Detailed Lebanese & Lebanese Related LCCC English New Bulletin For October 09/2018
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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How an Extremist Government Treats Girls and Women
Uzay Bulut/Gatestone Institute/October 08/18
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13051/turkey-child-marriages-pregnancies
The scandal of the underage girls who gave birth was covered up by the administration of the hospital. They failed to inform either the police or judicial officials -- even though they are obligated to do so by law and regulations when they discover a minor is pregnant or has been subjected to sexual abuse.
Instead, the social worker who exposed the scandal, Iclal Nergiz, has been persecuted by the hospital and other authorities. An investigation has been launched against her.
Sexual abuse against children in Turkey increased by 700% in the 10 years to 2017, according to the Diyarbakir Bar Association.
Sexual abuse against children in Turkey increased by 700% in the 10 years to 2017, according to the Diyarbakir Bar Association. 440,000 children under the age of 18 have given birth since 2002, according to Turkey's Human Rights Association. (Image source: iStock)
Turkey's Human Rights Association (IHD) has issued a chilling report about children's rights abuses in Turkey. According to it, "since 2002, under the AKP [Justice and Development Party] rule, 440,000 children under the age of 18 have given birth."
"One in every four marriage in Turkey is a child marriage," said Selen Doğan, a member of Ankara-based Flying Broom Women's Communication and Research Association.
According to the Turkish Civil Code, men and women cannot marry before they turn 18.
"There are only a few exceptions that allow someone to marry before turning 18. A 17-year-old person may be granted permission to be married with the consent of his/her parents or legal guardian; and a 16-year-old person may be granted permission to be married by a court decision and with the consent of his/her parents or legal guardian."
Nonetheless, Zelal Coşkun, a member of the Children's Rights Commission of the IHD, said that child marriages have been on the rise in recent years:
"According to the data of TÜİK [Turkish Statistical Institute], in the last 10 years, 482,908 [underage] girls have been married off with the permission of the state. In the last six years, 142,298 have become mothers and most got married in religious [Islamic] ceremonies."
These abusive acts take place in many parts of the world, but in Muslim societies the practice of underage marriages is warmly tolerated by many; in some instances, the perpetrators are protected by the authorities. That Islamic scriptures encourage early marriages -- for girls as young as nine -- also seems to be used to normalize abusive acts, including child marriages and underage mothers. Sadly, the practice of child marriages, a long-lasting tradition in Muslim communities, has a theological basis. Muhammad, the founder of Islam, married Aisha when she was six and consummated his marriage with her when she was nine. He was 54 years old. The Koran also advocates the practice.
"A List of Shame That Will Shatter Turkey," is the title of a report published by the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet, which includes the names of 115 underage girls who gave birth at just one Istanbul hospital, Kanuni Sultan Süleyman Education and Research Hospital, during just five months in 2017.
Worse, the scandal was covered up by the administration of the hospital. They failed to inform either the police or judicial officials -- even though they are obligated to do so by law and regulations when they discover a minor is pregnant or has been subjected to sexual abuse.
Instead, the social worker who exposed the scandal, Iclal Nergiz, has been persecuted by the hospital and other authorities. An investigation has been launched against her, her place of work has been changed twice and she has been exposed to heavy pressure and harassment. "Ever since the incident was exposed, nothing has changed except for my punishment [by the hospital]," Nergiz said in one interview.
"The hospital officials think that I have betrayed the country and that I have destroyed the image of the hospital! I am exposed to a policy of oppression and intimidation." Nergiz said in another interview.
The scandal came to light when Nergiz noticed that the files of a 17-year-old pregnant girl and the notification that had to be submitted to the police were both missing from the hospital records. She then sought help from the hospital administration and prosecutors.
"I noticed that a lot of pregnant adolescents, 15-year-olds, 16-year-olds, 18-year-olds, came to the hospital. Some were pregnant with their second child. Almost all had come to our hospital previously... But they were not reported to anyone for years.
"...These children are said to be married with an imam marriage. I would not call that a marriage. What matters is official marriage. And these kids are not officially married... I saw a 16-year-old Syrian kid who was pregnant with her second child. She gave birth to her first child when she was 12. I cannot forget her."Nergiz also says: "About 250 pregnant girls under age 18 were treated at the hospital over a period of five months and nine days. I realized the cases of 115 of these girls were not reported to police. Nor were they recorded in the protocols of the hospital police.
"...Every year, around 450 to 500 pregnant girls are taken to this hospital... There is not a single door I did not knock on at the hospital concerning these 115 children. But I ended up being marginalized."
According to Turkish law, people below the age of 18 are regarded as children. However, Nergiz says:
"... according to the hospital administration and the governor, they are not [children]... They do not report pregnant minors to anywhere. Because they do not care. That is why, the situation is so dire. To them, it is just normal. When I talk about 115 pregnant children, it is an optimistic number. There are doctors who do not even report child pregnancies to the social services unit. So, the real number is so much higher."
