Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on February 06-07/2024
Netanyahu says Gaza victory will deal 'fatal blow' to Iran, Hezbollah
Diplomatic push aims at de-escalating tensions on southern Lebanese front
French FM reportedly carrying Israeli proposals to Lebanon
French FM arrives in Beirut after Israel visit
Berri welcomes French Foreign Minister in Ain El-Tineh, broaches political developments with Mikati
Mikati welcomes French Foreign Minister at Grand Serail
Mikati urges donor countries to reconsider UNRWA funding cuts, meets German Parliamentary State Secretary, Ambassador of Estonia
French Foreign Minister confers with Bou Habib, makes no statement following meeting
Army chief receives French Foreign Minister in Yarzeh
Hezbollah targets Beit Hillel command center in northern Israel
Biden confuses Macron with dead French president
A Lebanese Parliamentary Delegation Holds Talks in Paris on Gaza and Lebanon's Security
Related Articles Gemayel: We're ready to sit with Hezbollah and discuss all matters
Geagea calls for presidential vote, says dialogue with Shiite Duo leads nowhere
Armed forces retirees block roads as they protest low salaries
Beirut Airport faces 'soaring' decline in travelers and flights in 2024: Here are the details
Exposing the 'diplomatic resistance': Amal Movement faces Israeli occupation in southern villages
Judge Nawaf Salam elected President of International Court of Justice
Appeal for Information: Minor Goes Missing in Ouzai
Sami Gemayel: We do not reject partnership, but rather Hezbollah's policy
Annen visits the Order of Malta Lebanon: Finding together the means to respond to an extraordinary crisis
Karami broaches developments in Lebanon and region with UN's Wronecka

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on February 06-07/2024
Four dead including civilians in Israeli strikes on Syria: monitor
Israeli military opens probe into reports of Oct. 7 friendly fire deaths
Israeli hostage families gain clout as political landscape shifts
Israel presses onslaught in Gaza’s Khan Younis
Argentina plans to move embassy to Jerusalem
Hamas responds to Gaza truce deal, Blinken says agreement ‘possible’
Hamas delivers 'positive' response to proposed Gaza deal, Blinken to take it to Israel
Blinken in Egypt on tour to seek 'enduring end' to Gaza war
Houthis launch new wave of missile attacks on ships off Yemeni coast
Yemen rebels claim fresh Red Sea ship attacks
US Says It Launched Strikes in Yemen Against Two Explosive Drone Boats
Cargo ship crew seized by Yemen's Houthis 'safe and sound', Bulgaria says
UNRWA says report into Israeli claims against staff due early March
At UN, Russia condemns US Mideast attacks, US says will continue to defend itself
Iraq and US need to return to negotiating, Iraq foreign minister says
UN envoy warns more attacks on Iraq threaten its hard-won stability
Opposing Ukraine aid bill is playing into Putin’s hands: Biden
US, Russia clash at UN over North Korea, Patriot missiles in Ukraine
Anger at Turkish government spills over at earthquake anniversary vigil
Russians are freezing as Soviet-era infrastructure in the country crumbles —and Moscow keeps spending on war

Titles For The Latest English LCCC  analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources on February 06-07/2024
Biden Opened the Floodgates of Hell/Gordon G. Chang/Gatestone Institute./February 6, 2024
What If the West Accepted Only Christian Refugees from the Muslim World?/Raymond Ibrahim./February 6, 2024
Working for a ceasefire, from the bottom up/James J. Zogby/The Arab Weekly/February 06/2024
Cutting off UNRWA funding is immoral and damaging/Yossi Mekelberg/Arab News/February 06, 2024
How US Republicans’ Iran policies compare to their rhetoric/Kerry Boyd Anderson/Arab News/February 06, 2024
Reasons to believe two-state solution is closer than ever/Benjamin Case, Arizona State University/Associated Press/February 06/2024
American Retaliation That Serves Iran/Nadim Koteich/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 06/2024
On the Background for US-Israeli ‘Coexistence’ with Iran/Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 06/2024
Iraq Cannot Be Subordinate, Nor Can It Be a Battlefield/Farhad Aladdin/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 06/2024

Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on February 06-07/2024
Netanyahu says Gaza victory will deal 'fatal blow' to Iran, Hezbollah
Agence France Presse/February 06, 2024
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that an Israeli victory against Hamas in Gaza will deal a "fatal blow" to the Palestinian militants as well as other Iran-backed groups in the region. "A complete victory will deal a fatal blow to the axis of evil that is Iran, Hezbollah, the Houthis and of course Hamas," Netanyahu said in an address to army commanders, according to a statement issued Monday by his office. Failure to achieve victory will threaten Israel's security, he said, without specifying what a victory would look like. "Without complete victory the (Israeli) displaced will not return, the next massacre will only be a matter of time and Iran, Hezbollah and others will simply celebrate." The Houthis, part of the anti-Western, anti-Israel "axis of resistance" of Iran-backed groups, have been harassing Red Sea shipping for months, triggering reprisal strikes by the United States and Britain. The rebels say the attacks on shipping are in solidarity with the Palestinians and in protest at Israeli military action in Gaza since October 7, when the territory's militant rulers Hamas attacked Israel. Over the past four months Israeli forces have also engaged in daily cross-border fire with Lebanese Hezbollah. On Monday several rockets were fired from Lebanon into northern Israel, the military said. Israel "struck the sources of the launches as well as additional areas in Lebanon," including Hezbollah targets, a military statement said. Netanyahu's comments came as France and the U.S.'s top diplomats were on separate Middle East crisis tours, aimed at securing a truce in the Israel-Hamas war.

Diplomatic push aims at de-escalating tensions on southern Lebanese front
NAJIA HOUSSARI/Arab News/February 06, 2024
BEIRUT: A diplomatic push is continuing in Lebanon, the result of ongoing efforts by the US to de-escalate tensions on the southern Lebanese front. As of Tuesday, military operations had been ongoing for 122 days and resulted in the loss of over 200 lives, primarily those of the Iran-backed Hezbollah, members of the Amal Movement, allied groups, and innocent civilians, including journalists. Border villages and towns have suffered extensive damage due to the operations on the southern front between Hezbollah and the Israeli army. Following the visit of British Foreign Secretary David Cameron to Beirut over the weekend, French Foreign Minister Stephane Segornet arrived in the Lebanese capital on Tuesday. Niels Annen, parliamentary state secretary of the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, is also present. Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry is scheduled to arrive on Wednesday. Parliamentary Speaker Nabih Berri’s media office said that Segornet and the accompanying delegation discussed “the political and field developments as a result of Israel’s continued aggression against the Gaza Strip and Lebanon.”
HIGHLIGHT
As of Tuesday, military operations had been ongoing for 122 days and resulted in the loss of over 200 lives, primarily those of the Iran-backed Hezbollah, members of the Amal Movement, allied groups, and innocent civilians, including journalists.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Abdallah Bou Habib later said of the meeting with Segornet: “The French are concerned about the safety of Lebanon. The French minister conveyed Israel’s interest in the return of settlers to their settlements, while we seek complete peace and full withdrawal (of the disputed areas to demarcate the southern borders, and the still-occupied areas in Shebaa Farms and Kfar Shuba).”He added: “We propose assistance from the international community to secure a greater presence for the Lebanese army, to recruit 7,000 members, and the French are interested in this matter.”Annen informed Lebanon’s Prime Minister Najib Mikati, according to a statement issued by Mikati’s media office, that his country “emphasizes its support for Lebanon in implementing Resolution 1701, and it has decided to continue supporting UNRWA (UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) in Lebanon, in addition to supporting development projects in this country.”Amos Hochstein, senior White House adviser, left Tel Aviv on Monday without visiting Lebanon, despite talk in Israel of “positive data that there is a real opportunity for the success of efforts to end the tension with Hezbollah, and that there is an American proposal that includes Hezbollah’s withdrawal to the north of the Litani River, intensifying the deployment of UNIFIL (UN Interim Force in Lebanon) forces and the Lebanese army in the southern Litani area, and the return of displaced persons along the border lines.”Hezbollah has insisted on “continuing its operations unless the war in the Gaza Strip stops.”The executive provisions of Resolution 1701 stipulate the Security Council’s call for “Hezbollah to immediately stop all attacks and Israel to immediately stop all offensive military operations, and to call on the Lebanese government and UNIFIL, upon the complete cessation of military operations, to deploy their forces together in various parts of the south.”
It also calls on “the Israeli government, with the beginning of that deployment, to withdraw all its forces from southern Lebanon in conjunction with the deployment.”
The resolution also “calls for Israel and Lebanon to support a permanent ceasefire and a long-term solution based on the following principles and elements: full respect for the Blue Line by both parties; security arrangements to prevent the resumption of hostilities, including the establishment between the Blue Line and the Litani River of an area free of any armed personnel, assets and weapons other than those of the government of Lebanon and of UNIFIL deployed in the area; full implementation of the relevant provisions of the Taif Accords, and of resolutions 1559 (2004) and 1680 (2006), that require the disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon.”This would mean that “pursuant to the Lebanese cabinet decision of July 27, 2006, there will be no weapons or authority in Lebanon other than that of the Lebanese state; no foreign forces in Lebanon without the consent of its government; no sales or supply of arms and related material to Lebanon except as authorized by its Government.”Airstrikes recently launched by Israeli warplanes, drones, and artillery have targeted properties in Tayr Harfa and Mays Al-Jabal and the outskirts of Hula, Markaba, Marwahin and Al-Khiyam, and the area between Naqoura and Alma Al-Shaab.
Hezbollah’s operations have targeted “the Israeli military site, Al-Marj, and a group of Israeli soldiers in the site’s vicinity with artillery shells.”Israeli Army Radio reported that “two soldiers were injured after a missile targeted Margaliot, a border area with Lebanon.”The Amal Movement, Hezbollah’s ally, mourned three of its members who were killed in an Israeli strike that targeted a house in Beit Lif on Monday evening. Meanwhile, Mikati has called on donor countries to “reconsider the decision to halt the funding of UNRWA.”Some countries stopped donations after Israel alleged the organization’s involvement in Hamas’ attacks on Oct. 7 last year. Mikati said: “Donor countries should look at UNRWA’s situation in Lebanon in an exceptional manner because there is a certain particularity that needs to be taken into account when it comes to Lebanon.” Mikati was speaking in the presence of Dorothee Klaus, the director of UNRWA’s affairs in Lebanon. Klaus said: “We currently have 19 donors that have stopped or suspended their grants. We can continue to provide our services until the end of March. We do not know what will happen after that in terms of service provision. If the funding is not restored, all Palestinians in Lebanon will be affected. This includes a large number of children, around 2,000 patients that benefit from our clinics, 50,000 patients who are hospitalized every year, and a large number of patients who rely on the medication we provide. “There are 12 Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, where a large number of those live below the poverty line. We do not have any information about whether any donor agencies will intervene and contribute.”

French FM reportedly carrying Israeli proposals to Lebanon
Naharnet/February 06, 2024
French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné, who arrived in Beirut on Tuesday, is carrying a message from Israel containing proposals for resolving the border conflict, a media report said. The proposals call for the Lebanese government to “take the necessary measures to implement Resolution 1701 and halt the military operations that Hezbollah is carrying out against Israel, in return for Israel’s refraining from any broad military action in the South,” al-Binaa newspaper quoted sources as saying. Nearly four months of cross-border fire have killed more than 210 people in Lebanon, most of them Hezbollah fighters but also including more than 25 civilians. On the Israeli side of the border, nine soldiers and six civilians have been killed, according to Israeli officials. The fighting has also displaced tens of thousands of residents on both sides of the border and Israel has warned that it is ready to use military force to return its settlers to their homes.

French FM arrives in Beirut after Israel visit
Associated Press/February 06, 2024
France’s new foreign minister Stéphane Séjourné arrived Tuesday in Lebanon and met with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri. Séjourné is scheduled to meet key Lebanese politicians in Beirut, after stops in Egypt on Saturday, Jordan on Sunday and Israel on Monday. France and Qatar last month mediated the first agreement between Israel and Hamas since a weeklong cease-fire in November. In Israel, Séjourné discussed with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issues related to Lebanon, a former French protectorate from where Hezbollah has fired at targets in northern Israel during the Israeli war on Gaza. Séjourné said France is committed to preventing any escalation of regional hostilities. This is the minister's first trip to the Middle East since his appointment.

Berri welcomes French Foreign Minister in Ain El-Tineh, broaches political developments with Mikati
NNA/February 06, 2024 
House Speaker, Nabih Berri, on Tuesday welcomed at the second presidency headquarters in Ain El-Tineh, French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné, in the presence of French Ambassador to Lebanon, Hervé Magro, the Director of North Africa and the Middle East at the French Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Anne Grillo, and a number of French Foreign Ministry advisors. The meeting was also attended by Speaker Berri’s Advisor, Dr. Mahmoud Berri. Discussions focused on the general situation in Lebanon and the region and the political and field developments as a result of Israel’s continued aggression against the Gaza Strip and Lebanon. On the other hand, Speaker Berri received at Ain el-Tineh, Caretaker Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, with whom he broached the general situation and political developments. Premier Mikati emphasized after the meeting “the necessity of consultation at this stage.”
“Consultation at this stage is not just necessary, it is imperative,” Premier Mikati stressed.

Mikati welcomes French Foreign Minister at Grand Serail
NNA/February 06, 2024 
Caretaker Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, on Tuesday welcomed at the Grand Serail, French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné. The meeting took place in the presence of French Ambassador to Lebanon, Hervé Magro, the Director of North Africa and the Middle East at the French Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Anne Grillo, and a number of advisors. From the Lebanese side, the meeting was attended by Premier Mikati’s Advisors former Minister Nicolas Nahhas and Ambassador Boutros Asaker. During the meeting, the French minister indicated that "his visit to Lebanon falls within the framework of a tour of a number of countries in the context of international efforts to stop the war in Gaza, preserve stability in Lebanon, and keep dangers away." Séjourné stressed that "electing a new president for Lebanon is an essential issue to keep pace with the major entitlements that Lebanon and the region are witnessing."
He stressed "the priority of preserving the calm in the south and stopping military operations."

Mikati urges donor countries to reconsider UNRWA funding cuts, meets German Parliamentary State Secretary, Ambassador of Estonia
NNA/February 06, 2024 
Caretaker Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, on Tuesday called on donor countries to "reconsider the issue of halting funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), because funding constitutes an urgent and necessary need for a cause not chosen by the Palestinians, but rather imposed upon them."Premier Mikati also called on donor countries to "consider the exceptional situation of UNRWA in Lebanon, because there is a Lebanese specificity that must be taken into account." Mikati also stressed that he will communicate with donor countries in the conferences and meetings he holds "to urge them to reconsider this issue in view of its direct repercussions on the overall Lebanese reality."Premier Mikati received today at the Grand Serail, the Director of UNRWA Affairs in Lebanon, Dr. Dorothy Klaus, in the presence of the Chairman of the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee, Dr. Dr. Bassel Al-Hassan. On the other hand, Mikati received at the Grand Serail, the Parliamentary State Secretary of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Niels Annen, in the presence of the accompanying delegation, and the German Ambassador to Lebanon, Kurt Georg Stoeckl-Stillfried. The meeting also took place in the presence of Mikati's Advisors, Ambassador Boutros Asaker and Ziad Mikati. Discussions during the meeting reportedly touched on the bilateral relations, financial and economic cooperation, in addition to the security situation in the south and the implementation of Resolution 1701. The German official informed the Prime Minister that his country “decided to continue supporting UNRWA in Lebanon in addition to supporting development projects in the country.” He also stressed "supporting Lebanon in implementing Resolution 1701."Mikati later received the Ambassador of Estonia, Ingrid Amer, with whom he discussed the current situation in Lebanon and the region.

