Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on January 26-27.2024
Text and video/Open letter from Elias Bejjani to the LF Party MP, Melhem Riachi: Hezbollah is an Iranian, jihadist, and terrorist organization, not Lebanese, and its members are mercenaries according to international military standards/Elias Bejjani/January 26, 2024
Lebanese Parliament approves 2024 budget
Austin says US committed to resolve Lebanon-Israel border tensions
Israeli FM threatens Lebanon with 'devastating blow'
Mikati's Address: Budget, Regional Stability, and Constitutional Responsibilities
Mikati: We've managed to halt collapse, begin recovery
Analyzing Hezbollah's Advanced Anti-Armor Missile
Border clashes: Hezbollah targets soldiers near Margaliot
The Quintet Committee is set to launch an initiative
Lebanon's Quintet Committee Says It Won't Be Substitute for Country's Sovereignty
5-nation group ambassadors to activate presidential file ahead of initiative
Diplomatic sources to LBCI: Quintet ambassadors emphasize continued cooperation between them
Geagea says Hezbollah not helping Gaza, making things worse
Jumblat walks back after describing 'Lebanon First' slogan as 'ridiculous'
Bohsali to LBCI: There will be no interruption in the supply of goods, but price increases would range between 2% and 15%
Education Minister: 1003 public schools have started receiving financial transfers in dollars from UNICEF
Sheikh Kabalan outlines solutions for Lebanon's economic and sovereign challenges
Lebanon's fuel prices on the rise

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on January 25-26/2024
UN court says Israel must prevent genocidal acts in Gaza
Top UN court stops short of ordering Gaza ceasefire, demands Israel contain deaths
UN Court: Israel Must Prevent Genocidal Acts in Gaza
More than 26,000 Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza since Oct.7 – Gaza health ministry
UN agency probes staff suspected of role in Oct. 7 attacks on Israel
Hamas attack: US pauses UNRWA funding over claims of staff involvement
Houthis Fire Missile Close to a Tanker Hauling Russian Oil
US, Iraq to begin talks soon on ending mission of US-led military coalition in Iraq
Attack on Iraqi Kurdish gas field leads to major power cuts
Washington Tells Baghdad US Troops Withdrawal Comes at Cost
Iraq Forms ‘Military Committee’ to Schedule US Withdrawal
Implications of the US-Led Coalition's Withdrawal from Iraq
Canada to re-start Turkey arms exports after Sweden NATO backing -sources
An unlikely challenger to Putin brings a rare show of defiance, creating a dilemma for the Kremlin
Putin says Ukraine shot down plane, not clear if deliberately or in error
Biden administration tells Congress it intends to sell Turkey F-16s after Erdogan approved Sweden’s NATO membership
US warship downs incoming missile fired from Yemen
The Lone Star State: Texas's Struggle for Independence and Current Political Challenges

Titles For The Latest English LCCC  analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources on January 25-26/2024
Canada: Nearly 100 Churches Torched, Four during Christmas, 2023/Raymond Ibrahim/January 26/2024
A Hundred Days after Gaza's October 7 (Part 2 of 4)/Inconvenient History from the SS Einsatzgruppen to Hamas/Gwythian Prins/Gatestone Institute./January 26, 2024
Question: “Should a Christian attend a gay wedding?”/GotQuestions.org?/January 26/2024
Turkiye, Iran manage tensions during Raisi’s visit/Sinem Cengiz/Arab News/January 26, 2024
Macron’s rightward shift is not without its risks/Zaid M. Belbagi/Arab News/January 26, 2024
No surprises in Saudi desire for two-state solution/Rabbi Marc Schneier/Arab News/January 26, 2024
Israel Endangers Jews/Sawsan al-Abtah/Asharq Al-Awsat/January 26, 2024
Iran-Pakistan: The Beautiful Vase Has Been Chipped/Sawsan al-Abtah/Asharq Al-Awsat/January 26, 2024

Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on January 26-27.2024
Text and video/Open letter from Elias Bejjani to the LF Party MP, Melhem Riachi: Hezbollah is an Iranian, jihadist, and terrorist organization, not Lebanese, and its members are mercenaries according to international military standards.
Elias Bejjani/January 26, 2024
(Both Videos are in Arabic)
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/126404/126404/
In an interview with the LF Party MP, Melhem Riachi on Al Jadeed TV, broadcasted yesterday (the link to the video clip of the interview in Arabic is posted below, forming the basis of our commentary), Riachi asserted that Hezbollah is Lebanese political party, and an ally of Iran.
This rhetoric is totally contradicted by the practical, public, and doctrinal stances of Hezbollah itself.
All its leaders, including Mr. Hassan Nasrallah, proudly declare allegiance to the Supreme Iranian Leader, “Al Waley Al Fakeh”, emphasizing that they are soldiers in its army and that all their resources—money, weapons, training, creed, and funding—are exclusively Iranian.
Hezbollah, is unlicensed in Lebanon, and adopts the name “Islamic Resistance in Lebanon.
In a context entirely detached from Lebanon, Hezbollah eulogizes those killed in its ranks on various battlefronts (Iranian fronts in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and other countries) using religious and jihadist terminology, without acknowledging Lebanon, viewing them as having “ascended while performing jihadist missions.
It is crucial to note that Lebanon is not an Islamic jihadist state; it is a secular state with no official religion.
The problem, and perhaps the dilemma, with Mr. Riachi and all others who claim, both in words and theory, to defend sovereignty, independence, identity, freedoms, and coexistence, is their (Dhimmitudeذمية ) reluctance to describe Hezbollah’s status as openly and proudly asserted by Hezbollah leadership and its documented list of aims, creed, affiliation and missions.
A piece of advice to MP, Riachi, and those who claim to defend sovereignty, including leaders, politicians, and citizens: if you lack the courage to testify to the truth and call things by their names, it is more honorable for you to remain silent. “No one is asking you for compromising Dhimmitude stances and rhetoric. Hezbollah does not care about your cajoling rhetoric, and it won’t believe or respect you, no matter how eloquent your words may be.
In conclusion, Hezbollah is an Iranian, jihadist, and terrorist organization, not Lebanese, and its leaders and members can be deemed mercenaries according to all international military standards.

Lebanese Parliament approves 2024 budget
The National/January 26, 2024
Lebanese MPs approved the country's 2024 draft budget following two days of discussions that were marked by heated arguments and the conflict in southern Lebanon, as much as they were about economic policy. Since the financial collapse in 2019, the currency has plummeted in value by about 98 per cent. Salaries have failed to catch up with rampant inflation and basic essentials such as medicine and electricity remain in severe shortage. One of the proposals was a tax system that was viewed as potentially placing an unjust and disproportionate burden on the less well-off in a country struggling with one of the worst economic crises in modern times.There are also concerns the budget lacks the financial reforms required for a $3 billion bailout from the International Monetary Fund. Among those reforms demanded by the IMF are a unification of Lebanon's numerous exchange rates. Ghassan Hasbani, an MP and former deputy prime minister, said the budget was “far from any reform” and “does not contain any public-sector reform to improve state revenue”. Many Lebanese blame the economic crisis on decades of mismanagement and corruption among the country's elite. It led to the introduction of informal capital controls, under which depositors were deprived of much of the value of their life savings. The budget was agreed on last year by the Council of Ministers and then faced a number of amendments by the parliament's Finance and Budget Committee. The parliament had been expected to vote on the draft budget on Thursday but due to the length and number of speeches, it was delayed until Friday. Addressing the parliament before the vote, caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said the budget was one that took into account the circumstances that Lebanon found itself in and that “the discussion around the budget must lead to the start of the country's recovery”. He said the budget was a continuation of that of 2022, which sought to begin “the process of unifying the exchange rate and increasing public revenues”. The debate often descended into acrimony. On Wednesday, Mr Mikati claimed the government had effectively halted Lebanon's economic collapse. In response, MP Paula Yacoubian said his government was “not able to manage” even the smallest of issues. Before the debate began on Wednesday, the MP Melhem Khalaf, a lawyer and constitutional expert, stormed out of the chamber in objection to the session being held. Mr Khalaf has repeatedly argued that parliament should only be meeting to vote on the country's next president. “I will not violate the constitution,” he said as he left the chamber. Lebanon has been without a president since October 2022 when Michel Aoun's term expired. The 128 MPs have failed to come close to appointing a successor, in 12 parliamentary sessions. Last year, only two presidential sessions were held amid the entrenched impasse.

Austin says US committed to resolve Lebanon-Israel border tensions
Naharnet/January 26, 2024
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has spoken with Israeli Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant and reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to resolve tensions along the Israel-Lebanon border and to avoid regional escalation. "Secretary Austin reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to the pursuit of diplomacy to resolve tensions along the Israel-Lebanon border and the shared goal of avoiding regional escalation," the U.S. Department of Defense said Thursday in a statement. "Austin reiterated U.S. support for Israel's right to defend itself and the importance of ensuring uninterrupted delivery of humanitarian assistance to Gaza," the statement said. Since the outbreak of war between Hamas and Israel on October 7, the Lebanese-Israeli border has witnessed a near-daily exchange of fire between Israel's army and Hezbollah. At least 202 people have been killed in south Lebanon, 147 of them belonging to Hezbollah.