The first court hearing that involved those who did not inform the judiciary about the scandal took place on June 25.
Akif Akça, the deputy head physician, and Nazlıcan Dilber, a social services expert, who are on trial for covering up child pregnancies, testified. They both rejected accusations that the presence of pregnant girls in the hospital was not reported to authorities: "Procedures were carried out according to the instructions of the Ministry of Health and there has been no negligence."
At the conclusion of the first hearing, the court lifted the ban on international travel that had been imposed on Akça and Dilber. They are now free to leave Turkey. The court also informed the two that they are not required to attend future hearings in the case.
A totally different ruling, however, was issued concerning Nergiz, who exposed the scandal. Although she did not appear at the first court hearing, as she is the one who exposed the scandal and lodged a complaint with prosecutors, the judge decided that Nergiz must attend the next hearing.
The reality she helped expose in that hospital is the reality of the entire country, Nergiz said. "The situation is the same all across Turkey. Moreover, what was exposed in that hospital is just the tip of the iceberg."
How many of these girls were already married when they arrived at the hospital to give birth and at what age did they get married? Or were they sexually abused out of wedlock? How many were later forced to marry their abusers? What happened to their babies? How many other children in Turkey are victims of similar abuses? It seems these questions will remain unanswered.
What is known is that child marriages, child rape, girls who become mothers although they themselves are still children, and other types of child sexual abuse are increasingly commonplace in Turkey.
"Turkey is the country that has the highest number of child marriages in Europe," stated a 2016 report by the Prevention of Violence and Rehabilitation Organization and the Crime and Violence Practice and Research Center by Istanbul's Acıbadem University. "But as religious [imam] marriages are widespread, it has not been possible to detect the real number of child marriages in Turkey." The report also detailed the terrible medical, psychological and social effects of child pregnancies on both underage mothers and their babies.
Sexual abuse against children in Turkey increased by 700% in the 10 years to 2017, according to the Diyarbakir Bar Association.
"According to the 2015 Turkey report by the organization ECPAT (End Child Prostitution and Trafficking), children are the group that is exposed to sexual violence the most in Turkey," Zelal Coşkun, a member of the Children's Rights Commission of the IHD, said at a symposium in Istanbul.
Coşkun emphasized that due to early marriages, many girls remain uneducated and unemployed:
"In Turkey, the net schooling rates of women are below those of men at all levels except for distance education. The number of girls who continue middle school after primary school are getting increasingly lower.
"According to the data of the Ministry of National Education, 97.4% of those who cannot continue their education due to child marriages and engagements are girls."
Although the legal system of Turkey is not yet based on Islamic sharia law, Islamic teachings and traditions still largely shape the thinking and behavior of many people -- including their views of child marriage and child abuse. The greatest victims of the Islamization of societies still seem to be girls and women.
*Uzay Bulut, a journalist from Turkey, is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute. She is currently based in Washington D.C.
© 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.

Abdul Mahdi and the Iraqi Fireball
Ghassan Charbel/Asharq Al Awsat/October 08/18
A few months ago, no one expected that Adel Abdul Mahdi would be asked to form the Iraqi government, despite his natural presence in the club of prominent Iraqi politicians. The reasons are many. Many felt that Dawa Party, which held this post for a long time through Nouri al-Maliki and then Haider al-Abadi, would not abandon such a critical position in the Iraqi state.
There are those who believed that Abadi would be the lucky man in a new tenure because the victory over ISIS was achieved during his premiership. Others saw in Abadi the perfect guarantor of coexistence between the Iranian influence and the American power on the Iraqi land.
Abdul Mahdi was probably well-aware of these facts. Months ago, he wrote an article in Al-Adala newspaper- overseen by him- apologizing in advance for not assuming the post of prime minister if it was assigned to him. Abdul Mahdi talked about the lack of the necessary conditions for success because of quotas, non-independence, conflicts and the absence of a vision, a plan and an approach. His analysis seemed realistic. The Iraqi situation is very complex and the Iraqi balances are very difficult.
However, the balances created by the recent elections and the ruptures within the Iraqi components finally led to Abdul Mahdi catching the fireball, following the election of Barham Saleh as president of the Republic. It is not surprising that Abdul Mahdi feels intimidated by his new mission. He was a partner in the post-Saddam Hussein era, became familiar with its problems, afflictions, and practices that added a heavy burden to the heritage of the Saddam period.
From his early presence in the governing council to his assumption of the ministry of finance and the posts of vice president and oil minister, Abdul Mahdi was in daily contact with the political, security and economic files. He knew that trying to resolve those matters was like walking through a minefield without a map.
