LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
May 12/2018
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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Which Side Are You On: Iran or Israel?
مع من انت، مع إيران أو إسرائيل
Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat/Friday, 11 May, 2018/
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64594/abdulrahman-al-rashed-which-side-are-you-on-iran-or-israel-%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B1%D8%AD%D9%85%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%B4%D8%AF-%D9%85%D8%B9-%D9%85%D9%86-%D8%AA%D9%82%D9%81/
It is a very embarrassing question because it violates all the concepts on which our political culture was built.
Yesterday, Israel attacked 50 bases run by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Syria in retaliation to 10 missiles fired toward Israel. It was claimed that the Revolutionary Guards had retaliated against an Israeli attack a night earlier.
Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Khalid al-Khalifa volunteered to explain the stance. He wrote on Twitter: “As long as Iran has breached the status quo in the region and invaded countries with its forces and missiles, any state in the region, including Israel, is entitled to defend itself by eliminating sources of danger." Sheikh Khalid’s stance is consistent with any state that stands against Iran’s crimes in the region. In politics, stances change in line with interests and necessities. If we ask the majority of the Syrian people about their opinion, they would chant and support Israel in targeting Iranian forces and their militias in Syria. There is no excuse stronger than defending the right of 600,000 people killed and 10 million displaced as a result of the crimes committed by Iran’s forces and allies. Stances have their justifications and they are not always sacred.
The stance is with Iran if it supports the Palestinians, with Israel when it strikes Iran’s forces in Syria, with the Palestinians when Israel attacks them, with the Lebanese-Iranian “Hezbollah” when it had claimed to be liberating Lebanon from Israeli occupation, and with Israel when it targeted “Hezbollah” after attacking the Lebanese and participating in the murder of Syrians. Support is always to a party that has come under attack against the aggressor.
Is it difficult to understand this logic? This is the required rational in a region suffering from turmoil. The ideologues are the only ones who are probably incapable of accepting it. If you ask any Syrian or Lebanese woman whose son was killed by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, she will not hesitate to pray for victory to Israel and for the loss and defeat of its rivals. This does not give the Israelis the right to occupy Palestinian territories or to persecute the Palestinian people.
We are facing a different phase and an unprecedented war. For the first time, Israel and Iran are in direct confrontation on Syrian territories rather than fighting proxy wars like they used to.
For the first time ever, we see the Revolutionary Guards that dominated the region, in Iraq, Yemen and Syria, paying a heavy price and realizing that they have crossed the red line. As they usually do in Lebanon, the Revolutionary Guards claimed in an official statement that they are not responsible for firing the 10 missiles towards Israel, blaming Assad’s forces.
The Israelis will not go to court and will not wait for international inspection commissions to address this issue. They don’t need evidence to know that Qassem Soleimani’s forces are behind it and that they will not be safe by hiding behind the powerless Syrian regime troops.
Tehran must have heard about the stance of the Syrian regime – Soleimani says he’s willing to sacrifice the last standing Iranian soldier for Assad’s sake – that it is willing to give up on Soleimani and the Iranians in any political deal.
Assad will cooperate with any power that achieves victory on Syrian territory. Now that Israel is involved in the war, Iran is probably the biggest loser. Meanwhile, the Russians do not heed the new developments.
The picture is today clearer: The aim is to force Tehran’s regime to back off. The plan includes US President Donald Trump’s decision to scrap the nuclear agreement and reinstate economic sanctions.
This is in addition to getting Israel’s military involved via the painful strikes that destroyed Iranian sites, and convincing the Russians of neutrality by becoming mere bystanders rather than threatening to use their missiles against Israel’s strikes.
All this aims to serve the same purpose after the Tehran government refused international calls to militarily retreat to its borders, and to stop interfering in the affairs of the region’s countries and toppling their governments.

Iraq Election: Weak Government, Strong Society
Amir Taheri/Asharq Al Awsat/Friday, 11 May, 2018
Iraqis are scheduled to go the polls tomorrow to elect a new parliament which would, in turn, choose a new government. You might say: So what? What’s the big deal?
The first reason why this is still a big deal is that the overwhelming majority of Iraqis still seem committed to pluralist elections as the sole means of choosing their government.
In 2003 when talk of holding elections started in newly liberated Iraq few people believed the Iraqis would understand the electoral process let alone develop a taste for it. One lost count of American and European “experts” who mocked the very idea of free elections in Iraq where, they opined, the “Arab mindset” was firmly entrenched against winning power at the ballot box.
Democrat Senator Joe Biden, the future US Vice President under Barack Obama, laughed the whole thing off” “One man, one vote, once!” he quipped. His recipe for Iraq was the division of the country into three mini-states, not democratic elections.
However, when millions of voters emerged from ballot boxes proudly showing purple-dyed fingers, the mockers knew that the two-finger sign was meant for them.
The second reason why tomorrow’s exercise is important is that its result isn’t “fixed” in advance, something rare in the “Muslim World” where traditional methods of changing governments include coups d’etat, riots, assassinations and even civil wars. In Iraq itself, murdering the Caliph had been the main method of changing government and policy since the Abbasid times.
The third reason is that tomorrow’s election could prove to be a major step towards the consolidation of Iraq’s position as a serious nation-state and thus a key element of stability in a region bedeviled by decades of turmoil and conflict.
Potentially, in terms of demography, natural resources, geopolitical location and, above all, quality of manpower, Iraq has the wherewithal to become a major player in regional politics. Many clichés are used to dismiss Iraq’s chances of redefining itself as a modern nation-state slowly devolving its democratic process. Iraqis, we are told are divided into sects.
That assumption was peddled by the Western “experts” that President George W Bush hired to tell him what Iraq looked and felt like. The “experts” relied on Ottoman era division of the” subject people” into “millahs” or religious communities, ignoring over a century of historic development under British protection, a mildly authoritarian monarchy and successive ideology-based despotisms and their numerous opponents.
The situation became more confusing when sectarians, often encouraged by Washington, moved center-stage both as collaborators with the American liberator and his adversaries. Iraq was pushed into a war of the sectarians which the “experts” dubbed a sectarian war. However, tomorrow’s election will provide a dramatic illustration of Iraq’s determination to move beyond sectarianism compared to previous elections in 2010 and 2014.
Those elections were contested by four big blocs: Two Shiite, one Arab Sunni and one Kurdish, fielding candidates under sectarian or ethnic labels. In this election, however, we have five big Shiite blocs, or lists, two Sunni and two Kurdish not to mention many other independent or trans-sectarian lists totaling over 80. The alliances that have taken shape are prompted by political and even ideological,
rather than religious and/or ethnic considerations. And it is a major step towards a more sophisticated form of democratic politics in which where-you-want-to-go is more important than where-you-come-from.
Finally, the coming election may mark the beginning of the end for attempts by foreign powers, notably the Islamic Republic in Iran but also the United States, not to mention smaller regional players such as Turkey and Israel, to force their agendas on Iraq.
Because of the sectarian methodology imposed by Washington the future Prime Minister would have to come from among Shiites. Right now four leading candidates are in the field. The first is the incumbent PM Haidar al-Abadi who rose to his position because at a certain delicate moment he was seen as everyone’s second choice.
Today, he hopes to emerge as the first choice of a majority of Iraqis thus rendering support from foreign powers irrelevant.
The second wannabe is former Premier Nuri Al-Maliki who first rose to that position as the joint choice of the Bush administration and the mullahs of Tehran.
Once Obama had decided to withdraw from Iraq al-Maliki, who had originally been cool on alliance with Tehran, decided or, perhaps, was forced to rely exclusively on Iran. But even today, and despite years of service to the Islamic Republic, al-Maliki is still regarded with suspicion in parts of the establishment in the Islamic Republic.
Iran’s reserve candidate is Hadi al-Ameri, the militia commander of Hashad al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization), handpicked by General Qassem Soleimani and his Quds (Jerusalem) Corps.
The fourth putative PM, regarded as the dark horse right now, is another former Prime Minister Ayad al-Allawi whose key trump is the ability to make a deal with both the Arab Sunnis and the Kurds as a consensus candidate.
Contrary to common “experts’ view” I believe that one outcome of this election would be a gradual reduction in the influence of both Iran and the United States as a sense of Iraqi-ness” (Uruqa) cuts across traditional sectarian and ethnic divides.
Whatever the outcome of the election the next Iraqi government would continue to operate from a position of relative weakness if only because he would lack a strong base of his own.
But is that a bad thing?
The answer is: not in the short run. Since its creation as a modern a nation-state in 1921 and until the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 Iraq always had strong governments which meant it had a weak or even non-existent civil society. In the past 15 years, however the balance has shifted in favor of the civil society which, in many instances, has had to start from zero.
Iraq may need two, three or even four more free and pluralist elections before an acceptable balance is formed between the power of the state and that of civil society.
In the meantime, whoever forms the future government in Baghdad must remain humble, steering away from grandiloquence, and focus on concrete policies that serve the bread-and-butter issues.
The first aim of the future government should be to make sure that the democratic process remains safe. Regardless of religious, sectarian, ideological or even political differences, all Iraqis share an interest in that.