French Foreign Minister confers with Bou Habib, makes no statement following meeting
NNA/February 06, 2024 
In the face of numerous challenges over the past four years, the Order of Malta Lebanon has found unwavering support from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Committed to sustainable programs, the BMZ has played a pivotal role in aiding vulnerable populations in Lebanon since the start of the crisis. During their very brief visit to Lebanon, Mr. Niels Annen, Parliamentary State Secretary, Ms. Annette Chammas, Head of the “Middle East II” Division and their delegation from the BMZ and the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany to Lebanon, were warmly welcomed at the Order of Malta Lebanon’s St. John the Baptist Center in Ain El Remmaneh.They were received by Mr. Marwan Sehnaoui, President of the Lebanese Association of the Knights of Malta (also known as the Order of Malta Lebanon), Mr. François Abi Saab, Chargé d'Affaires of the Embassy of the Sovereign Order of Malta to Lebanon , Mr. Rüdiger Krüse, former member of the German parliament and currently Chargé de Mission “Ahead” for the Order of Malta Lebanon, as well as members of the association's executive board, teams from the headquarters and the center. This visit underscored the shared philosophy of both institutions, which is to provide essential services during an extraordinary crisis, transcending political and religious affiliations of vulnerable people. The support from the BMZ has been instrumental in helping the Order of Malta Lebanon navigate one of the most severe economic and financial crises that have affected the country and all of its social components. This assistance has not only enhanced the organization's services but has also expanded its outreach to the most vulnerable individuals, with no distinction, across all the Lebanese territory. The BMZ's support to the Order of Malta Lebanon, through its partner Malteser International, has been focused on rebuilding and strengthening the structures of the Community Health Centers offering primary healthcare services. It has also contributed to the expansion of medical services adding secondary and tertiary referrals, the systematization and quality improvement of these services, as well as support for social assistance activities, particularly for the most marginalized individuals in society suffering from mental and/or physical disabilities. Moreover, two Mobile Community Kitchens, known as “The Sharing Wheel” have been launched to address the wave of malnutrition affecting mostly children and the elderly. During his address, Mr. Annen highlighted the Agro-Humanitarian Pillar, launched by the Order of Malta Lebanon and actively supported, among others, by the BMZ. He expressed his admiration for the nationwide deployment of the Agro-Humanitarian Centers to support small and medium-sized farmers, aligning humanitarian efforts with sustainable agricultural development. This multifaceted approach contributes significantly to the overall well-being and resilience of communities, laying the groundwork of a new approach to health and agriculture, to better, and sustainably serve the hard-hit population of Lebanon, thus, becoming a new source of hope.

Army chief receives French Foreign Minister in Yarzeh
NNA/February 06, 2024
Army commander, Major General Joseph Aoun, on Tuesday welcomed at his Yarzeh office, French Foreign Minister Stéphane Séjourné, accompanied by the Director of North Africa and the Middle East at the French Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Anne Grillo, and French Ambassador to Lebanon, Hervé Magro. Discussions reportedly touched on the general situation in Lebanon and the region. Séjourné stressed “the important army's role in preserving Lebanon's security and stability during the current circumstances."The Army Commander thanked “the French authorities for their continued support for the military institution.”

Hezbollah targets Beit Hillel command center in northern Israel
Naharnet/February 06, 2024
Hezbollah targeted Tuesday Israeli troops and positions including a command center in northern Israel as Israeli air strikes and artillery shelling targeted Lebanese border villages. Hezbollah said it has targeted the Beit Hillel command center, inflicting casualties and groups of soldiers in the Jal al-Alam, al-Marj, and Ramim posts. The group had earlier targeted the Ramim post with Burkan missiles. It said all attacks were "direct hits."Israel for its part bombed Mays al-Jabal, al-Labbouneh, Kfarshouba, Houla, Tayr Harfa, and the outskirts of al-Naqoura. On Monday Hezbollah targeted four posts in northern Israel, three of them in the occupied Shebaa Farms while Israel struck "the sources" of rocket launches as well as additional areas in Lebanon, "including Hezbollah targets". Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had said Monday that a complete victory in Gaza will deal a fatal blow to "the axis of evil" that is Iran, Hezbollah, the Houthis and Hamas. France and the U.S. are on separate Middle East crisis tours, aimed at securing a truce in the Israel-Hamas war. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant had warned days ago that a potential pause in Gaza will not apply to the ongoing hostilities with Hezbollah. Since the outbreak of war between Hamas and Israel on October 7, the Lebanese-Israeli border has witnessed near-daily exchanges of fire, mainly between the Israeli army and Hezbollah. The previous weeklong truce agreement in late November, in which 105 hostages were released, saw both Israel and Hezbollah hold their fire on the northern border, even though this wasn’t part of the agreement inked between Israel and Hamas via Qatar and Egypt.

Biden confuses Macron with dead French president
Agence France Presse/February 06, 2024
U.S. President Joe Biden confused his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron with France's long-dead former leader Francois Mitterrand, in a speech that went viral in video footage Tuesday. Addressing a campaign event in Las Vegas on Sunday, the 81-year-old U.S. leader described Macron's reaction to a speech at a G7 meeting in 2020. As well as getting Macron's name wrong, he misstated the country he leads. "And Mitterrand -- Macron, from Germany -- I mean, from France looked at me and said, said 'You know, what -- why -- how long you back for?'" Biden said, according to a White House transcript. Mitterrand was French president from 1981 to 1995, and died in 1996. Video of Biden's mix-up has been viewed thousands of times on X, formerly Twitter, and shared hundreds of times. Biden has made similar public mistakes in the past, notably in September 2022 when he called on a deceased congresswoman at a conference she helped organize. "Jackie, are you here? Where's Jackie? I think she was going to be here," he said, referring to Indiana representative Jackie Walorski, who had died a month earlier. And in April last year, a White House transcript corrected Biden when he confused New Zealand's All Blacks rugby team with the Black and Tans, a British military force notorious for its involvement in the Irish War of Independence. The transcript of his speech, given in a pub in Ireland, crossed out "Black and Tans" and inserted "All Blacks". Biden's predecessor and probable opponent in the November presidential election, Donald Trump, made a similar gaffe last month, confusing his party rival Nikki Haley with former House speaker Nancy Pelosi. Trump, 77, had falsely said Haley was in charge of security during the violent assault on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, prompting her to question his mental fitness during a campaign speech. Following Trump's gaffe, Biden also took the opportunity to make a dig at his potential presidential rival. "I don't agree with Nikki Haley on everything, but we agree on this much: She is not Nancy Pelosi," he had written in a post on X.

A Lebanese Parliamentary Delegation Holds Talks in Paris on Gaza and Lebanon's Security
LBCI/February 06, 2024
A Lebanese parliamentary delegation, comprising Deputy Speaker of Parliament Elias Bou Saab and MPs Simon Abi Ramia and Alain Aoun, held a series of meetings in Paris during their visit to France. They met with senior officials in the French Presidency and Ministry of Defense, discussing the impact of the ongoing war in Gaza on Lebanon. The discussions also focused on ongoing diplomatic efforts to prevent the current situation on the southern Lebanese border from escalating into military operations or open war. The delegation briefed French officials on the proposals discussed among influential countries, particularly with the United States, to reach a permanent ceasefire agreement in Gaza. They also explored mechanisms to ensure stability and security along the southern Lebanese border by reaching an agreement that paved the way for the implementation of Resolution 1701 by both parties and respected Lebanon's absolute sovereignty over its territory. The participants emphasized the importance of ongoing negotiations to facilitate the necessary groundwork for establishing a permanent and just solution that secures Lebanon's security, political stability, and economic prosperity.

Related Articles Gemayel: We're ready to sit with Hezbollah and discuss all matters
Naharnet/February 06, 2024
Kataeb Party chief Sami Gemayel has accused Hezbollah of seeking to “legalize its weapons through a certain alignment and a loyal president.”“It will seeking to silence the dissident voices, but nevertheless we are ready to sit with Hezbollah around a table and discuss all matters, within the institutions, if Hezbollah takes a decision to be under the authority of the constitution and the state and to accept equality,” Gemayel added, in an interview on LBCI. Noting that “federalism, decentralization and improving the system are not solutions to deal with those imposing and hijacking the country’s decisions,” Gemayel pointed out that “there is a problem called Hezbollah’s arms and sovereignty and another problem which is managing diversity and governance.”“The two problems are separate,” he added. As for the stalled presidential election, Gemayel said: “When we end the attempt to impose a candidate, a president will be elected within 48 hours, and at the moment Hezbollah accepts to meet us halfway we will accept dialogue, but it must present a goodwill gesture regarding a third candidate.”

Geagea calls for presidential vote, says dialogue with Shiite Duo leads nowhere
Naharnet/February 06, 2024
Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea has long opposed electing a president through dialogue. "All possible dialogues have led to nowhere," Geagea told MTV on Monday night. Geagea revealed that MPs from his party have been talking to Amal MPs but that all dialogues were "fruitless," accusing Hezbollah and its allies of clinging to their presidential candidate, Marada leader Suleiman Franjieh. "This won't be a real dialogue," he said. Geagea also stressed that a president should be elected through vote and not through consensus. "Otherwise why is there a vote?" he asked. "A president could have been elected by now in a second or third round of voting without a political consensus." Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri had said Sunday that the five-nation group for Lebanon supports "consensus" and "consultations." He said that he cannot prevent any party from boycotting the sessions because "boycotting sessions is a constitutional right," insisting that a quorum of 86 is needed to elect a president and thus consensus before a voting session is a must. "The quintet has lost hope," Geagea said, adding that they are leaning now towards a third candidate.

Armed forces retirees block roads as they protest low salaries
Naharnet/February 06, 2024
Armed forces retirees protested Tuesday their low salaries and blocked the Karantina road with burning tires. "Our demand is to live in dignity," a protester said. All public sector employees, including the members of the armed forces, get paid in Lebanese pounds. Their salaries have become too low to cover basic expenses while grocery stores and other businesses are now pricing their goods in dollars.

Beirut Airport faces 'soaring' decline in travelers and flights in 2024: Here are the details
LBCI/February 06, 2024
Beirut's Rafic Hariri International Airport recorded a decline in the number of travelers to and from Lebanon during the first month of 2024 compared to the same month in 2023. Additionally, the number of flights decreased by more than 14 percent. The airport's activity during January 2024 was distributed as follows:
Travelers:
The total number of passengers during the first month of the current year was 450,989 (a decrease of 8.49 percent compared to January 2023). The number of arrivals decreased by 5.17 percent, totaling 201,269 passengers, while the number of departures decreased by 10.87 percent, reaching 249,684 passengers. The transit passenger count also decreased by approximately 92 percent, with only 36 passengers. Flight activity: There was a decline in the number of flights for national, Arab, and foreign airlines using the airport in January 2024, with a decrease of 14.29 percent, totaling 3,848 flights.
This includes 1,923 arrivals to Lebanon (a decrease of 14.38 percent) and 1,925 departures from Lebanon (a decrease of 14.21 percent).

Exposing the 'diplomatic resistance': Amal Movement faces Israeli occupation in southern villages
LBCI/February 06, 2024
Has the Amal Movement entered into confrontations in the south against the Israeli occupation? With the "baptism of blood" and the five-fold martyrdom, the ranks of the Lebanese resistance have become an integral part of the southern scene. Five martyrs from the Amal Movement fell in the past few days. Two martyrs were targeted in a house in Blida, forming a focal point for the Movement. During the funeral procession, the level of challenge and tension increased when the Israeli occupation targeted a house in Blida, hundreds of meters away from the mourners. The matter did not end here. After the funeral, a salvo of rockets was launched from both the western and eastern sectors towards settlements in the Galilee without being claimed by Hezbollah or Palestinian factions until the Israeli occupation targeted a house belonging to the Movement in Beit Lif, where three additional members were martyred. Five martyrs in four days were added to Ali Daoud, the first martyr for the Movement in the south since the start of the confrontations after the eighth of October. Towns and villages in the south have become almost empty. Amal Movement members have been present there since the eighth of October, and some of them volunteer and come to the Movement's points in these towns from distant areas, eager to carry out military operations and defend Lebanon or are part of monitoring and stationed units. According to field sources, Amal Movement members roam in these nearly deserted villages, and their movements are exposed to the Israeli occupation, as well as their headquarters and points. The sources add that several missile launch operations have taken place from points in the south without being claimed by any party, and some unofficial statements attributed the operations to the Amal Movement. However, the Movement's central media has not officially claimed any operation launched from the south. Sources from the Movement confirm that they are present in the southern towns to defend the south and Lebanon in the event of any Israeli military incursion and ground assault on Lebanese sovereignty. Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri confirmed in a television interview after the targeting of Blida that the Amal Movement is alongside Hezbollah to defend every inch of Lebanese soil. It resists within its military capabilities and does not possess the capabilities and resources of Hezbollah, adding that he is not concerned about its diplomatic role. According to Speaker Berri, "diplomatic resistance" is an essential part of the resistance.

Judge Nawaf Salam elected President of International Court of Justice
LBCI/February 06, 2024
Judge Nawaf Salam was elected on Tuesday as President of the International Court of Justice for three years. In a statement, the Court said that President Salam had been elected as a president by his peers and He is “a Member of the Court since 6 February 2018,” the statement added. “Before joining the Court, President Salam was Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Lebanon to the United Nations in New York from July 2007 to December 2017,” the statement concluded by saying.

Appeal for Information: Minor Goes Missing in Ouzai
LBCI/February 06, 2024
The Directorate General of the Internal Security Forces, based on the referral of the competent judiciary, circulated on Tuesday a photo of the missing minor, Mohammad Khaled Al-Rayes (born in 2008, Lebanese), who left his residence located in the area of Bir Hassan on February 3, 2024, and has not returned since. Therefore, the Directorate requested that those who have seen him or have any information about him or his whereabouts to contact the Ouzai Police Station at the following number: 01-450897 to provide any information they may have.