The Iraqi opposition was trying to convince the world and itself that Iraq’s problem was limited to the existence of a tyrant named Saddam Hussein… that the ousting of the tyrant would immerse the Iraqi components in love and harmony… and that the elections would open the door to the establishment of a state worthy to be named as such, and modern and productive institutions that would help Iraqi citizens recover from feelings of oppression and marginalization and engage in a national workshop to restore dignity and decent living, and to regain Iraq’s unity and status in the region and the world.
It soon became clear that the Iraqi political forces were not ready to undertake such a large-scale mission. The winners were drenched with greed that does not allow for the restoration of the national equation. The losers were hit with frustration that prevented them from joining a formula that would limit their losses. The problem persisted despite several electoral rounds that failed to refine the political process and save the institutions from their weaknesses.
Abdul Mahdi knows that Iraq needs a massive reconstruction plan. Iraq’s national will must be rebuilt so that the country can regain the immunity it was lacking since the overthrowing of Saddam Hussein’s regime. The only way to accomplish this task is to restore the formula for coexistence. This process should be implemented on the basis of citizenship and equal rights and duties, away from the logic of dominance and monopoly on power.
A true Sunni-Shiite partnership in daily life and in major decisions is a must. The Arab-Kurdish partnership must also be revived based on the Constitution and its provisions. If successive governments have done their duty to maintain this partnership, the Iraqi army would not have collapsed in Mosul as we have seen, and the language of confrontation between Baghdad and Erbil would not have been renewed.
The task of the new government is not less than the recovery of Iraq and its people. The re-concentration of Iraqi institutions under the umbrella of the Constitution is a necessary first step to put an end to external intrusions into the Iraqi body. It makes no sense for Iraq to remain an arena for Iranian-American confrontation on its soil. This step is even more important given that relations between Washington and Tehran are heading for a new hot season, especially after oil sanctions become effective in the first week of November. Allowing the continuation of the policy of moving pawns on the Iraqi territory threatens to cause major damage to Iraq’s security and economy.
It is no longer a secret that in the post-Saddam era, Iraq has been subjected to unprecedented looting that has compounded with the losses imposed on the country during Saddam's military adventures. It is not normal at all to witness such poverty, unemployment and poor services in a country that supposedly floats on oil fields. The task is not easy at all. The network of interests established by years of corruption has deep roots in Iraqi minds and institutions. Abdul Mahdi is required to use the strength of citizens who have suffered from the absence of the obvious conditions for living, including drinking water and electricity.
Abdul Mahdi will not import ministers from another planet. They will come from the political forces; but he must be tough in rejecting the corrupt, who consider the state an open source for the children of their families and the group to which they belong.
Adel Abdul Mahdi knows Iraq. He knows the winds that crashed on his land. He passed through the Baath party and left. He joined communism and Maoism and left. He joined the Islamic trend through the “Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution”, and he is now in an independent position. He tested ideas and tasted capitals. After Baghdad, he lived in Damascus and Beirut, then in Paris and Tehran. His study of political economy in France qualifies him to deal with the problems at the table of his government. His stay in Iraqi Kurdistan in the 1990s enables him to understand the Kurds’ concerns and problems. Abdul Mahdi knows the story of Iraq. He was present at the pivotal moments. One day, civil administrator Paul Bremer decided to convince a number of members of the governing council that Saddam’s page had been turned. He took them to the Baghdad airport building. The US soldier woke up Saddam who was resting on his bed. He saw himself in front of Ahmed Chalabi, Adnan Pachachi, Adel Abdul Mahdi, Muwafaq al-Rubaie and General Sanchez, commander of US forces in Iraq. Saddam was tireless during the meeting because he was fighting the Americans, as he said. The conversation saw harsh words. Rubaie told Saddam: “You are cursed in this world and in the Hereafter.” He replied: “Shut up, you traitor, agent.”
It may not have occurred to Abdul Mahdi at the time that he would one day be called to heal the wounds of more than an era and that assuming the premiership task would be like receiving a fireball.

On Unity Day, Germany’s Feeling Divided Again
Leonid Bershidsky/Bloomberg/October 08/18
Germany is celebrating its national holiday on Wednesday. Yet this year, German Unity Day is less of a festive occasion. It’s been 28 years since the Berlin Wall came down, but a kind of invisible wall still separates the country’s east and west. For the first time, the nationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party is ahead of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union in polls taken in the ex-Communist eastern states.
Even though the economic gap between the country’s east and west has shrunk in the 28 years since reunification, the political chasm is widening. The east is swinging to the far right because many of its people still feel like second-class citizens, and the recent arrival of hundreds of thousands of immigrants has only intensified their sense of being abandoned by reunified Germany’s mostly western establishment.
TWO ECONOMIES
The German government has published a report on the progress of unification every year since 1997. The headline numbers show staggering economic improvement.
