal signed last year, the US pledged to pull out all foreign forces from Afghanistan by May 2021. Last week, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan “made clear” the US’ intention to review the agreement, a spokesperson from his office said in a statement.
China
The US relationship with China was “arguably the most important relationship we have in the world,” Blinken said. But he maintained his previous stance made during his Senate confirmation hearing that the Chinese government was carrying out genocide against Uighur Muslims. The issue was raised during Biden’s nominee for US ambassador to the United Nations earlier in the day. Linda Thomas-Greenfield refused to call the crimes a genocide, saying that the State Department would review the Trump administration’s decision. She claimed that not “all of the procedures” were followed by the former administration.
But Blinken said his opinion on the genocide remained unchanged. He also said that it was in Washington’s interest to cooperate with Beijing on issues such as climate change, though that fit within the larger context of areas of concern that the US has with China.
Gulf
Blinken said there needed to be an “urgent” review of the Iranian-backed Houthi militia’s recent designation as a terrorist organization. The move came under Blinken’s predecessor Mike Pompeo and was heavily criticized by human rights groups and the United Nations despite reassurances that humanitarian aid delivery would not be obstructed. Blinken’s comments came shortly after the Wall Street Journal reported that the US was putting a freeze on arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the UAE. But the top US diplomat was quick to downplay the move and suggested not overanalyzing. “It is typical at the start of an admin to review any pending sales, to make sure that what is being considered is something that advances our strategic objectives and advances our foreign policy,” Blinken said.
Iran
As for the Iran nuclear deal and the now-defunct Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), Blinken said there was a way to go before reaching a new agreement. He also warned that Iran would first need to “come back into full compliance with obligations under the JCPOA” before reciprocity from the US.
“Iran is out of compliance on a number of fronts. And it would take some time, should it make the decision to do so, for it to come back into compliance and time for us then to assess whether it was meeting its obligations,” he said. “We’re not there yet, to say the least.”Trump withdrew the US from the deal, which was brokered under former President Barack Obama.
Russia
Blinken took an aggressive stance on Russia, saying that the US administration was studying which actions to take in response to the poisoning of opposition figure Alexei Navalny. “We have a deep concern for Mr. Navalny’s safety and security, and the larger point is that his voice is the voice of many, many, many Russians and it should be heard, not muzzled,” Blinken said. Additionally, the US is reviewing what to do in response to the Solar Winds cyberattack, election interference and the alleged bounties placed on American troops in Afghanistan.

Iran dismisses US call to be the first to return to nuclear deal
AFP, Tehran/Thursday 28 January 2021
Iran dismissed Thursday a call by the US for it to return to full compliance of a nuclear deal first, insisting it had only taken “remedial measures” since America’s withdrawal. The administration of new US President Joe Biden on Wednesday confirmed its willingness to return to the deal, which has been hanging by a thread since his predecessor Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from it in 2018. But Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who made the announcement, said the US would only return to the deal agreed with major powers in 2015 once Iran resumes its commitments. Iran’s top diplomat, Mohammad Javad Zarif, on Thursday dismissed the demand. “Reality check for @SecBlinken: The US violated (the) JCPOA,” Zarif tweeted, referring to the accord by its formal name, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. Zarif said that as well as its unilateral withdrawal, the US had also imposed sanctions that “blocked food/medicine to Iranians” and “punished adherence” to a UN resolution. “Now, who should take 1st step? Never forget Trump’s maximum failure,” the foreign minister added, stressing Iran had “abided by the JCPOA” and had only taken “foreseen remedial measures”. Trump withdrew the US from JCPOA and imposed crippling sanctions on Iran in 2018, maintaining a policy of “maximum pressure” against the Islamic republic. New US secretary of state addresses Biden administration priorities, Iran deal. US has ‘urgent’ responsibility to ensure Iran doesn’t get nuclear weapons: Blinken. Iran a year later responded by suspending its compliance with most key nuclear commitments in the deal, under which it was promised economic relief for limits on its nuclear program. On January 4, Iran announced it had stepped up its uranium enrichment process to 20 percent purity, far above the 3.67 percent level permitted by the deal, but far below the amount required for an atomic bomb. Tehran has called on Washington to “unconditionally” lift sanctions imposed by Trump to salvage the nuclear deal. It has said it will return to full compliance once all parties to the accord fulfil their commitments to the agreement.

US will not return to Iran deal before Tehran comes back into ‘full compliance’
Joseph Haboush, Al Arabiya English/Wednesday 27 January 2021
The United States will not return to any previous Iran nuclear deal before Tehran “comes back into full compliance” with its obligations, newly-confirmed Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday. Meanwhile, the new administration will take a “very close look” at the recent designation of Yemen’s Houthi militia as a terrorist organization. Iran has appeared excited about the prospects of a new deal with Washington after Joe Biden was elected as the 46th US president. Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran’s foreign minister, has said in recent weeks that the US “must remedy its wrong; then Iran will respond.”But Blinken doubled down on what he said during his Senate confirmation hearing. Iran must first “come back into full compliance with obligations under the JCPOA” before reciprocity from the US, he said during his first news conference. “Iran is out of compliance on a number of fronts. And it would take some time, should it make the decision to do so, for it to come back into compliance and time for us then to assess whether it was meeting its obligations,” he said. “We’re not there yet, to say the least.”Former President Donald Trump withdrew the US from the deal, which was brokered under former President Barack Obama, as he launched a maximum pressure campaign on Iran with hard-hitting economic sanctions. If Iran returns to the deal, Washington will seek to build what Blinken called a “longer and stronger agreement” to deal with other “deeply problematic” issues. He appeared to be referring to Iran’s regional proxies and militias and its ballistic missile program. This is something Zarif and Iran have claimed they would not discuss as part of a new deal. One of Iran’s proxies in the region is the Houthi militia in Yemen. Before leaving the White House, the Trump administration slapped a terrorist designation on the group for its continued missile attacks on Saudi Arabia and its prevention of reaching a political solution to the war in Yemen. But Blinken said the State Department would take a “very urgent and a very close look” at the designation. Of all the steps that the previous administration took in their waning days, “that’s the priority in my book,” Blinken said of the designation. “We’re taking a very urgent and a very close look at that.”Waivers and licenses were issued shortly before the Trump administration left the White House in order to ensure that humanitarian aid would continue to flow.
- With agencies