Sami Gemayel: We do not reject partnership, but rather Hezbollah's policy
NNA/February 07, 2024
Kataeb Leader Samy Gemayel said that "the threat is always present; its intensity sometimes diminishes and at other times escalates". "We aspire to live in a country where there is a sovereign state, where citizens are equal in rights and duties. We desire a stable nation where freedom prevails, living under the umbrella of law and constitution," Gemayel said in an interview with LBCI. He considered that the primary prerequisite for the establishment of a state is to have defined borders and an authority that monopolizes the use of force before tackling other issues. "The basic components of the country do not exist, and our problem is primarily with Hezbollah. It must decide whether it wants to be a partner or continue with the logic of hegemony and unilateral decision-making," he emphasized.
"We reject the logic of violence and war. The fundamental problem is that Hezbollah adopts an exclusionary approach toward anyone who disagrees with its politics," he added. "When Al-Manar TV and Al-Akhbar newspaper claim responsibility for the campaign launched against me, does that automatically implicate Israeli involvement?" he asked. "The coup process in the country is cumulative and began with the election of Michel Aoun, putting the representatives before the choice of surrender or presidential vacuum. Hezbollah operates with a coup-like mentality in all its actions," he indicated.
"Since May 7th, the Free Patriotic Movement has also participated in the coup by aligning itself with Hezbollah's coup," he affirmed.
"When the Free Patriotic Movement aligns itself with Hezbollah's policies and when Mikati accepts to be the Prime Minister of Hezbollah's government, this signifies compliance with the coup," he went on saying.
"When Mikati says that he does not have a say in what happens in the south, this means accepting the conditions of the coup and that he does not bear the primary constitutional responsibility in the absence of president," he noted.
"In my estimation, there is no war in Lebanon on a large scale, and its probability is small, as both parties have an interest in reaching an agreement, and this is one of the tasks of Amos Hochstein," he stated.
"We neither reject nor refuse partnership, but we reject the imposition of Hezbollah's logic on all Lebanese citizens," he indicated.
"If there is a serious will of Hezbollah to open a new page, there must be a national conference for frankness and purification of memory based on the rules of recognition of the other, freedom and equality. If Hezbollah wants to develop the system currently based on a Christian-Sunni duality, the decision must be liberalized first and we must all be under the law," he said. "We must distinguish between Hezbollah's role in the south and its coup-like political behavior. On October 8th, it announced the opening of a supportive front to alleviate pressure on Gaza, thereby initiating the opening of the front rather than responding to aggression," Gemayel pointed out.
"Has Hezbollah benefited Gaza? Has anyone observed a decrease in the scenes of destruction in Gaza since Hezbollah entered the war? If the situation hasn't improved, it means Hezbollah's involvement in the war hasn't helped," he affirmed.
"The problem is that Hezbollah continues to address us with hypothetical scenarios, just as when it claimed that fighting ISIS in Syria prevented that organization from reaching Jounieh," he added. "We believe that no party should possess weapons, and militias should hand over their arms to the state," he stressed.
"We must be prepared for the worst scenario, which is similar to what we saw in the 1990s with the Syrians’ control over Lebanon," he went on saying.
"In exchange for May 25th, there should be April 26th, a day to commemorate the martyrs of the resistance and all martyrs," Gemayel noted.
"As soon as a person dies on the soil of Lebanon in a strange way, he is a martyr, and I am not ready to live with a party that cannot recognize our martyrs. Every human being who was martyred and fought in defense with a strange face inside is a martyr, even though I do not agree with the ideology and how we were dragged into war, which is a religious logic," he explained. "Neither Hezbollah nor Iran nor Israel have an interest in an open war in Lebanon. Therefore, Hezbollah does not act based on what is happening in Gaza, but rather based on Iran's interests," he asserted.
"If Hezbollah continues with the same logic, then either we succumb or we refuse," Gemayel stressed. "Israel does not want to open two fronts, as evidenced by its actions and statements. Similarly, Hezbollah does not want to jeopardize its political and military apparatus," he stressed. "Hezbollah wants a president from its team, legislating its weapons by law and constitution, and installing a system in the judiciary and security. Hezbollah's goal is to legislate what it has achieved in the country, and it will complete and consolidate its control. The next stage is to legislate what it has achieved," he added.
"I have full confidence in the Lebanese Army, and international support for the Army is the most important and powerful weapon against Israel; when the army deploys in the South, the whole world will be on our side," he pointed out.
"The issue of Syrian displacement is a matter of consensus among the Lebanese, but the problem is that Bashar al-Assad does not want the return of Syrians. Today, there is a ceasefire in Syria and no fighting, and the displaced have become economic migrants," he explained. "The normalization with Syria has exceeded the Lebanese state, and nothing prevents the displaced from returning to Syria. However, the international community must pressure Assad to repatriate them. There is a region not under regime control ready to receive the displaced, controlling 30% of Syrian territory. Let's start repatriating refugees from those areas," he said.
Regarding the return of former Prime Minister Saad Hariri to Lebanon, Gemayel clarified that there is no communication with him, and he hopes he returns like all Lebanese to Lebanon. "We will decide our stance toward him based on his positions when he returns," he stated. Regarding the 2024 budget, the Kataeb Leader pointed out that the problem lies in the fact that the budget is merely arithmetic without an economic vision and a purpose, while half of the Lebanese are outside the legitimate economy, facing multiple exchange rates and unresolved deposits.
He emphasized that the goal of any budget should be to broaden the tax base to avoid burdening taxes on the same people who are already paying, while they remain under the law. "A great disaster has occurred; there must be a comprehensive plan. I support a comprehensive project that results in a budget and draft laws. I am in favor of a comprehensive plan on how to restore deposits," he said. He considered that the responsibility lies with the Central Bank of Lebanon, its policies, Lebanese banks, and successive governments. "Complete deposit restoration is not realistic, and I support holding them accountable and accessing the accounts of the Central Bank and banks to determine the amount of money that can be returned. Bank owners must bear part of the responsibility," he affirmed. "Federalism and decentralization are solutions for managing people who want to live together, not solutions for those who seek imposition," he affirmed. Gemayel considered Federalism as a governance mechanism that presupposes equality and adheres to the logic of the state. "In 2030, Lebanon will not be like 'Lebanon of today'. 'Lebanon of Tomorrow' will not resemble 'Lebanon of today'. I aspire for the new Lebanon to be the Lebanon we dream of, a Lebanon of progress, where all Lebanese are equal in a modernized 10,452 square kilometers," Gemayel concluded. -- Kataeb.org

Annen visits the Order of Malta Lebanon: Finding together the means to respond to an extraordinary crisis
NNA/February 06, 2024
In the face of numerous challenges over the past four years, the Order of Malta Lebanon has found unwavering support from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Committed to sustainable programs, the BMZ has played a pivotal role in aiding vulnerable populations in Lebanon since the start of the crisis. During their very brief visit to Lebanon, Mr. Niels Annen, Parliamentary State Secretary, Ms. Annette Chammas, Head of the “Middle East II” Division and their delegation from the BMZ and the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany to Lebanon, were warmly welcomed at the Order of Malta Lebanon’s St. John the Baptist Center in Ain El Remmaneh. They were received by Mr. Marwan Sehnaoui, President of the Lebanese Association of the Knights of Malta (also known as the Order of Malta Lebanon), Mr. François Abi Saab, Chargé d'Affaires of the Embassy of the Sovereign Order of Malta to Lebanon , Mr. Rüdiger Krüse, former member of the German parliament and currently Chargé de Mission “Ahead” for the Order of Malta Lebanon, as well as members of the association's executive board, teams from the headquarters and the center.
This visit underscored the shared philosophy of both institutions, which is to provide essential services during an extraordinary crisis, transcending political and religious affiliations of vulnerable people.
The support from the BMZ has been instrumental in helping the Order of Malta Lebanon navigate one of the most severe economic and financial crises that have affected the country and all of its social components. This assistance has not only enhanced the organization's services but has also expanded its outreach to the most vulnerable individuals, with no distinction, across all the Lebanese territory. The BMZ's support to the Order of Malta Lebanon, through its partner Malteser International, has been focused on rebuilding and strengthening the structures of the Community Health Centers offering primary healthcare services. It has also contributed to the expansion of medical services adding secondary and tertiary referrals, the systematization and quality improvement of these services, as well as support for social assistance activities, particularly for the most marginalized individuals in society suffering from mental and/or physical disabilities. Moreover, two Mobile Community Kitchens, known as “The Sharing Wheel” have been launched to address the wave of malnutrition affecting mostly children and the elderly. During his address, Mr. Annen highlighted the Agro-Humanitarian Pillar, launched by the Order of Malta Lebanon and actively supported, among others, by the BMZ. He expressed his admiration for the nationwide deployment of the Agro-Humanitarian Centers to support small and medium-sized farmers, aligning humanitarian efforts with sustainable agricultural development. This multifaceted approach contributes significantly to the overall well-being and resilience of communities, laying the groundwork of a new approach to health and agriculture, to better, and sustainably serve the hard-hit population of Lebanon, thus, becoming a new source of hope.

Karami broaches developments in Lebanon and region with UN's Wronecka
NNA/February 06, 2024
Head of the "Dignity Movement" and member of the "National Accord" bloc, MP Faisal Karami, on Tuesday received at the residence of former PM Omar Karami in Beirut, the United United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon, Joanna Wronecka.
The meeting reportedly touched on the latest Lebanese developments at the political, economic and security levels. Discussions also dwelt on the latest developments on the regional and international arenas.

Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on February 06-07/2024
Four dead including civilians in Israeli strikes on Syria: monitor
AFP/February 07, 2024
BEIRUT: Israeli strikes on Syria’s Homs killed four people including two civilians Wednesday, a war monitor told AFP, with Syria’s defense ministry reporting an unspecified number of civilians dead and injured. “Four people have been killed, including two civilians, in the Israeli strikes on Homs city,” said Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Syria’s defense ministry reported that “the Israeli enemy launched air strikes from the direction north of Tripoli (Lebanon) targeting a number of sites in the city of Homs and its countryside... killing and injuring a number of civilians.” Syrian state television shared footage of rescuers rummaging through the rubble of what appears to be a collapsed building and carrying someone on a stretcher. Abdel Rahman told AFP that the building that was hit in Homs had completely collapsed. Earlier, Syrian state television reported “an Israeli assault” on central Syria, in the Homs province. Last week, the United States carried out strikes on Iran-backed groups in Syria and Iraq, killing dozens in retaliation for a deadly attack on its troops in Jordan. In January, Israeli strikes near Damascus killed eight people, including pro-Iran fighters, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights had said. During more than a decade of civil war in Syria, Israel has launched hundreds of air strikes in the country, primarily targeting Iran-backed forces as well as Syrian army positions. But such attacks have intensified since the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas began on October 7. Israel rarely comments on individual strikes targeting Syria but has repeatedly said it will not allow Iran, which backs President Bashar Assad’s government, to expand its presence there. Since 2011, Syria has endured a bloody conflict that has killed more than half a million people and displaced millions.

Israeli military opens probe into reports of Oct. 7 friendly fire deaths
Arab News/February 06, 2024
JERUSALEM: Israel has begun investigating possible breaches of the law by its forces during the Hamas attack on Oct. 7, the military said on Tuesday, following reports some Israeli civilians may have been killed by friendly fire in the fighting. The left-wing daily Haaretz said the investigation centered on an incident in Kibbutz Be’eri, one of the worst hit communities, in which a house was shelled by a tank, killing 12 Israeli hostages held by Palestinian Hamas gunmen. It said the probe had been delayed due to the demands of the four-month-old war in Gaza but as fighting has slackened, army commanders felt the time had come for an investigation. Asked to confirm the investigation would look at the incident, the Israel Defense Forces press desk sent a statement confirming the investigation was taking place, without offering further comment or details. “The IDF is operating the Fact Finding and Assessment Mechanism (FFAM) to examine reports and complaints regarding the violation of Israeli and international law during the fighting,” the military said in a statement. The statement said the fact-finding mission was in the initial stages but investigators had begun to collect materials. Once an investigation is completed, all materials would be handed over to the Military Advocate General’s office, which would decide if there were grounds to open a military police investigation. “The IDF is committed to conducting a thorough review and investigation,” the military said. Around 1,200 Israelis and foreigners were killed in the attack by thousands of Hamas-led gunmen, according to Israeli tallies, the worst loss of life in a single day since Israel’s founding in 1948. More than 240 people were taken hostage. Asked about the Be’eri incident, the Israeli military spokesperson, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said the army was still focused on fighting in Gaza but was preparing its investigation. “We will turn over every stone,” he told a regular press briefing. “We have started paving this path for learning and investigating. We will update.”Israeli media have previously reported on the incident during the chaotic fighting in Be’eri, when witnesses have said a tank opened fire on a house where gunmen were holding 12 Israelis hostage. In response to the attack, Israel launched an air and ground invasion of Gaza, which has so far killed more than 27,000 Palestinians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza, and reduced much of the enclave to rubble.
The attack by Hamas gunmen, who rampaged through communities around Gaza, has raised an array of questions about the readiness of the Israeli military which authorities have pledged to investigate fully once the fighting is over. “It will be a difficult journey,” the Chief of the General Staff, General Herzi Halevi said, commenting on the wider investigation into the security failures that preceded the attack. “We will emerge on the other side strengthened and much better, and that is exactly what we need,” he said.

Israeli hostage families gain clout as political landscape shifts
REUTERS/February 07, 2024
JERUSALEM/LONDON: Some hostage relatives have political appeal, according to a recent survey. When pollsters asked a representative sample of the Israeli public in January to name anyone they would like to see entering politics, relatives of hostages held by Hamas in Gaza were among the names that cropped up most often. The previously unreported survey shows the families’ appeal to Israelis who would like to see political change, at a time when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s popularity is at rock bottom. This is part of a wider transformation of Israel’s political landscape precipitated by the Oct. 7 Hamas attack, and likely to accelerate when the most intense phase of the Gaza war ends and a reckoning for the security failures of that day begins. “The hostage protests are a pivotal point for other types of protests against the government to emerge,” said Nimrod Nir, political psychologist at the Truman Research Institute of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, which conducted the survey. One of the names mentioned by respondents was Gil Dickmann, a cousin of hostage Carmel Gat and an active figure in the Hostages Families Forum campaign group.
Another was Jonathan Shamriz, whose brother Alon was one of three hostages mistakenly shot dead by Israeli forces in Gaza on Dec. 15, and who has become an outspoken government critic. “I will do what I need to in order to fix this country. If that means going into politics, then I’ll have to see,” he told Reuters. Some respondents did not mention names but wrote variants of “hostage families,” reflecting the impact of the Forum itself and its “Bring them home now” campaign. Hamas militants killed 1,200 people in southern Israel and abducted 253 in their Oct. 7 incursion, according to Israeli tallies. Israel has responded with an all-out military assault on the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip that has killed more than 27,000 Palestinians there, according to local health officials. The forum and most individual relatives of hostages have been trying to avoid partisan politics or confrontation with the right-wing coalition government while the lives of their loved ones hang in the balance. “Our struggle right now is not a political struggle,” said Elad Or, whose brother Dror is in Hamas captivity. Dror’s wife Yonat was killed. The couple’s two teenage children were held hostage until Nov. 25 when they were freed during a brief truce.
Mirroring the restraint of the families, who inspire huge public empathy, Netanyahu has mostly avoided overtly criticizing them, although frustrations have mounted on both sides. Protests by relatives outside his house have irked Netanyahu. He lashed out during a Jan. 27 news conference that such actions “only strengthen the demands of Hamas.” During the week-long truce in late November, Hamas freed more than 100 Israeli and foreign hostages in exchange for Israel releasing about 240 Palestinian prisoners. Since then, the issue of what price Israel should pay to get the more than 100 remaining hostages back, and how to balance that goal against its other stated war objective, to destroy Hamas, has become increasingly polarizing. Negotiations between Israel and Hamas on a ceasefire and hostage deal, mediated by Qatar and Egypt and backed by the United States, are ongoing but the outcome is uncertain. Netanyahu, who faces rifts within his fractious coalition over terms for a deal, said on Sunday Israel was not ready to accept any price for the hostages.
Polls by the Truman Institute and the Israel Democracy Institute show a sharp left-right split on the issue. On the left, support for a deal with Hamas involving concessions such as a ceasefire or prisoner release in exchange for the hostages is much higher, while on the right opposition to such a deal and support for continuing the war are stronger. Political scientist Tamar Hermann of the IDI said solidarity with the hostage families was blending with broader anti-government sentiment, partly rooted in a huge pre-war protest movement against Netanyahu’s plan to overhaul the judiciary.
A large proportion of the Gaza captives come from kibbutzim, communities that have deep historical links with the political left. New or existing left-wing parties could be a natural fit for any hostage relatives who did decide to go into politics. Asked whether his party wanted to recruit any of them, Tomer Reznik, secretary-general of left-wing Meretz, said it was reorganizing itself for the next election and part of this would be finding new candidates “relevant to the current situation.” Conversely, the hostage families are seen as opponents by some on the right, and especially on the ultra-nationalist far right, which has sway over Netanyahu because it is part of his fragile coalition. Two far-right ministers implacably opposed to a deal with Hamas could bring down his government at any moment. Some of Netanyahu’s hard-right supporters in politics and media portray the hostage families as leftists abusing public sympathy to further their anti-government agenda, said political scientist Gideon Rahat of the Hebrew University. One tactic, he said, was to amplify the voices of a tiny number of far-right hostage relatives who oppose any deal with Hamas, such as Eliyahu Libman, a settler from Kiryat Arba in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, whose son Elyakim is held hostage. Libman has argued that Israel must destroy Hamas, no matter the cost, so that no Israeli is harmed by it in future. “My son is the most important thing in the world to me but the state of Israel is also the most important thing in the world to me,” he said on Channel 13 TV.