The per-capita economic output in the eastern states and Berlin was only 43 percent of the western level in 1991. That number rose to 73 percent in 2016. An eastern household’s average disposable income stood at 61 percent of the western level in 1991 and at 85 percent in 2016. Unemployment at the end of last year reached 5.3 percent in the west and 7.6 percent in the east. That was a huge change from the first years after reunification, when the number of jobs available in the former East Germany decreased by 34 percent between 1989 and 1992, causing joblessness in the east to jump from zero percent to about 15 percent, twice the western level.
It’s only natural that differences remain — nobody expected them to disappear within one generation’s lifespan.
Eastern Germany’s output and income data look great compared with other post-Communist nations’. The Czech Republic, the wealthiest of them, had 45 percent of Germany’s per-capita gross domestic product and about 60 percent of eastern Germany’s.
By the end of next year, Germany will have pumped 156 billion euros ($180 billion) of targeted government subsidies under the so-called Solidarity Pact into the “new states” since 2005. That doesn’t include private investment by companies taking advantage of the east’s cheaper labor. Overall, the collapse of communism has worked out better for the ex-GDR than for other former Soviet satellites that have joined the European Union.
Still, some aspects of the remaining economic gap between Germany’s east and west are alarming. Above all, the east is barely catching up anymore. In the last 10 years, the west-east difference in per-capita GDP has only shrunk by 4.2 percentage points. The disposable income difference has held relatively steady since 2000. And east German business hasn’t really caught up as much as the headline numbers would suggest.
For example, per-capita industrial output in the east is only 52 percent of the western level, a vast improvement over the 17 percent registered in 1991, but still a lot of distance yet to cover. East German firms’ exports account for 36 percent of sales, compared with almost 49 percent for west German companies. In an export-oriented economy like Germany’s that’s a telling difference.
The reason is that in the east, businesses are on average smaller than in the west; they spend about half as much on research and development as a percentage of sales, have only 74 percent of the labor productivity (78 percent if Berlin is included), pay lower salaries and don’t drive infrastructure development as much. Even internet speeds are slower in the east.
That may never change; in the 28 years since reunification, not a single German multinational has placed its headquarters in the new states.
TWO NATIONS
East German men live, on average, to 77.2 years, about 18 months less than west German males, yet the population of the east is older than in the west. That’s due to a long-term depopulation trend: The east accounted for 18.3 percent of Germany’s population in 1991, down to 15.2 percent today.
Young people face economic pressure to keep leaving: Youth unemployment in the east, at 8.4 percent, is still about twice the western level, even though the general unemployment gap has shrunk. Though, statistically speaking, east-west migration has stopped, only Berlin, its surrounding state of Brandenburg and Saxony attract more people from the west than they lose to it; the other three eastern states still have negative domestic migration rates.
But the most glaring differences between the people who inhabit the two parts of Germany are in the way families function. About 39 percent of east German women with kids under three years-old hold down full-time jobs, compared with 19 percent in the west. A full quarter of eastern families and just 17.5 percent of western ones are single-parent households.
These dissimilarities can’t be attributed to the east’s relative economic backwardness, but rather to cultural differences, research has shown. In the former East Germany, where gender equality was a policy goal before the West warmed to the idea, women were more inclined to work full-time even when they had small children; they trusted the state to take care of the kids in the meantime, and they didn’t rely as much on male partners. This attitude appears to have been passed down to the next generations. The easterners still have a strong cultural preference for egalitarianism: There is still less economic inequality in the eastern states than in the west.
The relative unhappiness of east Germans is probably due to a combination of economic and cultural factors. And while a majority of westerners feel they have something to celebrate on German Unity Day, a minority of easterners feel like joining in.
TWO SOCIETIES
The economic, social and cultural gaps naturally result in different voting patterns; Die Linke, the successor party to the GDR’s Communists, has historically done much better in the new states than in the west. But the combination of slightly lower incomes, less favorable demographics and a lasting Communist heritage cannot quite explain the right-wing AfD’s rise to first place in polls. Nor can the generally declining popularity of the fractious ruling coalition of Christian Democrats and Social Democrats. In the west, according to a recent Infratest Dimap poll, the coalition remains popular. Two factors are likely most responsible for the nationalists’ ascendancy in the east. One of them is the easterners’ greater mistrust of the system and its institutions: the police, courts, media and federal government.
Germany is celebrating its national holiday on Wednesday. Yet this year, German Unity Day is less of a festive occasion. It’s been 28 years since the Berlin Wall came down, but a kind of invisible wall still separates the country’s east and west. For the first time, the nationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party is ahead of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union in polls taken in the ex-Communist eastern states.
Even though the economic gap between the country’s east and west has shrunk in the 28 years since reunification, the political chasm is widening. The east is swinging to the far right because many of its people still feel like second-class citizens, and the recent arrival of hundreds of thousands of immigrants has only intensified their sense of being abandoned by reunified Germany’s mostly western establishment.