Israeli FM threatens Lebanon with 'devastating blow'
Naharnet/January 26, 2024
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz has met with his Italian counterpart Antonio Tajani in Jerusalem and asked for Rome’s assistance in finding a diplomatic solution to Hezbollah’s presence on Israel’s northern border. “I requested his intervention vis-a-vis the Lebanese government to oust Hezbollah from southern Lebanon,” Katz tweeted, “or else Lebanon will face a devastating blow it won’t recover from.”Since the outbreak of war between Hamas and Israel on October 7, the Lebanese-Israeli border has witnessed a near-daily exchange of fire between Israel's army and Hezbollah. At least 202 people have been killed in south Lebanon, 147 of them belonging to Hezbollah. 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.

Mikati's Address: Budget, Regional Stability, and Constitutional Responsibilities
LBCI/January 26, 2024
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati stated on Friday that the 2024 budget is not ideal but aligns with the current circumstances. "We have been striving for rescue since 2019, and in 2023, we managed to halt the collapse and begin recovery. It is incumbent upon us to cooperate together to uplift the country," he added during a parliamentary session. On another note, Mikati addressed the recent correspondences between him and the US Secretary of State, emphasizing the urgent message regarding the official stance, which focuses on achieving sustainable and long-term stability in the region. Firstly, imposing a permanent ceasefire in Gaza to secure humanitarian aid for the besieged population, allowing for the resumption of mediation sessions for the exchange of prisoners and detainees. Secondly, reconvening trilateral meetings to resolve remaining disputes between Lebanon and Israel by implementing all United Nations treaties and resolutions, from the 1949 ceasefire agreement to UN Resolution 1701. Thirdly, an international initiative to permanently resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and revive the two-state solution, ensuring fair and comprehensive rights for Palestinians and sustainable security for Israelis. He emphasized Lebanon's commitment to keeping war away from its borders. Diplomatic and negotiation approaches remain the real and guaranteed approach to achieving permanent stability, starting from ending aggression on Gaza and embarking on a fair and just solution to the Palestinian issue, primarily based on establishing two states. Furthermore, Lebanon renews its call on the international community to stop Israeli violations, provocations, and attacks on Lebanon. The caretaker prime minister stated, "During the discussions, what caught my attention is some attempting to divert attention from the responsibility of MPs in electing a president by redirecting blame towards the government. My behavior aligns with the decision made by the highest constitutional reference, which is the Constitutional Council." He clarified that as the prime minister of all of Lebanon, he has the right to lead and oversee the Cabinet and public institutions, and he affirmed that he will continue to do everything available within the constitution.

Mikati: We've managed to halt collapse, begin recovery
Naharnet/January 26, 2024
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati announced Friday that the Lebanese state has managed to “halt” the financial collapse and begin “serious recovery.” “We’ve managed to halt the collapse and begin serious recovery. We have at Account 36 at the central bank more than LBP 100,000 billion and $1 billion, including $150 million in fresh dollars and 850 million lollars (Lebanese dollars),” Mikati said in his defense of the 2024 state budget in parliament. Some lawmakers’ “huge attack regarding taxes and fees entails a lot of populism and false accusations, seeing as the tax increase is insignificant,” Mikati added. “Elect a president and get off our backs!” the premier told some MPs. Noting that “approving the state budget within its constitutional timeframe is part of the government’s plan to consolidate stability,” Mikati said the central bank is “studying all means to achieve a unification of the multiple (dollar) exchange rates and avoid negativities.” “There is no intention to peg the exchange rate after we paid hefty prices due to its pegging to the U.S. dollar,” Mikati added. “The budget is not ideal under normal circumstances, but it is a budget that matches the circumstances that Lebanon is going through,” the premier said.
He also denied “ceding the country’s decision to certain political groups.”