A Month of Islam and Multiculturalism in Germany: April 2018
Soeren Kern/Gatestone Institute/May 11, 2018
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12285/islam-multiculturalism-germany-april
One of Germany's leading economists, Hans-Werner Sinn, warned that the migrant crisis could end up costing German taxpayers more than one trillion euros: "The cost to the taxpayer could also be higher. So far, there are about 1.5 million migrants who have come to Germany since 2015. And no: They are not dentists, lawyers and nuclear scientists, but mostly underqualified immigrants, who have arrived in the promised land... where the standard of living without employment is higher than in many countries of origin with employment."
In his first media interview as the new head of the influential GdP police union in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), Michael Mertens was asked if there are any no-go zones in NRW, Germany's most populous state. He replied: "There are areas where police do not go alone, only in large teams. Such areas are now present in almost all NRW cities."
"We now have new phenomenon in having refugees or people of Arab origin who are bringing another form of anti-Semitism back into the country. This dismays us." — German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
April 1. Senior German officials, including Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, always quick to outdo each other with good wishes for Islamic festivals, failed to greet Germans for Easter, the most important Christian festival. By contrast, Aiman ​​Mazyek, the head of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, did offer Easter greetings: "I wish you all peaceful and relaxing holidays. Happy Easter to the Christians, a happy 'Passover' to the Jews and a few contemplative days to the non-believers. #Variety makes you strong."
April 2. German churches were sheltering 611 illegal migrants at the end of March, up from 530 at the end of December 2017. Many churches in Germany provide refuge for refugees who face deportation or fear social and psychological hardships. German authorities tolerate church asylum, although there is no legal basis for it, according to the newsmagazine, Focus.
April 4. Sohail A., a 34-year-old rejected Pakistani asylum seeker living in Hamburg, confessed to slitting his two-year-old daughter's throat with a kitchen knife. Prosecutors said the man murdered his daughter out of "anger and revenge" because the girl's mother refused to allow the child to be taken to Pakistan.
April 4. Germany's domestic intelligence service (Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, BfV) reported that the number of Salafists in the country doubled during the past five years: there are now 11,000 Salafists in Germany, compared to 5,500 in 2013. Salafists are committed to replacing the German constitutional order with Sharia law.
April 5. The newspaper Bild reported that of the 5.93 million recipients of unemployment benefits in Germany, 2.03 million (34.3%) were foreigners. Nearly half of them (959,000) come from non-European countries. The largest group are Syrians (588,301), followed by Turks (259,447).
April 5. The newspaper Express revealed that the City of Cologne was paying a luxury boutique hotel €1.5 million ($1.8 million) a year to house migrants. In one case, the hotel was receiving €6,800 ($8,000) a month to house an Iraqi family of eight in a room sized 35 square meters (375 square feet).
April 6. The newspaper Express revealed that Andrea Horitzky, a board member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU), was receiving monthly government payments of €32,500 ($38,500) to house 31 migrants at a hotel owned by her family. When questioned, Horitzky said: "I have guests from all over the world. That's my private business and it's none of your business. I certainly am not doing this for the money."
April 8. Police arrested six men suspected of plotting knife attacks against spectators at the Berlin Half Marathon. The lead suspect reportedly knew Anis Amri, a Tunisian who killed 12 people and injured several dozen more when he drove a truck into a Berlin Christmas market in December 2016.
April 9. In Berlin, an 18-year-old Turk named Görkem A. received a suspended sentenced of two years in juvenile detention for ambushing a 40-year-old female jogger from behind, bashing her head with a brick and robbing her. He then kicked her in the head. She was hospitalized for injuries that included a broken jaw. The suspect was arrested based on a surveillance video from a security camera. Lisa Jani, a court spokeswoman, defended the lenient sentence: Görkem A. must pay the victim €2,000 ($2,400) as "symbolic" compensation.
April 9. North Rhine-Westphalia's Integration Minister, Joachim Stamp, announced a proposal to prohibit girls under the age of 14 from wearing headscarves to school. Amid a public outcry, Stamp quickly appeared to retreat: "The goal," he said, "is not necessarily a law."
April 9. Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Interior Ministry, Stephan Mayer, said that he expected the passage of a new law that would deny passports to jihadis with dual citizenship. He added that confiscating the German passports of alleged jihadis was a "pressing goal."
April 11. One of Germany's leading economists, Hans-Werner Sinn, warned that the migrant crisis could end up costing German taxpayers more than one trillion euros:
"The cost to the taxpayer could also be higher. So far, there are about 1.5 million migrants who have come to Germany since 2015. And no: They are not dentists, lawyers and nuclear scientists, but mostly underqualified immigrants, who have arrived in the promised land — one flowing with milk and honey and where the standard of living without employment is higher than in many countries of origin with employment."
April 11. Der Tagesspiegel published an exposé about the bullying of German students at the hands of Muslims in Berlin schools:
"I'm in seventh grade at a high school in Schöneberg. There I am marginalized because I am German and eat pork. I am cursed in Turkish and Arabic. In German, I am insulted as a son of a bitch or f**ked whore. In addition, I am sometimes beaten and kicked. If I get too close to other boys, they call me gay and kick me. Girls in my class are called sluts when they wear strapless shirts. I've been trying to change school for many months but cannot find an empty slot. The Education Department and the school do not help me."
April 11. Alexander Dobrindt, a leading member of the Christian Social Union (CSU), a political party based in Bavaria, said that Islam "has no cultural roots in Germany." He added:
"Islam has no cultural roots in Germany and with Sharia as a legal system, it has nothing in common with our Judeo-Christian heritage. No Islamic country on earth has developed a comparable democratic culture like the ones we know in Christian countries."
April 11. A food bank in Essen called Essener Tafel resumed offering food to migrants after a three-month ban. The relief organization generated controversy when it announced in January that it would no longer serve migrants because the proportion of non-Germans was too high. At the moment, 56% are Germans, compared to just 25% in January.
April 12. Kollegah and Farid Bang, a Muslim rap duo accused of singing anti-Semitic lyrics, was awarded Germany's top music prize, the Echo Music Award. The prize, awarded on Holocaust Remembrance Day, sparked public outrage. Justice Minister Heiko Maas said that "anti-Semitic provocations do not deserve a prize; they are repugnant." In an essay for Die Welt, comedian Oliver Polak wrote that the normalization of anti-Semitism in popular music was part of the reason "that young Jewish people are chased around and beaten up in schoolyards." After an extraordinary meeting in Berlin, Echo's organizer, the Federal Association of the Music Industry (BVMI), announced the end of the music award.
Germany's top music prize, the Echo Music Award, was awarded on April 12 to Kollegah and Farid Bang, a Muslim rap duo accused of singing anti-Semitic lyrics. The prize, awarded on Holocaust Remembrance Day, sparked public outrage.
April 12. A video posted on YouTube showed Muslim children at a mosque in Herford dressed in combat gear, equipped with toy weapons and covered with Turkish flags, pretending to be jihadis. In the background, listeners can hear the official election campaign song of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "We totally misjudged how this performance could be interpreted," said Necati Aydin, a representative of the mosque, which is run by the Turkish government.
April 12. German authorities launched a crackdown on Middle Eastern crime families in Essen, a city in North Rhine-Westphalia where some 70 Turkish, Kurdish and Arab-born clan members regularly engage in racketeering, extortion, money laundering, pimping and trafficking in humans, weapons and drugs. Middle Eastern crime clans now control large swathes of German cities and towns — areas that are effectively lawless and which German police increasingly fear to approach. The crime families, which are believed to have thousands of members, have for decades been allowed operate with virtual impunity: German judges and prosecutors were unable or unwilling to stop them, apparently out of fear of retribution.
April 12. The Interior Ministry reported that only ten of the more than 750 Islamist Gefährder (potentially highly dangerous persons) known to be residing in Germany have been deported during the past year. Parliamentarians called on the government to enforce an existing law which stipulates that individuals who pose a security risk be deported.
April 12. In the first test case of Germany's new internet censorship law, a court in Berlin ordered Facebook to restore a user's comment it had deleted. The case involved Facebook user Gabor B., who posted the following comment: "Germans are becoming increasingly stupid. No wonder, since the left-wing media litters them every day with fake news about 'skilled workers,' declining unemployment figures or Trump." Facebook said the comment violated its "community standards," but the court ruled that it was protected by the right to free speech.
April 13. A 33-year-old migrant from Niger fatally stabbed his ex-wife and her one-year-old daughter at the Jungfernstieg subway station in central Hamburg. In nearby Rendsburg, a 26-year-old Syrian man tried to decapitate his sleeping wife. She escaped with minor injuries. In Wuppertal, a 23-year-old migrant from India snatched a five-year-old boy from his family at the central railway station and pushed him in front of an oncoming train. The boy escaped with minor injuries; the man was known to police.
April 13. A 19-year-old Afghan asylum seeker was shot and killed by police after he went on a rampage at a bakery in Fulda. The Hesse State Criminal Police Office subsequently launched an investigation into why police used deadly force.
April 13. Three Syrians, aged 21, 23 and 27, were arrested in Saarland on suspicion of being members of Islamic State. All three arrived in Germany in 2015 posing as refugees.
April 14. An Emnid poll published by Bild found that 51% of those surveyed were worried about German no-go zones, areas where the state is unable or unwilling to enforce the law; 77% said that they wanted the state to take more forceful action against Middle Eastern crime families.
April 18. Two men wearing Jewish skullcaps were attacked by Arab-speaking passersby in Berlin. The assault, a video of which went viral on social media, highlighted the growing problem of Arab anti-Semitism in Germany. Chancellor Angela Merkel said: "This is a terrible incident. That is why we will respond here. The fight against such anti-Semitic acts must be won, that is very clear. This unfortunately exists among Germans, but also among people of Arab origin." A representative of the Jewish community in Berlin, Mike Samuel Delberg, said: "Such things should not be swept under the carpet. The political lip service must stop."
April 19. A report by Germany's five leading economic institutes found that in order to preserve the existing social welfare system, Germans would either have to work until age 70 or annually import 500,000 migrants.
April 19. Germany's domestic intelligence service (Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, BfV), reported that more than 1,000 German Islamists and Islamists from Germany have traveled to Syria and Iraq to take part in combat operations with the Islamic State and other jihadi groups. This figure is up from 960 at the end of December 2017.
April 19. Eurostat, the European statistics office, reported that Germany had taken in 325,400 refugees in 2017, accounting for almost 60% of the 540,000 migrants resettled in the EU last year. Most were from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.
April 20. Germany agreed to take in 10,200 refugees as part of a European Union plan to resettle 50,000 migrants from North Africa and the Middle East. EU Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos said the program of legal entry was designed to thwart smuggling gangs that illegally bring migrants to Europe.
April 22. Chancellor Angela Merkel said that refugees or people of Arab origin were responsible for the rise of anti-Semitism in Germany. In an interview with Israeli Channel 10 News, Merkel said: "We now have new phenomenon in having refugees or people of Arab origin who are bringing another form of anti-Semitism back into the country. This dismays us."
April 23. A 24-year-old Pakistani asylum seeker vandalized St. Mark's Church in Chemnitz. The man was arrested, questioned and released. He then vandalized St. Peter's Church, also in Chemnitz. Police blamed both incidents on the suspect's "mental health condition." Meanwhile, an "Asian man" sexually assaulted a 12-year-old girl at a Jewish cemetery in Mülheim.
April 24. North Rhine-Westphalia's Integration Minister, Joachim Stamp, said it was not possible to deport a former bodyguard of the late Osama bin Laden because of fears that he could be tortured or treated badly in his homeland. The 42-year-old Tunisian named Sami A. has been living in Bochum for more than a decade. Stamp confirmed that Sami A. receives €1,168 ($1,450) each month in welfare payments. He lives with his wife and children, who have German citizenship.
April 24. In his first media interview as the new head of the influential GdP police union in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), Michael Mertens was asked if there are any no-go zones in NRW, Germany's most populous state. He replied:
"There are areas where police do not go alone, only in large teams. Such areas are now present in almost all NRW cities. We must show a clear police presence and make it clear that everyone who lives in this country has to abide by the law."
April 26. Sibel H., a German-Turkish woman from Hesse, and Sabine S., a convert to Islam from Baden-Württemberg, returned to Germany on a flight from Baghdad after having joined the Islamic State in Syria. The Federal Prosecutor's Office had requested arrest warrants for the two women, but the Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof) ruled that the women should go free because no specific terrorist membership or support had been proven. The court treats males and females differently when assessing membership of or support for the Islamic State: male jihadis fight, torture or murder, while female jihadis mainly take care of the household, bear children and care for husbands and offspring. According to the Federal Court, such acts are not punishable because they do not constitute explicit support for terrorism.
April 27. A man with an "Arab phenotype" sexually assaulted four children between the ages of 11 and 12 at a zoo in Magdeburg. A 24-year-old "North African born in Palestine" was arrested after repeatedly raping at knifepoint a 46-year-old woman in her garden in Berlin.
April 28. Felix Klein, the German government's newly appointed special envoy to Jewish community, said he was not surprised that Jews are leaving Germany: "It is quite understandable that those who are scared for the safety of their children would consider leaving Germany," he said. "I hear this from my own Jewish friends. But we must do everything to avoid that." Klein also said that anti-Semitism in Germany is being fueled by mass migration from the Muslim world: "There is a tendency — anti-Semitic sentiment is more openly expressed. Anti-Semitism among Muslims and the extreme right and left existed before. But it is being expressed more unashamedly. Yes, the situation has become worse."
April 30. A study by Mediendienst Integration, an information service focused on immigration, found that demand for Islam courses in German schools far outstrips supply. Around 54,000 students at 800 schools across the country currently receive Islam religion lessons, although number of Muslim children aged six to 18 at German schools is now believed to be around 750,000 to 800,000.
*Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute.
© 2018 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.