TWO ECONOMIES
The German government has published a report on the progress of unification every year since 1997. The headline numbers show staggering economic improvement.
The per-capita economic output in the eastern states and Berlin was only 43 percent of the western level in 1991. That number rose to 73 percent in 2016. An eastern household’s average disposable income stood at 61 percent of the western level in 1991 and at 85 percent in 2016. Unemployment at the end of last year reached 5.3 percent in the west and 7.6 percent in the east. That was a huge change from the first years after reunification, when the number of jobs available in the former East Germany decreased by 34 percent between 1989 and 1992, causing joblessness in the east to jump from zero percent to about 15 percent, twice the western level.
It’s only natural that differences remain — nobody expected them to disappear within one generation’s lifespan.
Eastern Germany’s output and income data look great compared with other post-Communist nations’. The Czech Republic, the wealthiest of them, had 45 percent of Germany’s per-capita gross domestic product and about 60 percent of eastern Germany’s.
By the end of next year, Germany will have pumped 156 billion euros ($180 billion) of targeted government subsidies under the so-called Solidarity Pact into the “new states” since 2005. That doesn’t include private investment by companies taking advantage of the east’s cheaper labor. Overall, the collapse of communism has worked out better for the ex-GDR than for other former Soviet satellites that have joined the European Union.
Still, some aspects of the remaining economic gap between Germany’s east and west are alarming. Above all, the east is barely catching up anymore. In the last 10 years, the west-east difference in per-capita GDP has only shrunk by 4.2 percentage points. The disposable income difference has held relatively steady since 2000. And east German business hasn’t really caught up as much as the headline numbers would suggest.
For example, per-capita industrial output in the east is only 52 percent of the western level, a vast improvement over the 17 percent registered in 1991, but still a lot of distance yet to cover. East German firms’ exports account for 36 percent of sales, compared with almost 49 percent for west German companies. In an export-oriented economy like Germany’s that’s a telling difference.
The reason is that in the east, businesses are on average smaller than in the west; they spend about half as much on research and development as a percentage of sales, have only 74 percent of the labor productivity (78 percent if Berlin is included), pay lower salaries and don’t drive infrastructure development as much. Even internet speeds are slower in the east.
That may never change; in the 28 years since reunification, not a single German multinational has placed its headquarters in the new states.
TWO NATIONS
East German men live, on average, to 77.2 years, about 18 months less than west German males, yet the population of the east is older than in the west. That’s due to a long-term depopulation trend: The east accounted for 18.3 percent of Germany’s population in 1991, down to 15.2 percent today.
Young people face economic pressure to keep leaving: Youth unemployment in the east, at 8.4 percent, is still about twice the western level, even though the general unemployment gap has shrunk. Though, statistically speaking, east-west migration has stopped, only Berlin, its surrounding state of Brandenburg and Saxony attract more people from the west than they lose to it; the other three eastern states still have negative domestic migration rates.
But the most glaring differences between the people who inhabit the two parts of Germany are in the way families function. About 39 percent of east German women with kids under three years-old hold down full-time jobs, compared with 19 percent in the west. A full quarter of eastern families and just 17.5 percent of western ones are single-parent households.
These dissimilarities can’t be attributed to the east’s relative economic backwardness, but rather to cultural differences, research has shown. In the former East Germany, where gender equality was a policy goal before the West warmed to the idea, women were more inclined to work full-time even when they had small children; they trusted the state to take care of the kids in the meantime, and they didn’t rely as much on male partners. This attitude appears to have been passed down to the next generations. The easterners still have a strong cultural preference for egalitarianism: There is still less economic inequality in the eastern states than in the west.
The relative unhappiness of east Germans is probably due to a combination of economic and cultural factors. And while a majority of westerners feel they have something to celebrate on German Unity Day, a minority of easterners feel like joining in.
TWO SOCIETIES
The economic, social and cultural gaps naturally result in different voting patterns; Die Linke, the successor party to the GDR’s Communists, has historically done much better in the new states than in the west. But the combination of slightly lower incomes, less favorable demographics and a lasting Communist heritage cannot quite explain the right-wing AfD’s rise to first place in polls. Nor can the generally declining popularity of the fractious ruling coalition of Christian Democrats and Social Democrats. In the west, according to a recent Infratest Dimap poll, the coalition remains popular. Two factors are likely most responsible for the nationalists’ ascendancy in the east. One of them is the easterners’ greater mistrust of the system and its institutions: the police, courts, media and federal government.