Israel presses onslaught in Gaza’s Khan Younis
REUTERS/February 06, 2024
GAZA: Israeli forces killed at least 14 Palestinians in airstrikes as they pressed their onslaught in Gaza’s main southern city Khan Younis on Tuesday, while the top US diplomat pursued a quest to broker a ceasefire in the four-month-old war. Israel said its forces had killed dozens of Palestinian gunmen throughout Gaza in the past 24 hours with fighting focused on Khan Younis in the south and a threatened assault looming on a nearby border town teeming with displaced people. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Egypt for talks after a stop in Saudi Arabia during his latest trouble-shooting Middle East swing that Palestinians hope will nail down a ceasefire before Israeli forces storm Gaza’s southern fringes where over a million of Gaza’s people are sheltering. It was Blinken’s fifth trip to the region since Hamas militants’ lightning attack on Israel from Gaza on Oct. 7 triggered the war, and his first visit since Washington brokered an offer, with Israeli input, for the first extended ceasefire of the conflict. Hamas says it is still weighing the proposal. Blinken departed Riyadh just after sunrise and arrived in Cairo where he began talks with President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi. He is then due to fly on to Qatar and Israel.
Washington has for weeks sought an elusive deal to secure the release of remaining hostages among those Hamas kidnapped in its Oct. 7 assault, as key to making headway on broader challenges such as the governance of post-war Gaza. The ceasefire offer, delivered to Hamas last week by Qatari and Egyptian mediators, awaits a reply from militants who say they want more guarantees it will stop Israel’s blitz on Gaza, against Israeli vows to keep fighting until Hamas is wiped out. Washington also aims to prevent further escalation elsewhere in the Middle East, after days of US airstrikes on armed proxies of Iran, a major backer of Hamas, and further attacks on Red Sea shipping by Yemen’s Tehran-aligned Houthi militia. In an update on Tuesday, Gaza’s Health Ministry said at least 27,585 Palestinians had been confirmed killed in Israel’s military campaign, with thousands more feared buried under vast tracts of rubble across the densely populated enclave. Some 107 had been killed in the past 24 hours, the ministry said. Israel says 226 of its soldiers have been killed in its offensive, launched after militants from Hamas-ruled Gaza burst through the border fence and killed 1,200 people and took 253 hostages in a rampage through nearby Israeli communities. Israeli forces on Tuesday kept up the pressure on Khan Younis, the focus of their offensive for weeks. Aerial and tank bombardment thundered through the shattered city overnight, with at least 14 people killed by air strikes since the pre-dawn hours, Palestinian residents and medics told Reuters. They said Israeli tanks and aircraft continued to pound and besiege areas around Khan Younis’s two main hospitals — Nasser and Al-Amal. Israel’s military says Hamas militants use hospital premises for cover, which Gaza’s ruling Islamists deny.
Rafah, Palestinians’ last southern refuge from Israeli advances toward the border with Egypt, was battered by several Israeli air strikes and tank shelling overnight with medics reporting at least several wounded among the many displaced.
At makeshift tent camps in Rafah, untreated sewage flooded toward a shelter for the displaced, the latest sign of Gaza’s sanitation system collapsing, raising the spectre of disease. Clothes flapped outside tents made from sheets of thin plastic. Hanan Abu Gabal cooked for her family in a pot over a small fire in the sand. “We fled for our lives right in the middle of the battle. A rocket was thrown in the school and we barely made it out alive,” she said. “We were forcefully displaced from Khan Younis; they followed us. And now we’ve been forcefully displaced to Rafah, but where else are we meant to go?“
In Gaza City in the north of the narrow coastal enclave, residents reported further Israeli air strikes and tank shelling. Fighting has resurged in Gaza City two months after Israel said it had subdued the area. In parts of urban north Gaza, displaced people venturing back to check the fate of their homes after some Israeli tanks pulled back told Reuters they were shocked to find few buildings still standing, with rows of multi-floor apartment blocks razed and roads flipped upside down by Israeli bulldozers and bombs. During his Middle East swing, Blinken aims to win backing for US plans for what would follow a Gaza truce: rebuilding and running the tiny territory, and ultimately for a Palestinian state — which Israel now rules out — and for Arab countries to normalize relations with Israel. The ceasefire proposal, as described by sources close to the talks, envisages a truce of at least 40 days when militants would free civilians among remaining hostages they are holding, followed by later phases to hand over soldiers and bodies, in exchange for releases of Palestinians imprisoned in Israel.
The only truce so far lasted just a week in November.

Argentina plans to move embassy to Jerusalem
Agence France Presse/February 06, 2024
Argentina's President Javier Milei arrived in Israel on Tuesday and immediately announced a plan to relocate his country's embassy to Jerusalem. "My plan is to move the embassy to West Jerusalem," the libertarian head of state told Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz on the tarmac of the airport near Tel Aviv.

Hamas responds to Gaza truce deal, Blinken says agreement ‘possible’
REUTERS/February 06, 2024
GAZA STRIP: Hamas said on Tuesday it had delivered its response to a proposed ceasefire deal for Gaza, and the United States said it believed an agreement was possible.Details of Hamas’ response were not immediately revealed but Qatar, which helped mediate the proposal that was passed on to Hamas last week and would also involve the release of hostages held in Gaza, said the reply had made Doha “optimistic.” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, on a lightning tour of the Middle East, said Washington was reviewing Hamas’ response and that he would discuss it with Israeli officials when he visits the country on Wednesday. “There’s still a lot of work to do be done, but we continue to believe that an agreement is possible, and indeed essential,” he told a press conference in Doha with Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani. After Hamas issued a statement saying it had submitted its response to the ceasefire proposal, Sheikh Mohammed said it had been a “positive response” but declined to give further details. The proposed deal, drawn up more than a week ago by US and Israeli spy chiefs at a meeting with the Egyptians and Qataris, would secure the release of remaining hostages held by militants in Gaza in return for a long pause to fighting. Hamas has said previously that any deal must bring about a definitive end to the war. Israel has said it will not halt the war permanently until Hamas is destroyed. Sources close to the talks have said the truce would last at least 40 days, during which militants would free civilians among remaining hostages they hold. Further phases would follow, to hand over soldiers and dead bodies of hostages, in exchange for releases of Palestinians imprisoned in Israel. The only truce so far, in November, was initially agreed for just four days and extended to last a week. At the time, Hamas released 110 hostages in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. Israel began its military offensive in Gaza after militants from Hamas-ruled Gaza killed 1,200 people and took 253 hostages in southern Israel on Oct. 7. Gaza’s Health Ministry says at least 27,585 Palestinians have been confirmed killed in Israel’s military campaign, with thousands more feared buried under rubble.

Hamas delivers 'positive' response to proposed Gaza deal, Blinken to take it to Israel
Agence France Presse/February 06, 2024
Qatar said Tuesday that Hamas has delivered a "positive" response to a proposal to free hostages in return for pausing the Gaza war, which U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will take to Israel. "We have received a reply from Hamas with regards to the general framework of the agreement with regards to hostages. The reply includes some comments, but in general it is positive," Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani said after meeting Blinken in Doha. The Qatari prime minister -- who took part in talks a week ago in Paris with Israel, Egypt and the CIA that came up with the proposal -- said he was "optimistic" but declined to discuss the Hamas reply in detail, citing the "sensitivity of the circumstances." Hamas confirmed that it submitted its response to Egypt and Qatar. Blinken, on his fifth tour of the region, said that he would discuss the proposal on Wednesday in Israel, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has faced pressure from hardliners against perceived concessions to Hamas. "There's still a lot of work to be done. But we continue to believe that an agreement is possible and indeed essential, and we will continue to work relentlessly to achieve it," Blinken said. Blinken said that the deal "offers the prospect of extended calm, hostages out, more assistance in.""That would clearly be beneficial to everyone, and I think that offers the best path forward," Blinken said.

Blinken in Egypt on tour to seek 'enduring end' to Gaza war
Agence France Presse/February 06, 2024
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Egypt on Tuesday as part of his latest Middle East crisis tour, seeking a new ceasefire and "an enduring end" to the Israel-Hamas war. Heavy strikes and fighting in Gaza killed at least 99 people overnight, mostly women and children, said the health ministry in the Hamas-ruled territory that has been under almost four months of bombardment. Fears grew for more than a million Palestinians crowded into the far southern Rafah area as the battlefront draws ever closer in Israel's campaign to eradicate Hamas over the October 7 attack.
Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant warned on Monday that the military "will reach places where we have not yet fought... right up to the last Hamas bastion, which is Rafah", on the Egyptian border. Blinken -- on his fifth regional tour since the bloodiest ever Gaza war broke out -- was due to meet Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, a day after he held talks with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in Riyadh. The U.S. top envoy was later expected in Qatar and then Israel, hoping to shore up support for a truce deal that was hashed out in Paris in January but has not yet been signed off on by either Hamas or Israel. Israeli troops, with air and naval support, have been engaged in heavy urban combat centred on Gaza's main southern city of Khan Yunis, the hometown of Hamas's Gaza chief, Yahya Sinwar, much of which has been reduced to rubble. Israel accuses Sinwar of masterminding the October 7 attack, which resulted in the deaths of about 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures. Militants also seized around 250 hostages. Israel says 132 remain in Gaza including 28 who are believed to have been killed. Israel's withering military campaign has killed at least 27,585 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry.
'No place is safe'
The army said Tuesday that "over the past day, dozens of terrorists have been killed and approximately 80 individuals suspected of involvement in terrorist activity have been apprehended, including a number of terrorists that took part in the October 7 massacre".
It added that army snipers had killed more than 15 militants, and that a naval vessel had fired missiles at a "terrorist cell".An AFP journalist said overnight strikes rocked Khan Yunis and that two air strikes also struck Rafah. "No place is safe, no place at all -- where shall we go?" one Palestinian, Mohamad Kozaat, said after six members of his family, including his daughter, were wounded in an Israeli strike on the border town. The United States has strongly backed its top regional ally Israel with munitions and diplomatic support, but also urged steps to reduce civilian casualties and to eventually move toward a two-state solution with the Palestinians. The truce Blinken is hoping to seal proposes a six-week pause to fighting as Hamas frees hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel and more aid enters Gaza, according to a Hamas source. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has faced divisions within his cabinet and public fury over the fate of the remaining hostages, said Israel "will not accept" demands Hamas has made for an exchange involving thousands of prisoners. The premier's right-wing Likud party quoted him as saying the terms "should be similar to the previous agreement" in late November, which saw a more limited ratio of Palestinian prisoners exchanged for captives.
Houthi attacks
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in a phone call also told Netanyahu on Monday that "only a negotiated two-state solution would open up the prospect of a sustainable solution to the Middle East conflict". And French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne, on his first visit to the region since taking office, urged the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks "without delay". As the Gaza war has raged, violence has flared in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria and Yemen, where Iran-backed groups have launched attacks in support of Hamas, triggering counterattacks by Israel and the United States and its partners. For weeks, Yemen's Iran-backed Houthis have been targeting what they say are Israel-linked ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden in solidarity with Palestinians. The attacks on the vital shipping route have disrupted global trade and prompted reprisals by U.S. and British forces, including strikes on two "explosive-laden drone boats" on Monday, according to the U.S. military. The Houthis said Tuesday they struck U.S. and British ships in two separate attacks, one of which was confirmed by a security firm. Houthi spokesman Yahya Saree said the "the first attack targeted the American ship Star Nasia, while the other targeted the British ship Morning Tide". Blinken spoke with the Saudi crown prince about "regional coordination to achieve an enduring end to the crisis in Gaza" and "the urgent need to reduce regional tensions", said State Department spokesman Matthew Miller. Netanyahu said "a complete victory will deal a fatal blow" not just to Hamas but also to other Iran-backed militant groups across the region.

Houthis launch new wave of missile attacks on ships off Yemeni coast
SAEED AL-BATATI/Arab News/February 06, 2024
AL-MUKALLA: Yemen’s Houthi militia on Tuesday launched another wave of missiles toward ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden as the group’s leader vowed to continue attacks until Israel lifted its blockade of Gaza. A cargo vessel sailing 57 nautical miles west of the Houthi-controlled port city of Hodeidah sustained minor damage to its bridge after one of the weapons passed through its deck, according to British maritime agencies the UK Maritime Trade Operations, and Ambrey. The UKMTO reported that a small boat had been spotted off the ship’s port side. Meanwhile, Ambrey officials said a British-owned and Barbados-flagged cargo ship had been damaged in a drone attack while navigating through the southeast Red Sea. On Tuesday, the UKMTO warned shipping companies operating in the Gulf of Aden to exercise caution after receiving reports of an explosion near to a commercial vessel 50 nautical miles south of the Yemeni city of Aden. And Ambrey reported that a Greek-owned and Marshall Islands-flagged vessel sailing from the US to India was targeted 53 nautical miles southwest of Aden. The warnings were issued shortly after eyewitnesses in the Houthi-controlled Ibb province said on Tuesday that a missile had been fired from the Al-Hamza military camp in Ibb’s Al-Sabrah area. The Iran-backed Houthis have launched dozens of explosive-rigged drones and ballistic missiles at commercial and naval ships passing through Bab El-Mandeb (the strait that connects the Red Sea with the Gulf of Aden), the Red Sea, and the Gulf of Aden in what the militia group has described as military action in support of Palestine aimed at pressuring Israel into lifting its siege of Gaza. On Tuesday, Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Sarea claimed group responsibility for firing anti-ship missiles at the Marshall Islands-flagged bulk carrier Star Nasia, and the cargo ship Barbados Morning Tide. He said the first ship was American and the second British and that both vessels sustained direct hits. Sarea added that the attacks were in support of Palestine and retaliation for US and UK bombardments of Yemeni areas under Houthi control.
Since Jan. 12, American and British forces have conducted dozens of attacks on bases in Sanaa, Hodeidah, Hajjah, Al-Bayda, Saada, and other sites in a bid to diminish Houthi military capabilities to fire on ships. On Tuesday, Houthi media said that the US and UK had conducted three attacks in the northern province of Saada, the Houthi stronghold. And Houthi militia leader Abdul Malik Al-Houthi claimed that the US was flying the Marshallese flag on its ships to evade strikes, adding that attacks on shipping in the Red Sea would continue. Meanwhile, the Yemeni riyal rose modestly on Tuesday morning after the internationally recognized Presidential Leadership Council head named a new prime minister. Yemen’s Foreign Minister Ahmed Awad bin Mubarak will succeed Maeen Abdulmalik Saeed, who was made an adviser to PLC president, Rashad Al-Alimi. In a post on X, the new PM promised to focus on improving living standards for Yemenis, reviving government institutions, and putting an end to the Houthi military seizure of power in Yemen. Bin Mubarak said: “I assume this position today with the determination to improve the lives of every Yemeni man and woman, mindful of the suffering of our honorable people.”

Yemen rebels claim fresh Red Sea ship attacks
Associated Press/February 06, 2024
A ship traveling through the southern Red Sea was attacked by a suspected Yemen Houthi rebel drone early on Tuesday, authorities said, the latest assault in their campaign targeting vessels over Israel's war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The attack happened west of the Yemeni port of Hodeida, and the projectile caused "slight damage" to the vessel's windows on the bridge, the British military's United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations said. A small vessel had been nearby the ship before the attack, it added. The private security firm Ambrey identified the vessel as a Barbados-flagged, United Kingdom-owned cargo ship. No one was hurt onboard the vessel, which suffered "minor damage," the firm said. Later, a military spokesman of the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, Brig. Gen. Yahya Saree, claimed in a statement that the rebel forces attacked two separate vessels, one American and one British, in the Red Sea. He provided no evidence to support the claim. One of the ships the Houthis claimed attacking, the Morning Tide, matched details provided by Ambrey. Tracking data showed it to be in the Red Sea near the reported attack. Its owners could not be immediately reached. Since November, the rebels have repeatedly targeted ships in the Red Sea over Israel's offensive in Gaza against Hamas. But they have frequently targeted vessels with tenuous or no clear links to Israel, imperiling shipping in a key route for trade among Asia, the Mideast and Europe. In recent weeks, the U.S. and the United Kingdom, backed by other allies, have launched airstrikes targeting Houthi missile arsenals and launch sites for its attacks. The U.S. and Britain struck 36 Houthi targets in Yemen on Saturday. An air assault Friday in Iraq and Syria targeted other Iranian-backed militias and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard in retaliation for a drone strike that killed three U.S. troops in Jordan. The U.S. military's Central Command separately acknowledged an attack Monday on the Houthis, in which they attacked what they described as two Houthi drone boats loaded with explosives. American forces "determined they presented an imminent threat to U.S. Navy ships and merchant vessels in the region," the military said. "These actions will protect freedom of navigation and make international waters safer and more secure for U.S. Navy vessels and merchant vessels."