Iran will ‘demolish’ Tel Aviv, Haifa if attacked by Israel, warns top IRGC commander
Yaghoub Fazeli, Al Arabiya English/ Thursday 28 January 2021
Iran will “demolish” the cities of Tel Aviv and Haifa if an Israeli attack happens, Iran’s top military spokesperson warned on Wednesday. It came a day after the Israeli army said new plans were being drawn up to counter Tehran’s nuclear capabilities. If Israel “makes the smallest mistake against the Islamic Republic, we will strike the missile bases that they say they would use to attack Iran from, and also raze Haifa and Tel Aviv to the ground in the shortest time possible,” Brig. Gen. Abolfazl Shekarchi, the semi-official Fars news agency quoted him as saying. Israel does not realise Iran’s military capabilities, he said, adding: “This cancerous tumour in the region (Israel) must collapse as it has caused a lot of damage to Muslims.”Israel’s top general said on Tuesday that its military was refreshing its operational plans against Iran and that any US return to the 2015 nuclear deal would be “wrong.”“Iran can decide that it wants to advance to a bomb, either covertly or in a provocative way. In light of this basic analysis, I have ordered the IDF to prepare a number of operational plans, in addition to the existing ones. We are studying these plans and we will develop them over the next year,” Lieutenant-General Aviv Kohavi said in an address to Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies. “A return to the 2015 nuclear agreement, or even if it is a similar accord with several improvements, is bad and wrong from an operational and strategic point of view,” he said. Kochavi’s remarks came nearly a week after US President Joe Biden’s inauguration, who has pledged to rejoin the nuclear deal if Iran returns to complying with it. Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, pulled Washington out of the deal in 2018 and reimposed crippling sanctions on Iran as part of a “maximum pressure” campaign – a move welcomed by Israel. Tehran has said it will only take action after the US rejoins the deal. “It was the US that broke the deal—for no reason. It must remedy its wrong; then Iran will respond,” Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad said in a Twitter post on Tuesday.

US will continue to work with Israel to advance regional peace: US Secretary of State
Reuters/Thursday 28 January 2021
The United States reaffirms its commitment to Israel’s security and will continue to work closely with the country to advance peace in the region, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said. Blinken in a call with Israeli Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi, applauded recent progress made with the Abraham Accords and affirmed US interest in building further on that progress, according to a statement by the US State Department. “Foreign Minister Ashkenazi and Secretary Blinken acknowledged the steadfast partnership between the United States and Israel, and that the two countries would work closely together on challenges ahead,” it said. The so-called Abraham Accords is a US-brokered agreement to normalize diplomatic ties between Israel and Arab and Muslim countries. In the past few months, Israel reached deals with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco as part of the accords. While US President Joe Biden is expected to move US foreign policy away from Trump’s “America First” posture, the Democrat has indicated he would continue with the pursuit of the Abraham Accords.

US flies B-52 bomber over Middle East to ‘deter aggression’ amid Iran tensions
The Associated Press, DubaiWednesday 27 January 2021
The US military said Wednesday it again flew a B-52 bomber over the Middle East “to deter potential aggression” amid tensions with Iran. The B-52 flew nonstop from Louisiana’s Barksdale Air Force Base into the region earlier in the day. The plane went over both the Arabian Gulf and Saudi Arabia, according to flight-tracking data. The US military’s Central Command later published images of the bomber flying alongside Royal Saudi Air Force F-15s. While not mentioning Iran in its statement, Central Command said the flight was meant to “showcase the US commitment to regional security.” The flights, the third-such operation this year, had become common in the last months of former President Donald Trump’s administration. Trump’s 2018 decision to unilaterally withdraw from Iran’s nuclear deal with world powers sparked a series of escalating incidents in the region.
President Joe Biden has expressed a desire to return to the deal if Iran honors the deal’s limits on its nuclear program.

Israel-Sudan signing ceremony in Washington in next three months, minister says
Reuters/Wednesday 27 January 2021
Israel and Sudan will finalize a diplomatic deal to normalize relations at a signing ceremony in Washington in the next three months, Israeli Intelligence Minister Eli Cohen said on Wednesday. There was no immediate comment from Sudanese officials or from the US embassy in Israel. Sudan’s civilian government has said the deal to normalize relations with Israel can only take effect once approved by a transitional legislative council that is yet to be formed. Sudan joined the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco last year in agreeing to move toward normal relations with Israel in US-brokered deals. The new US administration of President Joe Biden has said it wants to build on those deals. “The peace agreement’s draft is progressing and a signing ceremony for Israel and Sudan is expected in Washington in the next three months,” Cohen told Israel’s Ynet TV. Cohen headed a delegation to Sudan on Monday to discuss advancing the normalization deal. He told Ynet TV that officials discussed three economic plans as well as border security. Cohen said he brought his hosts oil and fruit from the Holy Land and as a parting gift received an M16 rifle.

