Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on September 11-12/2023
Director Youssef El-Khoury apologizes for his inability to respond to all those who tried or are trying to call him because his cell phone is still confiscated by the security forces.
Director Youssef El Khoury Friends/September 11/2023
Director Youssef El Khoury extends his thanks and gratitude to everyone who stood by him and condemned his illegal and arbitrary detention arrest today. He genuinely apologizes for his inability to respond to all those who tried or are trying to contact him because his cell phone is still confiscated by the security forces.

Director Youssef Al-Khoury was released after arbitrary and illegal detention
Friends of director Youssef El Khoury/September 11, 2023
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/122158/122158/
Activist-Director Youssef El Khoury was released late today, after an illegal detention since 11 am (September 11, 2023) at the Mount Lebanon Information Center. (Jisr El Basha - Sin El Fil).
The detention was bizarrely justified as being for the sake of gathering information.!!!
During the detention hours, his lawyer was prohibited from attending the investigation. Meanwhile, Mr. Al-Khoury was released without the involvement of the Public Prosecution.
We are shocked by this method of harassment, which apparently aims to deprive citizens the right of have a legal representation during investigation procedures.
It is worth mentioning that our friend, Mr., Al-Khoury was released as a result of widespread condemnation and pressure in both Lebanon and Diaspora all over the social media- press facilities, and before a scheduled public demonstration that was going to take place in front of Mount Lebanon Information Center. where he was detained.

Director Youssef Al-Khoury Is illegally Arrested
Youssef Al Khoury Friends/September 11/2023
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/122151/122151/
Director Youssef Al-Khoury was summoned to this morning to the Mount Lebanon Information Center in Jisr El-Basha-Sin El Fil  for interrogating about a matter that is still unknown, under the pretext of preventive security and information gathering.
The investigation began with him after the expulsion of his legal lawyer because an investigation report was not been opened. Since more than six consecutive hours have passed on his arrest without being allowed to contact his lawyer or members of his family.
His current detention is considered a deprivation of freedom and requires opposition from all those fighting for freedom of opinion. Therefore, we call on all friends, comrades in the struggle, and people of free opinion to gather in front of The Mount Lebanon Information Command Center, located in Jisr El-Basha - Sin El Fil, starting at six-thirty this evening, to call for the release of our comrade, director Youssef El-Khoury.

Israel Sees South Lebanon Airport as Iran-Backed Springboard for Attacks
11 September 2023
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant accused Iran on Monday of setting up an airport in southern Lebanon to enable attacks against Israel. Israel is troubled by arch-foe Iran's nuclear program, missile build-up and support for regional militias. The most powerful of the latter, Lebanese Hezbollah, fought a war with Israel in 2006 and tensions across the border are rising anew. In televised remarks to an international security conference hosted by Reichman University, Gallant showed aerial images of what he described as an airport built by Iran with a view to pursuing "terrorist objectives" against Israel.
He did not elaborate on these, but said the site could accommodate mid-sized aircraft. The location he gave was near the Lebanese village of Birket Jabbour and city of Jezzin, some 20 km (12.4 miles) north of the Israeli border town of Metulla. A non-Israeli source with knowledge of the site said it could accommodate large drones - some of them weaponized - built off of Iranian blueprints. The source said drones launched from the site could be used for both internal and external operational activities - but added that the nature and direction of the runway suggested the former were more likely.
Hezbollah has been investing heavily in drone technology, the source said. Neither Hezbollah nor Iranian officials offered an immediate response to Gallant's remarks.

6 dead, over 60 injured in 5 days of clashes in Ain el-Helweh
Agence France Presse/September 11, 2023
At least six people have been killed and dozens wounded in five days of continuous clashes in the Ain el-Helweh Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon, first responders said Monday. Violence broke out late Thursday in the camp, just weeks after similar clashes pitted members of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement against Islamist militants. The toll has risen to at least "six dead, one of them killed on Monday, and more than 60 wounded," said Imad Hallak from the Palestinian Red Crescent's Lebanon branch. The casualties include both fighters and civilians, he added.
An AFP correspondent in Sidon reported ongoing clashes with automatic gunfire and shelling, after fighting had subsided somewhat overnight. Lebanon's official National News Agency (NNA) said the city's southern entrance was closed to traffic. The NNA had reported Saturday that three fighters and one civilian had been killed. Ain el-Helweh is home to more than 54,000 registered refugees and thousands of Palestinians who joined them in recent years from neighboring Syria, fleeing the civil war there. The camp, Lebanon's largest, was created for Palestinians who were driven out or fled during the 1948 war at the time of Israel's creation. The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, said Sunday that "hundreds of families have left the camp" since the clashes began. Some 400 families were sheltering in a mosque, while others were taking refuge with relatives or in emergency shelters, it added in a report.
The Lebanese Army said Sunday that shells hit two military sites near the camp, "leaving five soldiers wounded, one of them in critical condition."By long-standing convention, the army stays out of the Palestinian camps and leaves the factions to handle security there.
In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, the army warned "the relevant parties inside the camp" against endangering military sites, adding that it would "take appropriate measures." Five days of previous clashes that began in late July left 13 people dead and dozens wounded, in the worst outbreak of violence in the camp in years. That fighting erupted after the death of an Islamist militant, followed by an ambush that killed five Fatah members including a military leader. Lebanon hosts an estimated 250,000 Palestinian refugees, according to the U.N. agency. Most live in Lebanon's 12 official camps, and face a variety of legal restrictions including on employment.

Ceasefire agreement reached in Ain Al-Hilweh camp: Will it hold?
LBCI/September 11, 2023
A ceasefire decision has been made in Ain Al-Hilweh camp following a meeting held between the Acting General Security Chief, General Elias El-Baissari, and several representatives of Palestinian factions affiliated with the Joint Palestinian Action Committee, which falls under the umbrella of the Palestinian Liberation Organization/Factions of the National Alliance and Islamic Forces. However, the Fatah Movement has expressed readiness to cooperate with this decision, but what about the 'Muslim Youth' armed group who do not usually participate in official meetings? Will they also commit to it?
Palestinian sources closely monitoring the meeting have confirmed that a committee will be formed within the Joint Action Committee, comprising Islamic forces such as the 'Asbat Al-Ansar faction' and the 'Jihadist Islamic Movement.' Furthermore, this committee will coordinate the ceasefire mechanisms with the Muslim Youth group. This will coincide with the initiation of the Joint Action Committee's plan to surrender wanted people in Muslim Youth and settle the status of some wanted individuals, which may encourage them to turn themselves in voluntarily. Furthermore, there will be an appeal to cease armed demonstrations in the camp and limit them to the areas where Muslim Youth is present. However, suppose these negotiations do not succeed, which will not provide Muslim Youth with more than two weeks' notice, according to Palestinian sources. In that case, a new field phase may begin where they are encircled by several Palestinian factions. The extended meeting at the General Directorate of General Security coincided with the return of a member of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, Azzam Al-Ahmad, to Lebanon. Moreover, discussions are ongoing regarding a potential round of talks that may include meetings with Speaker Nabih Berri and Caretaker Prime Ministry Najib Mikati. Thus, will all these combined efforts lead to a permanent cessation of hostilities in the camp?

UNRWA calls for immediate halt in Ain el-Hilweh clashes, opens shelters for displaced
Naharnet/September 11, 2023
The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, has opened shelters in schools and other facilities to accommodate over 750 displaced people as fighting and heavy destruction of homes and facilities continued across southern Lebanon's Ain el-Hilweh refugee camp. "UNRWA, with partners, is responding to the urgent humanitarian needs," said Dorothée Klaus, the director of UNRWA affairs in Lebanon. "Meanwhile, armed groups continue to take over eight UNRWA schools which provide education for 5,900 Palestine Refugee children. We continue to receive horrific reports of extensive damage to the schools and education material meant for children. UNRWA is currently exploring alternatives to accommodate children from Ain el-Hilweh camp so they start the school year with their peers on 2 October and do not miss on their right to education," Klaus said. She called on all parties and those with influence over them to stop the violence. "Until then, those fighting should protect civilians, including children, wherever they are in the camp. They should refrain from attacks on civilian infrastructure including schools and medical facilities."

Islamist factions in Ain el-Hilweh say they will honor cease-fire
Associated Press/September 11, 2023
Islamist factions in Lebanon's largest Palestinian refugee camp have said they will abide by a cease-fire after three days of clashes killed at least five people and left hundreds of families displaced. Fighting between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah movement and Islamist groups has rocked southern Lebanon's Ain el-Hilweh refugee camp since Friday. Fatah and other factions in the camp had intended to crack down on suspects accused of killing one of their military generals in late July.
Besides the five killed, 52 others were wounded, Dr. Riad Abu Al-Einen, who heads the Al-Hamshari Hospital in Sidon that has received the casualties, told The Associated Press. The U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, however stated that four people were killed and 60 others wounded.
The Lebanese military said in a statement that five soldiers were wounded after three shells landed in army checkpoints surrounding the camp. One of the soldiers is in critical condition. "The army command repeats its warning to the concerned parties in the camp about the consequences of exposing military members and positions to danger, and affirms that the army will take appropriate measures in response," the statement said. Ain el-Hilweh, home to some 55,000 people according to the United Nations, is notorious for its lawlessness and violence is not uncommon in the camp. It was established in 1948 to house Palestinians who were displaced when Israel was established. Lebanese officials, security agencies and the U.N. have urged the warring factions to agree on a cease-fire. The interim chief of Lebanon's General Security agency Elias al-Baysari said that he will attend a Monday meeting between Palestinian factions and urge the factions to reach a resolution. The clashing factions in the camp said in a statement published Sunday by Lebanon's state-run National News Agency that they planned to abide by a cease-fire. UNRWA said hundreds of families displaced from the camp have taken shelter in nearby mosques, schools and the Sidon municipality building. The U.N. agency and local organizations are setting up additional shelters after Lebanon's prime minister and interior minister shut down an initiative by the municipality, the Lebanese Red Cross, and local community groups to set up a few dozen tents for families.
Palestinian Red Crescent paramedics set up stations at the camp's entrance to treat the wounded and provided food packages to displaced families.
Among the wounded was Sabine Al-Ahmad, 16, who fled the camp with her family. She was being treated for shrapnel wounds. "We were running away and a shell exploded over us," she told the AP. Dorothee Klaus, Director of UNRWA in Lebanon, said armed groups are still occupying the agency's schools in the camp. "UNRWA calls on all parties and those with influence over them to stop the violence," Klaus said in a statement. Several days of street battles in the Ain el-Hilweh camp between Fatah and members of the extremist Jund al-Sham group erupted earlier this summer that left 13 people dead and dozens wounded, and ended after an uneasy truce was put in place on Aug. 3. Those street battles forced hundreds to flee their homes. However, clashes were widely expected to resume as the Islamist groups never handed over those accused of killing the Fatah general to the Lebanese judiciary, as demanded by a committee of Palestinian factions last month. Lebanon is home to tens of thousands of Palestinian refugees and their descendants. Many live in the 12 refugee camps that are scattered around the small Mediterranean country.

Uncertain mission: French Envoy Le Drian returns to Lebanon
LBCI/September 11, 2023
The French envoy, Jean-Yves Le Drian, returns to Lebanon after approximately two months since his last visit without a clear vision of the direction his initiative will take. Before heading to Beirut on Monday morning, Le Drian met with the Adviser at the Royal Court in Riyadh, Nizar al-Alula, and the Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon, Walid Bukhari, at the Elysée Palace. However, Le Drian came to listen to the political parties in Lebanon, discuss their concerns, and, based on this, decide whether to intensify his efforts or declare that his mission was impossible. In this context, French sources told LBCI that Le Drian will meet all parties, especially Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, Speaker Nabih Berri, the Army Commander, and the heads of parliamentary blocs and parties. Moreover, some of them will visit him at the Pine Palace. So far, Le Drian's conversations with the Lebanese parties will be bilateral, and it is unlikely that he will be able to bring them together for a roundtable dialogue at the Pine Palace. However, French sources mentioned that there is nothing fixed about the format of the dialogue, and it is related to the results of his meetings in Beirut and whether he can create a dialogue dynamic among the Lebanese parties, which is the primary goal of his mission to Lebanon. So, will this visit be Le Drian's last to Beirut if he cannot break the presidential deadlock? Will the French role be replaced by the Qatari role, especially since Doha is part of the Group of Five working on mediating the presidential file?

UN rights chief urges int'l probe into Beirut port blast
Agence France Presse/September 11, 2023
The U.N. human rights chief decried Monday the lack of accountability for the 2020 Beirut port blast, urging an international probe into the massive explosion that killed that killed more than 220 people, wounded 7,500 and destroyed swathes of the city.
"Three years after the Beirut explosion, ... there has been no accountability," Volker Turk told the United Nations Human Rights Council, adding "it may therefore be time to consider an international fact-finding mission to look into human rights violations related to this tragedy."

Lebanon’s exclusion from transport route linking India and Europe
LBCI/September 11, 2023
Lebanon is out of the deal, a deal in which we could have been a part of, as the project connects India by sea to the United Arab Emirates and then by land via a railway to Saudi Arabia. Jordan has chosen the Israeli port of Haifa as its final stop in the Middle East before continuing its journey to Europe. The project aims to facilitate the movement of goods between Asia and the Middle East, extending to Europe, and the transmission of renewable energy and clean hydrogen through cables and pipelines. Lebanon, however, was excluded. According to some observers, this exclusion can be attributed to the political and economic instability that deters investments in the country. Additionally, as the sponsor and investor in this project, the United States seeks to support its ally, Israel, in its economic growth. Consequently, Lebanon has lost billions of dollars across various sectors, such as trade, energy, and the digital economy, which could have contributed to economic growth and opened the door to numerous job opportunities. While Lebanon failed to become a bridge between the East and West in the 21st century, it was a key route for transporting Saudi oil to Europe in the 1950s through the Trans-Arabian Pipeline (Tapline). This pipeline transported billions of barrels of crude oil over 1,648 kilometers from Abqaiq in Saudi Arabia to the Arabian Gulf, passing through Jordan, Syria, and then to the port of Sidon. From there, it continued to Europe through oil tankers in the sea. After World War II, the idea of establishing Tapline was developed by Saudi Aramco and other international companies to pump more oil to European countries that had become economically dependent on it, especially as maritime oil transportation was lengthy and expensive at the time. However, with the emergence of large oil tankers, now the optimal way to transport oil worldwide, Tapline was utterly shut down and dismantled in 2001. In the end, Lebanon continues to lose out on its geographic advantages and remains marginalized on the world map.