US Says It Launched Strikes in Yemen Against Two Explosive Drone Boats
John Harney and Mohammed Hatem/ Bloomberg /February 6, 2024
The US struck two Houthi sea drones in Yemen, as the Iran-backed group’s attacks around the Red Sea continue causing havoc in the shipping world. American forces hit the boats around 3.30 p.m. Yemen time on Monday, the latest of several strikes on Houthi positions since mid-January. The Houthis, a militant group that controls much of Yemen including its capital Sanaa and the Red Sea port of Hodeida, have used boats laden with explosives — as well as missiles and airborne drones — as part of their campaign to disrupt shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. The Houthis started their assaults in mid-November and say they’re in support of Hamas as its war against Israel in Gaza continues. “US forces identified the explosive USVs in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen and determined they presented an imminent threat to US Navy ships and merchant vessels in the region,” the US military said late on Monday. USV is the abbreviation for uncrewed surface vehicle. On Tuesday, the Houthis said they targeted two more ships sailing in the southern Red Sea. One of them, a small UK-run container ship called Morning Tide, had steel fragments on its deck after an explosion about 50 or 60 meters away at 3:19 a.m. local time, according to the vessel’s owner, London-based Furadino Shipping Ltd. The militants said they also targeted a commodity carrier called Star Nasia. The group has pledged to continue attacking vessels until Israel pulls out of the Gaza Strip. The US has said that while it doesn’t expect to deter the Houthis, its attacks — on targets such as airports, radar stations and weapons caches — are degrading their military capabilities. Israel Warns Time for Diplomacy With Hezbollah Running Out. Since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7 and Israeli forces retaliated with an offensive on Gaza, the wider region’s been roiled by spreading violence. As well as the Houthi attacks, US bases in Syria, Iraq and Jordan have been assaulted by Iran-supported groups, forcing Washington to respond with strikes of its own.

Cargo ship crew seized by Yemen's Houthis 'safe and sound', Bulgaria says
Agence France Presse/February 06, 2024
Bulgarian Transport Minister Georgy Gvozdeykov said Tuesday that the crew of the Galaxy Leader cargo ship captured by Yemen's Houthi rebels in November are "safe and sound" and will shortly return to Bulgaria. "The information we have ... on the sailors of the Galaxy Leader captured in the Red Sea is that they are well, safe and sound and are staying in a hotel," the minister told private Bulgarian television station bTV.

UNRWA says report into Israeli claims against staff due early March
REUTERS/February 06, 2024
BEIRUT: The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees expects a preliminary report into Israeli claims that a dozen of its employees took part in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel to be ready by early next month, its representative in Lebanon said Tuesday. Israel has accused 12 of UNRWA’s 13,000 employees in the Gaza Strip of taking part in the Hamas-led assault on Israel last year. The claims came as Israel faced a genocide case at the International Court of Justice over its war on Gaza, and after years of it calling for the agency to be disbanded. UNRWA’s representative in Lebanon Dorothee Klaus told reporters in Beirut that 19 donors had suspended their funding following the accusations. “We expect a preliminary investigation report early March, based on which we assume donors would look into their decisions of having suspended funding to UNRWA,” Klaus said. The UN’s oversight office is carrying out the investigation. UNRWA has said it acted quickly to address the allegations, with its head Philippe Lazzarini firing those allegedly involved and informing the UN’s secretary general, as well as the United States and other donors. Israel had informed Lazzarini of the accusations against the 12 staff members verbally, but other allegations were leaked to media that a larger number of UNRWA employees have Hamas links. Neither Israel nor any other official source has shared with UNRWA a dossier alleging that 190 of the agency’s staff members in Gaza are Hamas or Islamic Jihad militants. The first ever UN agency, UNRWA was established by a resolution of the body’s General Assembly in 1949 to look after refugees who fled or were pushed from their homes when Israel was created. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in January described UNRWA as “the backbone of all humanitarian response in Gaza” and has appealed to all countries to “guarantee the continuity of UNRWA’s lifesaving work.”The agency, whose biggest donors in 2022 included the US, Germany and the European Union, has repeatedly said its capacity to render humanitarian assistance to people in Gaza is on the verge of collapse.

At UN, Russia condemns US Mideast attacks, US says will continue to defend itself
Associated Press/February 07, 2024
Russia has accused the United States of aggression against Iraq and Syria aimed at preserving its global dominance and salvaging the Biden administration's "image" ahead of U.S. elections. The U.S. retorted that its military response to unjustified attacks by Iranian-backed proxies against American forces is not only legal but will continue. The exchange came at a contentious U.N. Security Council meeting called by Russia, Syria's closest ally, where both countries also said they did not want an escalation and spillover of the Israel-Hamas war. Many council members expressed fears of a growing Mideast conflict and urged de-escalation and stepped-up peace efforts.Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia accused the U.S. of violating international law and continuing "to sow chaos and destruction in the Middle East."He said violence by the United States and its allies has escalated from the Palestinian territories to Lebanon, the Red Sea and Yemen and is "nullifying international efforts to reestablish peace in the Middle East." He called on all countries "to unequivocally condemn these senseless acts … which violate the sovereignty of Iraq and the Syrian Arab Republic."The Russian ambassador claimed the United States is attempting "to flex muscles ... to justify and salvage the image of the current American administration ... in the light of the upcoming presidential pre-election campaign." And he claimed the Americans were undertaking military action in an effort "at any price to preserve their dominating position in the world."
U.S. Deputy Ambassador Robert Wood countered that the United States has an absolute right to self-defense against attacks on American forces and the actions it has taken were "necessary and proportionate."
He told the council that since Oct. 18, Iran-aligned militia groups have attacked U.S. and coalition forces over 165 times in Iraq, Syria, and in a drone attack on a Jordanian facility hosting U.S. forces fighting Islamic State extremists on Jan. 28 that killed three U.S. Army members and injured many more. The U.S. responded with 85 airstrikes in Iraq and Syria on Feb. 2 which both countries claimed resulted in civilian deaths, injuries and property destruction. They condemned the attacks as violations of their sovereignty – as their ambassadors did again at Monday's council meeting.
Wood stressed that the United States doesn't want more conflict in a region where it is "actively working to contain and deescalate the conflict in Gaza.""And we are not seeking a direct conflict with Iran," Wood said "But we will continue to defend our personnel against unacceptable attacks. Period."He accused Iran of failing "to rein in its extremist proxies."The United States calls on the 14 other council members, especially those with direct channels to Iran, "to press Iranian leaders to rein in their militias and stop these attacks," Wood said. "They should also press the Syrian regime to stop giving Iran a platform to destabilize the region."Iran's U.N. Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani countered that "all of the resistance group in the region are independent," and said they have legitimate rights to end "the illegal" U.S. presence in Iraq and Syria, stop the killings in Gaza and end Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories. "Therefore, any attempt to attribute these actions to Iran or its armed forces is misleading, baseless and unacceptable," Iravani told the council, adding that Iran has never sought to contribute to a spillover of the conflict, has no military presence in Iraq and has military advisors in Syria at the government's invitation to fight terrorism. He rejected claims that Iranian bases in Iraq and Syria were attacked, calling the allegations "unfounded" and attempts "to shift attention away from the U.S. aggressive actions."U.N. political chief Rosemary DiCarlo briefed the council, urging all parties to heed Secretary-General Antonio Guterres' call "to step back from the brink and to consider the unbearable human and economic cost of a potential regional conflict."She reiterated his call for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire and action to promote a political roadmap to peace in the region.China's U.N. Ambassador Zhang Jun, a Russian ally, echoed her concerns about escalating tensions and actions, and pointed a finger at the United States. "The US purports that it does not seek to create conflicts in the Middle East or anywhere else, but in reality, it does precisely the opposite," Zhang said. "The U.S. military actions are undoubtedly stoking new turmoil in this region and further intensifying tensions."Algeria's U.N. Ambassador Amar Bendjama, the Arab representative on the council, defended the sovereignty of Iraq and Syria and also said the U.S. airstrikes "are likely to further exacerbate the already precarious situation.""It may potentially lead toward a further escalation," he warned, urging restraint and de-escalation. "We firmly believe that force is not and will never be the means for peace and stability," Bendjama said.

Iraq and US need to return to negotiating, Iraq foreign minister says
REUTERS/February 07, 2024
CAIRO: Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein, in a phone call with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday, stressed the need to return to dialogue and the negotiating table over the future of the US-led international military coalition in Iraq, the foreign ministry said in a statement. Talks between the two countries began in January, but less than 24 hours later three US service members were killed in an attack that the United States said was carried out by Iran-backed militant groups in Syria and Iraq. The talks have paused since then.

UN envoy warns more attacks on Iraq threaten its hard-won stability
AP/February 07, 2024
UNITED NATIONS: Iraq’s government is focused on avoiding a domestic or regional spillover of the Israel-Hamas war but continuing attacks on the country threaten its hard-won stability, the UN envoy for Iraq warned Tuesday. With the war raging in Gaza, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert told the UN Security Council that “the Middle East is at a critical juncture” and “the same is true for Iraq.” Attacks originating from inside and outside Iraq will not only undo the country’s stability but “other achievements made in the past 18 months,” she said, adding that “messaging by strikes only serves to recklessly heighten tensions, to kill or injure people and to destroy property.”She pointed to the Jan. 28 drone strike on a Jordanian facility hosting US forces fighting Daesh extremists that killed three US Army members and injured many more – and to the US response with 85 airstrikes in Iraq and Syria against sites used by Iranian-backed militias and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard on Feb. 2. Both Iraq and Syria claimed civilians were killed and injured, and property destroyed. Hennis-Plasschaert said many Iraqis were also shocked at an Iranian missile attack in mid-January on the northern city of Irbil, the seat of Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region, which killed civilians and was at odds “with the great efforts made on the Iraq-Iran security agreement.”“Rather than shows of force, all efforts should center on safeguarding Iraq from being drawn in any way into a wider conflict,’ she said.
The UN envoy urged restraint from Iraq’s armed groups, its neighbor and other countries, saying this is “crucial” for the country’s stability and progress. “With Iraq cloaked in an already complex tapestry of challenges, it is of greatest importance that all attacks cease,” said Hennis-Plasschaert, who announced that after five years in Baghdad as the UN’s special representative she will be departing at the end of May. Russia called a council meeting Monday on the US airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, and its deputy ambassador, Dmitry Polyansky said that despite the security successes achieved by Baghdad, “the situation on the ground is tenuous.” He again blamed the United States for attempting to transform Iraq “into a stage for geopolitical score-settling to advance their parochial internal agendas” against a backdrop of its failed policy for a Mideast settlement and the current presidential election campaign. US deputy ambassador Robert Wood countered that Iran-aligned militia groups “threaten to undermine Iraq’s hard-fight gains” since Daesh extremists were defeated seven years ago. “Since October 2023, these groups have attacked US and coalition forces in Iraq, Syria and Jordan over 165 times,” causing deaths and injuries, including among Iraqi forces, he said. Wood said the US is waiting for recommendations from an independent review on how the UN political mission known as UNAMI “can help further Iraq’s plans to build a sustainable future for its citizens and adapt to its political transition and ever-changing security needs.”
Iraq’s UN Ambassador Abbas Al-Fatlawi told the council his country is seeking to regain the country’s “leading role” in the region and the world, outlining steps it is taking internationally and domestically. He condemned “American, Turkish and Iranian aggressions against Iraqi territory” which violate its sovereignty, and warned of the danger of expanding the Israel-Hamas war and its continuation. Al-Fatlawi said Iraq and the United States are conducting a first round of talks on the future presence of US and coalition forces fighting the remaining Daesh fighters, and discussed drawing up a timeline for their drawdown “in a manner that would guarantee a smooth transition.”

Opposing Ukraine aid bill is playing into Putin’s hands: Biden
AFP/February 07, 2024
WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden said Tuesday that Congress will be playing into the Kremlin’s hands if it fails to renew funding for Ukraine’s fight against Russian invasion — and blamed Donald Trump for playing politics with US national security. The “clock is ticking” for Ukraine, Biden warned. The US president called out Trump — his expected November election rival — for pressuring Republican lawmakers not to pass a $118 billion bill that would fund Ukraine’s military in return for strict US immigration curbs, a Republican demand. “We can’t walk away now. That’s what Putin’s betting on,” Biden said. “Supporting this bill is standing up to Putin. Opposing this bill is playing into his hands.” The immigration portion of the bill, he said, included the “toughest set of reforms to secure the border ever.”Despite themselves insisting on the immigration crackdown as a condition for renewing US aid to pro-Western Ukraine, Republicans have now responded to Trump’s pressure by making clear they will not help Democrats pass the huge bill. This will sink Ukraine’s chances of getting desperately needed weaponry and ammunition as it enters the third year of resisting a full-scale Russian invasion.
It also means that the toughly negotiated measures to harden the US-Mexican border and keep out undocumented migrants will be abandoned, despite getting initial approval from senior Republican and Democratic senators. “Most of our members feel that we’re not going to be able to make a law here,” Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell acknowledged in remarks to journalists Tuesday. Biden said Trump, who is running for a return to the White House largely on his anti-immigrant platform and claims that the southern border is suffering an “invasion,” was using the crisis to boost his electoral chances. “Donald Trump thinks it’s bad for him politically. Therefore... even though it helps his country, he’s not for it,” Biden said. “He’d rather weaponize this issue than actually solve it.”“For the last 24 hours he has done nothing, I’m told, but reach out to Republicans in the House and the Senate and threaten them and try to intimidate them,” Biden said. “It looks like they’re caving.”Trump has been ramping up attacks on the bill for weeks, undermining his own party’s leaders as they inched toward compromise on the border — and thereby opening the door to Ukraine aid. “Don’t be STUPID!!! We need a separate Border and Immigration Bill. It should not be tied to foreign aid in any way, shape, or form!” Trump posted in one of his many warnings to Republican legislators. Biden and Trump are campaigning on starkly divergent approaches to Ukraine, with the Democrat clear that helping the pro-Western ally repel Russia is vital to ensure a safer world while his predecessor pushes an isolationist “America First” policy. At home, Biden has pressed for a humane immigration policy but Republicans point to statistics showing migrant apprehensions reaching a record high of 302,000 in December, a surge Trump has been wielding as a major issue in the campaign. The deal, unveiled by senators Sunday, is a bipartisan $118 billion package of immigration restrictions that Biden has committed to signing into law. It is tied to a foreign aid package that includes $60 billion for Ukraine and $14 billion for Israel.

US, Russia clash at UN over North Korea, Patriot missiles in Ukraine
REUTERS/February 07, 2024
UNITED NATIONS: The United States accused Russia on Tuesday of firing at least nine North Korean-supplied missiles at Ukraine, while Moscow labeled Washington a “direct accomplice” in the downing of a Russian military transport plane last month. Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia and deputy US Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood traded the accusations at a UN Security Council meeting on Ukraine, requested by Moscow. Russia invaded neighboring Ukraine nearly two years ago.“To date, Russia has launched DPRK-supplied ballistic missiles against Ukraine on at least nine occasions,” Wood told the 15-member Security Council, using the North Korea’s formal name: the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). “Russia and the DPRK must be held accountable for their actions, which undermine long-standing obligations under UN Security Council resolutions,” he said.
Both Moscow and Pyongyang have denied the US accusations, but vowed last year to deepen military relations. Russia has stepped up ties with North Korea and other countries hostile to the United States such as Iran since the start of the war with Ukraine — relations that are a source of concern to the West. A Russian Air Force Il-76 fell from the skies on Jan. 24. Russia said all 74 people on board, including 65 captured Ukrainian soldiers en route to be swapped for Russian prisoners of war, were killed, and blamed Kyiv for downing the plane. “We possess irrefutable evidence that a Patriot surface-to-air missile was used to carry out the strike, which leaves no doubt the Washington is a direct accomplice in this crime as well,” Nebenzia told the Security Council. Russian investigators said last week that they had evidence showing that Ukraine’s military shot down the military transport plane with US-made Patriot surface-to-air missiles. Russia asked the council to meet on Tuesday after it said Ukraine killed at least 28 people when it used Western-supplied rockets to strike a bakery and restaurant on Saturday in Russian-controlled eastern Ukraine. Senior Ukrainian UN diplomat Serhii Dvornyk accused Russia of misusing the Security Council “for disseminating fakes.”Wood said the US was unable to independently verify the information — blaming an absence of independent media reporting — but laments all civilian casualties. He added: “To be clear, Russia is the only aggressor in this war, and the only one that could end this war today.”