CENTCOM chief arriving in Israel for talks with Kochavi on Iran
Jerusalem Post/January 28/2021
McKenzie’s arrival – he is scheduled to spend one day in Israel – is the first high-level visit by a top American official since Joe Biden was sworn in as president last week.Commander of CENTCOM, Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, was scheduled to arrive in Israel on Thursday for talks with IDF top brass about Iran and other regional challenges. McKenzie’s arrival – he is scheduled to spend one day in Israel – is the first high-level visit by a top American official since Joe Biden was sworn in as president last week and comes just two days after Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Aviv Kochavi attacked American plans to negotiate a new nuclear deal with Iran. The general's visit is the first since the Pentagon decided to move Israel from the jurisdiction of the European Command (EUCOM) in the US military to the Central Command. Israel has traditionally been barred from CENTCOM, which works closely with Arab states, many of which until now refused to openly operate alongside the IDF. Government officials said that the move to CENTCOM is of strategic significance for Israel and will allow for closer coordination and cooperation with the US military, with an emphasis on events in the Middle East. In another sign of growing regional cooperation, the US Air Force held a drill with Qatar this week integrating Emiri Air Force Rafale fighters with American KC-135 refueling tankers. The drill was held out of Qatar's Al Udeid Air Base. Exercise Sky Shield brought together members of the 379th Air Expeditionary Wing and the QEAF to demonstrate future interoperability throughout CENTCOM areas of responsibility.

Popular Rage Blankets Syria’s Sweida, Military Tensions Spike in Daraa
Daraa - Damascus - Riad al-Zein and Asharq Al-Awsat/January 28/2021
Popular anger has swept over the southern Syrian province of Sweida after news broke out on a senior security official having offended a spiritual leader of the Druze community. “Across Sweida, activists have monitored growing popular discontent against the background of the head of military intelligence in Syria’s south, Brigadier General Luay Al-Ali, insulting spiritual leader of the Druze sect Hikmat al-Hijri,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported. According to the UK-based watchdog, some individuals reacted to the news by tearing down posters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad despite ongoing efforts to defuse the tension. Several prominent regime officials have apologized to Hijri, the Observatory said, adding that large crowds have flocked to visit the cleric’s residence in Sweida’s countryside in a show of support. Visitors turned up from different Syrian regions, including Damascus and Quneitra.
Based on reports of Ali verbally insulting Hijri during a phone conversation, many are demanding that the intelligence director is dismissed. A few days ago, Observatory sources reported that local factions in Sweida set up a checkpoint on the Damascus-Sweida highway and arrested a regime officer.
This came in reaction to regime forces having arbitrarily arrested a villager from the rural Sweida countryside earlier. In the neighboring Daraa province, a powerful local body of former opposition fighters rejected conditions laid out by the Syrian regime to abort all attacks against Tafas town and Daraa’s western countryside. During negotiations, regime representatives tied halting assaults to the Central Daraa Committee expelling six wanted former opposition leaders to Idlib in Syria’s north. The Committee, for its part, made a counteroffer in which local tribes guarantee that the wanted individuals do not pursue any action against the Syrian regime. Rejecting the regime’s conditions increases the likelihood of a confrontation. Daraa has been rocked by instability since the regime's 2018 takeover, with regular assassinations of militia leaders, regime troops, former opposition figures, and civilians.

Russia opposed to widening scope of Iran nuclear deal if US rejoin
AFP/Wednesday 27 January 2021
Russia does not support expanding the Iran nuclear deal to other issues like Tehran’s regional influence should the United States decide to rejoin, Moscow’s deputy envoy to the UN said Wednesday. Known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the deal was agreed between Iran, the United States, China, Russian, Britain, France and Germany in 2015. It offered sanctions relief in exchange for curbs on Tehran’s nuclear ambitions and guarantees that it would not seek an atomic bomb. It fell apart when former US president Donald Trump withdrew from the accord and imposed unilateral sanctions on Tehran, but new President Joe Biden could rejoin the agreement. Last year, “we managed to save the deal, to keep it alive. We all hope that the new administration will make some practical moves in this regard,” said Moscow’s envoy, Dmitry Polyanskiy. “But you shouldn’t mix it up with a regional framework which exists,” the Russian diplomat told reporters. “It doesn’t exclude that there should be a process of regional dialect, of some confidence-building measures, of countries speaking to each other and understanding, identifying the sources and the reasons of tensions in the region.” Polyanskiy said the deal had become “very fragile” but still stood as a “genius achievement from world diplomacy.” “We don’t see any reasons for it to be modified,” he added. Given the idea that Biden could return to the deal, some have suggested it be renegotiated to include topics like ballistic missiles and Iran’s influence in the Middle East, from Lebanon to Yemen, which is frowned upon in the West. In 2017, French President Emmanuel Macron proposed adding several “pillars” to the deal, including one to ensure better controls on Iran’s missile arsenal and another on the situation in the region. Biden’s new Secretary of State Antony Blinken says Washington could rejoin the deal if Tehran agrees to respect its commitments.

Turkey-Greece talks held in ‘very positive’ atmosphere, Ankara says
Reuters/Wednesday 27 January 2021
Bilateral talks between Turkey and Greece to resolve long-standing maritime disputes, which resumed on Monday after a five-year hiatus, were held in a “very positive” atmosphere, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Wednesday. The neighboring NATO members held 60 rounds of talks from 2002 to 2016 to address disagreements over energy rights, claims to Mediterranean waters, air space and the status of some Aegean islands, but with little progress.
Talks resumed on Monday in Istanbul after months of tension, and pressure from the European Union. Speaking at a news conference in Ankara with his Irish counterpart Simon Coveney, Cavusoglu said the talks had focused on “whatever was discussed in the first 60 rounds”, and urged Greece to refrain from “provocations” at a time when Ankara was trying to establish a positive agenda with the EU.
 