Iran deal ignored Gulf concerns
الإتفاق النووي مع إيران تجاهل مخاوف ومصالح دول الخليج العربي
Hasan Al-Hasan/Arab News/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64599/hasan-al-hasan-iran-deal-ignored-gulf-concerns-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%AA%D9%81%D8%A7%D9%82-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%86%D9%88%D9%88%D9%8A-%D9%85%D8%B9-%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86-%D8%AA%D8%AC%D8%A7%D9%87/
When he announced his decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, US President Donald Trump spent more time criticizing it for its failure to address Tehran’s support for terrorism and its destabilizing regional activity, than most of its other defects. For years, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Israel and other regional states made the same point. But under Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama, their concerns were ignored.
With Trump in office, however, these states have been able to point to a worsened regional situation as evidence that the deal has done more harm than good. Ultimately, his decision strongly suggests that the deal’s most fatal defect was to ignore Iran’s neighbors and their ability to successfully oppose it. But the remedy may be too late.
From the perspective of regional states, the deal has enabled Iran to advance its relentless campaign of regional expansion, out of which more lives have been claimed than through its nuclear and ballistic missile programs together.
But at the time of the deal’s negotiation, the Obama administration defended the omission from discussion of Iran’s destabilizing activities. The administration claimed that this allowed the US and its regional allies to counter Iran more forcefully on its sponsorship of terrorism, independently of any progress on the nuclear file.
The departure of Tillerson and the appointment of Bolton and Pompeo to Trump’s policy inner circle came at an opportune moment.​
But in practice, Obama’s arguments have not held up. To begin with, the deal has not allowed for a more forceful confrontation with Iran on its destabilizing activities in the region. In fact, Obama was widely perceived as softening US policy on Tehran’s support for terrorism, out of fear that forceful action could jeopardize the deal.
In December 2017, Politico revealed that his administration had blocked an investigation by the US Drug Enforcement Agency into Hezbollah’s global drug trade, in effect shielding an Iran-allied terrorist entity from prosecution. Many in the region also interpreted Obama’s failure to enforce a red line on the use of chemical weapons in Syria in 2013 as a concession to Tehran to ensure its continued adherence to the negotiations.
The deal has also failed to turn Iran into a responsible state, and appears to have achieved the opposite. It has provided Tehran with a windfall of $10 billion in direct financial assets, according to the Wall Street Journal. This allowed it to ratchet up support for its proxies in Syria, Lebanon and Yemen.
Due in part to this support, Syrian President Bashar Assad has practically crushed his opponents, paving the way for an Iranian land bridge that cuts across Iraq and Syria to connect to the Mediterranean. As a result, Iran has managed to expand its military presence in Syria, and is now building military bases and assembling launch sites for ballistic missiles not far from Syria’s border with Israel.
Because of Obama’s policy toward Iran and the nuclear deal, US relations with Gulf states and Israel soured. In 2015, US-Saudi relations reached their nadir when the Kingdom announced military operations in Yemen without so much as a heads up to Washington — a highly unusual move. Obama moved swiftly to mend ties with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), convening a heads-of-state summit at Camp David later that year.
But the absence of Saudi King Salman and Bahrain’s King Hamad from the summit sent a clear message on the extent of Gulf displeasure. Although the US and GCC states signed the Camp David Accords, which encouraged the latter to mellow their criticism of the Iran deal, some of the American promises, including large-scale military exercises in the Gulf, never materialized.
The Obama administration also sought to mend ties with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and in 2016 signed off on the largest military aid package ever to Israel, worth $38 billion. This succeeded temporarily in dialling down the criticism of the Iran deal.
But with Trump installed as US president, all bets on the deal’s future were suddenly off. Israel, Saudi Arabia and the UAE spotted the opportunity and embarked on a lobbying effort to sway the new administration — including through their ties to Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner — against keeping the deal.
Moreover, the departure of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson (whose stance on Qatar irked Saudi Arabia and the UAE) and the appointment of John Bolton and Mike Pompeo (both of whom have advocated ditching the deal) to Trump’s policy inner circle came at an opportune moment.
And a week prior to Trump’s abandonment of the deal, Israel revealed a trove of intelligence that it claimed proved Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, setting the stage for a US withdrawal. Immediately following Trump’s decision, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain issued statements welcoming it.
But despite its many defects, pulling out of the deal at this stage makes little strategic sense. The US has already squandered its financial leverage over Iran by paying upfront for the deal. And given the lack of support from the deal’s other signatories for Trump’s decision, it may be difficult to implement global sanctions or assemble another international coalition to apply pressure on Iran.
Moreover, if the Europeans fail to offer Iran enough economic incentives to keep it on board, the latter is likely to resume enrichment in a few months, potentially setting off a nuclear arms race with regional competitors such as Saudi Arabia. The decision to scrap the deal may have made sense three or four years ago, but today it is highly uncertain that US withdrawal will lead to a safer, more stable Middle East.
• Hasan Al-Hasan is a Ph.D. researcher at King’s College London and the National University of Singapore, where his work focuses on Indian foreign policy in the Middle East. Previously, he served as a senior analyst at the office of the first deputy prime minister of Bahrain.
© 2018 Syndication Bureau
http://www.arabnews.com/node/1300866