Analyzing Hezbollah's Advanced Anti-Armor Missile
LBCI/January 26, 2024
What catches your attention most in the video released by Hezbollah's media wing about its operation on the Jal al-Alam site on Thursday night is its description of the specialized weapon used.
So, what is this weapon?
It is an anti-armor missile, but its uniqueness lies in its exceptional intelligence. As depicted in the video released by Hezbollah, the missile is equipped with a camera capable of capturing images during the mission. Based on these images, the command is given to proceed towards the target. It is crafted with smart technology to the extent that it can memorize images and coordinates, enabling it to reach the target.
This is just part of its precision. The other part is its ability to penetrate fortifications and maneuver in all directions. As for its strength, it surpasses precision to the capability of penetrating the target, starting from 20 centimeters of steel (tank) and reaching the ability to breach a meter of fortifications. The length of the missile, unnamed at least, can reach two meters, and its range can reach 20 kilometers.  Since it targeted the Lebanese interior site of Jal al-Alam, it can reach the vicinity of Acre at a depth of 20 kilometers along the same targeting line. The resistance missile has managed to engage analysts and the Israeli media, who have placed it within the framework of the psychological warfare exercised on Tel Aviv, as well as engaging Israeli security, military, and citizens. So, what's next for this Russian-origin, Iranian-made anti-armor missile developed by the resistance?

Border clashes: Hezbollah targets soldiers near Margaliot
Naharnet/January 26, 2024
Hezbollah targeted Friday a group of Israeli soldiers near the Hunin Castle in Margaliot and the Ma'ale Golani post as Israeli artillery shelled several border towns. Earlier on Friday, an Iron Dome interception missile exploded over al-Naqoura and artillery shells hit the southern border towns of Houla, Kfarkila, Mays al-Jabal and Wadi Hamoul. Israeli warplanes had carried out heavy airstrikes overnight on al-Khiam. Hezbollah said it targeted the Ma'ale Golani post with Falaq-1, announcing the use of the unguided Iranian-made surface-to-surface missiles for the first time since the outbreak of the war. On Thursday, Hezbollah attacked three Israeli targets including air defense systems with two suicide drones and posts in northern Israel while Israeli drones carried out airstrikes deep inside Lebanon. Since the outbreak of war between Hamas and Israel on October 7, the Lebanese-Israeli border has witnessed a near-daily exchange of fire between Israel's army and Hezbollah. At least 202 people have been killed in south Lebanon, 147 of them belonging to Hezbollah. At least 26 civilians have also been killed, including three journalists and two rescuers in addition to a Lebanese soldier. More than 83,000 Lebanese have been forced to flee their homes since hostilities began, according to the International Organization for Migration. On the Israeli side, 15 people have been killed in the northern border area, including nine soldiers and six civilians, according to the Israeli army.

The Quintet Committee is set to launch an initiative
LBCI/January 26, 2024
Sources reveal that the Quintet committee ambassadors in Beirut are preparing to address the presidential election file and launch a central Quintet committee initiative. Considering the president's election as a priority, they have not discussed specific candidate names but rather the criteria required for the future president. The meeting also touched upon the regional situation and the southern front, examining its impact on the presidential file. The meeting concluded without any issued stance or statement. Diplomatic sources closely following the matter described to "Al-Joumhouria" the meeting as "an initial step to schedule the ambassadors' visits for a round of discussions with Lebanese officials and political forces." Following this, there will be a meeting of the Quintet committee at the level of delegates from one of the member states. This meeting is expected to produce decisions or recommendations carried by the French envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian to Beirut, possibly accompanied by another envoy from committee members.

Lebanon's Quintet Committee Says It Won't Be Substitute for Country's Sovereignty
Asharq Al-Awsat/January 26, 2024
The ambassadors of the Quintet Committee on Lebanon held a meeting on Thursday to break the impasse created by the failure to solve the Lebanese presidential elections issue since November 2022. The talks took place at the residence of Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Walid Al-Bukhari to relaunch the committee's efforts to end the presidential vacuum and its direct and indirect impacts on Lebanon by bringing the views of the Lebanese political forces closer. The meeting also paves the way for the upcoming visit of French presidential envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian to Lebanon, to announce the criteria that determine the identity and features of the prospective president. Information obtained by Asharq Al-Awsat pointed to “ongoing efforts towards a common and unified vision for member states according to a specific timetable.”The meeting emphasized that the presidential elections depended on an internal Lebanese decision, pointing to the need for a parallel Lebanese movement that converges with the efforts of the Quintet Committee, away from any Iranian influence. The attendees affirmed “the unity of vision and efforts” of the quintet. A source present at the meeting told Asharq Al-Awsat that the participants stressed that the committee “will not be a substitute for the will of the Lebanese political forces and Lebanon’s sovereignty.”They also highlighted the necessity of “making the current movement a success in order to put the presidential election as a priority in political meetings in Lebanon and the region.”The meeting also stressed the importance of distancing the electoral issue from political bets on regional developments and attempts to link it to the war in Gaza. The five-member committee was formed to help the Lebanese political forces elect a new president for the country, which is suffering from one of its worst financial and economic crises. The war in Gaza and Hezbollah’s engagement have halted presidential talks, but efforts launched recently by Al-Bukhari brought back the matter to the forefront.