Lack of quorum turns cabinet session on refugees into ministerial meeting
Naharnet/September 11, 2023
Cabinet failed to convene Monday at the Grand serail to discuss the Syrian refugee crisis amid a new wave of illegal crossings, due to a lack of quorum. Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati called instead for a consultative ministerial meeting at his office. Army chief General Joseph Aoun and Acting General Security chief Brig. Gen. Elias Bayssari attended the meeting to discuss the crossing points and ways to limit illegal entries. In addition to the Free Patriotic Movement ministers, Economy Minister Amin Salam, Environment Minister Nasser Yassin, Agriculture Minister Abbas Hajj Hassan, Tourism Minister Walid Nassar and Health Minister Firas Abiad did not attend the session. Over the past months, thousands of Syrian citizens made it to Lebanon through illegal crossing points seeking a better life, as living conditions are worsening in Syria, where inflation surged after President Bashar Assad’s decision in August to double public sector wages and pensions.Mikati warned last week that over a thousand Syrian refugees each week fleeing to Lebanon "could create harsh imbalances", after the The Lebanese army said it had prevented 1,200 Syrians from crossing into Lebanon last week and another 1,100 Syrians the previous week. Lebanon hosts some 805,000 United Nations-registered Syrian refugees, but officials estimate the actual number is far higher: between 1.5 million and 2 million. Cabinet is set to convene in a second session today to discuss the 2024 state budget.

Berri denies suspending his dialogue initiative
Naharnet/September 11, 2023
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has denied reports claiming that he had suspended his presidential dialogue initiative. “I have not suspended my initiative. To the contrary, it is ongoing, continuous and in harmony with the French initiative. The two initiatives complement each other and their essence is the same: dialogue and consensus for the election of a president,” Berri said in an interview with al-Liwaa newspaper published Monday. “I’m waiting for the visit of French envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian and I expect that my initiative will be merged with Le Drian’s initiative to reach the aspired positive result through dialogue and consensus,” the Speaker added. Berri had on August 31 called on the Lebanese parties to engage in seven days of dialogue in parliament prior to going to open-ended electoral sessions to choose a new president. His initiative was rejected by most of the opposition MPs and was eventually criticized by Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil.

LF tells Le Drian it won't attend dialogue before president election
Naharnet/September 11, 2023
The Lebanese Forces has informed French envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian that it will not attend any dialogue conference prior to the election of a new president, LF lawmaker Ghada Ayoub said. “The Strong Republic bloc’s specifications for the president and his missions are clear and in line with the Doha meeting’s closing statement,” Ayoub said in an interview on Radio Free Lebanon. “Parliament should perform its role and dialogue must take place in the (electoral) sessions,” the MP added. Le Drian is expected to arrive today, Monday in Beirut to meet with the Lebanese parties over the presidential file. He will start his meetings on Tuesday according to media reports.

Financial transition: BDL prepares for dollar transactions via the Bloomberg platform
LBCI/September 11, 2023
Sources within the Banque du Liban (BDL) have confirmed that the transition to conducting transactions in dollars through the Bloomberg platform will be seamless and straightforward. Acting BDL Governor Wassim Mansouri, who has thus far managed to prevent the dollar's exchange rate from spiraling at this stage, will maintain control as Bloomberg integration begins. Any reports of exorbitant dollar prices are dismissed as baseless speculation. The sources revealed that the BDL has initiated negotiations with Bloomberg, and upon finalizing the agreement, registration will commence for banks and financial institutions interested in utilizing this platform. Notably, the BDL will not incur any costs related to Bloomberg integration. Existing agreements with Bloomberg will remain in place, allowing banks to fulfill their financial obligations to the agency. Financial institutions, particularly licensed currency exchange businesses and those in the top tier will be required to establish dedicated departments responsible for verifying the sources of funds used in transactions via the Bloomberg platform. This move is part of the country's ongoing efforts to combat money laundering. Firms failing to establish these departments will not be permitted access until the BDL drafts a circular to address this requirement. In preparation for this transition, a Bloomberg team is set to arrive in Lebanon to train those interested in working with the platform, instructing them on how to trade foreign currency rates. The full implementation of the platform is expected to take over two months.

Undercover in Lebanon: Unraveling the web of forgery gangs and illegal migration
LBCI/September 11, 2023
Lebanon is not only a victim of random displacement but has also become a haven for forgery gangs facilitating illegal migration, even through legal border crossings. These gangs exploit people's desire to migrate, mainly Syrians and Iraqis. They provide mostly forged European passports or fake European visas to travel to European countries, often France or Germany. Imagine that some individuals send the genuine documents of someone who had previously obtained a legitimate European passport through the mail to Lebanon. Then, a relative who resembles them might attempt to enter Europe using these documents. Believe it or not, this happens, and the danger lies in the fact that all security features of the passport are intact, and uncovering these tricks depends on the professionalism of the security personnel. In the document security lab of the General Security at Beirut Rafic Hariri International Airport, dozens of seized documents belong to civilians or individuals wanted locally or internationally for various crimes and from different nationalities. Among the confiscated items was a forged stamp of the General Security carried by a Syrian to prove his legal entry into Lebanon. The list of forgeries is extensive. In 2022, the General Security at Beirut Rafic Hariri International Airport seized 769 fake documents, including 304 passports and 151 fake visas, held mainly by Syrian nationals. At the airport, trained personnel examine documents and analyze facial features during entry and exit procedures. Outside the airport, proactive work led the Lebanese General Security to apprehend a Lebanese and another Syrian in the Bekaa region, coordinating with his brother in Syria. They were caught with forged documents, including Syrian passports and Palestinian travel documents with European visas. These offenses deserve strict penalties for those who manipulate the destinies of entire populations.

Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on September 11-12/2023
Moroccans with Shovels and Bulldozers Dig through Rubble but Hope for Survivors Dwindles after Quake
Asharq Al Awsat/11 September 2023
Survivors with shovels worked alongside bulldozers Monday to dig through remote Moroccan villages flattened by a monstrous earthquake, as hope dwindled of finding people alive under wood-and-dirt homes that pancaked into rubble and rescuers overseas waited for Morocco to let them help. More than 2,400 were killed when the quake struck late Friday — the strongest in the North African country in more than a century.
A French aid group that specializes in locating people trapped under debris said it is withdrawing an offer to send a nine-person search-and-rescue team after waiting without success for a green light from Morocco to deploy. Rescuers Without Borders' founder, Arnaud Fraisse, told The Associated Press that "our role is not to find bodies."Because homes in quake-hit areas were often made of mud bricks with roofs of wood, stone and clay, he said, the hope of finding survivors at this point is slim. "When all of that collapses, you don’t have much chance of surviving, because there are no air pockets," Fraisse said — a contrast to places where buildings are made of concrete or other strong materials. "People are generally suffocated by the dust." Moroccan officials have so far accepted government-offered aid from just four countries — Spain, Qatar, Britain and the United Arab Emirates. Morocco’s Interior Ministry says officials want to avoid a lack of coordination that "would be counterproductive." The United Nations estimates that 300,000 people were affected by Friday night’s magnitude 6.8 quake, made more dangerous by its relatively shallow depth. Most of the destruction and deaths were in Al Haouz province in the High Atlas Mountains, where homes folded in on themselves and steep and winding roads became clogged with rubble. Residents sometimes cleared away rocks themselves. In the remote impoverished settlement of Tafeghaghte, villagers estimated that more than half of the 160 inhabitants were killed. People worked quickly to clear dead bodies, but a foul stench filled the air Monday from what residents said were dead cattle. Most buildings had disintegrated. Ibrahim Wahdouch lost two young daughters and two other family members and likened the village to a warzone.
"There’s not shooting but look around," he said. On Monday, a teen carried a shovel through the rocks, bulldozers cleaned up debris and survivors steered away from half-wrecked buildings that threatened to collapse. A day earlier, people cheered when trucks full of soldiers arrived in the town of Amizmiz, down the mountain from Tafeghaghte. But they pleaded for more help. "It’s a catastrophe,’’ said survivor Salah Ancheu. "We don’t know what the future is. The aid remains insufficient." Army units deployed Monday along a paved road leading from Amizmiz to remoter mountain villages. State news agency MAP reported that bulldozers and other equipment are being used to clear routes. Tourists and residents lined up to give blood. In some villages, people wept as boys and helmet-clad police carried the dead through streets. Khadija Fairouje’s face was puffy from crying as she joined relatives and neighbors hauling possessions down rock-strewn streets. Offers of help poured in from around the world. But Moroccan authorities frustrated some overseas rescuers who didn't want to deploy without official approval, which wasn't quickly forthcoming. Fraisse of Rescuers Without Borders said about 100 teams — with roughly 3,000 rescuers in total — that are registered with the UN could have deployed quickly to the city of Marrakech that was also hit by the quake. He surmised that Moroccan authorities may be trying to avoid the logistical chaos seen when a 2004 quake killed more 600 people and aid flights overwhelmed an airport in the disaster zone. "Logistically, it’s extremely complicated to manage, because the rescuers then all need to be transported by truck on broken, unusable roads to the zones," he told the AP. "So I think they didn’t want to experience again what they encountered during the last big quake."
He said his group lodged its offer of assistance on Saturday afternoon with Morocco's Embassy in France before deciding Monday that it would no longer be of help.
"It’s their responsibility. They can do what they want," Fraisse said. "They didn’t call. So today we think it’s no longer necessary for us to go there, because we won’t do effective work." A Spanish search-and-rescue team arrived in Marrakech and headed to the rural Talat N’Yaaqoub, according to Spain’s Emergency Military Unit. Britain sent a 60-person search team with four dogs, medical staff, listening devices and concrete-cutting gear. But the Czech Republic was waiting for permission to send a team of 70 rescuers. And Germany sent home more than 50 rescuers who'd been waiting to fly out, news agency dpa reported. France, which has many ties to Morocco and said four of its citizens died in the quake, said Moroccan authorities are evaluating proposals on a case-by-case basis.
French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna said Morocco is "the master of its choices, which must be respected." She announced 5 million euros ($5.4 million) in emergency funds for Moroccan and international non-governmental groups rushing to help survivors. French towns and cities have offered more than 2 million euros ($2.1 million) in aid, and popular performers are also collecting donations. Those left homeless — or fearing more aftershocks — have slept outside in the streets of the ancient city of Marrakech or under makeshift canopies in devastated Atlas Mountain towns like Moulay Brahim.
"I was asleep when the earthquake struck. I could not escape because the roof fell on me. I was trapped. I was saved by my neighbors who cleared the rubble with their bare hands," said Fatna Bechar. "Now, I am living with them in their house because mine was completely destroyed."The quake had a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 and hit at 11:11 p.m. Friday, the USGS said. A total of 2,497 people were confirmed dead and at least 2,476 others were injured, the Interior Ministry reported. Aftershocks have since hit the zone, rattling nerves in areas where damage has left buildings unstable. Morocco’s deadliest quake was a magnitude 5.8 temblor in 1960 that struck near the city of Agadir, killing at least 12,000. It prompted Morocco to change construction rules, but many buildings, especially rural homes, are not built to withstand such tremors. Flags were lowered across Morocco, as King Mohammed VI ordered three days of national mourning starting Sunday. But there was little time for mourning as survivors tried to salvage anything from damaged homes. Khadija Fairouje's face was puffy from crying as she joined relatives and neighbors hauling possessions down rock-strewn streets. She had lost her daughter and three grandsons aged 4 to 11 when their home collapsed while they were sleeping less than 48 hours earlier. "Nothing’s left. Everything fell," said her sister, Hafida Fairouje.

Iran, US on verge of prisoner swap under Qatar-mediated deal
Parisa Hafezi and Andrew Mills/September 11, 20236
DUBAI/DOHA, Sept 11 (Reuters) - When $6 billion of unfrozen Iranian funds are wired to banks in Qatar as early as next week, it will trigger a carefully choreographed sequence that will see as many as five detained U.S. dual nationals leave Iran and a similar number of Iranian prisoners held in the U.S. fly home, according to eight Iranian and other sources familiar with the negotiations who spoke to Reuters. As a first step, Iran on Aug. 10 released four U.S. citizens from Tehran’s Evin prison into house arrest, where they joined a fifth, who was already under house arrest. Later that day U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the move the first step of a process that would lead to their return home. They include businessmen Siamak Namazi, 51, and Emad Sharqi, 59, as well as environmentalist Morad Tahbaz, 67, who also holds British nationality, the U.S. administration has said. The Tahbaz and Shargi families did not respond to requests for comment. A lawyer for the Namazi family declined to comment. The identities of the fourth and fifth Americans, one of whom according to two sources is a woman, have not been disclosed. Reuters couldn't establish which Iranian prisoners, in turn, would be swapped by the U.S.

Iran hopes for funds transfer in 'coming days' under US deal
Agence France Presse/September 11, 20236
Iran said that it hopes the transfer of frozen funds as part of a deal with the United States to exchange prisoners would take place within days. Iran said Monday that it hopes the transfer of frozen funds as part of a deal with the United States to exchange prisoners would take place within days. "We hope that this transfer will be completed in the coming days and that Iran will have full access to its assets," said Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani. He said the funds will allow the Islamic republic to "purchase all non-sanctioned goods" which are not limited to food and medicine.

IAEA expresses regret for ‘disregard’ in dealing with Iran nuclear file
LBCI/September 11, 2023
The Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency expressed his regret on Monday for what he considered "disregard" of Iran's nuclear escalation, amid a limited reduction in tension between Tehran and Washington.