The tactics behind Iran’s dual response to US withdrawal
التكتيكات الإيرانية المزدوجة رداً على الإنسحاب الأمريكي
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Arab News/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64597/dr-majid-rafizadeh-the-tactics-behind-irans-dual-response-to-us-withdrawal-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D9%83%D8%AA%D9%8A%D9%83%D8%A7%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9/
Tehran’s politicians and the state-owned Persian news outlets have been heavily covering the US decision to pull out of the nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which was struck in 2015 between six world powers, known as the P5+1, and Iran.
The reactions and responses coming out of Iran are mixed. On the one hand, hard-liners are taking a tough stance by lashing out at the US and leading calls to “set fire to the nuclear deal.” When the Majlis, Iran’s Parliament, opened its session the day after President Donald Trump announced the US withdrawal from the deal, hard-line representatives burned a US flag and a copy of the agreement, while chanting “Death to America.”
These hard-liners are attempting to appease Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and make a reality of his previously symbolic phrase, “Set it (the nuclear deal) on fire.” Before the election of Trump, Khamenei warned that “if the threat from the American presidential candidates to tear up the deal becomes operational then Tehran will set fire to the deal.”
In addition, the regime in Tehran is warning that the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal will bring significant harm to America. Such threats against the US will most likely escalate.
On the other hand, Iran’s so-called moderate political party and its media outlets are taking a totally different approach. The moderates are forcefully spreading the narrative that European nations are robustly standing with Iran and opposing the US. For example, the Arman newspaper’s front-page headline quoted Federica Mogherini, the EU high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, as stating that “we (Germany, France and the UK) will stay in the JCPOA.” The Hamdeli newspaper’s headline applauded the French ambassador for saying: “We will support the JCPOA.”
Similarly, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani reacted by repeatedly promoting and buttressing the argument that there is no issue with the nuclear deal, even though the US has withdrawn from it.
In the Iranian newspaper Etela’at, he said the nuclear agreement was between the P5+1 countries (the five permanent members of the UN Security Council — China, the US , Russia, France and the UK — plus Germany). All that has changed, he said, is that an intruder (the US) has left the accord. Now the agreement is between Iran and the other five nations, he added. Some state-controlled outlets, such as Hamshahri, supported his position, with headlines such as “the JCPOA stays, the US left.”
Any astute analyst who has studied the four decades of Iran’s ruling mullahs will know that such mixed reactions originating from the country should not be regarded as a surprise. It illustrates a tactical move utilized by the clerical establishment; such a dual approach is the modus operandi of the Iranian regime.
For instance, before the nuclear agreement was reached, the hard-liners — including Khamenei, high-ranking members of the powerful Revolutionary Guards and their hard-line social base — were taking a similarly strident stance by opposing the deal and criticizing the negotiations between Rouhani’s technocrat team and the West. Even a few hours before the UN unanimously voted to endorse the deal, Maj. Gen. Mohammed Ali Jafari, head of the Revolutionary Guards, rejected it, saying: “Some parts of the draft have clearly crossed the Iran’s red lines, especially in Tehran’s military capabilities. We will never accept it.”
This is a classic good cop, bad cop strategy. The moderates set the tone on the international stage through their shrewd diplomatic skills and softer tone, while the hard-liners take a tougher stance to assist the moderates in obtaining more concessions from the other side.
Although the Revolutionary Guards have been a major beneficiary of the nuclear deal, thanks to the lifting of crippling sanctions against Iran, Jafari added that the UN should not “waste its time” passing a resolution endorsing the agreement.
Hence, the big question now is why is the Iranian regime playing such a tactical game? The answer is that this is a classic good cop, bad cop strategy. The moderates set the tone on the international stage through their shrewd diplomatic skills and softer tone, while the hard-liners take a tougher stance to assist the moderates in obtaining more concessions from the other side.
In addition, it is critical to point out that when it comes to Iranian politics, the rhetoric of the leaders across the political spectrum matters less on certain occasions. The most important issue is the instructions that Khamenei gives behind closed doors to both the moderates and hard-liners. These instructions might totally differ from what Khamenei expresses in his public speeches and announcements.
For example, before the nuclear deal, Khamenei continually criticized the negotiations with the West and any potential agreement. But he desperately needed the nuclear deal. Without his blessing, Rouhani would not have been able to negotiate with the West and reach an agreement. In fact, were it not for Khamenei’s blessing, Rouhani would not have been approved by the Guardian Council to run for the presidency in the first place.
Khamenei is the final decision maker when it comes to Iran’s major foreign and domestic policies. Despite his public announcements and threats to set fire to the nuclear deal, the latest developments from within Iran suggest that even though the US has withdrawn, Khamenei, his gilded circle and the senior cadre of the Revolutionary Guards still desire to remain in the nuclear deal and keep it intact because of the benefits that it is bringing to the regime.
• Dr. Majid Rafizadeh is a Harvard-educated Iranian-American political scientist. He is a leading expert on Iran and US foreign policy, a businessman and president of the International American Council.
Twitter: @Dr_Rafizadeh