Anger at Turkish government spills over at earthquake anniversary vigil
REUTERS/February 07, 2024
HATAY, Turkiye: More than 10,000 people gathered early on Tuesday to hold a vigil for the one-year anniversary of the devastating earthquakes that hit southeastern Turkiye, as some protested what they called government negligence in the aftermath. The magnitude 7.8 tremor, the deadliest disaster in Turkiye’s modern history, leveled towns and parts of cities in the country’s southeast and neighboring Syria. It killed more than 50,000 people in Turkiye, some 5,900 in Syria, and left millions homeless. In the southeastern Turkish province of Hatay, the country’s worst-hit, people called for the government and local authorities to resign during the vigil, and demanded that officials do not present themselves at the memorial, while booing speeches.
FASTFACT
The magnitude 7.8 tremor, the deadliest disaster in Turkiye’s modern history, levelled towns and parts of cities in the country’s southeast and neighboring Syria. It killed more than 50,000 people in Turkiye, some 5,900 in Syria, and left millions homeless. In the main square of the city of Hatay, located in the province, some chanted, “Can anybody hear my voice?” as Health Minister Fahrettin Koca spoke, a slogan referring to calls heard from under the rubble as people waited for days for help to arrive. Residents say many people died not because of the buildings collapsing, but rather from waiting for so long trapped in the rubble in the cold. After the vigil, people tossed flowers into the Asi River, which runs through the city. Merve Gursel, who lost her aunt, her aunt’s husband and her cousins in the earthquake, called out their names as she tossed a carnation into the water for each one. “Nobody was with these people that day. These people’s pain is that they could not be rescued. These people’s pain is that they could not have their voices heard,” she said. “This (the protests) is the echo of people’s inner pain. It is an echo of how much people have suffered. There is no way to describe how to make up for the pain here. Those people’s hearts are bleeding.”Nesibe Duzgun said she was tossing flowers in the water for everyone she knew and that the move unified the people of Hatay. President Tayyip Erdogan said in a statement on social media site X that the pain of the loss from the earthquakes was as fresh now as it was a year ago, and his government had moved in the immediate aftermath of what they call “the disaster of the century.” “The unity of the century was displayed in the face of the disaster of the century,” he said.However, Nurul Sabah Aksu, a Hatay resident, said the government had abandoned the people of the city to die. “Thousands of people died here. Where were they? Why did they leave Hatay like this? Why did they forget about us?” Aksu asked.

Russians are freezing as Soviet-era infrastructure in the country crumbles —and Moscow keeps spending on war
Huileng Tan/Business Insider/February 6, 2024 at 1:03 a.m. EST
Heating systems are breaking down in Russia's harsh winter, leaving many people freezing. Much of Russia's Soviet-era infrastructure needs modernizing. But Russia is splurging on war rather than public utilities. Heating systems are breaking down in Russia's harsh winter, leaving many people freezing as Moscow continues to spend on its war in Ukraine. Parts of Russia are experiencing an unusually cold winter — temperatures in Siberia hit -70 degrees Fahrenheit in December. The brutal conditions are made worse because Russia's infrastructure is poorly maintained, with many of its facilitates dating from the Soviet era, according to media reports. This has caused a spate of breakdowns in central heating systems since December that has even hit parts of the Moscow region and the city of St. Petersburg, The Bell, an independent Russian media outlet, reported on January 16. In one incident, more than a dozen people suffered from burns in the Western Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod when a large heating pipe burst, causing boiling water to flow into the streets, DW reported, citing a local news channel on Telegram. The damaged pipe also caused over 3,000 people to lose access to heating. "We are still using the communal infrastructure that was made during the Soviet era," said Russian lawmaker Svetlana Razvorotneva, who is a member of a national urban engineering committee, per DW. About 40% of the communal heating grid in the country needs to be replaced urgently, she added. However, funding for public utilities made up just 2.2% of Russia's total expenditure last year, according to the Financial Times. In contrast, Moscow's spending on military expenses made up about 21% of Russia's budget in the same year, per Reuters. Russia is also ramping up defense spending to one-third of its budget this year as the war in Ukraine looks set to enter its third year, Russia's finance ministry said in October, per Reuters. As costs for the war add up, the Kremlin will likely need to introduce austerity measures to deal with Russia's budget deficit, UK intelligence reported on Monday.Even so, Russian leader Vladimir Putin is still almost certain to win a fifth term in Russia's presidential election in March. “People are dissatisfied with the state of communal services, but they perceive the situation as a chronic disease," Denis Volkov, the director of Levada Center, an independent research organization, told the FT. "When something breaks, it annoys them, but it does not come as a surprise.”

Latest English LCCC  analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on February 06-07/2024
Biden Opened the Floodgates of Hell
Gordon G. Chang/Gatestone Institute./February 6, 2024
China and Russia [do]... not respect the sovereignty of other states.
Biden... should realize that there can be no accommodation with regimes that either seek the destruction of the United States—China and Iran, for instance—or regimes helping such enemies—most notably Russia. Biden should be supporting America's friends to the hilt and seeking total victory for Ukraine and Israel. Continuing with existing policies is perhaps the most dangerous option of all. Those policies may sound reasonable, constructive, and pleasing to the ear, but they have in fact created the disastrous situation that now exists.
Biden has opened the floodgates of Hell. Although nothing is inevitable, we are fast approaching the point where, as a practical matter, he will not be able to stop China and Russia, directly and through proxies, from merging existing conflicts and turning them into the next global war.
President Joe Biden should realize that there can be no accommodation with regimes that either seek the destruction of the United States—China and Iran, for instance—or regimes helping such enemies—most notably Russia. Biden should be supporting America's friends to the hilt and seeking total victory for Ukraine and Israel. Pictured: Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping meet in Beijing on February 4, 2022. (Photo by Alexei Druzhinin/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images)
President Joe Biden's foreign policy has collapsed. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan effectively admitted that to CNN's Dana Bash on February 4.
"You have said now a couple times on this show and you have said this many times before that the administration is trying to prevent this from spreading into a regional conflict," Bash told Sullivan on "State of the Union," referring to the war in Gaza.
The CNN anchor proceeded to list some of the places to which the Gaza conflict has now spread. Then she asked this:
"My colleague Peter Bergen smartly pointed out that this conflict involves 10 countries, at least four major terrorist groups, so isn't this already a regional conflict?"
"Well, Dana, what I would say is that these are distinct but related challenges," the national security adviser replied. Then he struggled to put the best face on the ongoing disaster: "For example, what's happening in the Red Sea is obviously to a certain extent triggered by what's happening in Gaza, but it's not the same thing. The Houthis aren't just hitting ships related to Israel; they're hitting a lot of different ships from a lot of different countries. And so we are trying to deal with the challenge to freedom of navigation in the Red Sea. That is a distinct challenge. The militia groups in Iraq and Syria are hitting our forces. We're responding. And then of course Israel is dealing both with the challenge of Hamas in Gaza and the threat from Hezbollah in the north."
Sullivan, although not his intention, confirmed the war in Gaza has already extended beyond that troubled strip.
The situation is actually worse than he let on. Hamas leaders have fled Qatar and are now hiding out in Qatari diplomatic missions in Morocco, where they are unwanted by the King, and in Algeria, where they are welcomed by the regime.
Iran, therefore, effectively has operatives at the western end of the Mediterranean. In December, the regime's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) publicly threatened to close off that body of water, just as it has essentially crippled shipping through the Red Sea. With terrorists close to the Strait of Gibraltar, the IRGC might be able to make good on what otherwise appears to be a wild boast.
Hamas operatives have also fled Qatar for Turkey, which controls access to the Black Sea, and Lebanon.
War, therefore, has spread farther than Dana Bash's question suggests. Biden's Afghanistan debacle of August 2021 was quickly followed by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, by China's and Russia's fueling insurgencies in North Africa, and by Iran's attacks on Israel from Gaza and the Golan Heights.
"Blood now soaks the soil of three continents," Jonathan Bass, an energy consultant with InfraGlobal Partners and an expert on Gulf state politics, told Gatestone this month. "More will be spilled. Aggressors are now on killing sprees."
American policy is failing, and it will continue to fail because it is based on a fundamentally flawed premise. Biden seems to believe that the world has not fundamentally changed since the Cold War and, therefore, it is possible to integrate virtually all nations into the rules-based international system.
The world, however, has already cleaved and hardened into factions, and one of the factions, the one centered around China and Russia, does not respect the sovereignty of other states. In other words, Beijing and Moscow do not accept the assumptions that have defined the world since the Peace of Westphalia of 1648, which established the current international system. Chinese and Russian leaders do not agree as to what should replace Westphalia, but they are nonetheless working together to bring it down.
Biden, however, is trying to work with China as a partner. Unfortunately for him, its regime is promoting the notion that it has the obligation to rule—not just dominate—the entire world. In short, Xi Jinping believes the United States is at most a Chinese colony. Moreover, the Communist Party has declared a "people's war" against America. In these circumstances, long-term cooperation with China's regime is not possible.
Western democracies often think they can work with evil, something evident from persistent British attempts in the late 1930s to "civilize" and "appease" the brutes of the Third Reich. American leaders, as they vainly tried to integrate China's Communist Party into the international system after the Cold War, learned nothing from the earlier failure.
Biden has been trying to manage the Ukraine conflict, and he is searching for a compromise in the Middle East. Instead, he should realize that there can be no accommodation with regimes that either seek the destruction of the United States—China and Iran, for instance—or regimes helping such enemies—most notably Russia. Biden should be supporting America's friends to the hilt and seeking total victory for Ukraine and Israel.
Analysts say that seeking total victory is dangerous. Yes, it is. Yet saying something is dangerous is no longer a meaningful objection. After three decades of truly misguided American policy—the failure is bipartisan—every course of action is exceedingly dangerous. Continuing with existing policies is perhaps the most dangerous option of all. Those policies may sound reasonable, constructive, and pleasing to the ear, but they have in fact created the disastrous situation that now exists.
Now, bad actors are openly acting in concert. Just before the American counterstrikes of February 2 and 3 over the deaths at the Tower 22 base in Jordan, an Iranian reconnaissance vessel, the Behshad, fled the Red Sea and obtained refuge just outside the Chinese naval base in nearby Djibouti, a sign of Beijing's support for enemies of the United States. Why does China's comprehensive support for Iran matter? Gregory Copley, president of the International Strategic Studies Association, told Gatestone in December that there are no more "regional wars" because "all of them have some degree of involvement by the great powers."Let's remember there were, in the 1930s, separate wars that merged into what we now call World War II. The same dynamic is happening now.
Biden has opened the floodgates of Hell. Although nothing is inevitable, we are fast approaching the point where, as a practical matter, he will not be able to stop China and Russia, directly and through proxies, from merging existing conflicts and turning them into the next global war. 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.
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What If the West Accepted Only Christian Refugees from the Muslim World?
Raymond Ibrahim./February 6, 2024 
For years now, a number of mostly Eastern European nations have been arguing that, if they are going to accept any refugees from the Muslim world, they prefer Christians. Hungary, for example, has apparently been doing just that.
To this, the official Western response has been to cry “racism!” Barack Obama, for instance, once called such a suggestion “shameful,” loftily adding: “That’s not American. That’s not who we are. We don’t have religious tests to our compassion.” Meanwhile, it was later revealed that his administration was doing precisely that—but in reverse: discriminating against persecuted Christian asylum seekers, while favoring Muslims.
All emotionalism and name calling aside—that is, the stuff of American politics—there are, in fact, several objective reasons why the West should give priority, if not exclusivity, to Christian refugees from the Muslim world—and some of these are actually to the benefit of Western nations. Consider:
Christians are real victims of persecution. From a humanitarian point of view—and humanitarianism is the chief reason cited in accepting refugees—Christians should receive top priority simply because they are the most persecuted group in the Middle East. As former Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop once put it, “I think that Christian minorities are being persecuted in Syria and even if the conflict were over they would still be persecuted.”
Indeed. While they are especially targeted by the Islamic State and other professional jihadists, before ISIS, Christians were and continue to be targeted by Muslims—Muslim mobs, Muslim individuals, Muslim regimes, and Muslim terrorists, from Muslim countries of all races (Arab, African, Asian, etc.)—and for the same reason: Christians are infidel number one. (See Crucified Again: Exposing Islam’s New War on Christians for hundreds of anecdotes before the rise of ISIS as well as the Muslim doctrines that create such hate and contempt for Christians.)
Conversely, Muslim refugees are not fleeing direct persecution, but chaos created by the violent and intolerant teachings of their own religion, Islam—hence why violence and intolerance follows Muslims into Europe.
Muslim persecution of Christians has been further enabled by Western policies. Western nations should accept Christian refugees on the basis that Western actions in the Middle East are directly responsible for exacerbating the plight of Christian minorities. Christians were not terrorized in Bashar Assad’s Syria, or Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, or Muamar Gaddafi’s Libya. Their persecution grew exponentially only after the U.S. and other Western states interfered in those nations in the name of “democracy.” All they did is unleash the jihadist forces that the dictators had long kept suppressed.
Unlike Muslims, Christians are easily assimilated in Western countries, due to a shared Christian heritage. As a Slovakian official once explained, Muslims would not fit in, including because there are no mosques in the Slavic nation. Conversely, “Slovakia as a Christian country can really help Christians from Syria to find a new home in Slovakia.”
This too is common sense. The same Christian teachings that molded Europe over the centuries are the same ones that mold Middle Eastern Christians—whether Orthodox, Catholic, or Protestant. As San Diego’s Father Noel once said, Mideast Christians “who come here [America] ‘want to be good citizens’ and many who came here a decade ago are now lawyers, teachers, or other productive members of society.”
Meanwhile, Muslims follow a completely different blueprint, the Koran—which condemns Christians by name, calls for constant war (jihad) against all non-Muslims, and advocates any number of distinctly anti-Western practices. Hence it is no surprise that many Muslim migrants are anti-Western at heart.
Mideast Christians bring trustworthy language and cultural skills that are beneficial to the West. They understand the Middle Eastern—including Islamic—mindset and can help the West understand it. Moreover, unlike Muslims, Christians have no “conflicting loyalty” issues: Islamic law forbids Muslims from aiding “infidels” against fellow Muslims (click here to see some of the treachery this leads to in the U.S. and here to see the treachery Christians have suffered from their longtime Muslim neighbors and “friends”). Subversive Muslims are working to infiltrate every corner of the U.S. government. No such threat exists among Mideast Christians. They too render unto God what is God’s and unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.
Finally, it goes without saying that Mideast Christians have no sympathy for the ideology that made their lives a living hell—the ideology that is also hostile to everything in the West. Thus a win-win: the West and Mideast Christians complement each other, if only in that they share the same threat.
All the above reasons—from those that offer humanitarian relief to the true victims of persecution, to those that offer benefits to the West—are unassailable in their logic and wisdom. Yet, because Western progressives prioritize politically correct ideals and fantasies over stark reality, there is little chance that they will be considered.
Quite the reverse: all throughout the West, masses of Muslims have been and continue to be granted easy asylum, while the few Christian applicants are scrutinized and often rejected.
The reason for this is simple: for the progressive (now “woke”) mindset—which dominates Western governments, media, and academia—taking in refugees has little to do with altruism and everything to do egoism: It matters little who is really being persecuted—as seen, the West is directly responsible for greatly exacerbating the sufferings of Christians around the world.
No, what’s important is that the progressives “feel good” about themselves. By taking in “foreign” Muslims, as opposed to “siding” with same-old, same-old Christians, they get to feel “enlightened,” “open-minded,” “tolerant,” and “multicultural”—and that’s all that matters here.
Meanwhile, reality marches on: The same Islamic mentality that persecutes and slaughters “infidel” Christians in the Middle East continues to grow at an alarming rate in the West.