Explainer-What has changed in Iran one year since Mahsa Amini protests erupted?
DUBAI (Reuters)/Parisa Hafezi/September 11, 2023
Iran's rulers have intensified a clampdown on dissent nearly one year since the death in police custody of Mahsa Amini sparked protests which spiralled into some of the worst political turmoil since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
HOW DID THE PROTESTS START?
Protests began soon after the Sept. 16 death of Kurdish Iranian woman Mahsa Amini, 22, who had been arrested by morality police three days earlier for allegedly violating Iran's mandatory Islamic dress code. Amini, described as a shy person who minded her own business and stayed clear of politics, was detained as she stepped out of a train station in Tehran. News of her death circulated on social media. Protests erupted at her funeral in her hometown Saqez and then spread across the country with demonstrators chanting "Woman, life, freedom" in a furious challenge to Iran's clerical rulers. While Amini's family said she had been killed by blows to her head and limbs, the authorities said she had died due to existing medical problems, further fuelling anger over her death.
WHAT DID PROTESTERS WANT?
With women and young people often at the forefront, protesters targeted symbols of the Islamic Republic, burning pictures of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and chanting "Death to the Dictator". Women, including schoolgirls, took off and burned headscarves, revolting against laws obliging women to cover their hair and wear loose-fitting clothes. The protests were particularly intense in areas home to ethnic minorities that have long faced discrimination by the state, including Kurds in the northwest and Baluchis in the southeast. Meanwhile, a growing number of women were disregarding the dress code. After a chess player and a climber competed without wearing headscarves other prominent women defied the authorities by violating the hijab law and voicing support for the protests. Authorities have imposed travel bans and jail terms on several public figures from athletes to actresses.
QUELLING THE PROTESTS
Security forces restricted access to messaging apps and fiercely confronted the leaderless protesters using tear gas, clubs and, in some cases, live ammunition even as the protests rumbled on into the new year. A paramilitary volunteer militia, the Basij, played a prominent part in the crackdown. Rights groups said over 500 people - including 71 minors - were killed, hundreds wounded and thousands arrested. Iran carried out seven executions linked to the unrest. Authorities have not given any official estimated death toll, but said dozens of the security forces were killed in the "riots".
DID ANYTHING CHANGE?
Buttressed by the Revolutionary Guards, the ruling elite appears to remain deeply entrenched in power despite its initial difficulties in subduing the protests.
Morality police largely vanished from the streets after Amini died in their custody. But as the protests fizzled they returned to streets and surveillance cameras were installed to identify and penalise unveiled women. Authorities described the veil as "one of the principles of the Islamic Republic" and ordered both private and public sectors to deny services to any women who had discarded it, temporarily closing thousands of non-compliant businesses. But with many Iranians saying the number of unveiled women continues to grow, the parliament is considering longer prison terms for anyone who flouts the dress code and harsher penalties for celebrities and businesses that violate the rules. Outside Iran, Western countries imposed new sanctions on security forces and on dozens of Iranian officials over the protests, further straining already difficult ties.
HOW WILL IRAN'S LEADERS SHORE UP THEIR POSITION?
Recent actions by security forces suggest Iran's rulers intend to brook no flicker of dissent as the anniversary of Amini's death approaches. Activists have accused authorities of a campaign to intimidate and instil fear, arresting, summoning for questioning, threatening or firing people connected to the protests. Journalists, lawyers, activists, students, academics, artists, public figures and family members of killed protesters, especially among ethnic minorities, have been targeted in recent weeks. Iranian officials have blamed the unrest on foreign foes, notably the U.S. and Israel, raising the stakes for anybody facing arrest.
However, in cracking down they risk widening a rift between the clerical leadership and ordinary Iranians increasingly dismayed by an economy hammered by sanctions and mismanagement, a potential source of future unrest.

Russia expands military bases along Finland border
Joe Barnes/The Telegraph/September 11, 2023
Russia has started expanding military bases along its border with Finland, according to new satellite imagery, as it seeks to reinforce supply lines of tanks and heavy artillery for its war in Ukraine. Three large buildings have been constructed at the Alakurtti military base, around 31 miles from the frontier, in the first signs of development at the site for years. Satellite images, published by Finland’s national broadcaster, appeared to show the construction of another military storage site at a tank and artillery depot in Petrozavodsk, some 108 miles from the border. The developments come after Moscow earlier this year threatened “countermeasures” against Nato when Finland became the Western alliance’s 31st member country. Finland’s membership nearly doubled Nato’s border with Russia, adding 833 miles of frontier, close to where Russian military bases house the largest concentration of nuclear weapons in the world. The satellite images appear to show three new storage warehouses at the base in Alakurtti, which is normally home to Russia’s 80th Separate Arctic Motor Rifle Brigade. Each of the buildings were erected from foundation to full height within a single day, according to a comparison of images taken late last year and just last month. Major Marko Eklund, a retired Finnish military operative, said the halls, which are about 100 metres long and 25 metres wide, could be used to house up to 40 armoured vehicles, to support a battalion. Russia has stationed about 2,000 troops at the Alakurtti base, but the majority of its forces in the area have been deployed to fight in Ukraine.
Significant losses
The forces, which are trained to fight in cold, dark Arctic conditions, are believed to have suffered heavy losses during the invasion. In June, it was reported that Ukrainian troops struck a command post manned by the brigade near the front lines. It’s not known whether Russia will increase the number of troops stationed in the region, but Nato officials believe it could take Moscow years to create a force capable of a cross-border offensive. Separate images revealed the construction of a new large warehouse amid the artillery cannons and tanks stored at Petrozavodsk, the site of Russia’s largest concentration of military hardware near the Finnish border. The kit stored at the site is enough to equip at least one motorised brigade of 4,000 Russian soldiers. Maj Eklund told Yle that the new building could store 50 armoured vehicles, but is most likely going to be used to refurbish and deliver equipment to Moscow’s forces in Ukraine. Most of the kit there has been gathering dust, having sat at the base since units were disbanded in the 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union. However, Russian losses have been so significant in Ukraine that its military has been forced to turn to deep storage units, like Petrozavodsk, to re-equip its forces. Satellite images taken in July showed 2S3 Akatsiya self-propelled howitzers, which were first manufactured in 1967, being loaded onto trains. Artillery units stationed at Petrozavodsk have steadily declined, according to Maj Eklund, who said more than 100 howitzers had been sent to the front lines in Ukraine since the beginning of the war. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month, then enjoy 1 year for just $9 with our US-exclusive offer.

Ukraine collects Russian bodies on 'road of death' in retaken southeast
BLAHODATNE, Ukraine (Reuters)/Anna Voitenko/September 11, 2023
Wearing face masks, the Ukrainian soldiers poked sticks into the undergrowth along a deserted country road, searching for the bodies of Russian soldiers they hoped to exchange for their own comrades, living and dead.
They called it the "road of death" after the number of Russian soldiers killed there when Ukrainian forces retook the southeastern village of Blahodatne at the start of their counteroffensive in June. Three months on, the frontline had shifted south and it was finally safe enough for the three-man team of Ukrainian soldiers to start their operation in this liberated part of Donetsk region. "We're going to search," said Volodymyr, a 50-year-old marine, as artillery fire boomed in the distance. "Search with our eyes. And using smell."
The route was dotted with gutted vehicles and shattered buildings. At one point, they used a rope to tug a body to make sure it had not been booby-trapped by retreating Russian forces. "Here's what we do. We gather up their bodies. We arrange exchanges for our prisoners who are alive. And for bodies. Our boys," Vasylii, a 53-year-old volunteer, said. "You know, so that a mother can go and visit the cemetery."Russia and Ukraine have conducted regular exchanges of prisoners of war, as well as the bodies of dead soldiers, since the Kremlin launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022. The group recovered nine bodies in their day-long search on Friday. Each was loaded onto the back of a truck and taken for forensic examination. Volodymyr said Russian forces had been forced to retreat rapidly from Blahodatne and that the only other route out had been unusable because it was heavily mined. "There was probably an exchange of fire. But they retreated very quickly," he said. "They left the wounded and killed on the way and escaped to Urozhaine. But they didn't stay in Urozhaine for long either. There was intense fighting for Urozhaine," he said, referring to a nearby village that was later retaken.

Moscow and Pyongyang confirm North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will visit Russia to meet with Putin
SEOUL, South Korea (AP)/September 11, 2023
Russia and North Korea confirmed Monday that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will visit Russia in a highly anticipated meeting with President Vladimir Putin that has sparked Western concerns about a potential arms deal for Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
A brief statement on the Kremlin’s website said Kim’s visit is at Putin's invitation and would take place “in the coming days.” The visit also was reported by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency, which said the leaders would meet — without specifying when and where. Associated Press journalists near the North Korea-Russia frontier saw a green train with yellow trim — similar to the train used by Kim during previous foreign trips — at a station on the North Korean side of a border river.
It was unclear whether Kim was on the train, which was seen moving back and forth between the station and the approach to the bridge that connects the countries. It had not crossed the bridge as of 7 p.m. (1000 GMT). Citing unidentified South Korean government sources, the Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported that the train likely left the North Korean capital of Pyongyang on Sunday evening and that a Kim-Putin meeting is possible as early as Tuesday. The Yonhap news agency and some other media published similar reports. Japan’s Kyodo news agency cited Russian officials as saying Kim was possibly heading for Russia in his personal train. South Korea’s Presidential Office, Defense Ministry and National Intelligence Service didn’t immediately confirm those details. U.S. officials released intelligence last week that North Korea and Russia were arranging a meeting between their leaders that would take place within this month as they expand their cooperation in the face of deepening confrontations with the United States. A possible venue for the meeting is the eastern Russian city of Vladivostok, where Putin arrived Monday to attend an international forum that runs through Wednesday, according to Russia’s TASS news agency. The city was also the site of Putin’s first meeting with Kim in 2019. According to U.S. officials, Putin could focus on securing more supplies of North Korean artillery and other ammunition to refill declining reserves as he seeks to defuse a Ukrainian counteroffensive and show that he’s capable of grinding out a long war of attrition. That could potentially put more pressure on the United States and its partners to pursue negotiations as concerns over a protracted conflict grow despite their huge shipments of advanced weaponry to Ukraine in the past 17 months.
North Korea has possibly tens of millions of artillery shells and rockets based on Soviet designs that could potentially give a huge boost to the Russian army, analysts say.
In exchange, Kim could seek badly needed energy and food aid and advanced weapons technologies, including those related to intercontinental ballistic missiles, nuclear-capable ballistic missile submarines and military reconnaissance satellites, analysts say.
There are concerns that potential Russian technology transfers would increase the threat posed by Kim’s growing arsenal of nuclear weapons and missiles that are designed to target the U.S., South Korea, and Japan. After a complicated, hot-and-cold relationship for decades, Russia and North Korea have been drawing closer since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The bond has been driven by Putin’s need for war help and Kim’s efforts to boost the visibility of his partnerships with traditional allies Moscow and Beijing as he tries to break out of diplomatic isolation and have North Korea be part of a united front against Washington. While using the distraction caused by the Ukraine conflict to ramp up its weapons development, North Korea has repeatedly blamed Washington for the crisis in Ukraine, claiming the West’s “hegemonic policy” justified a Russian offensive in Ukraine to protect itself.
North Korea is the only nation besides Russia and Syria to recognize the independence of two Russian-backed separatist regions in eastern Ukraine — Donetsk and Luhansk -– and it has also hinted at an interest in sending construction workers to those areas to help with rebuilding efforts. Russia -– along with China -– have blocked U.S.-led efforts at the U.N. Security Council to strengthen sanctions on North Korea over its intensifying missile tests while accusing Washington of worsening tensions with Pyongyang by expanding military exercises with South Korea and Japan. The United States has been accusing North Korea since last year of providing Russia with arms, including artillery shells sold to the Russian mercenary group Wagner. Both Russian and North Korean officials denied such claims. But speculation about the countries’ military cooperation grew after Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu made a rare visit to North Korea in July, when Kim invited him to an arms exhibition and a massive military parade in the capital where he showcased ICBMs designed to target the U.S. mainland.
Following that visit, Kim toured North Korea’s weapons factories, including a facility producing artillery systems where he urged workers to speed up the development and large-scale production of new kinds of ammunition. Experts say Kim’s visits to the factories likely had a dual goal of encouraging the modernization of North Korean weaponry and examining artillery and other supplies that could possibly be exported to Russia.
Jon Finer, U.S. President Joe Biden’s chief deputy national security adviser, told reporters Sunday that buying weapons from North Korea “may be the best and may be the only option” open to Moscow as it tries to keep its war effort going. “We have serious concerns about the prospect of North Korea potentially selling weapons, additional weapons, to the Russian military. It is interesting to reflect for a minute on what it says that when Russia goes around the world looking for partners that can help it, it lands on North Korea,” Finer said aboard a plane carrying Biden from India to Vietnam.
Some analysts say a potential meeting between Kim and Putin would be more about symbolic gains than substantial military cooperation. Russia, which has always closely guarded its most important weapons technologies, even from key allies such as China, could be unwilling to make major technology transfers with North Korea for what is likely to be limited war supplies transported over a small rail link between the countries, they say.

Russians opened fire on a Ukrainian flag tied to balloons, revealing their position for a counterattack, Ukraine says
Sophia Ankel/Business Insider/September 11, 2023
A Ukrainian flag attached to helium balloons flew into occupied territory, Kyiv's military said. Russian soldiers tried to shoot it down but revealed their firing positions, an official said. Ukraine was able to use this information to launch an attack on the soldiers, the official added. Russian soldiers accidentally revealed their positions after they tried to shoot down a Ukrainian flag suspended from balloons flying over occupied territory, a Ukrainian official said. The large flag, attached to dozens of helium balloons, was released from the Ukrainian-controlled town of Avdiyivka on Sunday by the military. The launch was to commemorate the 245th anniversary of the city's founding, according to Vitalii Barabash, the head of the Avdiivka city military administration. It eventually flew over Russian-occupied Donetsk City in eastern Ukraine, where Russian soldiers attempted to shoot it down, Barabash told national television, The Kyiv Independent reported. "When the Ukrainian flag flew from Avdiyivka to Donetsk, the Russians tried to shoot it down with all the means at their disposal and revealed all their firing positions," he said, according to a translation by the Ukrainian NGO Euromaidan Press. Barabash said that Ukraine's 110th brigade then "worked effectively to attack the Russian soldiers." He didn't give specifics of the attack or how successful it was. Ukraine's defense ministry did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment. "To be honest, it was probably the most successful flag launch [from Avdiyivka to Donetsk ] ever," Barabash added. "For several hours, the Ukrainian flag was flying over occupied Donetsk. I had a lot of messages from people living in the occupied territory, who told me they are waiting for the liberation of Donetsk." Footage of the flag flying over various parts of the Russian-occupied city was published by the Telegram channel Typical Donetsk. Donetsk City has been occupied by Russia since 2014 when fighting in eastern Ukraine began. Barabash's comments come amid elections in other Moscow-occupied territories, including Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia. The Kremlin is expected to claim a heavy victory in the elections, which have been dismissed as "fake elections" and a "sham" by Kyiv and the West, The Guardian reported.