Who are the winners and losers from US oil sanctions on Iran?
من هم الخاسرين والرابحين من عقوبات أميركا البترولية على إيران
Wael Mahdi/Arab News/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64597/dr-majid-rafizadeh-the-tactics-behind-irans-dual-response-to-us-withdrawal-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D9%83%D8%AA%D9%8A%D9%83%D8%A7%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9/
It seems clear that all producers will benefit from rising prices following the decision of US president Donald Trump this week to impose sanctions on Iranian oil exports within 180 days. Conversely, it would be reasonable to expect that consuming nations will suffer from high oil prices.
But in reality things could be different depending on the development of events. Not all oil producers will benefit in the same way and not all consumers will be affected in the same way. Similarly, not all international oil companies will benefit or lose in the same way.
So who are the real winners from the renewed sanctions on Iranian oil and who are the losers? And why are the sanctions this time different from the last round of sanctions that were imposed in the summer of 2012?
Starting with the second question, the dynamics in the market differ greatly from the previous situation. In 2012, demand was not very strong and there was no excess supply in the market to replace Iranian crude.
Iran mainly produces medium and heavy-density crude oil with a high sulfur content, otherwise known as sour crude. Not all producers can supply this type of crude, and most of the medium and heavy excess capacity is in the Gulf region, in countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iraq.
The growth in world oil demand in 2012 was about 800,000 barrels per day (bpd), largely unchanged on the previous year, as US oil demand moved from deep contraction to minor growth, according to OPEC estimates at the time.
The supply picture was different, with output from outside the group not growing greatly, despite oil prices trading at above $100 that year. Non-OPEC’s supply growth was projected at 500,000 bpd in 2012 with gains from US and Canada, according to the organization’s estimates. OPEC at that time had a production ceiling of 30 million bpd.
The supply and demand situation in 2012 was reflected in pricing dynamics. Due to the lack of enough medium and heavy spare capacity, the gap in prices between Dubai crude oil, which represents Gulf heavy sour grades, and Brent oil, which represents medium-sweet grades, narrowed to record lows in that year following the embargo on Iranian shipments. This was because the value of medium and heavy grades went up due to scarcity.
The price spread between Brent and WTI widened greatly, as the US was not exporting crude oil and most shipments to Asia came from Brent-linked crude grades or Brent itself. By the end of 2012, the Brent-WTI spread reached $24. Today, the dynamics of the market are totally different. Fundamentals are healthy and there is abundant crude in the market — mainly sweet and light oil. This time around, it is not hard to replace an Iranian shipment, even from within OPEC, as many countries — including Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE — have invested in adding capacity.
According to OPEC’s latest monthly report, oil demand in 2018 might grow by 1.63 million bpd, twice the amount in 2012. Growth in supply from outside OPEC this year is around 1.71 million bpd, more than three times that in 2012.
US oil companies will benefit more than OPEC producers, while refiners in Asia and Europe will suffer
Meanwhile the Dubai-Brent spread, which now stands at $4 per barrel, is expected to narrow later in the year and early in 2019, as the value of Dubai might rise. As for the Brent-WTI spread, the former is trading now at a premium of $6 to WTI.
The only significant difference is that OPEC and some non-OPEC producers have an agreement to cut production as oil prices now trade at little more than half their levels in 2012. If the sanctions on Iranian crude result in the end of that agreement, there will be a flood of medium and heavy grades in the market and any sanctions on Iranian crude will not affect the balance of the market.
Saudi Arabia alone can increase production by another 500,000 to 1 million bpd in a short period. But this is unlikely, given the Kingdom’s close coordinations since last year with Russia and others to balance the market; therefore the responsibility for increasing supply is likely to be shared by a wide group of producers.
It is hard to tell whether the new sanctions will spell the end of the OPEC plus agreement. Oil prices are not yet at the level where producers in the agreement want them to be, as they are not yet high enough to bring back lost investments in the industry. So the deal might continue but with a new distribution of the quotas of producers. Another important difference with the situation in 2012 is that the US now has enough capacity to replace Iranian condensates to Asia due to the increased production of shale oil and gas from areas such as the Permian and Eagle Ford. Back in 2012, it was hard to replace Iranian condensates — a form of a very light oil. With all of this in mind, who will be the winners and losers from the new sanctions on Iran? US oil companies are in a better position to benefit more than OPEC countries, while refiners in Asia and Europe will suffer when they look for new sources of supply. This is for two reasons.
First, such refiners will need to get some oil that is priced based on Brent. Second, some refiners will lose the discounts and the long billing cycles that Iran usually offers to its customers to compete with other Gulf producers.
Another source of concern for refiners is the refining margin. The shift in use of other type of crudes that are not configured by the refineries will change the economics, and may shrink the profits made from refining each barrel. For the US refiners, there is not much to fear. But for EU and Asian refiners the margins will be a big concern next year. OPEC will no doubt think about these issues in its next ministerial meeting in June but there are many challenges. First, distributing Iranian market share is not going to be easy, and selling crude at reasonable discounts and pricing to Iran’s customers is a delicate marketing issue.
Second, whenever there is a void in the market, everyone will try to sell more crude. This may result in cheating by some members of the agreement.
What is almost certain is that OPEC and non-OPEC allies are interested in keeping the agreement because it results in higher oil prices. And as oil prices are expected to increase next year, although not greatly, producers will need to balance the market and make sure they do not jeopardize the balance of the market. But will the sanctions work this time? This really depends on the role that the EU plays. Last time it was not the embargo that hurt Iranian oil exports but the withdrawal of EU insurers from insuring Iranian tankers that made customers unwilling to buy Iranian oil.
• Wael Mahdi is an energy reporter specializing on OPEC and a co-author of “OPEC in a Shale Oil World: Where to Next?” Twitter @waelmahdi