This is not merely part of the Communist legacy, which undermined confidence in institutions in all post-Communist countries. East Germans are unique in having an excellent reason to treat the authorities as alien to them. In the years since their country was swallowed up by its wealthier, democratic neighbor, the number of easterners at the top levels of government, the justice system and corporate hierarchies has barely increased. Last year, no top federal judges, only 1.6 percent of the top managers of companies included in Germany’s DAX stock index, 1 percent of generals and admirals and 7 percent of cabinet ministers in easterner Merkel’s cabinet were from the east.
This is such an extreme case of non-representation that quotas for east Germans have been suggested. No wonder any party that styles itself as anti-elite can do well in the east.
The popularity of an anti-immigration party like AfD also makes sense. Traditionally, Germany’s east has had a low share of immigrants: about 7 percent in the new states, compared with 12 percent in the former West Germany.
In the past, the xenophobia in the east was fueled by a paucity of contact with foreigners. Now, there may be too much. Germany took in 1.2 million asylum seekers in 2015 and 2016. They were distributed among states more or less according to their population and economic well-being. But the east had more empty housing. Eastern Germany excluding Berlin took in 20.7 percent of the asylum seekers, more than its share of Germany’s population. Coupled with the longstanding mistrust of “others,” this almost certainly helped the AfD as the party exploited Germany’s fears about “Islamization.”
To the rest of Germany, the AfD is a dangerous political force that should be watched by the domestic intelligence service like other radical organizations; 66 percent of westerners would like that. In the east, only 48 percent would favor such a measure because the AfD is viewed as a legitimate party trying to right wrongs that the Western-led system ignores.
The east, of course, is a relatively small part of Germany, and its political preferences aren’t decisive on the national level. But that only serves to perpetuate the country’s division. Reiner Haseloff, the first minister of the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, said recently that the border between east and west “cannot be smoothed out even in the next 100 years.” For his party, the CDU, that’s way too long to wait: The political force that brought about Germany’s reunification is quickly losing ground in the east. And as the government phases out a special tax to support the new states next year, since presumably they have caught up enough, it’ll have even less leverage there.

Saudi Arabia and The US: A Peer-to-Peer Relationship
Salman Al-dossary/Asharq Al Awsat/October 08/18
Throughout his 2016 presidential campaign, US President Donald Trump toured various states, launching an assortment of statements that tickled voters’ feelings. He did not spare any country. He has targeted all of his country’s allies, one by one, including Saudi Arabia.
He has invested well in issues that excite US citizens, such as oil prices, the demand of financial returns from countries he claims the US protects, and the provision of more jobs at the expense of those countries. The fact is there is no better than these statements to earn votes. Lower oil prices and more money! Oh my God, how tempted the voters are!
Trump then entered the White House as president almost two years ago, and his previous positions turned upside down. He traveled to Saudi Arabia as the first country to be visited by a US president after his election. He adopted the Kingdom’s position in its strategy against Iran. He joined it in the war against ISIS, along with 50 other states – a war that proved to be very successful.
Both sides benefited from their alliance economically, militarily and politically. He did not translate a single statement from his electoral campaign. In the US midterm elections, he resorted again to his favorite rhetoric, but this time as a president. Electoral votes are not easy to attract; to be the ally of Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Japan, Germany and others, constituted a dense subject for his tours in the US. However, the truth is that nothing has changed much in the Administration’s positions with its allies. All that has changed is that there is a US president who launches exciting statements for his citizens. At the same time, his positions and policies do not change towards the same allies whom he attacks.
Undeniably, there is no comparison between the Saudi-US relations in the era of former President Barack Obama and that of his successor, Donald Trump. The first has spent eight years working against the Saudi agenda and that of regional states, and his country failed to achieve any progress with its strategy. When Trump embraced the Saudi agenda, success was guaranteed. This equation was clearly explained by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in his interview with Bloomberg, stressing, in a strong and decisive response – the first of its kind by a US ally – to Trump’s claim that Riyadh has agreed to pay in return for this protection: “In fact, we will pay nothing for our security.” Full stop.
Certainly, it cannot be said that Saudi-American relations are lukewarm or tense, although there are many countries and entities that wish so and work for it. The fact is that Saudi Arabia is dealing with its ally on a peer-to-peer basis. The Kingdom disapproves of Trump’s statements, corrects them and reveals their truth. It points to errors if they occur. It does not allow any attempt to harm its prestige and status.
The Kingdom does not act like a small marginal country that acts like a subordinate to the leader and that doesn’t dare to respond to President Trump, even if he explicitly accused it of supporting terrorism; and what is meant here, of course, is Qatar. The Saudi message of utmost importance was delivered by the Crown Prince, who said that neither the United States nor any other country in the world protects his country, just as this nearly 300-year-old Kingdom protects itself. It actually pays money to its people, who are protecting its security and stability.