Russia says ban on Russians bringing cars, some goods into EU is racist
MOSCOW (Reuters)/September 11, 2023
Russia said on Monday a European Union ban on Russians bringing their cars and some personal goods into the bloc was racist, and one ally of President Vladimir Putin suggested that all diplomatic relations should be severed in response. In an explanatory note to its rules on sanctions imposed over the Ukraine war, the European Commission said Russians were temporarily barred from bringing some personal goods or vehicles into the 27-nation EU. The annex referred to in the advice also appears to ban the import of a host of items which could be dual use alongside more mundane items such as make-up, toothpaste, deodorants, toilet paper and mobile phones. "It's just racism," Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, said of the Commission's advice. "This is racism pure and simple."Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said the EU had just spat in the face of all Russians, saying they were being treated as "half-animals with bad heredity". "What should we do? Certainly not introduce retaliatory restrictions for EU citizens, we are not racists," Medvedev said. "It would be better to simply suspend diplomatic relations with the EU for a while."
SANCTIONS
The West imposed stringent sanctions on Russia after Putin ordered troops into Ukraine in a full-scale invasion in 2022. Moscow says the sanctions and the confiscation of Russian property amount to a declaration of economic war. The Kremlin has vowed that Russia, whose economy is forecast to grow this year, will never bow to the West over Ukraine. In a question and answer sheet, the European Commission asked: "Can Russian nationals temporarily bring personal goods and vehicles listed in Annex XXI and subject to the prohibition in Art. 3i of Council Regulation 833/2014 into the Union, e.g. for touristic travels?""No. Article 3i of Council Regulation 833/2014 prohibits the purchase, import, or transfer, directly or indirectly, of goods as listed in Annex XXI to the Regulation if they originate in Russia or are exported from Russia. This includes motor vehicles (cars) falling under CN code 8703."Asked about the implementation of the rules, a Commission spokesperson said clothes worn by someone crossing a border were unlikely to be aimed at circumventing sanctions. "That is a different situation to an expensive car," the spokesperson said. Some Russians say the West has at times played into the hands of the Kremlin by appearing to cast all Russian citizens as enemies who should be punished and ostracised for a war over which they have no say. The Kremlin says Russians are being illegally discriminated against in the West amid a wave of Russophobia.

Burhan Visits Eritrea to Discuss Sudan Conflict with the President
Asharq Al Awsat/15:47-11 September 2023
Sudan’s military chief traveled to Eritrea on Monday for a meeting with President Isaias Afwerki, the general's latest international trip since fighting broke out between his army and a rival paramilitary force in mid-April, state media said. Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan has been looking for international support since tensions with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, commanded by Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, burst into open fighting that has reduced Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, and its neighboring cities of Omdurman and Bahri, to urban battlefields. According to Sudan's state-run SUNA news agency, Monday's talks between Burhan and Isaias will focus on bilateral relations and the conflict in Sudan. No further details were given. For year, relations between Eritrea and Sudan have been fraught. Sudan is host to some 126,000 Eritrean refugees, according to figures published by the UN refugee agency. The visit is Burhan's fourth high profile diplomatic meeting in the past two weeks. Last week, he met with Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in Doha. The previous week, he met with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in the Egyptian coastal city of el-Alamein. Fighting raged in Sudan. On Sunday, a drone attack in an open market in Khartoum killed at least 43 people. The Associated Press has been unbale to verify which force was behind the attack. In the western Darfur region — the scene of a genocidal campaign in the early 2000s — the conflict has morphed into ethnic violence, according to rights groups and the United Nations. The conflict has killed more than 4,000 people, according to the United Nations. The real toll is likely much higher, doctors and activists say.

Storm and Floods Kill at Least 150 People in Libya
Asharq Al Awsat/15:47-11 September 2023
A powerful storm and heavy floods have killed 150 people in the eastern Libyan city of Derna over the last two days and the death toll is expected to rise to 250, the head of the Red Crescent in Benghazi said on Monday. Footage on social media showed people stranded on the roofs of their vehicles as Storm Daniel hit Benghazi, Sousse, Al Bayda, Al-Marj and Derna, a city on the Mediterranean some 250 km (150 miles) east of Benghazi. "We recorded at least 150 deaths after the collapse of buildings. We expect death toll to rise to 250. The situation is very catastrophic," the Red Crescent's Kais Fhakeri told Reuters. The toll in other areas was not immediately clear. "We were asleep, and when we woke up, we found water besieging the house. We are inside and trying to get out," Derna resident Ahmed Mohamed told Reuters by phone on Monday. The missing include seven members of the Libyan National Army (LNA), its spokesman, Ahmad Mismari, said. The LNA is led by Khalifa Haftar which controls the eastern part of the divided country. Heavy floods washed away vehicles, footage broadcast by eastern Libya's Almostkbal TV showed. The channel also posted pictures of a collapsed road between Sousse and Shahat, home to the Greek-founded and UNESCO-listed archaeological site Cyrene. Witnesses said the water level had reached three meters (10 feet) in Derna. Libya's eastern-based parliament declared three days of mourning. Abdulhamid al-Dbeibah, head of the Government of National Unity in Tripoli, also declared three days of mourning in all the affected cities, calling them "disaster areas". Four major oil ports in Libya, Ras Lanuf, Zueitina, Brega and Es Sidra, were closed from Saturday evening for three days, two oil engineers told Reuters. Search-and-rescue operations were ongoing, witnesses said. Authorities declared a state of extreme emergency, closing schools and stores and imposing a curfew. His administration holds little sway in eastern Libya, but Dbeibah said on Sunday he had directed all state agencies to “immediately deal” with the damage and floods in eastern cities. Dbeibah's government is recognized by the Central Bank of Libya, which disburses funds to government departments across the country. The United Nations in Libya said it was following the storm closely and would "provide urgent relief assistance in support of response efforts at local and national levels".

Israeli delegation attends UNESCO gathering in Saudi Arabia
RIYADH (Reuters)/September 11, 2023
An Israeli delegation on Monday attended a meeting by the United Nations' cultural agency in Riyadh, in another sign that Saudi Arabia is opening up to Israel with Washington pressing for a full normalisation of ties. Three Israeli officials were seen sitting at Israel's chairs of the 45th session of UNESCO's World Heritage Committee, a Reuters witness said. The officials declined to comment when approached by Reuters. Another Israeli official said the delegation included the Foreign Ministry's deputy director-general for international organisations and the ambassador to international organisations in Paris. A delegate from Israel's Education Ministry and the chair of Israel's Antiquities Authority also took part in the gathering, the official said. The Saudi government did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Israel's Foreign Ministry spokesperson and UNESCO declined to comment. Public appearances of Israeli officials are rare in Saudi Arabia, a Muslim powerhouse and home to Islam's holiest shrines, but both sides have had covert contacts which were forged partly through shared fears of Iran. Washington has been pressing its traditional ally Riyadh to sign a normalisation deal with Israel, which would be its biggest diplomatic win in the region and following similar agreements with United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco, known as the Abraham Accords. However, Riyadh has so far resisted U.S. pressure and linked the move to the creation of a Palestinian state as part of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, along with other demands.

Israel's contentious legal overhaul comes to a head as judges hear cases on their own fate
JERUSALEM (AP)/September 11, 2023
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's judicial overhaul plan has plunged the country into nine months of unrest and exposed bitter divisions within Israeli society. On Tuesday, the country’s gaze shifts from the streets to the courtroom, where a panel of Supreme Court judges will deliberate over the very laws meant to curtail their power. Israel’s High Court is to hear the first of three flashpoint cases in the coming weeks, all dealing with the legality of the overhaul. Netanyahu unveiled the plan early this year, saying the country's unelected judges hold too much power over parliament. He is backed by an alliance of ultranationalist and religious parties, each motivated by different grievances against the legal system. Opponents say the plan will push the country toward authoritarian rule by concentrating power in the hands of Netanyahu and his parliamentary allies. The court's rulings could set the stage for a constitutional crisis, casting doubt on who holds ultimate legal authority in the country — parliament or the courts.
HOW DID WE GET HERE?
The plan has triggered mass protests, shaken the economy, sparked mass refusals by military reservists and drawn concern from the country's top ally, the U.S. But Netanyahu's government has barreled forward. It passed the first major law in July, barring the Supreme Court from striking down decisions by parliament it deems “unreasonable.”Judges have used this legal standard in the past to prevent government decisions viewed as unsound or corrupt. Earlier this year, the court blocked the appointment of a politician with past convictions of bribery and tax offenses as finance minister. Netanyahu's allies say parliament should have the final say over appointments. A second case will look at a law passed early this year that makes it harder for the country's attorney general to declare a prime minister unfit and remove him from office. The new law allows this only in cases of mental or physical incapacitation. Critics say the law was passed to protect Netanyahu while he is on trial for corruption charges. The third case involves Justice Minister Yariv Levin's refusal to convene the committee that chooses the country's judges. Critics accuse Levin, a key architect of the overhaul, of holding up the committee until he can appoint judges sympathetic to the overhaul.
WHY DO THESE CASES MATTER?
Tuesday's case is a contest between fundamentally different interpretations of democracy.
Netanyahu and his coalition say that as the people’s elected representatives, they have a democratic mandate to govern without being hobbled by the court. “A court that sets the laws for itself and decides for itself which laws it operates under is not a court,” Simcha Rothman, another key architect of the overhaul, told the Army Radio station Monday. Opponents say with Israel's weak system of checks and balances, the court must retain the power to review and override some government decisions. They say that if the court loses the reasonability standard, Netanyahu's government could appoint convicted cronies to Cabinet posts, roll back rights for women and minorities, and annex the occupied West Bank. “This government has already expressed a desire to fire officials like the attorney general and replace them with yes-men that will do whatever the government wants. And the reasonability bill presumably takes away our power to challenge that,” said Noa Sattath, executive director of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, a group challenging the law. On Sept. 19, the Supreme Court is set to hear arguments challenging the legality of Levin’s refusal to convene the judicial appointments committee. The final case, on the attorney general's powers to declare a prime minister incapacitated, is set for Sept. 28.
WHAT ARE THE POSSIBLE OUTCOMES?
The laws on reasonability and removing the prime minister from office are what are known as “Basic Laws" — major pieces of legislation that serve as a sort of informal constitution, which Israel does not have. While parliament can easily amend Basic Laws with a bare majority, the court itself has never struck down that type of legislation and doing so would thrust Israel into uncharted territory. Rulings are likely months way, but much is at stake. If the court strikes down the new laws, senior officials, including Levin, have hinted they won't respect the ruling. That would plunge Israel into a constitutional crisis, where citizens and the country's security forces are left to decide which set of orders to follow — the parliament’s or the court’s. If, on the other hand, the court sides with the government, protesters have vowed to amp up civil disobedience. They say future measures could include strikes, walkouts, and tax evasion. Given the controversy surrounding the case, it’s possible that the court will find a way to soften its decision by limiting the implementation of the law without striking it down. It is also possible that a compromise between the coalition and the opposition will be reached, said Amichai Cohen, a constitutional law professor at Ono College and a senior fellow at the Israel Democracy Institute.
“The court has never before faced such an extreme threat,” he said.

Israel Includes Gaza Americans in US Visa-waiver Pilot as Deadline Nears
Asharq Al Awsat/11 September 2023
Israel eased travel for Palestinian Americans from the Gaza Strip on Monday as part of final preparations for a deal enabling Israelis to enter the United States without visas, an Israeli official said. As a condition for its accession to the US Visa Waiver Program (VWP), Israel has since July 20 loosened access through its borders, and in and out of the occupied West Bank, for Palestinian Americans in what the allies deem a pilot period, Reuters said. The deadline for Israel to show compliance with the US conditions is Sept 30. If successful, it expects to be incorporated in the VWP by November - a respite for relations strained by disputes over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's judicial reforms and policies on the Palestinians. Gaza, whose governing Islamist Hamas is designated a terrorist group by Israel and the United States, was previously excluded from the pilot. The enclave is under an Israeli and Egyptian blockade and both maintain restrictions along their borders with it. The exclusion stirred protests by Palestinian Americans and calls from Washington for a change in practice. An Israeli official said that, as of Monday, Palestinian Americans living in Gaza and who are not deemed security threats will be able to enter Israel on a "B2" tourist visa, opening up the possibility of them taking flights out of its airports. Israel previously said it intended to include Palestinian Americans living in Gaza - whose number it puts at between 100 and 130 - on Sept 15 but would try to bring the date forward. The US Embassy in Jerusalem had no immediate comment. As part of the pilot, Israel says it has already been letting Palestinian Americans leave Gaza by special buses to Jordan, from which they could travel elsewhere. In another new policy, Israel says it is allowing Palestinian Americans from abroad who have first-degree relatives in Gaza to make once-yearly visits of up to 90 days. Palestinian and US officials have assessed that the number of dual US nationals in Gaza may be several hundred. Asked about the apparent discrepancy in the figures, an Israeli official said most of those are not full-time Gaza residents.