Iran and Israel on the brink: What will stop them?
إيران وإسرائيل على شفير الهاوية فمن سيوقفهما
Yossi Mekelberg/Arab News/May 11/18
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In the early hours of Thursday morning, the much-anticipated Iranian missile launch on the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights took place. Ever since Israel increased its frequency of attacks on military bases in Syria — in particular those manned by Iranian forces and their Hezbollah allies — a few weeks ago, the clock counting down to an Iranian retaliation had been ticking.
Israeli security forces braced themselves for an attack, though the place, time and magnitude was unknown. When it eventually happened, 20 rockets were fired by Iran’s Quds Force — a special unit affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps — at frontline Israeli posts in the Golan Heights. The rockets were all either intercepted or failed to cross the border between Israel and Syria. This represents a major failure for Iran in its ability to respond to Israel’s military operations against its installations in Syria.
Israel’s instant military response, striking from the air dozens of Iranian targets in Syria, leaves both countries on the brink of open hostilities. It remains to be seen whether they are capable of withdrawing from the brink of war, bearing in mind that Wednesday night was the first time that Iran had directly attacked Israel militarily, and that Israel openly admitted it targeted Iranian forces in its northeastern neighbor. This is a patent escalation that, without diplomatic intervention from the outside, might spiral out of control, especially in the extremely volatile Syrian context.
For the more than seven years since the conflict in Syria broke out, Tel Aviv had maintained a restrained approach toward developments there, limiting its intervention in the hostilities to situations only when it felt threatened. It was a conscientious decision, based on intelligence assessment, that Israel had nothing to gain from such an intervention and, even if it wanted to influence the situation there to serve its interests, it had no capacity to do so. It made a clear decision, which was relayed to its enemies across the border, that it would not tolerate the arming of Hezbollah by Iran with weapons that might endanger it, and it would respond militarily to any firing inside Israel from across the Syrian border. For most of the period since March 2011, the border was relatively calm and Israel could adhere to these red lines.
However, as the war in Syria raged on, the presence of Iranian military personnel in the country consistently increased. Toward the end of last year, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu explicitly asserted: “We will not allow (Iran) to entrench itself militarily in Syria, as it seeks to do, for the express purpose of eradicating our state.” The writing was on the wall for months, as Israel has increasingly become unnerved by the Iranian presence in Syria; the growing military capabilities of Hezbollah in Lebanon, enabled by their patrons in Tehran; and by Iranian support for the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas. Israel under Netanyahu is a country with a siege mentality, even without seeing Iran in almost every direction it looks. With it, its sense of strategic claustrophobia multiplied.
It is impossible to separate the confrontation between Iran and Israel in Syria, and potentially in Lebanon, from the broader strategic picture, especially the Iran nuclear deal and US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the agreement earlier this week. In the mind of Israeli strategists, and especially the current Israeli government, Iran is an existential threat that has to be contained. From their perspective, the only way to do so was to abolish the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and, in the longer term, bring regime change to Tehran. Netanyahu has been advocating for this objective for years. For him, Trump’s decision was an exoneration of his long-held position.
Events this week injured Iran economically, military and its pride suffered a major blow, but this could spell danger too, as it still has the military capabilities to respond.
Moreover, from the magnitude of the air force attack on Iranian forces and dozens of Iranian installations — including intelligence and logistics sites around Damascus, munitions warehouses, and observation and military posts — it is clear Israel had prepared for this operation for quite some time and was just waiting for the opportunity to present itself. Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman asserted that the Israeli army had hit “nearly all the Iranian infrastructure in Syria” and that “they must remember that if it rains here (in Israel), it will pour there.”
Lieberman further stated: “I hope that we have finished this chapter and that everyone got the message.” Similarly, Netanyahu, who this week visited Moscow for meetings with President Vladimir Putin, insisted on the right of Israel to take any necessary steps to stop Iran from “attacking the state of Israel as part of their strategy to destroy the state of Israel.” One suspects that Putin gave the green light to Israel’s comprehensive attacks; otherwise it would have been a massive diplomatic insult and embarrassment had this happened behind his back, especially in a place where Russia has vital interests, a substantial military presence and involvement in the conflict.
Support for Israel also came from Washington, underlining Iran’s isolation. However, there must be a call for calm and caution.
Iran’s leaders suffered a double blow this week, with the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal and Israel’s military operation in Syria, which exposed its vulnerability. It might be the case that, in recent years, while the focus was on Iran’s pursuit of nuclear capability, the international community neglected to notice its pursuit of regional hegemony through more conventional means.
Events this week injured Iran economically, military and its pride suffered a major blow, but this could spell danger too, as it still has the military capabilities to respond. Moreover, it might embolden those more radical voices in the regime over the pragmatic ones, represented by President Hassan Rouhani and Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif.
The way forward should involve a concerted effort by the international community, including the UN Security Council, aimed at preventing further escalation. In the long run, it is imperative to explore peaceful means to reduce tensions between Iran and the region, otherwise what we witnessed on Thursday could be the prologue to another protracted and bloody conflict in the Middle East — and maybe beyond.
• Yossi Mekelberg is professor of international relations at Regent’s University London, where he is head of the International Relations and Social Sciences Program. He is also an associate fellow of the MENA Program at Chatham House. He is a regular contributor to the international written and electronic media. Twitter: @YMekelberg

Disputes over Iraq and Syria: Strategies and ramifications
Shehab Al-Makahleh/Al Arabiya/May 11/18
Disputes in the Middle East cannot be resolved unilaterally. They can only be tackled collectively, through integrated regional and international cooperation. This applies to challenges such as the Palestinian cause, terrorism, Arab-Iranian conflict and other lesser predicaments.
Some political observers believe that the Arab-Iranian dispute should be addressed even before the Palestinian-Israeli issue. Since 1967, the Middle East has been a hub for the worst military conflicts and wars.
About 22 percent of world’s conflicts have been concentrated in the region during the past three decades. When the eight-year Iraqi-Iranian went on from 1980 to 1988, both countries lost more than 2 million soldiers.
UN statistics reveal that about 40 percent of the total number of those killed in armed conflicts have fallen in the Middle East since 1980 until the end of 2017. Such conflicts have complicated the political scene and have led to further chaos when the Arab Spring erupted in some Arab republics.
Up to 72 percent of world war toll and military conflict fatalities have been reported in the Middle East. Moreover, the Middle East has the highest levels of terrorist attacks since 2003. Incidents of terrorism increased by 50 percent, leaving many countries behind owing to their impact on economies.
Iran and Arab states are heading toward direct regional conflict that would drive Israel to intervene by targeting some strategic sites in Iran to turn balance of power
Balance of power
Many states harbor a strong belief that their main enemy is Iran as it tampers with the stability of Arab countries. This started with Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen and Syria. Since no conflict can take place without the pretext, if the root cause is to be resolved then changing the balance of power and the regime in Iran are a must.As Iran was eying Iraq since 1980s, after regime had changed in Tehran in 1979, a conflict broke out which saw in the Iranian expansionist policies a strategy to rule over the whole region.
The first Iranian step was to control Iraq after American pullout because Iraq is in the north of the Gulf and Iran is located to the east of the Gulf States.
This is likely to pose a major threat to Gulf states as Iraq is geographically and strategically located between three major powers: The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states, Turkey and Iran.
Iranians have sought to play the Iraq card first before moving to play other cards which include sectarianism, the cards of Syria, Lebanon and Yemen. Iran believes that an Arab-Iranian model can be created through the Iraqi gate, with the support of others – such as Russia, Syria – without reaching a compromise between Arabs and Iranians in such a conflict.
There is a firm belief that the Iranian regime should be changed in order for the country’s policies to be changed accordingly. Hence, changing the regime of the Vilayat al-Faqih may be considered a regional and international necessity before the possibility of confluence of Iraq and the other Gulf states in the form of an alliance or to form a new regional system.
No peace deal
But why all previous wars have ended with no peace deal or surrender agreement? The Iran-Iraqi war ended on August 8, 1988 with a truce but without a peace or surrender agreement being signed. The same applies to the two wars against Iraq.
Thus, the answer is simply tacit which bears the seeds of a war that would erupt any moment. Should this happen, Iran will be forced to leave Iraq and Syria to protect its borders. Iran looks at Arabs, whether Sunni or Shiite, from a heritage perspective. It considers the GCC a springboard backed by the West to besiege Iranian revolution. On the other hand, Gulf Arabs regard the Iranian revolution as an existential threat. This was exemplified by Khomeini who called on Arabs in the Gulf to stir up revolution.
Iran and Arab states are heading toward direct regional conflict that would drive Israel to intervene by targeting some strategic sites in Iran to turn balance of power. The month of May is very critical where the future of the Middle East region will be at stake.