The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on January 28-29/2021

The Open University; meeting the challenge of distance learning in the COVID-19 age
Professor Agnes Kukulska-Hulme/Al Arabiya/January 28/2021
The Open University is one of the world’s largest leading providers in online education with over 175,000 students studying with us. The OU delivers courses in social sciences, business, technology, humanities, and it is almost entirely online. Since our inception in 1969, we have always had a diverse student population with a broad array of needs and circumstances – over 2 million people have achieved their learning goals by studying with us.
Remote study is a popular way to gain new skills and a qualification, and there are many advantages to online learning; flexibility, work anytime, study anywhere, work on mobile devices. Academics and developers at the OU design courses for digital presentation and interaction from scratch, rather than re-version face-to-face courses for on-line delivery - which many learning providers are doing because of the Covid-19 crisis.
One of our most successful partnerships is with the Arab Open University (AOU) which has seen over 38 thousand students graduate. This partnership began in 2002 when Arab Open University campuses in Kuwait, Jordan and Lebanon were approved for delivery of OU validated programmes. Since then it has expanded and now includes approved sites in nine sovereign states: Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Jordan, Oman, Lebanon, Egypt, Sudan and most recently Palestine. There are currently 30 thousands students enrolled across 9 middle east states.
The blended learning model with daytime and evening classes allows students to learn whilst they earn and has proved popular across the region. Furthermore, the AOU’s flexible learning model caters for students with caring responsibilities, in particular female students who often outnumber male students in programme enrolment.
The OU welcomes this diversity and is constantly striving to adapt to change to achieve the best possible outcomes for students, whatever their background. To help do this the OU commissions an annual report into emerging pedagogies to help improve connection and collaboration between students and teachers.
The ninth edition of the ‘Innovating Pedagogy’ report has just been launched (January 2021) looking at new ways of teaching, learning and assessment. The report is the result of a collaboration between the Institute of Educational Technology at the OU and colleagues at Beijing Foreign Studies University. Working together they combined their expertise and ideas about emerging trends and practices. The findings introduce ten innovative pedagogies that either already influence educational practice or offer opportunities for the future.
Fair chances, greater opportunity
Several pedagogies in the report are concerned with providing fair chances and enabling greater student participation. In open and distance learning contexts, these have long been cherished aims and have led to innovations such as openly available online courses taken by very large numbers of people who would otherwise miss out on learning opportunities. Equity-oriented pedagogy has a focus on inclusivity, going beyond opening up access to education and asking how every student in a class or cohort or programme can achieve similar positive outcomes, regardless of their background and characteristics such as gender, disability or ethnicity.
Study on the move
Younger students have been brought up with mobile technology and embrace educational resources available on mobile platforms. Mobile devices and smart phones are the main players in enabling individuals to access various resources at any time, from anywhere in a flexible manner. Hence, courses and programmes, which can be accessed through mobile technologies, have the edge over traditional courses, since their reach is much larger to a bigger audience and clientele.
Being so established in the online learning environment means, The Open University can offer our students courses based on sound scientific foundations, with high quality resources, and teachers who are experienced in delivering at scale through digital platforms - using the latest pedagogies. The OU has been a world leading pioneer of online learning for many years, enriching and transforming many lives. This method of teaching and learning is popular with students and in the post Covid era is set to grow even more.