Protests kick off at Israeli justice minister's home
Associated Press/11 September 2023
Scores of Israeli protesters on Monday flooded the streets outside the home of Israel's justice minister, the architect of the country's divisive judicial overhaul, a day before a pivotal hearing in which the Supreme Court will decide whether to accept the curbing of its powers. Israeli police said they arrested six people in the central Israeli town of Modiin, home to Justice Minister Yair Levin, on charges of disrupting public order and blocking roads as they protested plans by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's far-right government to weaken the Supreme Court. The judicial plan has triggered one of the biggest domestic crises in Israeli history and exposed the country's bitter divides.
On Tuesday, all 15 of Israel's Supreme Court justices will appear on the bench for the first time ever to hear an appeal against the first major part of the overhaul, which the the government pushed through parliament in July. The rowdy crowd of roughly 200 demonstrators outside Levin's home blew horns, chanted through megaphones against the government and brandished signs, jostling with police who pushed back the crowds. After a few hours, Levin left his besieged home in a sleek black car surrounded by police officers and security guards who tried to clear a path for him through the swarm of protesters. Further demonstrations are expected this week as the Supreme Court hears petitions Tuesday by rights groups and individuals calling it to strike down the law passed by parliament that cancels the court's ability to block government actions and appointments using the legal concept that they are "unreasonable."
The hearings put the country's top justices in the unprecedented position of defending their own independence and ruling on their own fate. The court faces massive public pressure to strike down the law and has an inherent interest in preserving its powers and independence. But if it does so, Netanyahu's government could ignore the ruling, setting the stage for a crisis over who has ultimate authority. Levin, a Netanyahu ally who has spearheaded the overhaul, argued in interviews with local media last week against proposals to seek a compromise with the opposition and soften the current judicial changes. Critics of the overhaul describe it as a blow to democracy, arguing that Israel's judiciary represents the primary check on the powers of the prime minister and his majority coalition in parliament. They also say the prime minister has a conflict of interest trying to change the legal system at a time when he is on trial for corruption charges. Supporters of Netanyahu's far-right, ultra-Orthodox government say the law will prevent liberal, unelected judges from interfering with the decisions of elected lawmakers. They also say the court should not be able to rule on a law limiting its own authority.

Yemeni Authorities Try to Contain Clashes Between Ethiopian Immigrants That Killed 10
Asharq Al Awsat/15:47-11 September 2023
The Yemeni security authorities launched a campaign in Aden to contain the bloody clash between Ethiopian immigrants, which killed ten and injured dozens of others.
Yemeni sources reported that the authorities in Aden are transferring migrants to temporary camps in Mansoura and Sheikh Othman. According to the sources, although the security forces ended the clashes, the issue persists, and police vehicles were seen in the streets transporting migrants to a gathering point near the Basateen camp in Sheikh Othman District. The Yemeni police and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) remained silent about the reasons for the outbreak of confrontations.
The President of Oromo Human Rights, Arafat Jibril Barki, stated that the main reason for the confrontations was the refusal of the Ethiopian authorities to receive migrants from the Amhara and Tigray nationalities. Ethiopia denied their entrance because of the security conditions in the regions and only accepted nationals of the Oromo ethnicity. Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat, Jibril said the problem began last Thursday in front of the office of the International Organization for Migration. The migrants were demanding to return to their country, but the Ethiopian government asked the UN not to allow the return of two ethnic groups. The individuals banned from traveling attacked the international immigration representative and one of the guards. Arafat Jibril reported that the protesters tore up a travel ticket given to an Oromo national, and one of them stabbed an employee while the guard responded and shot the attacker, killing him. Clashes began and expanded to other areas, killing ten, six of whom were from Amhara, one from Tigray, and three from Oromo. The official stated that the news of excluding the Amhara and Tigray ethnicities spread quickly among migrants, which led to heated discussions that developed into violent clashes before the security forces intervened.
- Yemeni tries to contain the situation
The Yemeni authorities proceeded with their campaigns against illegal immigrants and are discussing the issue with international organizations. Government sources confirmed that transferring them to the Kharaz camp in Lahj is the best option, given the complexities associated with the internal situation in Ethiopia. Yemeni officials told Asharq Al-Awsat that the largest Kharaz camp in the country lacks many services. But it is the only place capable of accommodating the thousands of migrants pouring in, exceeding 86,000 over the past months. Officials confirmed that thousands of migrants wanted to return to their country after discovering that smugglers deceived them, bringing them to a nation at war rather than taking them to the Gulf. The International Organization for Migration had suspended the voluntary return program for thousands of migrants due to lack of funding, but it has recently reactivated it. UN estimates indicate that the number of African immigrants in Yemen exceeds 200,000, including 43,000 stranded people. The organization explains that thousands of migrants are unable to continue their journey onward. They cannot return to their countries of origin and are currently living in dire humanitarian conditions. According to the organization that monitors and tracks the movement of migrants and internal displacement, thousands of migrants from the Horn of Africa continued to flow to Yemen. About 11,000 immigrants have returned to their home countries as part of the voluntary return program, as the organization works to support stranded migrants to ensure a safer return.

Drone attack on open market kills at least 43 in Sudan
Associated Press/September 11, 2023
A drone attack Sunday on an open market south of Sudan's capital, Khartoum, killed at least 43 people, activists and a medical group said, as the military and a powerful rival paramilitary group battle for control of the country. More than 55 others were wounded in the attack in Khartoum's May neighborhood, where paramilitary forces battling the military were heavily deployed, the Sudan Doctors' Union said in a statement. The casualties were taken to Bashair University Hospital. The Resistance Committees, an activist group that helps organize humanitarian assistance, posted footage on social media showing bodies wrapped in white sheets in an open yard at the hospital. Sudan has been rocked by violence since mid-April, when tensions between the country's military, led by Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, commanded by Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, burst into open fighting. The RSF blamed the military's air force for Sunday's attack, though it was not immediately possible to independently verify the claim. The military, meanwhile, said Sunday afternoon that it didn't target civilians, describing the RSF accusations as "false and misleading claims."Indiscriminate shelling and airstrikes by both factions are not uncommon in Sudan's war, which has made the Greater Khartoum area a battleground. The conflict has since spread to several parts of the country. In the Greater Khartoum area, which includes the cities of Khartoum, Omdurman and Bahri, RSF troops have commandeered civilian homes and turned them into operational bases. The military responded by bombing these residential areas, rights groups and activists say. In the western Darfur region — the scene of a genocidal campaign in the early 2000s — the conflict has morphed into ethnic violence, with the RSF and allied Arab militias attacking ethnic African groups, according to rights groups and the United Nations. Fierce clashes ensued over the weekend in al-Fasher, the provincial capital of North Darfur province, following an attack on a military facility by the RSF, local media reported. Clementine Nkweta-Salami, the U.N. humanitarian coordinator in Sudan, expressed concerns Sunday about the clashes in al-Fasher. Writing on X, formerly known as Twitter, the U.N. official called for warring factions to stop fighting "so that humanitarians can bring in food, medicine and shelter items to those who need them most."
The war has killed more than 4,000 people, according to August figures from the United Nations. However, the real toll is almost certainly much higher, doctors and activists say. The number of internally displaced persons has nearly doubled since mid-April to reach at least 7.1 million people, according to the U.N. refugee agency. Another 1.1 million are refugees in neighboring countries, according to figures released last week by the International Organization for Migration. Chad received about 465,000 refugees, mostly from West Darfur province where the RSF and its Arab militias launched scorched-earth attacks on non-Arab tribes in the provincial capital of Geneina and its surrounding areas, according to the U.N. and rights groups.

Historic Cairo cemetery faces destruction from new highways as Egypt's government reshapes the city
CAIRO (AP)/September 11, 2023
The cane chairs and umbrella still stand in the courtyard of Hussein Omar’s family mausoleum, where his grandmother came every morning for 19 years after her daughter — his mother — died. Near her grave, she would sit and pray under the date palm and among the flowering plants, a few hours of peace in Cairo ’s historic City of the Dead. Now the mausoleum, built in 1924 in a neo-Islamic style and housing the graves of a number of prominent Egyptians from a century ago, is threatened with demolition.
Authorities have already razed hundreds of tombs and mausoleums as they carry out plans to build a network of multilane highways through the City of the Dead, a vast cemetery that has been in use for more than a millennium. Stunned preservationists say the construction is destroying a unique part of Egypt’s heritage where major Islamic figures, prominent Egyptian politicians, artists and scholars and the loved ones of many Egyptians are buried.
“It’s always felt like a very sacred space. We always thought that whatever happens in the rest of Cairo, the City of the Dead would be safe,” said Omar, a historian who is writing a 500-year history of Cairo as told through the necropolis. "As we see now, that’s not the case.”The work is part of a mega-building campaign by President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi that is reshaping the city of some 20 million people. His government has put up massive freeways and flyovers at a furious rate, torn down several older neighborhoods it considers slums and built housing projects. It has encouraged the growth of gated suburban compounds outside the city while building a giant new capital in the desert. Though many support the roadwork to unclog congestion in the overcrowded city, the construction has also brought complaints of uprooting green spaces and trees.
But the cemetery destruction sparked an outcry that is unusual in an Egypt, where dissent has been squelched for years under el-Sissi. Dozens of parties, activists, public figures and non-governmental organizations signed a petition in August condemning the destruction. Five members of a committee of experts formed by the government to study the cemeteries resigned in protest, saying authorities ignored its recommendations that demolitions be halted and alternatives to the routes be found. The government’s project is destroying a “unique, architectural, historic fabric,” Ayman Wanas, an official with the government department that lists distinctive buildings, wrote in his resignation letter posted online. “It’s a waste of Egypt’s historic, valuable heritage which is irreplaceable.”Apparently in response, authorities last week temporarily halted the demolition of tombs in the main part of the cemetery, a municipal official who oversees the eastern Cairo area where the cemeteries are located, told The Associated Press. He said no explanation was given to the municipality, but he believes the government either wants to examine alternatives or wants to quiet criticism ahead of a meeting of the United Nations cultural agency, UNESCO, that started Sunday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't allowed to brief media.
Security agents told grave caretakers not to let anyone enter or photograph sites, several caretakers said. The area is designated by UNESCO as a world heritage zone. But many preservationists sharply criticize the agency for remaining silent over the destruction. In a statement to the AP, UNESCO said it has expressed concerns to the Egyptian government and asked for more information on the work.
There was no official announcement of the temporary halt and no word that the highway plans had been changed. The City of the Dead, covering nearly 2 square miles (5 square kilometers), has been a unique space in Cairo for centuries. Originally a desert plain outside the city, it first came into use soon after the Muslim conquest of Egypt in the 700s. Imam Shafii, one of the top scholars of early Islam, was buried there after his death in 819, and now the grey dome of his mausoleum-shrine towers over the district.
Over the centuries, it was filled with the tombs of Mamluk and Ottoman nobles and ordinary Egyptians. A rare large open space in Cairo, it has a stark beauty — quiet dirt paths run through a landscape of grave-markers, ancient domes and unexpected areas of greenery. Stately mausoleum compounds hold elaborately carved and decorated cenotaphs inside. The area also abounds with life. Families come weekly to visit loved ones’ graves, spending the day with picnics and food. Generations of caretaker families live in the mausoleums. Kids fly kites on its empty roads in the evening. Tens of thousand of people live in residential neighborhoods within the cemetery, and on Fridays its main avenue is packed with an outdoor market. The main demolitions so far have been in an area dotted with mausoleums of some of Egypt’s most notable families of the late 1800s and early 1900s. The government said it has given families who had to exhume and move their loved ones new burial plots, usually in the suburbs outside Cairo. Omar’s extended family has five mausoleums in the cemetery, two of which are slated for destruction. His mother, who died in 2001, is buried in the Barakat family mausoleum. Among his forebearers there are Fathallah and Atef Barakat, two nationalist figures who participated in the 1919 Revolution against British colonial rule. For Omar and others, the necropolis isn't just a historic site, but a center of personal memories and a place that joins life, death and peace. Omar recalls visiting the mausoleum as a 6-year-old and asking his grandmother what the sound was that he was hearing. Raised in densely urbanized Cairo, he didn’t recognize the sound of birds singing. “It is about the cohesiveness of the space, the peacefulness of the space. It has historically been a place of serenity,” he said. “What does it mean to have some lone surviving mausolea in the middle of a massive jumble of roads and traffic?” In 2020, a large highway flyover was built across the southern end of the cemetery, razing hundreds of graves. The more extensive plans now reportedly include making way for two new highways, two large roundabouts, a giant cloverleaf and the widening of other roads. Preservationists fear that will mean the City of the Dead's end: Carved up between highways, its remaining pieces would be vulnerable to further destruction.
The government has long argued the graves are not on a list of protected official historic Islamic and Christian monuments, a list that has hardly been updated in decades.
Two 700-year-old minarets on the list that are in the path of the roadwork are being dismantled and moved to another location. The planned highways weave within yards (meters) of several other registered monuments.
Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly said in June that alternative burial sites are being provided for families moving their dead ahead of the construction. He said tomb markers of historic figures would be collected in a “Cemetery of the Immortals.”
Mostafa el-Sadek, a university professor who leads a volunteer initiative to document ancient graves and mausoleums, was frustrated by the government’s insistence on razing the tombs. “The demolition must stop,” he said. “This area has layers and layers of history. Any problems, including the groundwater, could be resolved. It’s a matter of willingness.”
Lee Keath And Samy Magdy, The Associated Press