Working for a ceasefire, from the bottom up
James J. Zogby/The Arab Weekly/February 06/2024
The administration’s stubborn aversion to even the use of the term ‘ceasefire’ remains inexplicable.
Despite the Biden administration’s refusal to back a ceasefire that would help end Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza, momentum is growing across the US calling on the administration to reverse course. What is significant is that the opposition to the White House’s position is coming from within the president’s own party. The administration’s stubborn aversion to even the use of the term ‘ceasefire’ remains inexplicable. It may be recalled that just a few days after the Israeli bombings that followed the October 7 attacks, the State Department issued a statement calling for a ceasefire that was quickly taken down and followed by a guidance memo to diplomats saying the term was not to be used. As the number of civilian casualties continued to grow, administration officials repeatedly fell back on the line that Israel had the right to defend itself, that Hamas had to be eliminated and that a ceasefire would only allow Hamas to rebuild its capacity. The administration attempted to absolve itself by coupling this rejection of a ceasefire with appeals to Israel to avoid civilian casualties and with support for humanitarian aid. Those arguments have failed the test of time. The carpet bombing of residential areas of Gaza, the clear intent to demolish housing and infrastructure, the forced evacuation of millions, and more have led to Israel being charged with genocide. And leading analysts in the US and Israel have noted that the “elimination of Hamas” is at best “a fool’s errand.”As the dimensions of the human tragedy unfolding in Gaza became clearer, the US has found itself virtually isolated in the world community in its rejection of a UAE-sponsored Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire that would allow unimpeded humanitarian aid. Countering this proposal, the US supported increased aid to Gaza but would not consider the reality that without an end to the bombing aid could not be delivered nor reach those most in need.
Slowly but surely US public opinion has changed with substantial majorities now wanting a ceasefire and voters indicating by a two to one margin that they are more inclined to support candidates who call for a ceasefire, with the margin of support for a ceasefire greater among Democrats and key Democratic constituencies (young voters and non-white voters). Still the administration resists. This past week, a leading Democratic Senator, Chris Van Hollen, joined the chorus of legislators calling for a ceasefire, making him the 68th member of the Senate or House of Representatives to do so. This represents more than one quarter of the Democrats in Congress and can be expected to grow. More significant, and somewhat unexpected, are the numbers of city councils who have taken up the call for a ceasefire. Led by the grassroot mobilisation of Palestinian Americans, progressive Jewish groups and Black activists, major cities including Atlanta, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Detroit, Seattle, St Louis and three dozen other municipalities have passed strong ceasefire resolutions. And while a vote on a similar resolution has been delayed for a few days in Chicago, the US’s third largest city and home of this year’s Democratic National Convention, that city’s Mayor, Brandon Johnson, this week issued a strong call in support of a ceasefire.
Because the language used by Mayor Johnson was so evocative it warrants consideration. Echoing the sentiments of his voters, he not only expressed his horror at the loss of life, but also tied the liberation of Blacks with the justifiable need for Palestinian liberation. He said: “I’m not mayor of the city of Chicago if people weren’t pushing the government to recognise the value of liberation, what it means for people, groups and nations. And, in this instance, people should be liberated.”Just two weeks ago, an emergency summit on Gaza was convened in Chicago under the auspices of the Reverend Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow Push Coalition. During those sessions, prominent Black clergymen similarly connected their struggle for justice with that of the Palestinians living under occupation. They were joined by progressive Jewish rabbis, Protestant church leaders, Arab-Americans and American Muslims, all united in the call for a ceasefire and committed to advancing this effort nationwide. The effort is advancing.

Cutting off UNRWA funding is immoral and damaging
Yossi Mekelberg/Arab News/February 06, 2024
In times of war, the tactic of deflecting from your own wrongdoings by highlighting others’ shortcomings is as old as conflict itself. During the last week, Israel’s PR machine has been focused on the organization that has, for the last 75 years, been in charge of providing humanitarian aid to Palestinian refugees residing in the Middle East.
Israel’s anger in the face of the expose that 12 UN Relief and Works Agency employees were directly involved in the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre is understandable and justified. To say that there has not been a more embarrassing and damaging revelation in this organization’s history would be stating the very obvious. But the call to defund UNRWA, and the support for this call voiced by some governments, is a knee-jerk reaction that amounts to a betrayal of the many Palestinian victims of both the current and previous wars in their time of most desperate need.
Had Israel’s out-of-control assaults against UNRWA begun with the revelation that some of the latter’s employees were among those who carried out Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack, or in its aftermath helped to hide the hostages taken, there might have been some sympathy for Israel’s lashing out. However, the current situation comes on the back of years of venomous accusations, many of them baseless.
The organization has been attacked for its very existence, for allegedly being in cahoots with terrorists, for perpetuating the Palestinian refugee tragedy, for being corrupt, for not being good value for its funders and for being generally anti-Israeli. It has been made a scapegoat for the political failure — for which Israel is largely responsible — to bring about an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including a satisfactory solution to the plight and legal status of the refugees.
There is no reason for these countries to pause their funding to the agency at the worst possible time for the Gazan people
Nothing can excuse the participation of any UN employee in an act of terrorism and, in this case, the response from UNRWA’s leadership has been entirely correct. Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini immediately announced: “To protect the agency’s ability to deliver humanitarian assistance, I have taken the decision to immediately terminate the contracts of these staff members and launch an investigation in order to establish the truth without delay.”
This is what should be expected of the organization, although its response was based on information given by the Israelis and before the completion of its own internal investigation. But for both moral and practical reasons, I can only imagine the shock and dismay of both those in charge of UNRWA and across the UN system at the news of the involvement of a number of its people in the Oct. 7 attack.
The immediate calculated hysterics demonstrated by Israeli spokespersons in calling for the defunding of UNRWA, given Israel’s long-held hostility to the agency, was only to be expected. But Israel appears confused about who exactly it is fighting in Gaza: Is it Hamas or is it those humanitarian workers who risk their lives in doing their very best to provide shelter, medical help, food, water and, yes, some dignity for those who were already refugees and now have been displaced once more by this horrific war?
Let us also for a moment allow some figures to provide us with a little perspective. UNRWA employs about 13,000 Palestinians in Gaza, out of its 30,000-strong workforce across the region. Most of them are refugees. According to Israeli intelligence’s own dossier, 190 of them are Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad operatives and 1,200 have “links” to these organizations. The latter could mean anything (or absolutely nothing), such as one or more family members or friends possibly being members of these groups, which on its own is no reason not to employ them.
If the Israeli dossier is accurate, they represent a tiny proportion of UNRWA’s workforce. This issue needs to be addressed, certainly, but it is hardly a reason for nine countries, including the US, the UK and Canada, to pause their funding to the agency at the worst possible time for the Gazan people.
Neither Israel nor those who have decided to stop funding UNRWA have mentioned that 152 of its humanitarian workers have already been killed during this war or that many of them are among the 1.7 million other Gazan people displaced, which amounts to more than three-quarters of the population. Some of the displaced have been forced to move several times as a result of Israel’s relentless bombardments and ground attacks and, despite constantly running out of capacity, UNRWA’s facilities and aid remain their only hope.
Israel would like to see the refugee issue disappear into thin air. The very existence of UNRWA is an inconvenient reminder.
Behind the severity of Israel’s accusations against a few of the agency’s people is hidden a much broader agenda, one which is the real source of so much Israeli venom aimed at UNRWA. Israel would like to see the refugee issue just disappear into thin air. The very existence of UNRWA is an inconvenient reminder of the issue of Palestinian refugees and of Israel’s role in creating it in the first place — and for leaving it unresolved ever since.
The people of Gaza will remain in Gaza after the war ends, whether Israel recognizes them or not. Many more are now refugees and further displaced. There is an international responsibility to protect them and provide them with humanitarian aid.
Israel’s call to defund UNRWA is one of the longest-running bluffs in its policies toward the Palestinians. Because were UNRWA to be dismantled, it is Israel, as the occupying country, that would be responsible for the refugees’ well-being, at least in the West Bank and Gaza. And if they are deprived of medical services, education, financial help and shelter, the anger will be first and foremost directed at Israel, and not without justification. Moreover, the demise of UNRWA would mean the loss of thousands of jobs for refugees, with all the implications attached to such a development, let alone the fact that those are the people likely to become the very backbone of a future independent Palestinian state. And in other host countries, the defunding of UNRWA will only serve as a further destabilizing factor in a region already on the brink of widespread armed conflict. The need for UNRWA to discipline those among them who have brought the organization into disrepute is indisputable. However, to punish the entire agency — and thus the recipients of its humanitarian services — is immoral and immensely damaging. It will only condemn millions of innocent people to more misery and suffering, which cannot be justified. And for those who want UNRWA to disappear, here is your challenge: please come up with a viable alternative that does not compromise the well-being of millions of refugees and their just aspiration for self-determination living side by side with Israel.
*Yossi Mekelberg is a professor of international relations and an associate fellow of the Middle East and North Africa Program at international affairs think tank Chatham House. X: @YMekelberg

How US Republicans’ Iran policies compare to their rhetoric
Kerry Boyd Anderson/Arab News/February 06, 2024
The US decision to hit multiple targets in Iraq and Syria in recent days, following an attack on US soldiers in Jordan that killed three troops, reflected both foreign policy and domestic political realities. President Joe Biden faced criticism from Republicans for not acting more quickly and forcefully, while some Democrats called for caution. While the attack on US soldiers and the US response present new risks of escalation at a time of high regional tensions, the situation also reflects long-running political attitudes in Washington toward Iran.
Republican and Democratic politicians have mixed records in terms of policy toward Iran since the 1979 revolution. As Jay Solomon wrote in “The Iran Wars,” “Iran’s belligerence has inspired a schizophrenic US strategy toward Tehran over the past 35 years.”Typically, Republicans have the most hawkish attitudes. Republican politicians have a long history of demanding that the US president show strength and force toward Iran. However, in reality, Republican policies tend to reflect both greater pragmatism and incoherence than their rhetoric.
When the Iranian revolution occurred in 1979, President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, was in the White House. His inability to free Americans taken hostage in Tehran contributed to his election loss to Ronald Reagan the following year. During the campaign, Reagan blamed Carter’s “weakness and vacillation” for leading to the hostage crisis and promised that “no dictator would dare” do such a thing if he were president. As a final insult to Carter, who many Iranians hated for allowing the deposed shah to enter the US and for an attempted military rescue in Iranian territory, the Iranian government released the hostages on the day that Reagan was inaugurated as president.
In reality, Republican policies tend to reflect both greater pragmatism and incoherence than their rhetoric.
Reagan came to power riding a wave of enthusiasm for American might, promising to forcefully defend US interests. However, during his two terms in office, his administration’s policies toward Iran demonstrated a willingness to quietly work with Tehran when it suited Washington’s interests. While the Reagan administration mostly supported Iraq in the Iraq-Iran War, and engaged in the Tanker War against Iran, it also secretly sold missiles to Iran in what became part of the Iran-Contra scandal.
In his inaugural address in 1989, George H.W. Bush said that the US would offer “good will” to those who would help to release “Americans who are held against their will in foreign lands.” As several Americans were held by Iranian proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon, many took Bush’s words as an offer to extend goodwill toward Tehran if it would help secure the hostages’ release. Bush took a pragmatic approach toward Iran, but frustration over the Lebanon hostage crisis, US efforts to limit Iranian influence in Iraq after the first Gulf War and other issues undermined any conciliatory efforts. However, Bush showed no interest in attacking Iran.
In 2002, President George W. Bush famously labeled Iran as part of an “axis of evil,” along with Iraq and North Korea, and his administration included notable anti-Iran hawks. Some of the neoconservatives who served in or influenced his administration saw overthrowing the Iranian regime as the ultimate goal in the region and even believed that overthrowing Saddam Hussein in Iraq would start a chain of events that would result in the downfall of the regime in Tehran. Vice President Dick Cheney reportedly urged the president to consider hitting targets inside Iran in response to Iranian support for militants in Iraq who were attacking US forces. Bush also ordered the military to “study what would be necessary for a strike” against nuclear facilities in Iran.
However, the Bush administration did not directly attack Iran. Rather, the president reportedly stopped Israel from attacking an Iranian nuclear site. While the administration included hawks who wanted to hit Iranian territory, other senior officials feared that the consequences would run counter to US interests. The latter group preferred to focus on military action against Iranian-supported militants in Iraq, while using covert actions and economic sanctions against Tehran.
When Republicans control US foreign policy, they have so far avoided military strikes on Iranian territory
While campaigning for president, Donald Trump disparaged President Barack Obama for making a “bad deal” with Iran when he agreed to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and promised that he would take a tougher approach. While some of the Republicans around President Trump — notably John Bolton, briefly the national security adviser, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo — wanted to take military action directly against Iran, Trump did not want to engage in another war in the Middle East. Trump was more focused on the idea that he could negotiate a far better deal with Iran.
Trump reportedly came very close to attacking sites in Iran in 2019 but then canceled the plans. His administration tightened sanctions on Iran and took military actions aimed at Iranian interests in the region — most notably the assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in the last few days of Trump’s term — but did not attack Iran directly.
Today, Republican leaders are again calling for harsh action against Iran. Some — such as Sens. Lindsey Graham and Tom Cotton and, once again, Bolton — are even calling for directly attacking Iranian territory. Hawkish rhetoric against Tehran is a frequent theme for Republicans, especially when they can use it to portray a Democratic president as weak. However, when Republicans control US foreign policy, they have so far avoided military strikes on Iranian territory.
Both Republican and Democratic presidents have been willing to engage in covert actions, war with Iranian proxies, naval confrontations and economic sanctions, but most Republican leaders — including the likely Republican nominee for president in 2024, Trump — do not want a direct war with Iran.
*Kerry Boyd Anderson is a professional analyst of international security issues and Middle East political and business risk. X: @KBAresearch

Reasons to believe two-state solution is closer than ever
Benjamin Case, Arizona State University/Associated Press/February 06/2024
As the war in the Gaza Strip enters its fourth month, on the surface it might seem like possibilities for long-term, peaceful solutions are impossible. Even before the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel by Hamas-led forces from Gaza, many analysts were already declaring the idea of a two-state solution dead.
There are real barriers to the creation of a Palestinian state alongside a separate Israel. For example, the current Israeli government rejects the creation of a Palestinian state, and Hamas refuses to recognize Israel. After Oct. 7, some analysts think the barriers are even more insurmountable. As a scholar of political violence and conflict, I think the unprecedented scale of violence in Israel and Gaza is creating equally unprecedented urgency to find a solution, not just to the current violence, but to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Few, if any, historical conflicts neatly compare to the one between Israelis and Palestinians. But there are similarities in the fall of apartheid in South Africa in the early 1990s, when growing international pressure and an intensifying war focused attention on an unsustainable system – and pushed people to find possibilities for peace that previously seemed impossible.
The fall of South African apartheid.
In 1948, the white-nationalist Afrikaner National Party was elected to run South Africa, a country that had already been controlled by a colonial white minority government.
The National Party formalized racial segregation policies in a system known as apartheid, an Afrikaans word that means "apartness" or "separateness." Apartheid ranked people by racial group, with white people at the top, Asian and people of mixed heritage lower, and Black people at the bottom with the most restrictions and fewest rights – for example, to live or work where they chose. Apartheid resulted in deep poverty and indignity for Black communities, quickly generating anti-apartheid social movements that South African police tried to violently suppress. The collapse of apartheid policies in the early 1990s is often attributed to a combination of South African resistance and the economic pressure brought by international anti-apartheid boycotts of South Africa. There was another major factor, though: South Africa's "border war" in Namibia and Angola. Since 1948, South Africa had imposed its apartheid policies over a neighboring region it occupied after World War II, then called South-West Africa, which is now Namibia. Like Black South Africans, people in South-West Africa resisted apartheid. Beginning in the 1960s, South Africa's military began employing local militias in South-West Africa to combat a Namibian independence movement. Soon after, South Africa attempted to expand its control over neighboring Angola, which was in civil war after winning independence from Portugal.
The war in South West Africa and Angola became a proxy for the ongoing Cold War and Western countries' fear of communism spreading. The U.S. supported South Africa's army and pro-Western militias, while the Soviet Union and Cuba supported pro-independence fighters. Cuba would eventually send 30,000 troops to fight on the ground on Angola's side. By the 1980s, the conflict was escalating into wider war, threatening to pull the United States and Soviet Union into direct conflict.
South Africa was forced to mobilize its reserve troops, and white South Africans began protesting at home. It was becoming clear that not just the war but the country's brutal apartheid system was not sustainable, lending credibility to those who wanted a democratic solution. The mutually destructive war had no clear end or military solution. South Africa and opposing armies were also running out of money to keep fighting.
This stalemate pushed Cuba, Angola and South Africa to a peace deal in 1988, and South Africa withdrew its forces. The war with Namibia continued, but not for long.
South African Prime Minister P.W. Botha resigned in 1989 after losing the support of his own far-right party for his failure in the war and inability to impose order. In 1990, Namibia declared independence. That same year, the new South African government began rolling back apartheid policies, paving the way for historic elections in 1994 that were won in a landslide by anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela. South Africa's involvement in its border war is different in many ways from Israel's military campaign in Gaza. But there are also similarities that may offer guidance.
A way toward two states?
For more than half a century, Israel has controlled the borders of the West Bank and Gaza. Home to 5 million Palestinians, these areas exist in a kind of netherworld between being part of Israel and being separate, sovereign entities. Israel controls their territory, but Palestinians who live in the West Bank and Gaza cannot vote in Israel and do not have basic rights or freedom of movement. It is a situation that many analysts have long understood is unsustainable, as it has repeatedly given way to extreme fighting between Israelis and Palestinians. Yet with the U.S. and other powers firmly backing Israel as a strategic ally, few could see realistic possibilities for change. The shocking scale of violence in the war is changing that. About 1,200 people were killed and 240 were kidnapped in Hamas' Oct. 7 attack. In Gaza, Israel's war has killed more than 27,000 residents, mostly civilians. I think that this violence, along with the threat of a wider war breaking out, is upending the once-remote idea of significant change in the region.
Nearly the entire population of 2 million people in Gaza have been displaced from their homes and face dire humanitarian emergencies due to food, water and power shortages, foreign aid blockages and the destruction of Gaza's hospitals. With Houthi militants in Yemen entering the conflict and threats from Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, the U.S. is wary of being pulled into another war in the Middle East.
Pressure is growing internationally for a cease-fire – and a two-state solution.
The U.S., the European Union and China all voice support for a two-state solution, and Saudi Arabia has made the possibility of a historic accord with Israel contingent on it.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said that a two-state solution is the "only path" to peace. Pressure is mounting in Israel as well, as people continue to protest for the Israeli government to make a deal and bring 130 hostages still captive home alive. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's approval ratings are tanking. Israel's economy is shrinking. And the Israeli government is increasingly divided over the war effort, with Netanyahu losing support in his own far-right party.
There remain large obstacles to realizing a two-state solution. There is also growing international consensus that a two-state solution is the only acceptable outcome of the current violence. In my view, the conditions unfolding in Israel and Gaza are beginning to reach a breaking point, similar to the conditions in South Africa that formed prior to apartheid's defeat. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here:
https://theconversation.com/there-are-reasons-to-believe-a-two-state-solution-for-israelis-and-palestinians-is-closer-than-ever-220524.