John Brennan's Dark Fantasies Become a Homeland Security Bulletin
Chris Farrell/Gatestone Institute/January 28/2021
Why did Brennan leave out communists?
We have every reason to suspect Schiff's motives and the law enforcement legitimacy of his proposal. Combined with Brennan's theories – this sort of thinking comprises the dark fantasies of people seeking to destroy liberty in the name of defending the Constitution.
The Biden administration, its allies, advocates, and television sock puppets are advancing a Constitution-threatening series of initiatives disguised as "safety and security" measures. This, combined with the Big Social Media-backed suppression of free speech, and not-so-subtle "shaming," are all aimed at crushing opposition and stopping people from questioning decisions, motives and authority. The pressure is palpable. Our liberties are in grave danger.
In a shocking moment of honesty and clarity, Obama CIA Director John Brennan gave the rest of America keen insight into The Washington DC Establishment's plans and actions for the Trumpsters and other "Deplorables" populating the land.
In an interview, Brennan lies and exaggerates to the public about a supposed domestic terrorist insurgency across the country that is gaining strength and threatening the republic. Brennan asserts that he knows that members of the Biden team:
"... are now moving in laser-like fashion to try to uncover as much as they can about what looks like insurgency movements that we've seen overseas, where they germinate in different parts of the country, and they gain strength, and it brings together an unholy alliance, frequently, religious extremists, authoritarians, fascists, bigots, racists, nativists, even libertarians. And, unfortunately, I think there has been this momentum that has been generated as a result of, unfortunately, the demagogic rhetoric of people that just departed government, but also those that continue in the halls of Congress. And, so, I really do think that law enforcement, homeland security, intelligence, and even defense officials are doing everything possible to root out what seems to be a very, very serious and insidious threat to our democracy and our republic."
How do libertarians and authoritarians fit in the same rhetorical political basket? Very tough to reconcile those positions, unless you really do not care about the "logic" of your assertion. Why did Brennan leave out communists? Brennan reportedly voted for Communist Party presidential candidate Gus Hall in 1976, while a student at Fordham University. What about Islamic supremacists? Why did Brennan leave them out of the "unholy alliance?"
Answer: Because it STILL is really all about Trump, Trumpism, and Trumpsters, and destroying any remnant of the MAGA movement. Anyone outside the Uniparty is suspect. In case you still do not get it yet – The Establishment holds staged Uniparty events like a solidarity and bipartisanship wreath-laying. Political cowards stage this sort of propagandistic thing at Arlington National Cemetery – using real heroes as props. It is not a pretty sight.
The proposed solution for the threat Brennan and The Establishment see is Rep. Adam Schiff's (D-CA) new domestic terrorism law proposal. Schiff, who cannot be trusted given his documented track record on his "proof" of President Trump's "collusion" with Russia, and his failed effort to impeach Trump out of the secretive meetings of the House Intelligence Committee, made the following statement in conjunction with his new proposed law:
"When violence fueled by homegrown, hateful ideology poses a more immediate threat to the safety and security of Americans on American soil than an international terrorist organization, it's time for our laws to catch up."
We have every reason to suspect Schiff's motives and the law enforcement legitimacy of his proposal. Combined with Brennan's theories – this sort of thinking comprises the dark fantasies of people seeking to destroy liberty in the name of defending the Constitution.
Thankfully, not everyone in Washington, DC is buying the nonsense. Former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI) spoke intelligently in opposition to the Schiff, Brennan, and the "deprogramming Trumpsters" mania. Like Gabbard, there are some who have clearly articulated the truth: These overreactions are an unconstitutional over-reach that threaten our individual liberties
You will recall that Brennan once tweeted at President Trump:
"When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but you will not destroy America... America will triumph over you."
Now, your government has doubled-down on Brennan's dark fantasies of insurgent guerrilla forces germinating in different regions of the country, seeking to overthrow the government. The Department of Homeland Security just issued a bulletin alerting the public about a growing risk of attacks by "ideologically-motivated violent extremists" agitated about President Biden's inauguration and "perceived grievances fueled by false narratives." Troops, apparently without credible threat, will reportedly be remaining in Washington DC until the end of March.
Purportedly, the bulletin aims to warn the public about a "heightened threat environment" across the United States "that is likely to persist over the coming weeks." [Read: years]. Who are these people behind the "threat?" Homeland Security has an obligation to name names and identify groups. Give us a "Most Wanted" list of 10 people. We just had 25,000 National Guard troops protecting a few politicians in an empty city during the Biden inauguration. What are we reacting to now?
Pay close attention here:
"DHSFo does not have any information to indicate a specific, credible plot; however, violent riots have continued in recent days and we remain concerned that individuals frustrated with the exercise of governmental authority and the presidential transition, as well as other perceived grievances and ideological causes fueled by false narratives, could continue to mobilize a broad range of ideologically-motivated actors to incite or commit violence." [Emphasis added.]
The Biden administration, its allies, advocates, and television sock puppets are advancing a Constitution-threatening series of initiatives disguised as "safety and security" measures. This, combined with the Big Social Media-backed suppression of free speech, and not-so-subtle "shaming," are all aimed at crushing opposition and stopping people from questioning decisions, motives and authority. The pressure is palpable. Our liberties are in grave danger.
Chris Farrell is a former counterintelligence case officer. For the past 20 years, he has served as the Director of Investigations & Research for Judicial Watch. The views expressed are the author's alone, and not necessarily those of Judicial Watch.
© 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.