Motives and hidden danger behind the Hamas-Israel indirect talks in Cairo
Ramzy Baroud/Al ASrabiya/October 08/18
The division and infighting between Palestinian groups, Hamas and Fatah, have always come at a high price for the Palestinian people. However, the cost of that enmity is reaching its most dangerous levels yet. While the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority continues to receive American military aid to sustain ‘security coordination’ between its forces and the Israeli Occupation army, Hamas is holding indirect talks with Israel. These indirect talks – between Palestinian groups, Hamas, the Islamic Jihad and others and the Israeli government – restarted in Cairo with the mediation of Egypt’s General Intelligence Services (GIS). The aim, for this round, is mostly focused on salvaging an earlier short-term truce agreement, also signed in Cairo, leaving a long-term truce arrangement for future dates. To put pressure on Palestinian negotiators, Israeli snipers killed seven unarmed Palestinian protesters at the fence separating besieged Gaza from Israel last Friday, Sep 28. Two of those killed were children aged 12 and 14-years-old.
That was one of the most violent encounters since thousands of Palestinians began protesting at the fence under the banner of “The Great March of Return”. As many as 193 Palestinians were killed since the protests began on March 30, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.
Clearly, the Israeli government wanted to send a violent message, one not just aimed at Palestinian groups in Gaza but is also intended for an Israeli audience. The Israeli hardline Education Minister, Naftali Bennett, has been particularly outspoken against his government’s engagement with the Gaza groups. The opportunistic Bennett is accusing his Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, of ‘weakness’ in engaging in ceasefire talks. “The Lieberman-Hamas agreements have crashed,” he was quoted as saying in the Israeli news website, Ynet, adding, “The terror is continuing at the expense of the security of our residents thanks to Lieberman’s policy of restraint and weakness.”If the deliberate killing of the seven Palestinian protesters was a reassurance to right wing Israelis that their government is still in control, the resumption of the talks in Cairo reflects the sense of urgency in Tel Aviv to control the repercussions of the Strip’s growing economic woes. A truce with Hamas that has no real chance of succeeding or even creating a mere political horizon will surely divide an already fragmented Palestinian leadership
Economic collapse
Gaza is indeed on the verge of economic collapse. A high-level diplomatic meeting of international donors in New York revealed the extent of the impending crisis. According to the World Bank, unemployment in the Strip, which has been under an Israeli blockade for 11 years, stands at 70 percent. Furthermore, with the continued US financial punishment of the Palestinians, through the holding of aid funds to the Palestinian Authority, UNRWA and other relief programs, Gazans are running out of options. Although Israel launches regular wars on the Gaza Strip in the name of ‘deterrence’, another war for the time-being might not fit into Netanyahu’s immediate political calculations. He is politically embattled and in need of keeping his right-wing coalition in order as opposed to being forced to cope with the outcomes of another deadly war that will surely receive massive international condemnations. Hence, his secret talks in Cairo with the Palestinians groups.
Israel is certainly not interested in a long-term truce in Gaza; Tel Aviv wants Gaza isolated and besieged but also wants to reserve its control over the nature and timing of violent campaigns.
In fact, there is little disagreement among top officials in Israel regarding the recurring need to ‘mow the lawn’, as in attacking Gaza through regular military campaigns. It is only a question of when. Moreover, Israel is in the process of building an underground barrier along the Gaza fence. There are massive investments in various other schemes all aimed at tightening the noose around Gaza’s 2-million inhabitants. But Israel’s strategy is also political. A truce with Hamas that has no real chance of succeeding or even creating a mere political horizon will surely divide an already fragmented Palestinian leadership. The talks in Cairo are also supported by the US administration of Donald Trump which is busy pressuring the PA and others to accept its ill-defined ‘Deal of the Century.” US motives behind its support of the truce talks in Cairo are unsurprisingly similar to those of Israel. Israel and the US are working diligently to change the rules of the game entirely. In fact, the ‘Deal of the Century’ is precisely that - redefining the ‘conflict’ altogether so that fundamental issues to Palestinians for any future peace agreement are removed from the agenda.
Legal and political foundation
With unconditional support from the Trump Administration, Tel Aviv sees a golden opportunity to redefine what has, for decades, constituted the legal and political foundation of the ‘Palestinian-Israeli conflict.’Indeed, the new strategy has so far targeted the status of East Jerusalem as an Occupied Palestinian city and also the Right of Return for Palestinian refugees. It aims to create a new reality in which Israel achieves its strategic goals while the rights of Palestinians are limited to mere humanitarian issues. Clearly, Israel and the US are using the division between Palestinian factions to their advantage. While for years Fatah received numerous financial and political perks from Washington, Hamas subsisted in isolation under a permanent siege and protracted state of war. It seems that the Trump Administration - under the auspices of Trump’s senior adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner - are turning the tables. While the subservience of the PA under the leadership of Mahmoud Abbas has been successfully tested in the past, under the Trump Administration the US demands complete ‘respect’, thus total obedience. Fatah opposes indirect Hamas-Israeli talks on the grounds that any agreement should be facilitated by the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), not individual factions.