12 phone calls from Theresa May to Trump
Mamdouh AlMuhaini/Al Arabiya/May 11/18
Two parties engaged in a fateful battle to keep the US in the nuclear deal and were at some point more enthusiastic about this than the Iranians themselves.
A European party and an American one that mainly consists of Democrats, particularly those affiliated with the faction of former President Barack Obama, the godfather of the deal. Although these two parties have some similar goals, they also have different motives.
On the European level, British Prime Minister Theresa May exhausted US President Donald Trump with phone calls in an attempt to convince him to change his stance. She made 12 calls to him in a short period of time. This was followed by dispatching the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Boris Johnson to the White House.
For the first time, we notice how she tasked junior diplomats in the Middle East to defend the nuclear deal to an audience whose majority rejects it, and this caused them embarrassment. German Chancellor Angela Merkel also visited Washington and met with Trump for long hours to convince him not to withdraw from the deal.
However, the romantic trip which has been engraved in our memories and which did not have a happy ending was that of French President Emmanuel Macron who can be described as the new lecturer of the deal now that Obama is out of the picture.
When he visited Trump in Washington, he brought up his well-known arguments and resorted to embraces, kisses and holding hands to influence the American president. However, all these Europeans efforts proved to be futile and Trump decided to withdraw from the deal. While making the announcement, Trump noted that the entire agreement was based on lies.
US National Security Advisor John Bolton said Trump decided to withdraw in the last second, but we cannot believe such claims. As more reports emerge, we realize that Trump had decided to withdraw from the deal after he rearranged his team and kept the doves out of it, particularly his former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson who convinced Trump to postpone scrapping the deal twice.
The Europeans are saying that during this last phase, American negotiators were leniently working and did not have any strong belief in the cause because they knew that their president had made up his mind to withdraw from the deal.
Europe’s angry reactions convey justified fears because resuming its trade with Iran greatly threatens its trade with the US
Knock on the door
However, if the US president had decided to withdraw then why did he let European leaders beg him not to and knock on his door every hour?
Most likely, he saw this as a big chance to display America’s power, which he wants to embody in himself and his administration and which is the opposite of how the former administration was as he was always accused it of being humiliatingly weak.
This is not the first time he does so with the Europeans as he withdrew from the Paris Agreement on climate change and once threatened to impose a 35 percent import tax on German cars. The issue of the Iranian nuclear deal is more humiliating.
A high-ranking official at the EU angrily commented on Trump’s decision and said: “We must stop acting like we’re yielding.” On Thursday, Merkel reiterated her past statements in a new tone and said: “It is no longer such that the United States simply protects us, but Europe must take its destiny in its own hands.”
Abstract political theories and major economic gains constitute the motives of this European enthusiasm. Their political argument is not different from that of the former American administration despite the major transformations on the ground.
The idea in general seems right and perfect, i.e. the deal will contribute to integrating the Iranian regime in the world order and strengthen the reformist movement thus it will defuse crises and spread peace. However, what we saw was the complete opposite.
Almost everyone knows that the American money brought by European funds and investments encouraged the Iranian regime’s dangerous behavior to spread chaos and destroy regional peace. History is not on European side.
For instance, they decided to strongly confront the Nazi threat and did not think of making any peace agreements even when Chamberlain made the deals, which he celebrated. When Hitler’s troubled deputy Rudolf Hess traveled to Britain in search of peace, he was confined to a solitary prison.
The Europeans then struggled for a long time while confronting Stalin’s iron rule. Western powers are now united in a hawkish determination to confront the influence of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The other motive is related to economy. European countries are trying to maintain these economic ties with Iran as they clearly said they will work to maintain their companies’ interests. European companies rushed to invest in Iran after the deal was signed.
Iranian-German commercial trade is around $4 billion a year. Last year, the French company Renault sent more than 60,000 to Iran. The French company Total is considered the largest investor in Iranian gas and oil. (There is a detailed report by colleague Hanan al-Manouri in Al Arabiya.net about the European billions that are now in the wind.)
Terms of agreement
Europe’s angry reactions convey justified fears because resuming its trade with Iran greatly threatens its trade with the US. Before withdrawing from the deal, the US Treasury had thwarted European banks’ operations that fund large projects and deals inside Iran because they violated the terms of the agreement.
The American party that opposes Trump’s move has made huge efforts to maintain Obama’s only legacy in foreign policy and which is now shattered to pieces. This was the main reason behind their enthusiasm as they have used all means of intimidation and resorted to media attacks to deter Trump from making his decision.
After he withdrew from the deal, we heard several angry and bitter comments which, interestingly, greatly resemble the comments made by Iranian regime officials. Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani repeated the same accusations they made, that Trump does not have the mental capability to manage and govern. This accusation is at the core of the American leftist camp’s propaganda.
There were angry reactions following the withdrawal of the deal including a tweet by former director of the Central Intelligence Agency John Brennan in which he said: “Today, Donald Trump simultaneously lied about the Iranian nuclear deal, undermined global confidence in US commitments, alienated our closest allies, strengthened Iranian hawks, & gave North Korea more reason to keep its nukes. This madness is a danger to our national security.”
Brennan is an agitated and reckless man who lacks any sense of wisdom, and his statements reflect the rage toward the Trump administration and its decision, which is considered historical except by these two parties as well as by the mullahs in Tehran.

Iraq’s Elections: Red Flags and Opportunities for Inclusion
Bilal Wahab/The Washington Institute/May 11/2018
A closer look at the local security changes, turnout obstacles, sectarian divisions, and other factors that could determine the shape of Iraq’s next government.
Iraqis head to the polls on May 12 to elect a new parliament, after which legislators will choose a speaker, president, and prime minister. The elections come at the end of four tough years for Iraq, with the Islamic State seizing a third of the country in 2014 and the Kurds making a strong push for independence last September.
Despite the turmoil, Kurdish-Arab violence has been minimal, and the numerous victors of the war against IS are all hoping to turn their battlefield triumph into votes. Chief among them is Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, who is seeking reelection and a stronger mandate to govern. The numerous Shia militias who fought IS have formed a political coalition that is expected to do well. Yet the electoral prospects are uncertain for the Kurds, whose independence referendum and subsequent military and political setbacks have diluted the goodwill they gained by fighting IS in the north.
Indeed, ethnosectarian divisions continue to cast a shadow over the Iraqi political scene. Interestingly, however, the public thirst for accountability has caused fragmentation within each group, leaving the Shia, Sunni, and Kurdish houses internally divided on the eve of the election. This may further complicate and delay the government formation process.
DETERMINANTS OF A SUCCESSFUL ELECTION
Security. Although security in Iraqi cities has significantly improved in recent months, IS remains a threat, especially as it transitions from a territory-controlling entity back into an urban insurgency. Polling stations and election season in general have been among the group’s favorite targets over the years.
Turnout. Around 18 million Iraqis are eligible to vote this year, and they will have to sift through some 7,000 candidates to fill 329 seats in parliament, a quarter of which (83) are allocated to women. On average, 60 percent of voters took part in the two previous elections, but recent polls indicate that more of the electorate is disillusioned by a political class that has been unable to deliver on key concerns such as job creation, economic reforms, and curbing corruption. Despite making cosmetic changes to party names and slogans, the main contenders are familiar faces. In a nod to the public discontent, leading Shia ayatollah Ali al-Sistani issued a fatwa emphasizing people’s right not to vote if they cannot identify with any of the candidates.
Sunni participation. Whether due to boycotts or lack of security, turnout among Iraq’s Sunni minority has been consistently low in past elections. Sunni parties are actively participating in this year’s campaign, but many of their constituents were forced to flee during the war against IS and still live in refugee camps. Although the Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) has committed to placing ballot boxes at these camps, fears of low Sunni turnout persist—not least because security in many of these areas is provided by Kurdish personnel or militias from the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), which are dominated by the country’s Shia majority.
Kurdish unity. Kurdish parties have campaigned as if this were a local election—rather than reassuming the unified stance that helped them maximize gains from Baghdad in the past, they have focused on each other’s failures instead. As a result, the Kurds collectively stand to lose seats in parliament, decreasing their leverage in Baghdad.
Changes in local control. To determine whether minorities will lose influence at the national level, one litmus test may be the turnout and voting results in areas that recently changed hands. In Kirkuk and Sinjar, for example, army and PMF forces replaced Kurdish forces in response to the independence referendum, while many Sunni towns and refugee camps are still controlled by Shia PMF units. Such local control often translates into votes by enabling coercion and cooptation. Kurdish parties losing significant votes in Kirkuk would be a glaring red flag in this regard, as would PMF-affiliated parties making gains in Sunni areas.
Election fraud. Allegations and instances of fraud have haunted all Iraqi elections, at times contributing to public distrust about the electoral process, delaying the certification of results (as seen in the 2010 recount), and impeding government formation. Current members of IHEC were nominated by the parties in power, so the commission has a partisan flavor despite being representative. And while IHEC recently invested in modern voting technology that could help reduce fraud and declare results faster, some fear that registration cards not collected by their owners may open the door for ghost votes, especially by parties already in government (e.g., certain officials could create fake IDs to match uncollected voter cards and give them to other Iraqis).
Iranian meddling. Tehran’s desire to shape the outcome of Iraqi elections is always a given, but it is unclear how aggressive such interference will be this time around. In light of the many pressures Iran is under—from Israeli strikes in Syria to U.S. renunciation of the nuclear deal—the regime may be too distracted to pay full attention to Iraq’s vote. Alternatively, it could stay passive on purpose, relying on its local proxies in various institutions to wield influence in Baghdad while trying to convince Europeans that they should continue doing business with Iran. More likely, however, Tehran will take a direct approach by attempting to play spoiler, insisting on its favorite candidates for top jobs in the next Iraqi government. Although this path risks hurting Tehran’s international reputation, Tehran may calculate that a neutral Iraq would be dangerous to the Islamic Republic if a regional war erupts.
U.S. INTERESTS
The United States remains committed to a strong, neutral, democratic Iraq. Specific outcomes aside, Washington has an interest in the country running a clean election that results in an inclusive government. Iraqis, including members of the PMF, are cognizant that U.S. military support was instrumental in their ability to defeat IS, so Washington may need to remind them of this fact as they proceed through the election and its aftermath—likely including long weeks of waiting for final results and forming the next government. More broadly, U.S. officials should maintain full attention on all of these processes, since they will shape Iraq for the next four years.
*Bilal Wahab is the Nathan and Esther K. Wagner Fellow at The Washington Institute.