US media has to win back public’s faith in post-Trump era
Zaid M. Belbagi /Arab News/January 28/2021
Aside from the bellicose denouncements, the denials, the Senate trials and the rallies, what the Donald Trump presidency will truly be remembered for is the storming of the Capitol this month. This act drew consternation and, at some moments, horror. However, more significantly, though somewhat on the sidelines, it drew attention to a more pressing issue: That the chief irritant of many in the US is the media organizations that have grown to be so biased, so very much politically involved, that some even chose to bear arms rather than trust in the country’s institutions. Like him or loathe him, Trump used his four years at the pinnacle of political power to do at least one thing — illustrate the ills and growing influence of fake news.
The term “fake news” has come to personify the four years in which the White House found itself pitted against the media at large. This unprecedented state of affairs was born from the president’s biggest detractors — the sections of the media that were solely focused on an ever more rapidly changing news cycle, pedaling stories that may or may not be based on the truth. Fake news, in many respects, shone a spotlight on the entire Trump presidency. The former president’s continual jousting with some parts of the media — while selecting certain outlets that backed his agenda and disregarding others that may have been critical — was a powerful exercise in how the unchecked growth of this sector has had wild political ramifications.
For a president who complained that “it’s always Russia, Russia, Russia,” it is no doubt unsurprising that a Russian term came to feature so highly during his time in the White House. “Pod-del’mei novosti” (counterfeit/fake news) is a concept that has a long history in the official obfuscation of facts, to which Russia is home. The idea that news can be faked or packaged in a deliberately antagonistic way to fulfill a certain political agenda has become so prominent in the international media that, whether through the planting of false information or the deliberate dissemination of provocative reports, it has not only sown social unrest but developed an entire political culture in which the media is villainized. The implications of this have been on display in the incredibly stratified American society that Trump left behind.
Where, historically, the media has sought to act as a check on government, raising the awareness of issues that should be brought to the attention of the public, certain outlets have now come to be seen as a corrupt and somewhat unreliable and divisive force. This was embraced by Trump as he sought to deflect the challenges of his presidency and chaotic administration by blaming all the ills of his tenure on fake news.
Concerning the political phenomenon of a self-promoting media personality rising to the top, the media was not only Trump’s greatest ally, but also his most powerful opponent. What is most chilling about the former president’s vendetta against fake news is the fact that he based his entire career on PR stunts and the close courting of the media. He only seemed to target sections of the media once their interest in his activities began to highlight the more unsavory and questionable aspects. It is within this battle that American society was divided further, by media outlets on both sides of the political spectrum, which discouraged debate in lieu of sensationalism.
As the power of certain institutions waned and the power of the mob greatly expanded, many have been left wondering when exactly patriotism became a blunt instrument that Americans wielded against one another. As the US intelligentsia looked upon the unhappiness of under-represented and angry Americans with disdain and sections of the media portrayed this as a battle between “us” and “them,” a more important realization has come about, summarized by political scientist Katherine Cramer: “The cultural elite are inexcusably unaware of the challenges and perspectives of many others in this country.”
The straight-talking former president, in seeking to shock audiences with his audacity, highlighted a very important point in that the political “norm” did not reflect the views of many Americans, and only a very narrow group of liberal elites shaped the news agenda. The continued exposure of this fact through his rather crude approach of attempting to discredit all media did in fact draw attention to how saturated audiences are with forced news agendas.
Trump’s use and manipulation of the media, alongside his simultaneous derision of it, highlighted the extent of the problem. Ushered in on a mandate to represent the vast swaths of the American people who deem “the system” not to be working for them, he coupled his celebrity with rabble-rousing methods to appeal to a larger demographic. Where white supremacists had once harbored anarchical aspirations, Trump used Twitter, Facebook and “friendly” news platforms to appeal to a wider group of Americans, Hispanics and even African Americans, who through their shared feelings of neglect were united in supporting Trump’s isolationist and unorthodox administration.
Certain outlets have now come to be seen as a corrupt and somewhat unreliable and divisive force.
After having used social media to amplify his voice, Trump began to couple the big tech companies that own the majority of the mass media platforms with the financial elite, discrediting his opponents on a whim. Such divisive policies were reinforced, not challenged, with the suspension of his Twitter account — the last great act in the Trump show and the perfect example of how divisive the media has become, fake or otherwise.
The last four years have, without a doubt, brought the perils of an overly biased and unverified media to the fore. In seeking to influence and anger, sections of the media, empowered by social media platforms, have neglected their obligations to inform and inspire. Trump’s attempt to circumvent this stark new reality by encouraging a culture of “alternative facts” was not the solution; what is needed is to restore faith in the media and the verification of news. Without such an effort, mainstream political life will continue to play host to reactionaries who, given the division and anger they have been shown to cause, are not the future the democratic process was meant to entail. As Australian politician Arthur Calwell once said: “It is better to be defeated on principle than to win on lies.”
*Zaid M. Belbagi is a political commentator, and an adviser to private clients between London and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Twitter: @Moulay_Zaid