In truth, what annoys Abbas is the fact that his party, which has undemocratically dominated Palestinian political space for decades, is being increasingly marginalized by its traditional benefactors, Tel Aviv and Washington. Hamas should, however, be wary of the long-term consequences of its own political maneuvering. While the short-term truce is justifiable on humanitarian grounds, a long-term truce that determines the nature and scope of Palestinian Resistance and further distinguishes between the political aspirations of Palestinians in Gaza and those in the rest of Palestine, is a political gamble, to say the least.
Sidelining Gaza from the rest of the Palestinian struggle is now a joint Israeli-US strategy predicated on choking off Palestinians from badly needed funds and also developing several tracks of talks involving Palestinian groups separately. Abbas, whose political apparatus is largely reliant for its survival on the ‘security coordination’ with Israel, US political validation and financial handouts, has little with which to challenge the new US-Israeli strategy. Hamas, on the other hand, feels that it has greater chance of achieving an end to the siege through the Cairo talks. However, delinking the future of Gaza from the future of all Palestinians will come at a dire cost: dividing Palestine and the aspirations of her people between competing factions.

Why China’s Belt and Road Initiative is more than just new ‘great game’
Sabena Siddiqui/Al ASrabiya/October 08/18
Established 2000 years ago by Chinese imperial envoy Zhang Qian, the ancient Silk Route linked China to Central Asia and the Middle East in the days of the Han Dynasty. Today, the same route has been revived in the form of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Marking five years since China’s BRI was launched this year is not only a milestone, it is also a juncture to take stock of the mega-project and assess its progress and impact. Generally seen as the most ambitious geostrategic initiative of this century, the BRI is mostly misunderstood and taken as a threat or a new “great game”. Basically, it is an investment project affecting two-thirds of the global population and the aim is to provide the necessary infrastructure to enable a free flow of logistics from some of the most under-developed and remote parts of the world to more developed countries and specially built economic zones.
Bridging the infrastructure gap in lesser-developed continents like Asia and Africa, it was just a matter of time before the idea clicked with more developed, rich countries as they all needed markets to sell their goods. Having the largest populations, the lesser developed nations in these two continents only lacked trade facilities and economic inter-connectivity.
And trade and transport connectivity is exactly what China has sought to provide, at the same time it has also ensured its own solid economic links with these new untapped global markets. Developing infrastructure across South East Asia, Eurasia, the Middle East, Africa and the Indian Ocean, China has not only revived the ancient Silk Route, it has opened up opportunities for everyone. Addressing a conference on the occasion in Beijing, President Xi Jinping stressed that the initiative was about economic co-operation and not any kind of geopolitical or military alliance. Creating an open club promoting inclusiveness was the intention and it was not any sort of “China Club”, he said. Seen as the most ambitious geostrategic initiative of this century, the BRI is mostly misunderstood and taken as a threat or new “great game”
Sea and land routes
Based on two major sea and land routes, namely the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road and the Silk Road Economic Belt, the development plan is then divided into six main corridors. Up till now, the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is the most well-known as it was the first to be initiated. Having the distinction of being called the “flagship corridor” of the BRI due to the vital location and accessibility of Gwadar sea-port, this corridor received priority and was developed on a fast-track basis. Also a focal part of China’s foreign policy today, the BRI has five main targets, developing trade ties, infrastructure, political co-operation, financial integration and most important of all, people to people exchanges. Establishing local banks, China is investing $4 -8 trillion in the BRI initially and it has created a $40 billion Silk Road Fund. Having the largest foreign currency reserves at $3.6 trillion, China is also the largest exporter globally with $2.34 trillion and the largest importer at $1.96 trillion. Not only that, it is the biggest financier of the Asian Infrastructure and Investment Bank (AIIB) with investments around $20 trillion so it was in a good position to launch the BRI.
Funded by the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), Exim Bank and the China Development Bank, the following projects valued above $1 billion each have been successfully completed in the last five years. Additionally, 82 overseas economic and trade zones were set up while 16 free trade agreements were signed with 24 countries in May this year. Meanwhile, China’s trade with BRI countries grew in this five-year span and exceeds $5.5 trillion today. Placing emphasis on increasing imports from BRI countries in the coming years to reduce the trade deficit, China believes in sustainability and balanced trade relations. Further investment exceeding $1 trillion is also to be carried out on free trade zones and other projects. Notwithstanding controversies and negative perceptions, it does seem like the BRI is beginning to give positive results. Instead of looking inward, China preferred trade connectivity and incorporated it as a foreign policy effort that can benefit all parties. Predictably, in the long run, the only effective response other global powers can adopt towards the BRI is an even better economic vision that is strategically planned, amply resourced and sustainable over time.