Iran will quit nuclear deal, restart enrichment, ramp up military tension
إيران ستخرج من الإتفاق النووي وتعيد تخصيب اليورانيوم وتصعد في التوتر العسكري
Debka File/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64603/debka-file-iran-will-quit-nuclear-deal-restart-enrichment-ramp-up-military-tension-%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86-%D8%B3%D8%AA%D8%AE%D8%B1%D8%AC-%D9%85%D9%86-
Exclusive: Tehran will challenge the US by restarting nuclear fuel enrichment and ramp up its military confrontation with Israel. The Iranian leadership reached these decisions on Thursday, May 10, after Israeli warplanes smashed its military assets in the Damascus area that morning, DEBKAfile’s exclusive intelligence sources report. These steps follow the strategic plans Tehran had drawn up for the eventuality of the US quitting the 2015 nuclear pact.
In the coming weeks, therefore, Tehran will choose its moment to abandon the nuclear deal and restart high level uranium enrichment, in the face of President Donald Trump’s warning that this action would meet with “very severe consequences.” In light of Iran’s strategy, the US, after quitting the nuclear deal, Thursday asked the nuclear watchdog IAEA to continue inspections of the Iranian nuclear program. Washington intends to keep independent monitors accessing Iran’s nuclear activities for as long as they are permitted.
DEBKAfile’s sources outline the motives behind Iran’s next steps:
Tehran does not believe that Israel’s massive assault on Iranian bases, missiles stores, logistic centers and other military sites in Damascus and points south on Thursday night – described as its largest air operation since the Yom Kippur War – was triggered by the Qods rocket barrage on the Golan a few hours earlier. Iranian strategists are convinced that it was planned in advance by the Trump administration and Netanyahu government as Act One of a major joint campaign.
Tehran discounts European ability to preserve the nuclear pact without the United States. In a phone conversation Thursday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel told Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani that it was imperative to halt his country’s ballistic missile development and production and rein in its military involvement in Syria and Yemen.
Rouhani countered by demanding guarantees that no European Union member would join President Trump’s new sanctions, either directly or indirectly. And indeed, as they spoke, new US sanctions were clamped down on six people and three companies with ties to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the penalties targeted those who had funneled millions of dollars to the group, funding its “malign activity”. Iran’s central bank helped the IRGC to access US dollars via “a large-scale currency exchange network,” he said.
The Treasury Department said all six individuals were Iranian. This order went out from Washington a few hours after Israel accused Al Qods of launching the 20-missile barrage on the Golan from Syria.
Iran’s leaders have no illusions about the EU being able to deliver any such guarantees and are playing along with European leaders in a show of diplomacy to buy time for getting organized to confront the US and Israeli campaigns.
Tehran expects the coming rounds of US sanctions to be exceptionally harsh and comprehensive. If the pressure forces Iran to agree to negotiate on a new nuclear deal as demanded by Washington, its leaders would rather not start out with the weak hand they hold at present. They believe they can only improve the odds in their favor by military escalation. When Rouhani said Thursday that Iran does not want “new tensions” in the region, he was playing for time for Iran to get its next moves – resumption of enrichment and armed confrontation – in place.


Iran will quit nuclear deal, restart enrichment, ramp up military tension
إيران ستخرج من الإتفاق النووي وتعيد تخصيب اليورانيوم وتصعد في التوتر العسكري
Debka File/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64603/debka-file-iran-will-quit-nuclear-deal-restart-enrichment-ramp-up-military-tension-%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86-%D8%B3%D8%AA%D8%AE%D8%B1%D8%AC-%D9%85%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%AA%D9%81%D8%A7/

Lebanon’s elections and the region’s challenges
Randa Takieddine/Al Arabiya/May 11/18
انتخابات لبنان وتحديات المنطقة
رندة تقي الدين/الحياة/09 أيار/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64592/randa-takieddine-lebanons-elections-and-the-regions-challenges-%D8%B1%D9%86%D8%AF%D8%A9-%D8%AA%D9%82%D9%8A-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AF%D9%8A%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%86%D8%AA%D8%AE%D8%A7%D8%A8%D8%A7/

Which Side Are You On: Iran or Israel?
مع من انت، مع إيران أو إسرائيل
Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat/Friday, 11 May, 2018/
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64594/abdulrahman-al-rashed-which-side-are-you-on-iran-or-israel-%D8%B9%D8%A8%D8%AF-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B1%D8%AD%D9%85%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%B4%D8%AF-%D9%85%D8%B9-%D9%85%D9%86-%D8%AA%D9%82%D9%81/

Iran deal ignored Gulf concerns
الإتفاق النووي مع إيران تجاهل مخاوف ومصالح دول الخليج العربي
Hasan Al-Hasan/Arab News/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64599/hasan-al-hasan-iran-deal-ignored-gulf-concerns-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%AA%D9%81%D8%A7%D9%82-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%86%D9%88%D9%88%D9%8A-%D9%85%D8%B9-%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86-%D8%AA%D8%AC%D8%A7%D9%87/

The tactics behind Iran’s dual response to US withdrawal
التكتيكات الإيرانية المزدوجة رداً على الإنسحاب الأمريكي
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Arab News/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64597/dr-majid-rafizadeh-the-tactics-behind-irans-dual-response-to-us-withdrawal-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D9%83%D8%AA%D9%8A%D9%83%D8%A7%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9/

Who are the winners and losers from US oil sanctions on Iran?
من هم الخاسرين والرابحين من عقوبات أميركا البترولية على إيران
Wael Mahdi/Arab News/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64597/dr-majid-rafizadeh-the-tactics-behind-irans-dual-response-to-us-withdrawal-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D9%83%D8%AA%D9%8A%D9%83%D8%A7%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%8A%D8%A9/

Iran and Israel on the brink: What will stop them?
إيران وإسرائيل على شفير الهاوية فمن سيوقفهما
Yossi Mekelberg/Arab News/May 11/18
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/64599/hasan-al-hasan-iran-deal-ignored-gulf-concerns-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%AA%D9%81%D8%A7%D9%82-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%86%D9%88%D9%88%D9%8A-%D9%85%D8%B9-%D8%A5%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86-%D8%AA%D8%AC%D8%A7%D9%87/

الحريّة والتجربة الحزبية

إيلي الحاج/مدى الصوت/11 أيار/18

https://alsawt.org/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AD%D8%B1%D9%8A%D9%91%D8%A9-%D9%88%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D8%AC%D8%B1%D8%A8%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AD%D8%B2%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%A9/