Iran’s regional chess game exposes US confusion
Nadim Shehadi/Arab News/January 28/2021
On the day that Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani was assassinated in Baghdad last January, he was a field commander in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), moving across borders between Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, which for him were the same theater of operation. In fact, what seem like failed states in the region can be considered successful IRGC operations. In Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen, what seem like unrelated organizations operate under the same banner. They gain control using similar methods, including assassinations, paralysis, economic collapse, a constant state of crisis, and ideologically fueled violence. By ignoring the actions of the IRGC in negotiations with Iran, Tehran can stick to agreements like the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which it negotiated with the West while having a free hand to pursue a destabilizing agenda through its proxies, making the Middle East look like a failed region.
Hamas, Hezbollah, Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi and the Houthis all follow the same pattern of collapsing the state and replacing it with parallel institutions. Hezbollah is active in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen, and coordinates closely with Hamas in Palestine. The instruments used include suppressing dissent through targeted assassinations and holding the state hostage through paralysis.
In Lebanon, the assassinations started by taking on internal dissent within the Shiite community, targeting people like Daoud Daoud, Mahmoud Faqih and Hassan Sbayti, who were leaders of the rival Amal Movement. Three years of infighting between the two groups ended with Hezbollah hegemony in 1990. Then came the assassinations of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in 2005, journalists like Gebran Tueni, politicians like Pierre Gemayel and Walid Eido, army and security personnel like Wissam Eid and Francois Hajj, and civil society activists like Samir Kassir. The same is still happening in Iraq, where 2020 was the year of assassinations, with the victims including Hisham Al-Hashimi, Reham Yaqoub, Tahseen Ali and Ludia Remon. In Yemen, the assassination of government minister Hassan Zaid last year — as well as those of prominent dissenters Ahmed Sharaf Al-Din, Abdul Karim Jadban, Mohammed Abdul-Malik Al-Mutawakel and Abdul Karim Al-Khaiwani — followed the same pattern.
Control is gained in one country after another by contributing to the collapse of state institutions and replacing them with alternative ones tied together through their links to Iran. The Iranian toolkit also includes gaining time through negotiations, creating paralysis, and demands like integration into state institutions and formalizing the inclusion of militias in the military through headlines like a “common or integrated defense strategy” under the pretext that the official armies are ineffective. In Gaza, Hamas holds the population hostage, under siege, and maintains the state of war and poverty, while any reprieve can only be obtained by way of Hamas’ own negotiations with Israel. Through corruption and clientelism, the militias penetrate state institutions and bankrupt them, often empowering their own alternatives and thus constituting a parallel state feeding on the carcass of its victim.
These proxies can also play a dual role: One as an integral part of the societies they penetrate and the other as contingents of the IRGC. In Yemen, for example, the Houthis negotiate like a political actor but at the same time behave like an unaccountable militia, escalating violence and working outside the confines of the Stockholm Agreement. In Lebanon, Hezbollah is part of the government and parliament, and, along with its allies, has veto power that can create paralysis for months on end. In Iraq, while there are four main players that are part of the Tansiqiya (coordination) committee, there is also a proliferation of unknown organizations that spring up with different names. Fragmentation also renders the parallel order of the militias “antifragile” and difficult to pin down. This gives Iran and the IRGC plausible deniability about their role in the various conflicts in the region.
While Iran sees the whole region as one theater of operations, the picture from Washington looks different, with each context seen as separate and the conflicts unconnected. The region also looks chaotic, hopeless and full of unresolvable problems and dysfunctional societies. One example is the summer of 2006, when Iranian proxies created chaos and war in Gaza, Lebanon and Iraq at the same time. The reaction in Washington to such an impression is bipartisan consensus on the need to get out of the region because it is impossible to manage.
While Iran views the region as a chessboard, the US sees it more like a poker table. In a game of chess, every move is linked to future moves and the game has a precise final goal. Chess pieces can also be sacrificed toward that goal — short-term loss with the aim of long-term gain. Here the enemy is clearly the US and the aim is to drive it out of the region.
In the American poker game, each hand is seen as independent. There is no overall aim and no constant, identifiable enemy. The US feels it can win some and lose some and pull out of the game at any time. Washington’s poker game is also weak and fragmented and, because of internal politics, it seems to be playing with its cards on show.
Because of internal politics, America seems to be playing poker with its cards on show.
A deal like the JCPOA, for example, was seen as a success by both sides, but for different reasons. For Iran, it was a temporary sacrifice that gave it a free hand to pursue larger regional aims (against US interests). The US saw it as a successful negotiation regardless of its effect of empowering the IRGC in the larger game. It was a success in a region where every other initiative was failing.
Moves to address the larger picture, like adding the IRGC or any of its proxies to the list of terrorist organizations or imposing additional sanctions, become entangled in internal partisan politics, where the parties in the US aim to score points against each other and are divorced from the original context.
The combination of all these factors gives a huge win to Iran. The IRGC, through its proxies, can flare up the whole region while making the various crises seem like separate, unrelated incidents. This confuses the US into thinking that the region is endemically dysfunctional and impossible to fix. At the same time, Iran can look like it is complying with agreements like the JCPOA and give some semblance of being a stable, reliable actor.
*Nadim Shehadi is the executive director of the LAU Headquarters and Academic Center in New York and an Associate Fellow of Chatham House in London.

Will the Biden team tighten or unravel US-Saudi ties?
Simon Henderson/The Hill//January 28/2021
Many thought U.S.-Saudi relations were going to be an early casualty of the Biden administration. Perhaps they still will be, but for the moment the ties are strengthening. On Monday, the Wall Street Journal reported “U.S. Forces Expand Reach in Saudi Arabia.” On Sunday, the Israeli newspaper Haaretz had reported “Israel Allows U.S. to Deploy Iron Dome Missile Defense in the Gulf.” Quite where the missiles will be deployed is not being disclosed, but the kingdom would be one obvious destination.
Yet these developments, apparently finalized in the last months, or even weeks, of the Trump administration, are surely vulnerable to any readjustment of relations or reduction in U.S. posture in the Gulf. Congressional sentiment is already concerned about a deal with Saudi Arabia to supply extra munitions for its air force, likely to be dropped (with varying degrees of accuracy) on Houthi targets in Yemen. And the deal to sell F-35 advanced fighter jets and drones to the United Arab Emirates (UAE), signed on the morning of Jan. 20 no less, is likely to be subject to a review lasting “many months.”
Clarification on the real state of the ties between Washington and Riyadh could be provided if and when the CIA’s assessment of the murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi is released. Avril Haines, who was confirmed as Director of National Intelligence last week, promised to declassify the intelligence report on the incident during her appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
That development is a proverbial (and perhaps appropriate) “sword of Damocles” hanging over Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, aka MbS, the de facto leader of Saudi Arabia. In a “transition report” on human rights, published Jan. 26, even the conservative Foundation for the Defense of Democracies described MbS as “the primary culprit” in Khashoggi’s murder.
Other items on almost any liberal agenda against Saudi Arabia include the continued detention of women activists, including Loujain al-Hathloul, who could be released at the end of next month. But she still would be banned from leaving the kingdom for five years, a restriction she and others will noisily protest. MbS appears to be deaf to the disquiet that such actions prompt. His diplomats argue human rights are a domestic issue and do not concern foreigners. But at the weekend he announced plans to double the value of the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund to over $1 trillion. To the extent that he wants foreign investors, he may need to change his thinking.
Meanwhile, MbS has another headache. Someone is targeting his capital Riyadh with missiles or drones. On Jan. 23 and again on Jan. 26, residents heard loud explosions and saw smoke high overhead. Saudi media were silent, but the American embassy issued a security alert, which offered some confirmation that something bad happened. Today the Wall Street Journal reported that an important royal complex suffered minor damage. The first attack may have emanated in Iraq, where security is poor and pro-Iranian groups can operate freely. The second attack may have been from Yemen, where the Houthi rebel government is sustained, at least militarily, by Iran.
The lack of apparent damage is little relief either to Saudi Arabia or its Gulf Arab allies, which are even more vulnerable to direct or instigated attacks by Iran. That new calculus has operated since the September 2019 drone and cruise missile attack on Saudi Arabia’s crucial Abqaiq oil processing plant and another facility. If Iran wants to attack, it can. Small pinprick incidents are likely to be deliberate, rather than an indication of equipment failure.
The policy ingredient lacking clarity for the moment is the degree to which the Biden administration wants to compromise with Tehran over restrictions on its nuclear program. With Tony Blinken confirmed as Secretary of State, things may change — although many would anticipate that diplomacy will be slow and, like the original 2015 deal, may have limited impact on Iran’s regional activities.
The Wall Street Journal report said that U.S. forces will be operating from air bases in Taif and Tabuk, in the West of the kingdom, as well as the current Prince Sultan base south of Riyadh. The Red Sea port of Yanbu would be used for transport ships, avoiding the Strait of Hormuz. Much of this is reminiscent of the footprint the U.S. had in the late 1990s when Saddam Hussein in Iraq needed to be deterred. Whether the Biden administration knew it was inheriting this strategy is yet to be revealed.
*Simon Henderson is the Baker Fellow and director of the Bernstein Program on Gulf and Energy Policy at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Follow him on Twitter @shendersongulf.