North Korean train presumably carrying Kim Jong Un departed for Russia
Associated Press/September 11, 2023
A North Korean train presumably carrying leader Kim Jong Un has departed for Russia for a possible meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, South Korean media said Monday.Citing unidentified South Korean government sources, the Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported that the train likely left the North Korean capital of Pyongyang on Sunday evening and that a Kim-Putin meeting is possible as early as Tuesday. The Yonhap news agency and some other media published similar reports. Japan's Kyodo news agency cited Russian officials as saying that Kim was possibly heading for Russia in his personal train. South Korea's Presidential Office, Defense Ministry and National Intelligence Service didn't immediately confirm those details. U.S. officials released intelligence last week that North Korea and Russia were arranging a meeting between their leaders that would take place within this month as they expand their cooperation in the face of deepening confrontations with the United States. A possible venue for the meeting is the eastern Russian city of Vladivostok, where Putin arrived Monday to attend an international forum that runs through Wednesday, according to Russia's TASS news agency. The city was also the site of Putin's first meeting with Kim in 2019. According to U.S. officials, Putin could focus on securing more supplies of North Korean artillery and other ammunition to refill declining reserves as he seeks to defuse a Ukrainian counteroffensive and show that he's capable of grinding out a long war of attrition. That could potentially put more pressure on the United States and its partners to pursue negotiations as concerns about a protracted conflict grow despite their huge shipments of advanced weaponry to Ukraine over the past 17 months. North Korea has possibly tens of millions of artillery shells and rockets based on Soviet designs that could potentially give a huge boost to the Russian army, analysts say. In exchange, Kim could seek badly needed energy and food aid and advanced weapons technologies, including those related to intercontinental ballistic missiles, nuclear-capable ballistic missile submarines and military reconnaissance satellites, analysts say. There are concerns that potential Russian technology transfers would increase the threat posed by Kim's growing arsenal of nuclear weapons and missiles that are designed to target the United States, South Korea, and Japan.
After a complicated, hot-and-cold relationship for decades, Russia and North Korea have been drawing closer to each other since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The bond has been driven by Putin's need for war help and Kim's efforts to boost the visibility of his partnerships with traditional allies Moscow and Beijing as he tries to break out of diplomatic isolation and have North Korea be part of a united front against Washington. While using the distraction caused by the Ukraine conflict to ramp up its weapons development, North Korea has repeatedly blamed the United States for the crisis in Ukraine, claiming the West's "hegemonic policy" justified a Russian offensive in Ukraine to protect itself.
North Korea is the only nation aside of Russia and Syria to recognize the independence of two Russian-backed separatist regions in eastern Ukraine — Donetsk and Luhansk -– and it has also hinted at an interest in sending construction workers to those areas to help with rebuilding efforts. Russia -– along with China -– have blocked U.S.-led efforts at the U.N. Security Council to strengthen sanctions on North Korea over its intensifying missile tests while accusing Washington of worsening tensions with Pyongyang by expanding military exercises with South Korea and Japan. The United States has been accusing North Korea since last year of providing Russia with arms, including artillery shells sold to the Russian mercenary group Wagner. Both Russian and North Korean officials denied such claims. But speculation about the countries' military cooperation grew after Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu made a rare visit to North Korea in July, when Kim invited him to an arms exhibition and a massive military parade in the capital where he showcased ICBMs designed to target the U.S. mainland. Following Shoigu's visit, Kim toured North Korea's weapons factories, including a facility producing artillery systems where he urged workers to speed up the development and large-scale production of new kinds of ammunition. Experts say Kim's visits to the factories likely had a dual goal of encouraging the modernization of North Korean weaponry and examining artillery and other supplies that could possibly be exported to Russia. Jon Finer, U.S. President Joe Biden's chief deputy national security adviser, told reporters on Sunday that buying weapons from North Korea "may be the best and may be the only option" open to Moscow as it tries to keep its war effort going. "We have serious concerns about the prospect of North Korea potentially selling weapons, additional weapons, to the Russian military. It is interesting to reflect for a minute on what it says that when Russia goes around the world looking for partners that can help it, it lands on North Korea," Finer said aboard a plane carrying Biden from India to Vietnam. Some analysts say a potential meeting between Kim and Putin would be more about symbolic gains than substantial military cooperation. Russia — which has always closely guarded its most important weapons technologies, even from key allies such as China — could be unwilling to make major technology transfers with North Korea for what is likely to be limited war supplies transported over a small rail link between the countries, they say.

Latest English LCCC  analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on September 11-12/2023
Analysis of IAEA Iran Verification and Monitoring Report – September 2023
Institute for Science and International Security/September 11/2023
David Albright
Institute for Science and International Security
Sarah Burkhard
Institute for Science and International Security
Spencer Faragasso
Institute for Science and International Security
Andrea Stricker
Nonproliferation and Biodefense Program Deputy Director and Research Fellow
Background
● This report summarizes and assesses information in the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA’s) quarterly report, dated September 4, 2023, Verification and monitoring in the Islamic Republic of Iran in light of United Nations Security Council resolution 2231 (2015), including Iran’s compliance with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). It also covers findings from a separate IAEA report, NPT Safeguards Agreement with the Islamic Republic of Iran, issued also on September 4, 2023.
Findings
● Iran retains the ability, using 40 kilograms (kg) of 60 percent highly enriched uranium (HEU) and three or four advanced centrifuge cascades, to break out and produce enough weapon-grade enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon in 12 days. Currently, Iran would only need one-third of its existing stock of 60 percent enriched uranium. This breakout could be difficult for the IAEA to detect promptly, if Iran delayed inspectors’ access.
● Using more of its remaining stock of 60 percent enriched uranium in the same three or four cascades, and its stock of near 20 percent enriched uranium in the vast bulk of its production-scale cascades, Iran could produce enough weapon-grade uranium (WGU) for an additional five nuclear weapons within the first month of a breakout, bringing the total to enough WGU for six nuclear weapons, or an increase of one since May 2023. Thus, Iran has increased its breakout capability, despite only a small increase in its 60 percent stock (see below), because its near 20 percent and less than five percent LEU stocks increased.
● In the second month, using its remaining stock of 60 percent material and part of its stock of less than 5 percent low enriched uranium (LEU), Iran could produce enough WGU for an additional two weapons. Using the rest of its stock of less than 5 percent LEU) (but greater than 2 percent enriched uranium), Iran could produce enough WGU for a ninth weapon by the end of the third month, and a tenth by the end of the fourth month.
● In summary, Iran could produce enough WGU for six nuclear weapons in one month, eight in two months, nine in three months, and ten in four months. Iran’s stockpile of 60 percent HEU was 121.6 kg (Uranium mass, or U mass) or 179.9 kg uranium hexafluoride mass (hex mass) as of August 19.
● The amount of 60 percent HEU produced during this most recent reporting period was about half of the amount produced during the previous reporting period, despite comparable timespans. The average production rate dropped from 9 kg (U mass) per month to 4.3 kg.
● The IAEA reports that from mid-June onwards, Iran reduced the production rate of near 60 percent HEU “by approximately two-thirds,” indicating that during this reporting period, which spans mid-May to mid-August, one month at full production was followed by two months of reduced production.
● Of note, Iran only recently doubled its production of near 60 percent HEU when it started, in November 2022, to enrich to near 60 percent HEU in two advanced centrifuge cascades at Fordow. Thus, for six months, from December 2022 to June 2023, it accumulated about double the monthly average amount compared to the previous year and may still be able to hit an annual production target even if it were to stop producing 60 percent altogether for the next six months.
● The IAEA also reports that Iran downblended 6.4 kg (Uranium mass) of its near 60 percent stock by mixing it with near 5 percent LEU to produce 22.2 kg of 20 percent enriched uranium. Because it was not downblended to natural uranium or to at least near 5 percent LEU, the downblending had little impact on the breakout timelines.
● Overall, neither the slow-down in 60 percent production nor the downblending improved the breakout situation; in fact, the situation worsened.
● Iran continued to produce 60 percent HEU from 5 percent LEU feed in advanced centrifuge cascades at the above-ground Pilot Fuel Enrichment Plant (PFEP) and the below-ground Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant (FFEP); the latter includes an IR-6 centrifuge cascade that is easily modifiable to change operations. This cascade was at the center of an IAEA-detected undeclared mode of operation in January 2023. It was interconnected with another IR-6 cascade to produce HEU, and subsequently, the IAEA detected the presence of near-84 percent HEU particles at the cascade’s product sampling point.
● The IAEA has “accepted Iran’s explanation for the origin of these particles” and verified that no diversion of declared uranium and no accumulation of uranium enriched to more than 60 percent took place. At the same time, the IAEA sought increased access and intensification of verification activities at the FFEP. In a May 2023 report on Iran’s compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the IAEA reported that it installed enrichment monitoring devices (EMD) at both the FFEP and at the PFEP to “monitor the enrichment level of the HEU being produced by Iran.” These monitors are not JCPOA-related but are installed pursuant to Iran’s comprehensive safeguards agreement (CSA) with the agency. IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi confirmed in a press conference that the EMD data will notify the IAEA of “another oscillation or otherwise” in the enrichment level in “real-time.” The IAEA reports, “The evaluation of the data collected confirmed the general good functioning of the systems.” However, “adjustments and changes to operational procedures required to enable their commissioning […] are being discussed with Iran.”
● Iran continues to keep the majority (83 percent) of its stock of 60 percent HEU and nearly 85 percent of its stock of 20 percent enriched uranium at the Esfahan Fuel Plate Fabrication Plant (FPFP), where Iran maintains a capability to make enriched uranium metal. Iran’s storage of so much proliferation-sensitive material at the FPFP, which may not be as thoroughly monitored as Natanz and Fordow, requires enhanced IAEA safeguards to detect and prevent diversion to a secret enrichment plant. For example, there should be stepped up inspector presence and remote camera surveillance.
● As of August 19, 2023, Iran had an IAEA-estimated stock of 535.8 kg of 20 percent enriched uranium (U mass and in the form of UF6), equivalent to 792.6 kg (hex mass), representing an increase of 64.9 kg from 470.9 kg (U mass). Iran also had a stock of 33 kg (U mass) of 20 percent uranium in other chemical forms.
● The average production rate of 20 percent enriched uranium at the FFEP increased slightly to 13.2 kg (U mass) or 19.6 kg (hex mass) per month.
● Iran’s number of installed advanced centrifuges has remained fairly steady since February 2023. It now has a total of about 6100 advanced centrifuges at Natanz and Fordow, where most are deployed at the Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP) (see Figures 1 and 2).
● Including the installed IR-1 centrifuges at Natanz and Fordow brings the total number of installed centrifuges to about 13,330 centrifuges. It should be noted that many of the advanced centrifuges are deployed but not enriching uranium, and the IR-1 centrifuges have far less ability to enrich uranium than the advanced ones.
● During this reporting period, Iran installed one additional cascade of IR-4 centrifuges at the Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP), where Iran now has a total of 36 cascades of IR-1 centrifuges, 21 cascades of IR-2m centrifuges, five cascades of IR-4 centrifuges, and three cascades of IR-6 centrifuges installed. An additional seven IR-4 centrifuge cascades are planned, and the installation of one IR-4 cascade was ongoing.
● Iran did not install any additional advanced centrifuge cascades at the FFEP, where it is currently operating six IR-1 centrifuge cascades and two IR-6 centrifuge cascades, although it plans to install up to 14 additional IR-6 centrifuge cascades.
● This lull in deployment was preceded by a spike in advanced centrifuge deployment from August 2022 to February 2023. A slowing of advanced centrifuge deployments and enrichment using those machines may be one reported term of an informal nuclear understanding with the United States, although this is unverified. It is unclear whether this means Iran is produced fewer centrifuges than expected, implying possible manufacturing difficulties, or is keeping newly produced machines in unmonitored storage instead.
● Iran’s current, total operating enrichment capability is estimated to remain at about 19,100 separative work units (SWU) per year, where only cascades enriching uranium during this reporting period are included in this estimate. As of this reporting period, Iran was not yet using its fully installed enrichment capacity at the FEP.
● Iran’s overall reported stockpile of enriched uranium decreased by 949 kg (U mass) from 4744.5 kg to 3795.5 kg (U mass) (see Table 1). This decrease largely stems from a decrease in uranium enriched to less than 2 percent, while all other stocks grew.
● Iran’s stockpile of near 5 percent LEU increased by 610.7 kg (U mass) to 1950.9 kg (U mass) or 2885.9 kg (hex mass). Average production of near 5 percent LEU at the FEP increased, while the feed rate for 20 percent and 60 percent enriched uranium production decreased.
● Despite the increase during this reporting period in the amount of uranium enriched between two and five percent, Iran has not prioritized stockpiling this material over the past two and a half years. In addition, it has not made planned progress on the Enriched Uranium Powder Plant, a key civil facility to convert less than five percent enriched uranium hexafluoride into a uranium oxide powder for use in nuclear power reactor fuel. These two choices are at odds with Iran’s contention that its primary goal is to accumulate 4-5 percent enriched uranium for use in nuclear power reactor fuel. Instead, Iran has used this stock extensively to produce near 20 percent and 60 percent enriched uranium, far beyond Iran’s civilian needs.
● The IAEA reported no progress by Iran on resolving a discrepancy in Iran’s natural uranium inventory at the Uranium Conversion Facility (UCF). The IAEA previously reported a shortfall in Iran’s declaration, which may indicate that Iran mixed into the UCF inventory undeclared uranium it used in the past at the Lavisan-Shian site during its early-2000s nuclear weapons program. After acknowledging a discrepancy, Iran insisted that the discrepancy is “inaccurate” and “baseless,” and that “differences” are “predictable” and that “the matter is considered as resolved.” The IAEA did not agree with Iran’s claim.
● The IAEA reports that Iran has not started commissioning the Arak reactor, now called the Khondab Heavy Water Research Reactor (KHRR), or IR-20. Iran previously informed the IAEA that it expected to commission the reactor in 2023 and start operations in 2024, but construction efforts on the reactor continue.
● The IAEA underscores that “for more than two and a half years Iran has not provided updated declarations and the Agency has not been able to conduct any complementary access under the Additional Protocol to any sites and locations in Iran.”
● The IAEA reports no new progress on installing new surveillance cameras at Iran’s nuclear-related facilities, including centrifuge manufacturing and assembly sites. Iran also has not turned over data or footage associated with monitoring devices and cameras, as it committed in an IAEA/Iran Joint Statement from March 2023.
● The absence of monitoring and surveillance equipment, particularly since June 2022, has caused the IAEA to doubt its ability to ascertain whether Iran has diverted or may divert advanced centrifuges. A risk is that Iran could accumulate a secret stock of advanced centrifuges, deployable in the future at a clandestine enrichment plant or during a breakout at declared sites. Another risk is that Iran will establish additional centrifuge manufacturing sites unknown to the IAEA. Iran has proven its ability to move manufacturing equipment to new, undeclared sites, further complicating any future verification effort and contributing to uncertainty about where Iran manufactures centrifuges.
● Iran’s refusal to implement the non-voluntary Modified Code 3.1 to its CSA raises doubts about whether Iran will report the construction of a new enrichment plant or provide design information to the IAEA as soon as it decides to construct such a facility. Iran is building a new facility in the mountains near Natanz that is deeply buried and could be a potential site for a new enrichment plant.
● The IAEA concludes that “Iran’s decision to remove all of the Agency’s equipment previously installed in Iran for JCPOA-related surveillance and monitoring activities in relation to the JCPOA has [had] detrimental implications for the Agency’s ability to provide assurance of the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear programme.”
● Concern about Iran’s installation of advanced centrifuges at an undeclared site increases as its 60 percent HEU stocks grow. Such a scenario is becoming more worrisome and viable, since a relatively small number of advanced centrifuge cascades would suffice for the rapid enrichment of the 60 percent HEU to weapon-grade. This hybrid strategy involves the diversion of safeguarded HEU and the secret manufacture and deployment of only three or four cascades of advanced centrifuges. With greater uncertainty about the number of advanced centrifuges Iran is making, there is a greater chance of Iran hiding away the requisite number of advanced centrifuges to realize this scenario.
● According to a separate NPT report, Iran held discussions with the IAEA in August but did not make progress in addressing the IAEA’s remaining questions about undeclared nuclear weapons activities and undeclared nuclear material found at two sites, Varamin and Turquz-Abad. Iran is stone-walling the IAEA.
● Combined with Iran’s refusal to resolve outstanding safeguards violations, the IAEA has a significantly reduced ability to monitor Iran’s complex and growing nuclear program, which notably has unresolved nuclear weapons dimensions. The IAEA’s ability to detect diversion of nuclear materials, equipment, and other capabilities to undeclared facilities remains greatly diminished.
Figure 1. The total number of advanced centrifuges installed at all three enrichment facilities. One cascade of IR-4 centrifuges was reportedly added during this quarterly report. As can be seen, centrifuge installation has been relatively minimal since February 2023.
Figure 2. The total number of advanced centrifuges deployed at the Natanz Fuel Enrichment Plant. The deployment rate remained flat between February and May 2023 quarterly reports, with only a single cascade of IR-4 centrifuges deployed during the most recent reporting period. These numbers demonstrate that Iran has made no tangible concession and, on the contrary, continued to deploy advanced centrifuges, albeit at a much slower rate than in 2022.
Andrea Stricker is deputy director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ (FDD) Nonproliferation and Biodefense Program and an FDD research fellow. Follow her on X @StrickerNonpro. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focused on national security and foreign policy.