American Retaliation That Serves Iran
Nadim Koteich/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 06/2024
If the Americans had been following Iran’s advice on how to respond to the attacks of "Hezbollah in Iraq" on the US "Tower 22" base that killed three soldiers in Jordan, its response would not have suited the Iranians any better.
While targeting Iranian proxies in Syria and Iraq in the way the US did had always been the most likely scenario, the US statements that preceded and followed the retaliation, in which the US signaled that it does not want a war with Iran, were a gift to the latter. It reassured Iran that the United States would not change its current approach of engaging Tehran's proxies rather than directly attacking Iran itself.
Washington is, of course, entitled to bet on its strategy limiting escalation in the Middle East and averting destabilization in the region that precipitates a direct clash with Iran. However, this bet overlooks a key question: what does Iran really want?
More importantly, this bet overlooks what are supposed to be the shared interests of the US and its allies in the region, both Arab and non-Arab - actions that harm them should concern the US, even if these actions do not directly undermine its own security and interests.
The bet on de-escalation and averting destabilization overlooks the fact that Iranian foreign policy clearly reflects its ambitions for regional hegemony and its desire to establish a strategic depth throughout the Middle East through militias and proxies. This strategy is driven by a complex mix of security considerations and ideological motives, and Iran is playing a carefully calibrated game in the Middle East. Through these militias, it seeks to enhance its standing in the region and assert itself as a major player in regional political, security, and military issues, in the face of its Gulf competitors first and foremost, and secondly Israel and the United States.
Moreover, Iran’s support for proxies enhances its image domestically, allowing the regime to present itself as the protector of Muslims in general and the Shiites in particular, and these proxies also help Iran project itself as the leader of the camp opposing Western influence.
Moreover, Iran's proxies grant it influence over other countries in the region, such as Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen, allowing it to gain political and economic advantages that partially compensate for the damage done by Western sanctions on it. It also allows Iran to present itself as the victor in its political and diplomatic struggle with the United States.
In addition, by maintaining these militias in neighboring countries, Iran creates for itself a buffer zone that protects it from the threats of its adversaries and moves the battles waged against it outside its territory.
Accordingly, seeking to reduce escalation to avoid destabilization clashes with the objectives that Iran has explicitly laid out, even if we assume that the US is genuinely working to achieve these objectives.
The truth is that strikes like those that hit Iran's proxies recently, in response to Iran's direct sponsorship of lethal attacks against Americans, directly benefit Iran and reinforce two narratives that, while they may seem contradictory, are in fact complementary.
1- After these cautious and calculated strikes, Iran can boost its narrative of being an undefeatable adversary feared by its enemies.
2- These strikes also play into conspiratorial framings of how the world works. For example, it reinforces the claim that Iran and the US are secretly colluding to undermine the interests of regional powers.
There seems to be no limit to the benefits that the clerical regime can reap for either of these narratives. They help Iran push an anti-colonial and anti-Western ideological discourse and achieve its practical strategic interests. Chief among its interests is keeping the states hosting these militias weak and perpetuating the despair of these country’s peoples and governments at having their sovereignty compromised and their national dignity squandered, buttressing their conviction that they have always been and will remain victims caught in the crosshairs of international politics.
Contrary to the naivety that the US has demonstrated in its response to Iran's militias, Iran has shown exceptional adeptness at handling this moment. It instructed its proxies to announce a suspension of their attacks against American interests, as we saw in the communique of "Hezbollah in Iraq," while simultaneously leading a propaganda campaign to emphasize the independence of these militias! How can the party that imposed the cessation of attacks not bear responsibility for the decision to launch the attacks in the first place?
This scenario illustrates the complexity of the proxy war that Iran is waging, in which it deliberately obscures its responsibility. It is important to note that Iran does not merely seek to maintain plausible deniability, but also wants to project an image of restraint and rationality in the face of what it presents as US aggression. It is no secret that this narrative resonates strongly given today’s global context, as the world is becoming increasingly skeptical of the justifications and legitimacy of American military interventions on the international stage.
The tepid American response to Iran's direct sponsorship of its proxies' attacks exposes a grave deficiency in its conception of Iran's behavior. Iran is driven by its desire for regional dominance and ideological influence, and it is committed to enhancing its interests while minimizing the risks of a direct clash with the US. Ultimately, the US has given Iran what it wants. Rather, it has encouraged further provocation, as reflected by the actions of the Houthi militia and some Iraqi militias following the American strikes.
Only more severe strikes, of the sort that directly undermines Iran’s standing and makes it look weak, could deter Iran and encourage US allies to stand united behind the US. Anything less than a recipe for audacious Iranian actions that perpetuate regional instability.

On the Background for US-Israeli ‘Coexistence’ with Iran
Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 06/2024
US President Joe Biden fulfilled his promise... and launched a military attack against Iran. The attacks were "against" Iran in the flexible and loose sense of the term. Indeed, Iranian territory was not hit, and the attack did not intend to inflict a decisive military defeat on the Tehran regime that would achieve the attack’s political objective. Instead, as we expected - given how the approach the last two Democratic administrations had taken - the attacks targeted Arab territory within Tehran's political and military sphere of influence. Moreover, it was launched for psychological reasons and to meet the need to retaliate during an "election year," a time when a president's administration cannot be made to appear weak in the face of challenges. Anyway, Hussein Akbari, the Iranian ambassador to Syria, quickly reassured us that not a single Iranian had fallen as a result of the dozens of US airstrikes. It thus becomes clear that the objective of "sending a deterrent message" was not achieved... leaving aside the fact that the US had never intended for it to be a decisive blow.
The attack was undoubtedly calibrated by Washington. Accordingly, we were told that the recent attack was "only one part of the US response" to the attack on the al-Tanf base in the Syrian desert near the Iraqi-Syrian-Jordanian border triangle.
In fact, something is becoming increasingly evident with every "negotiation" interval using live ammunition between the groups known as "the Great Satan" and "the Little Satan" (America and Israel), and the "Axis of Resistance:" There is no end in sight for the ongoing competition over how to share the region within the framework of the so-called "rules of engagement."
I believe that our brothers in Palestine have now realized - even if they had chosen to avoid skepticism before - that the Iranian regime will not fight in their defense... although it has never missed an opportunity to exploit their cause, their fate, their dreams, and their suffering.
The mission to "eliminate Israel within 7 minutes" has been forgotten despite the destruction seen in the Gaza Strip and the martyrdom and injury of tens of thousands of its people.
It turns out that "unity of the arenas" - a concept that many had promoted and believed in - only applies to the "Arab territory occupied by Iran." On the other hand, Iranian territory remains unthreatened by direct retaliation.
Also, despite the intensity of the artillery and all the smoke rising from the shelling on the Lebanese-Israeli border front, the military operations were evidently targeted. They are targeting settlements that have already been evacuated.
Accordingly, the goal was to silence the Lebanese skeptics and to save face for the Iran axis... even after the assassination of the Hamas leader Saleh al-Arouri in the Hezbollah stronghold of Beirut’s southern suburbs. Of course, this was paralleled by Washington's insistence on "preventing regional escalation" to allow Israel to focus solely on Gaza...
Indeed, this applies even at sea. The Red Sea has become a "waterfront" for posturing and one-upmanship, another episode of the ongoing "negotiations." Once again, Washington has demonstrated that it intended to deal with the Tehran regime on a case-by-case basis as it puts all of its weight behind the war to displace the Gaza Strip. And again, we recall how quickly the White House announced that "there is no evidence of Tehran's involvement" within hours of the attack on October 7.
I genuinely do not mean to incite Washington and Tel Aviv against Iran’s people, land, and culture. Iran is a neighbor with whom we have had ties for thousands of years.
That is absolutely not my intention. Iran is an integral part of the region, and our civilizations have been linked for centuries... We have both taken and given much to each other. Only the delusional could refuse to acknowledge what this ancient civilization has contributed to our Arab and Islamic world, and indeed to the entire world, through the contribution of its innovators and geniuses to theology, philosophy, science, culture, art, and administration...To put it briefly, Iran is not alien to the region, nor are we alien to them. It remains close to us... even when its rulers, from time to time, seek to deny our brotherhood, coexistence, and understanding. Our real problem with Tehran is that, using slogans of "liberating Jerusalem" as cover, it is fighting us... and not those who are occupying Jerusalem. Washington and Tel Aviv are well aware of this fact. Over the past few years, US administrations have, "on the surface" sought to curb the excesses of Israeli right-wing extremists and prevented them from attacking Iran.
Throughout this period, Tehran has expanded its destructive occupation of Arab territories - especially in Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon - through its sectarian militias, under the pretext of fighting Israel to liberate Palestine. The fascist right wing in Israel, the Likud, has reaped the benefits of overblowing the threat of the "Iranian ogre" to dominate Israeli politics. As a result, fears of Iranian expansion led some Arabs to accept and normalize relations with Israel, while Israel’s extremism pushed other Arabs to accept subservience to Tehran's mullahs and their Revolutionary Guards.
Meanwhile, Washington was comfortable giving directions on both sides, politically, academically, and in the media. The countries of the Arab Levant have fallen. Their wealth has been plundered, and their social fabric has been torn. They have witnessed the broadest sectarian ethnic cleansing in centuries. Despite this, American decision-makers (with Israeli suggestion and support) are still racing to find "strategic justifications" for Washington's reluctance to put an end to the unrestrained Tehran regime.

Iraq Cannot Be Subordinate, Nor Can It Be a Battlefield
Farhad Aladdin/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 06/2024
As regional and international powers vie to expand their influence in the Middle East and the drums of an imminent war continue to echo here and there, the ambassador of a European country and I discussed Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani’s announcement that the international coalition forces should leave Iraq. “What is Iraq’s ultimate objective?” he asked me.
While it is a simple question, its answer is consequential and deserves clarification. We should explain our position to both the ambassador and the international community, as well as our people, as Iraqis are asking the same question themselves.
The goal may be clear and straightforward, but escalation by this party or that complicates things. Iraq is certainly striving to avoid entanglement in a conflict imposed by another party. Indeed, becoming embroiled in yet another conflict undermines peace and stability in the present and the future. Iraq is keen on taking care of its citizens, who have been exhausted by such wars. We want to safeguard their security, improve basic services, rebuild infrastructure, and invest in our human and natural resources to build a promising future for Iraqis.
To this end, Iraq must break out of the cycle of regional and international conflicts and the military presence established to combat ISIS, as the Prime Minister believes that “ISIS no longer represents a threat to the Iraqi state.”
Over the past forty years, Iraq has been devastated by a series of wars, starting with the Iran-Iraq War, which was followed by the Gulf Wars, the war to bring down the regime, and most recently, the war against ISIS. These wars have left destruction, ruin, suffering, and calamities in their wake, and Iraq went from being one of the strongest countries in the region to one of the weakest. Its wealth has been eroded, and it now owes hundreds of billions to various regional and global countries. Its infrastructure and its military, industrial, and agricultural capacities have collapsed. Over a quarter of its population lives in poverty, unemployment has soared, and educational, health and other basic services crumbled. Most importantly, the human loss of life, the number of youths, children, and women we have lost, is horrific.
Despite the heavy burden left by this legacy, the current government led by Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani has taken on the responsibility of rebuilding the state and set out an ambitious program. However, it finds itself caught in regional and international conflict, and the various warring parties are indifferent to Iraq's interests. They are focused solely on their own, and they have neglected the challenges facing the country. The situation in Iraq was exacerbated further by the events of October in Gaza.
The government is determined to achieve its goals, and it cannot do so if Iraq remains a battleground and its security remains precarious. Violent developments threaten a larger and more extensive war than the one at hand, and putting the brakes on this war requires action on multiple fronts and in various directions:
First: Enhancing and developing bilateral relations with the countries of the international coalition in a manner that serves Iraq, aligns with the needs of the Iraqi state, and serves our mutual interests. The statement released following the meeting between the Prime Minister and the Secretary-General of NATO in Davos reflects our intention to make this happen. "Iraq does not object to cooperating with NATO countries in the fields of armament, training, and equipping, within the framework of the bilateral relations between Iraq and the countries of this alliance."
Second: Distancing Iraq from the conflict. Iraq does not want to be a party to regional conflicts, but rather aims to maintain an equal distance with all countries, especially those involved in the conflict. Iraq considers both Iran and the United States to be strategic partners and cannot be a party to their regional disputes. Their conflict can be seen in Syria. Iran needs air and land corridors to reach Syria, while the United States needs to use Iraqi territory to support its forces in Syria. However, both can find alternative ways to further their interests and plans, be it in Syria or other hotspots, without implicating Iraq in the ongoing conflict.
Third: Strengthening Iraq on the regional and international stage. Iraq cannot be subordinate to anyone, nor can be any party’s backyard. Iraq has many strengths conducive to playing a pivotal role in global politics and diplomacy. It is crucial for global energy markets and it has a strategic location in the Middle East. Iraq is also the only Arab state with strong ties to all neighboring countries and major powers, both in the East and West, and it is particularly significant for the fight against terrorism.
Fourth: Furthering our mutual interests with the countries of the region and the international community as Iraq strives to rebuild its state and infrastructure. It has the resources and material capabilities to offer strategic projects that countries and corporations can benefit from, whether directly or indirectly.
Fifth: No forces have more experience in combating terrorism, especially ISIS, than Iraq’s. These forces have fought the most dangerous and fiercest terrorist organizations, engaged in intense urban warfare, and achieved remarkable victories, demonstrating unparalleled bravery. The international community can benefit from Iraq’s experience in combating the most formidable terrorist organizations and cells.
Ending the state of war is a priority for the Iraqi state. To answer the ambassador's question, Iraq seeks stability and prosperity by all possible means. It has all the requisites needed to do so for its people, given its wealth of natural resources and human capital, and its strategic location.
The Iraqi people have suffered immensely for decades. The time has come for them to live in peace, and the government’s program will ensure that this happens very soon. Moreover, the Prime Minister is determined to realize the ultimate aspirations and legitimate expectations of the Iraqi people. We must always remember that opportunities usually come only once, and this is a crucial opportunity for partners and friendly countries. They should remember that the stability and prosperity of Iraq are key to the political stability, security, and economic prosperity of the region.