Are there pieces of Trump’s foreign policy worth keeping?
Dennis Ross/Juan C. Zarate/Los Angeles Times/January 28/2021
The shock of the Jan. 6 mob assault on the Congress and the stain on the image of American democracy will not wear off anytime soon. This moment has amplified the impulse to reject the vestiges of Trump administration policies.
In the realm of foreign policy, this would not be a stark departure from how incoming presidents have reacted to their predecessors’ agendas. The instinct to make swift, dramatic changes is understandable and can often be right. Eisenhower needed to find a way to end the Korean War. Kennedy needed to take account of the awakening in the developing nations that did not fit neatly into the two Cold War blocs. Nixon pledged to end the Vietnam War.
Yet, most administrations also discover that their judgments about their predecessor’s foreign policy can miss the mark. Bill Clinton went into office determined to reverse George H.W. Bush’s policy on the former Yugoslavia and within six months was not so sure it was wrong. George W. Bush scrapped the Clinton-era nuclear accord with North Korea because of North Korean cheating, only to negotiate another nuclear deal, which the North Koreans ultimately failed to honor.
Barack Obama felt he had to reverse the Bush approach to regime change in the Middle East, and yet by the time of the Arab Spring, he sided with the people in the squares trying to oust leaders in palaces. Obama also pledged to reverse Bush-era counter-terrorism policies but ultimately expanded many of them such as targeted strikes on terrorist leaders and broad-based surveillance.
Donald Trump stormed into the Oval Office pledging to reverse all of the signature Obama-era policies — pulling out of the Paris climate accord, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and the Iran nuclear deal. More generally, his “America First” world view rejected many of the precepts of post-World War II American foreign policy in which U.S. alliances, leadership and commitments to other nations were foundational.
Even if Trump had not instigated the attack on democracy with conspiracy theories about a stolen election, there would be much to fix. First, President Biden must restore the integrity and perception of American democracy. Second, it is essential to show support for long-standing alliances and to promote democratic values while speaking out against authoritarian regimes. Third, the United States must be ready to shape coalitions to deal with pandemics, climate change and challenges that respect no borders.
While there is much to change, some Trump administration approaches to foreign policy should not be reversed reflexively. For example, in the Middle East, the recent establishment of formal relations between Israel and Arab countries of the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco creates new realities in the region. It reflects a strategic convergence between many Arab states and Israel, not just on threats but also on their common interest to promote more technologically driven economies and to address water and food security needs.
The Biden administration can build on these agreements and forge even more. It can broker Arab outreach to Israel to promote Israeli moves that could benefit the Palestinians and yield Palestinian responses. Normalization with Arab nations will not produce Israeli-Palestinian peace in the short run, but it can be a means to break the stalemate between Israelis and Palestinians and reestablish a sense of possibility.
The Trump administration’s wholesale withdrawal from the Iran nuclear agreement was a mistake and has given Iran an excuse to accelerate its nuclear program. Yet its “maximum pressure” campaign has certainly created leverage that should not be discounted. The supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, may be trying to force Iran onto the Biden administration’s agenda by, among other things, enriching uranium to 20% and showing that the Islamic Republic presents a problem that must be addressed. But, as his words in a recent speech indicate, the Iranian leader is doing so not because he wants the U.S. to rush to rejoin the nuclear deal but because he wants sanctions relief — which Iran should not get for free.
The Trump administration’s confrontational approach to China now resonates with members of Congress on both sides of the aisle. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated concerns about China’s chokehold on supply chains and unfair trade practices. Even Biden has said that he was in no hurry to lift the tariffs Trump put on Chinese exports to the U.S. China’s widespread theft of intellectual property, expansion of its surveillance state beyond its borders, and human rights abuses in Hong Kong and Xinjiang will need to become a central focus for the Biden administration and our allies.
The beginning of a new administration is often a time for reversing course, but reflexive impulses in foreign policy are seldom right. Biden will need to demonstrate his ability to lead globally and heal America’s democracy in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack and the effects of the pandemic. Still, in forming his own foreign policy agenda, Biden should consider seriously the elements of his predecessor’s approach worth keeping.
*Dennis Ross served in senior national security positions in the Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Clinton and Obama administrations. He is counselor at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
*Juan Zarate was deputy national security advisor in the George W. Bush administration. He is chairman of the Center on Economic and Financial Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Follow Juan on Twitter @JCZarate1. FDD is a nonpartisan think tank focused on foreign policy and national security issues.