Twenty Years Later, Iran Remains In Non-Compliance With Its Nuclear Nonproliferation Obligations
Olli Heinonen and Andrea Stricker/ 19FortyFive/September 8, 2023
Nonproliferation and Biodefense Program Deputy Director and Research Fellow
Sept. 12 will mark the 20th anniversary of the first resolution criticizing Iran by the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA’s) board of governors.
The board, a 35-nation body tasked with policymaking for the UN nuclear watchdog, issues such resolutions to pressure countries to comply with their nonproliferation safeguards obligations. In 2023, the Islamic Republic has still not fulfilled the demands of the original resolution, and it appears poised to make nuclear weapons at a time of its choosing. A new approach is needed that refocuses Western attention on addressing Iran’s fundamental breaches of its nonproliferation obligations — and soon.
The strictly worded resolution passed by the board in September 2003 demanded that Tehran provide “a full declaration” under its safeguards agreement — the fundamental legal accord that parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty reach with the IAEA to ensure international oversight and the peacefulness of their nuclear programs.
The resolution followed international discovery in mid-2002 of Iran’s vast, secret nuclear program, including a uranium enrichment site at Natanz and Iran’s acquisition and processing of uranium. Both breached Tehran’s safeguards agreement, because Iran failed to report them.
To support the IAEA’s “verification of the correctness and completeness of Iran’s declarations,” the first resolution also demanded unrestricted access to Iranian sites and environmental sampling, which would enable the agency to detect traces of nuclear materials. The board requested Tehran answer the agency’s questions about the origins of its nuclear activities, give details about experimentation, and provide any other information or explanations the agency deemed necessary.
Twenty years later, Iran has not remedied “all failures identified by the Agency” or cooperated “fully with the Agency to ensure verification of compliance with Iran’s safeguards agreement,” as the original resolution stipulated. The board has since passed 15 other Iran resolutions. In 2006, it referred Iran’s case to the UN Security Council, which passed a series of sanctions against Tehran.
The United States, Europe, and their partners have tried nuclear deals — most systematically the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which Washington left in 2018 — but to little success. Iran pockets concessions without meaningful reciprocation.
Since 2018, the IAEA remains embroiled in a fruitless investigation of information the agency learned from an Israeli raid on a Tehran warehouse. The raid’s findings indicated that Iran had a full-fledged nuclear weapons program up until mid-2003 called the Amad Plan.
The pilfered materials suggested Iran likely retains some of its nuclear weapons-related work, today overseen by the Organization of Defense Innovation Research, known by its Persian acronym, SPND. Under SPND, Tehran advances disparate activities at locations not inspected by the IAEA.
Tehran initially refused IAEA access to sites so that Iran could remove evidence. Yet when the IAEA succeeded in detecting undeclared nuclear material and disclosed facts about Iranian nuclear weapons activities, as it did in March 2022 and May 2023, the international community failed to put meaningful pressure on the IAEA to probe deeper, or on Iran to cooperate more.
In its Iran safeguards report for September, the IAEA still could not verify the correctness and completeness of Iran’s declarations. In short: The IAEA is unable to provide credible assurances of the peaceful nature of Tehran’s nuclear program.
Iran now has thousands of advanced centrifuges spinning at fortified enrichment locations, and the capability to produce enough weapons-grade uranium for several nuclear bombs in under three months. It may be building a new enrichment site deep in the mountains near Natanz that would be immune to even the strongest U.S. bunker-buster bombs. Tehran is limiting IAEA monitoring of its nuclear sites and activities, withdrawing cameras, and restricting inspections. Iran advances its nuclear program, waiting for an opportune time to cross the nuclear threshold.
A reported new arrangement between Tehran and the Biden administration requires just token reductions of Iran’s capabilities in return for significant sanctions relief. Thus far, according to the IAEA’s latest reporting, these regime concessions appear illusory. The West heralds this as a win, but the Islamic Republic remains a nuclear threshold state.
The United States and its partners must act.
They must demand a new, comprehensive, and verifiable declaration by Tehran of all nuclear activities, past and present, and direct the IAEA to undertake a large-scale investigation backed by full Iranian cooperation. The investigation must include access to sites and equipment, personnel interviews, and provision of documentation. It is indispensable that the IAEA inspect all installations and institutes involved in the pre-2003 Amad Plan — something it has not yet done.
Moreover, absent a halt to Iran’s uranium enrichment program, Tehran’s full cooperation with the IAEA, and a deep IAEA investigation into the regime’s ongoing nuclear weapons activities, Washington and its partners should not authorize further sanctions relief for Iran.
The 20th year of the Iran nuclear crisis is upon us. Unless the West pivots soon and changes its lackadaisical approach, the result could be a regime that need not rush. Under the world’s watch, it will simply stroll to possession of atomic weapons.
**Olli Heinonen is a distinguished fellow at the Stimson Center and served for 27 years at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), most recently as deputy director-general. Andrea Stricker is deputy director of the nonproliferation and biodefense program and a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). Follow them on X @OlliHeinonen and @StrickerNonpro.

Why did Turkey’s foreign minister go to Iran?
Sinan Ciddi/Washington Examiner/September 11/ 2023
Hakan Fidan, Turkey’s foreign minister, paid a visit to Iran on Sunday. The invitation, extended to him by his Iranian counterpart, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, was publicized as an “opportunity to discuss the possibilities for further advancing our bilateral cooperation in all fields with Iran and to exchange views on current regional and international developments.”
While Ankara maintains an interest in expanding its horizons with Tehran, the actual focus of the high-level meeting between the foreign ministers was to discuss Syria.
Since 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin has been keen to facilitate the normalization of ties between Ankara and Damascus. This is easier wished than accomplished as Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and Bashar Assad of Syria are bitter enemies. Erdogan spent the better part of the last decade trying to overthrow Assad. Given that Assad is likely to hold on to power, Erdogan has few options other than to rekindle a functional relationship with Assad.
Damascus, however, is in a strong bargaining position: In return for even beginning talks to normalize ties with Ankara, the Syrian government has demanded that all Turkish troops, presently occupying large swaths of northern Syria, leave its territory.
Erdogan needs the cooperation of Assad for a number of reasons: He would like to return a symbolic number of Syrian refugees, which number close to four million in Turkey. He would also like the Syrian government to work with Turkey to contain, ideally dismember, the Syrian Kurdish military entity, the Syrian Democratic Forces, which is considered a terrorist entity by Turkey and which is a key U.S. partner in the fight against ISIS.
Since the May elections, Erdogan has been under immense pressure to make headway on these two issues. Independent of the Turkish public, Erdogan is also under pressure from Putin to mend fences with Assad. Turkey’s political and economic exposure to Moscow is too high for Erdogan to ignore. Turkey depends on Russia for its natural gas supply, tourism revenues, nuclear energy capability, and bilateral trade.
In light of this, what is the relevance of Fidan’s visit to Tehran? It is likely a diplomatic push by Fidan to get Assad to drop his precondition to remove Turkish troops from Syria before Assad and Erdogan can meet. Assad has no motivation to make Erdogan’s life easier, but he may listen to Moscow and Tehran, his two big patrons. Fidan’s visit to Tehran was preceded by a visit to Moscow, where he met with his Russian counterpart SergeyLavrov and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.
Similarly, Fidan’s diplomatic efforts were mirrored by Erdogan, who met with Putin on Monday. In all of these meetings Ankara is trying to achieve two major goals: To solicit Moscow and Tehran’s help in getting Assad to the negotiating table without preconditions and to highlight Turkey’s importance to the West by exploring opportunities of getting Russia to reenter the grain deal.
All of this helps underscore what Erdogan would like to label as Turkey’s strategic autonomy. In reality, playing diplomatic footsie with Russia and Iran is a further demonstration of Turkey’s drift from the West. On the one hand, the Turkish government has been in quiet negotiations to secure $35 billion worth of stabilization funding, likely facilitated by the Biden administration. On the other, we see little to no commitment on the part of Ankara to back international sanctions against two of the greatest threats to the liberal international order. It is likely that the $35 billion line of credit that may come from Washington is a quid pro quo for Ankara to approve Sweden’s NATO membership in October. It is worth noting that while leaning on the West for bailout funding, Erdogan referred to Putin as his “valued friend” during their meeting in Sochi.
The previous three U.S. administrations have struggled with how to handle an increasingly anti-Western Erdogan. Professor Henri Barkey recently published a refreshingly concise set of recommendations in a Foreign Affairs article, which the Biden administration appears reluctant to read, let alone implement. There is little sense in offering cash incentives to Erdogan while he continues to further distance Turkey from the West and move into the orbit of Moscow and Tehran.
*Sinan Ciddi (@SinanCiddi) is a nonresident senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where he contributes to FDD’s Turkey Program and Center on Military and Political Power. Follow Sinan on X @SinanCiddi. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

When 9/11 Was a Day of Victory against Jihad
Raymond Ibrahim/September 11/ 2023
Although 9/11 will forever be associated with the jihadist massacre of some 3,000 Americans, for centuries earlier, September 11 was celebrated as the day when a small band of Christian knights defeated a massive Muslim horde. That story is worth recounting. After the Ottoman Empire declared jihad on Malta in the spring of 1565, 30,000 Turks, armed to the teeth and with all sorts of heavy artillery, descended on the tiny Mediterranean island, which was defended by a few thousand shabbily armed Maltese men, under the leadership of the Knights of Saint John.
Enter Jean Parisot de Valette (1494–1568), the Grand Master of the Knights: “His disposition is rather sad,” wrote a contemporary, but “for his age [seventy-one], he is very robust” and “very devout.” As the Muslim sails approached, he explained to his men what was at stake: “A formidable army composed of audacious barbarians is descending on this island,” he warned; “these persons, my brothers, are the enemies of Jesus Christ. Today it is a question of the defense of our Faith as to whether the book of the Evangelist [the Gospel] is to be superseded by that of the Koran? God on this occasion demands of us our lives, already vowed to His service. Happy will those be who first consummate this sacrifice.”Once the Turks arrived, they subjected the tiny Mediterranean island to what was then the heaviest nonstop bombardment any locale had been subjected to in history. “With the roar of the artillery and the arquebuses, the hair-raising screams, the smoke and fire and flame,” a chronicler wrote, “it seemed that the whole world was at the point of exploding.”The vastly outnumbered and soon wearied defenders, who were ordered to “fight bravely and sell their lives to the barbarians as dearly as possible,” did just that; and for every Christian killed defending the fort, numerous Muslim besiegers fell.
After reducing to rubble and storming the fort of St. Elmo, the Turks sadistically slaughtered all 1,500 of its defenders: the Knights of Saint John “were hung upside down from iron rings . . . and had their heads split, their chests open, and their hearts torn out.” The Muslim commander, Mustafa, ordered their mutilated corpses (along with one Maltese priest) nailed to wooden crosses and set adrift to deride and demoralize the other onlooking defenders.
The terror tactic failed. The 71-year-old Valette delivered a thundering and defiant speech before the huddled Christians, beheaded all Muslim prisoners, and fired their heads from cannon at the Turkish besiegers.
The Ottomans continued to subject the rest of the island to a sustained bombardment (some 130,000 cannonballs were fired in total). “I don’t know if the image of hell can describe the appalling battle,” wrote a contemporary: “the fire, the heat, the continuous flames from the flamethrowers and fire hoops; the thick smoke, the stench, the disemboweled and mutilated corpses, the clash of arms, the groans, shouts, and cries, the roar of the guns . . . men wounding, killing, scrabbling, throwing one another back, falling and firing.”
Although the rest of the forts were reduced to rubble, much Muslim blood was spilled for each inch gained; for “when they got within arms’ reach the scimitar was no match for the long two-handed sword of the Christians.” Desperate fighting spilled into the streets, where even Maltese women and children participated. It was now late August and the island was still not taken. That, and mass Muslim casualties, led to mass demoralization in the Ottoman camp. Embarrassed talk of lifting the siege had already begun when a Sicilian relief force finally arrived with nearly 10,000 soldiers at St. Paul’s Bay. There, where the apostle was once shipwrecked, the final scene of this Armageddon played out as the fresh newcomers routed the retreating Ottomans. The Muslims finally fled, and Malta was liberated, on September 11, a day which for years thereafter was celebrated.
Note: All quotations in the above account were excerpted from and documented in the Raymond Ibrahim’s book, Sword and Scimitar: Fourteen Centuries of War between Islam and the West.

Time to Declare a 'People's War' on the CCP: All of China Is One Military Machine
Gordon G. Chang/Gatestone Institute./September 11, 2023
Washington should be trying to end the rule of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It is time to declare a "people's war" against the CCP. We are in an us-or-them fight.
The Party certainly thinks that way. In May 2019, People's Daily, the CCP's self-described "mouthpiece"... declared a "people's war" against the United States.
"A people's war is a total war, and its strategy and tactics require the overall mobilization of political, economic, cultural, diplomatic, military, and other power resources, the integrated use of multiple forms of struggle and combat methods." — PLA Daily, an official news website of the Communist Party's People's Liberation Army, April 1, 2023.
Although it denies doing so, China's regime is conducting "unrestricted warfare" against America.
Unrestricted warfare means total war. The regime's deliberate spread of COVID-19 and support for the Chinese fentanyl gangs, for example, should be viewed in that light.
Most Americans have chosen not to see the Chinese regime's hatred of America.
Why should Americans be concerned?
The Party, with strident anti-Americanism, is establishing a justification to strike America. As James Lilley, the great American ambassador to Beijing, said, the Chinese always telegraph their punches. They are now telegraphing punches.
[US National Security Adviser Jake] Sullivan and others are willing to impose, for instance, technology sanctions on China, but they are largely ineffective.
Xi Jinping has a policy of "military-civilian fusion," which means that anything a civilian organization possesses can be — and is — pipelined to the Chinese military. In the Communist Party's top-down system, every individual and entity in China must obey every Party order.
It's a warning to America....
The U.S. Commerce Department allowed transfers of American technology to SMIC on the condition there would be no transfers to Huawei.
Why would Commerce ever think SMIC would keep that promise? The only realistic solution is to treat all Chinese parties as one and to prevent tech transfers to all of them.
Xi's regime is mobilizing all of the country's civilians for war. The Chinese leader never misses an opportunity to talk about it. China's regime is clearly planning to wage "kinetic" war — the type Americans are used to seeing in the movies — on America.
Obviously, American parties, especially businesses, should not be enabling the Chinese regime to kill Americans. This means they should not be engaging in any transaction that can strengthen any part of China. We should think of all of China as military.
"Don't say we didn't warn you!" — Chinese Communist Party's People's Daily, May 31 2019.
China's regime is conducting "unrestricted warfare" against America. Unrestricted warfare means total war. The regime's deliberate spread of COVID-19 and support for the Chinese fentanyl gangs, for example, should be viewed in that light. Washington should be trying to end the rule of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It is time to declare a "people's war" against the CCP. We are in an us-or-them fight. Pictured: China's President Xi Jinping (standing in vehicle) inspects People's Liberation Army soldiers at a military base in Hong Kong on June 30, 2017. (Photo by Dale de la Rey/AFP via Getty Images)
"I want to be clear that we do not seek to decouple or to hold China's economy back," declared U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo during her August trip to Beijing.
Well, why not, Madam Secretary? The U.S. should be holding the Chinese economy back. In fact, we should be doing more than just that. Washington should be trying to end the rule of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It is time to declare a "people's war" against the CCP. We are in an us-or-them fight.
The Party certainly thinks that way. In May 2019, People's Daily, the CCP's self-described "mouthpiece" and therefore most authoritative publication in China, declared a "people's war" against the United States.
That phrase carries great meaning. As PLA Daily, an official news website of the Party's People's Liberation Army, stated in April, "A people's war is a total war, and its strategy and tactics require the overall mobilization of political, economic, cultural, diplomatic, military, and other power resources, the integrated use of multiple forms of struggle and combat methods."
What exactly are "multiple forms of struggle and combat methods"? Although it denies doing so, China's regime is conducting "unrestricted warfare" against America.
Unrestricted warfare means total war. The regime's deliberate spread of COVID-19 and support for the Chinese fentanyl gangs, for example, should be viewed in that light. We must remember: In China's tightly controlled public square, the extermination of Americans is a permitted topic, as the explosive comments of prominent academic Li Yi tell us.
Most Americans have chosen not to see the Chinese regime's hatred of America. Those who have noticed are probably perplexed by its overheated rhetoric.
Why should Americans be concerned?
The Party, with strident anti-Americanism, is establishing a justification to strike America. As James Lilley, the great American ambassador to Beijing, said, the Chinese always telegraph their punches. They are now telegraphing punches.
They are telegraphing punches when their country is facing severe economic and other problems. For ideological reasons — Xi Jinping is a Maoist at heart — China's leader is unwilling to adopt those measures that would stabilize the situation. Instead, he is pursuing strategies that are clearly making matters worse.
It can be no coincidence that, as the country's economy deteriorates and markets fall, China's external behavior has become even more belligerent. For instance, Beijing, by interfering with Philippine vessels resupplying an outpost at Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea, has been risking war.
As Xi's regime telegraphs punches, President Joe Biden appears oblivious. On September 10 while in Vietnam, he echoed Raimondo saying, "I don't want to contain China."
Going one step further, Biden wished his Chinese counterpart well. "I want to see China succeed economically," the president said.
Biden's comments are at best perplexing in light of both China's malicious actions against America and his awareness that the country, as he proclaimed in August at a Democratic Party fundraiser in Utah, is a "ticking time bomb." "That's not good, because when bad folks have problems, they do bad things," he noted.
Biden's administration, however, is not adopting adequate measures to defend the U.S. in the face of such an evident danger. For example, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on September 5 said the United States "should continue on a course of 'small yard, high fence' set of technology restrictions focused narrowly on national security concerns."
Sullivan and others are willing to impose, for instance, technology sanctions on China, but they are largely ineffective. The general approach of the Biden administration is to prohibit transfers of technology to military-related parties in China — that's the reference to "small yard" — but allow transfers to nominally civilian parties.
America cannot enforce Sullivan's "high fence," unfortunately.
Xi Jinping has a policy of "military-civilian fusion," which means that anything a civilian organization possesses can be — and is — pipelined to the Chinese military. In the Communist Party's top-down system, every individual and entity in China must obey every Party order.
It's a warning to America: The just-released Mate 60 Pro smartphone of Huawei Technologies contains chips from SMIC, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., China's largest contract chip-maker. SMIC sold those chips to Huawei in violation of U.S. sanctions, including the Commerce Department's Foreign Direct Product Rule. U.S. sanctions applied because the chips in the new phone were made with U.S. technology. The U.S. Commerce Department allowed transfers of American technology to SMIC on the condition there would be no transfers to Huawei.
Why would Commerce ever think SMIC would keep that promise? The only realistic solution is to treat all Chinese parties as one and to prevent tech transfers to all of them.
Xi's regime is mobilizing all of the country's civilians for war. The Chinese leader never misses an opportunity to talk about it. China's regime is clearly planning to wage "kinetic" war — the type Americans are used to seeing in the movies — on America.
Obviously, American parties, especially businesses, should not be enabling the Chinese regime to kill Americans. This means they should not be engaging in any transaction that can strengthen any part of China. We should think of all of China as military.
Americans should take their enemy as it is, not the way they would like it to be. So Secretary Raimondo needs to say that, yes, the United States will take all measures to defend itself from China. And Biden must start telling the world that China is America's enemy.
People's Daily in May 2019 issued a commentary titled "United States, Don't Underestimate China's Ability to Strike Back." The Communist Party in that commentary stated this: "Don't say we didn't warn you!"
Yes, Americans have been warned. All of China is one military machine, so it is time to declare an American "people's war" on the Chinese Communist Party.
Gordon G. Chang is the author of The Coming Collapse of China, a Gatestone Institute distinguished senior fellow, and a member of its Advisory Board.
© 2023 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.

UNESCO Vote Highlights Continued UN Bias Against Israel....Congress Must Block Funding, Biden Should Reconsider His Decision to Join
Pete Hoekstra/Gatestone Institute/September 11, 2023
In one of the latest examples [of anti-Israel bias], UNESCO recently announced it will designate the city of Jericho as a "Palestinian" heritage site.
This is a clear attack on Christians and Jews, who also view the city as an important part of their cultural and religious history. The Biden administration should object to this designation and protest UNESCO's clear bias strongly.
[A]s former U.S. Ambassador to the UN and former National Security Advisor John Bolton advised in his strong article, "Biden's foolish rush to rejoin UNESCO has nothing to do with China": "Congress should firmly block any UNESCO funding, as it has consistently done."
Rather than building a culture of peace, UNESCO is perpetuating a culture of anger and division.
By exiting UNESCO again, the U.S. would send a clear message that it will not tolerate the organization's anti-Israel bias and that it will stand up to other racist and anti-Semitic actions at the UN.
In one of the latest examples of anti-Israel bias, UNESCO recently announced it will designate the city of Jericho as a "Palestinian" heritage site. Pictured: Delegates attend the UNESCO Extended 45th session of the World Heritage Committee in Riyadh on September 11, 2023. (Photo by Fayez Nureldine/AFP via Getty Images)
Most people know the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) through its eponymous and popular designation of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. By UNESCO's own definition, "World Heritage sites belong to all the peoples of the world, irrespective of the territory on which they are located." But an impending late-September vote by UNESCO again calls into question whether the organization holds to its stated beliefs or fits into the broader pattern of anti-Israel bias that permeates the United Nations.
The clear bias of the UN against the State of Israel was on full display in 2022. The UN General Assembly passed 28 resolutions criticizing countries. Of these resolutions, 15 criticized Israel, while only 13 were critical of all the other countries around the world combined. In a world beset by conflict, with a war in Ukraine, genocide against the Uyghurs in China, violence in Myanmar, the Taliban horrors in Afghanistan, instability in the Sahel, military infighting in the Sudan, and gang violence in Haiti, among the many global hotspots, Israel being the primary focus of UN criticism is totally inappropriate.
The Biden administration correctly highlighted this bias early on. In 2021, U.S. Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield, addressing the UN Security Council, stated:
"Israelis also shared with me their concern that the United Nations is intrinsically biased against Israel. They interpret the overwhelming focus on Israel in this body as a denial of Israel's right to exist and an unfair focus on this one country – and they are correct."
Given the bias evidenced in the UN General Assembly and at the UN Security Council, it should not come as a surprise to find anti-Israel bias at other UN organizations such as UNESCO. In one of the latest examples, UNESCO recently announced it will designate the city of Jericho as a "Palestinian" heritage site. This is a clear attack on Christians and Jews, who also view the city as an important part of their cultural and religious history. The Biden administration should object to this designation and protest UNESCO's clear bias strongly.
In addition, as former U.S. Ambassador to the UN and former National Security Advisor John Bolton advised in his strong article, "Biden's foolish rush to rejoin UNESCO has nothing to do with China": "Congress should firmly block any UNESCO funding, as it has consistently done."
In 2017, UNESCO designated the city of Hebron as a "Palestinian World Heritage site." As part of the Hebron designation, UNESCO labeled the Ibrahimi Mosque, also known as the Tomb of the Patriarchs, as a site being "at risk." Designating a site as "at risk" is meant to highlight a concern that sites are in danger of damage, and maybe even loss. The U.S. objected to the "at risk" designation, noting it called into question the seriousness of such assessments.
The Tomb of the Patriarchs is the burial site of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and a site that is holy to Muslims, Christians and Jews alike. Given that the location is revered by all three religions, the specificity of the designation was a clear affront to Christians and Jews who also hold the site as sacred.
UNESCO's actions only serve to further inflame tensions in the area. Whether it is the 2017 Hebron designations or the more recent plan to designate Jericho, the moves clearly go against UNESCO's own stated mission:
"UNESCO's mission is to contribute to the building of a culture of peace, the eradication of poverty, sustainable development and intercultural dialogue through education, the sciences, culture, communication and information."
Let us put emphasis on the first part of that mission, "to contribute to the building of a culture of peace." Creating turmoil over sites like Jericho and Hebron does exactly the opposite. It transforms these historical sites into political footballs and even sites of violence. Rather than highlighting the opportunity for these major faiths — Islam, Judaism, and Christianity — to work together to honor and preserve these important locations, UNESCO has put these sites into the crosshairs of today's political disagreements. Rather than building a culture of peace, it is perpetuating a culture of anger and division.
The U.S. has responded in the past to the blatant politically divisive positions of the UN and UNESCO and the Biden administration should consider doing the same. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan withdrew the U.S. from UNESCO because of its political bias and perceived mismanagement. The U.S. and Israel stopped financing UNESCO after it voted to include "Palestine" as a member state in 2011. In 2017, President Donald Trump filed notice that the U.S. was quitting UNESCO because of its anti-Israel bias, a move that became effective in 2019.
President Joe Biden made the poorly-timed decision to rejoin UNESCO in July 2023. Given the pending vote by UNESCO regarding Jericho becoming a "Palestinian heritage site," the Biden administration should reconsider its decision to rejoin the organization. This is an in-your-face decision by UNESCO to the U.S. that will only increase tensions and undercut the very foundation of UNESCO's mission. By exiting UNESCO again, the U.S. would send a clear message that it will not tolerate the organization's anti-Israel bias and that it will stand up to other racist and anti-Semitic actions at the UN.
*Peter Hoekstra is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute. He was US Ambassador to the Netherlands during the Trump administration. He also served 18 years in the U.S. House of Representatives representing the Second District of Michigan and served as Chairman and Ranking Member of the House Intelligence Committee.
© 2023 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.