5-nation group ambassadors to activate presidential file ahead of initiative
Naharnet/January 26, 2024
The ambassadors of the five-nation group for Lebanon, who met Thursday at the Saudi envoy’s residence, have devised a roadmap for their meetings with Lebanese officials and leaders in a bid to re-activate the presidential election file, media reports said. The envoys will kickstart their drive next week and their first meeting will be with Speaker Nabih Berri, al-Joumhouria newspaper reported on Friday. The talks will be aimed at preparing for a meeting that the five-nation group will hold next month in Riyadh or Cairo, the daily said. “The central five-nation committee will launch an initiative, seeing as the election of a president is a priority for it,” the newspaper added, noting that the ambassadors “did not discuss names of candidates but rather characteristics that the new president should enjoy.”“They also discussed the situations of the region and the southern front and their impact on the presidential file, without issuing any statement or stance after the meeting,” al-Joumhouria said. “French envoy Jean-Yves Le Drian will carry the decisions or recommendations of the meeting of the five-nation group to Beirut and he might be accompanied by another member of the committee,” the daily added.

Diplomatic sources to LBCI: Quintet ambassadors emphasize continued cooperation between them
LBCI/January 26, 2024
Sources to LBCI quoted informed diplomatic sources as saying thart Yesterday's meeting of the Quintet ambassadors emphasized the continued cooperation between them and working on urging Lebanese officials to elect a president, form a government, and implement the required reforms.According to the sources, the meeting dismissed all rumors suggesting disagreements between Lebanon's friends and its external partners, revealing that those spreading these rumors aim to obstruct any progress in the presidential election file, while it is assumed that MPs should adhere to their constitutional responsibilities and work quickly to find a solution to the presidential vacancy issue.

Geagea says Hezbollah not helping Gaza, making things worse
Naharnet/January 26, 2024
Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea slammed again Hezbollah in a televised interview, as he accused the group of worsening the situation instead of helping in reaching a solution to ease the tension in the region. Since the outbreak of war between Hamas and Israel on October 7, the Lebanese-Israeli border has witnessed a near-daily exchange of fire between Israel's army and Hezbollah. At least 202 people have been killed in south Lebanon, 147 of them belonging to Hezbollah. At least 26 civilians have also been killed, including three journalists and two rescuers in addition to a Lebanese soldier. "What Hezbollah is doing is not helping but rather delaying reaching a solution," Geagea told MTV on Thursday night, as he accused the group of being "Lebanon's biggest problem."Geagea urged the government to control the situation is the south, adding that the government, although running in caretaker capacity, is responsible of preventing a war and implementing the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701 -- which ended the 2006 conflict and called for all armed personnel to pull back north of the Litani River, except for United Nations peacekeepers and Lebanese state security forces. Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati had said Lebanon was ready to implement international resolutions if Israel also complied and withdrew from disputed territory.

Jumblat walks back after describing 'Lebanon First' slogan as 'ridiculous'
Naharnet/January 26, 2024
Former Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat walked back Friday a statement he had previously made, in which he described a March 14 slogan as ridiculous. In an interview with al-Akhbar, Jumblat said "time has changed since the days when we raised the ridiculous 'Lebanon First' (Loubnan Awwalan) slogan at the time of the so-called March 14 Alliance." Jumblat later said in a post on X, formally known as Twitter, that his description was "out of place." "In my interview with al-Akhbar newspaper, I described 'Lebanon First' as ridiculous, which makes me deny an important era in my history. Therefore, I hope that this description would be considered as inappropriate,” Jumblat wrote on X.

Bohsali to LBCI: There will be no interruption in the supply of goods, but price increases would range between 2% and 15%
LBCI/January 26, 2024
Hani Bohsali, the head of the Food Importers Syndicate, emphasized that "the syndicate had issued a statement expressing its concern about the negative developments affecting the food sector since the onset of the disputes in December."
On LBCI's "Nharkom Said" TV show, Bohsali stated, "The situation has developed negatively, and we are in the midst of the storm, facing what we feared, especially the closure of the Red Sea route. Ninety percent of ships have been redirected to Africa, leading to delays in the arrival of goods." He added, "There will be no interruption in the supply of goods and commodities, but there will be a disruption in the supply chain, resulting in potential delays in the arrival of some goods. However, Lebanon's warehouses are sufficient for two to three months."Bohsali affirmed that price increases would range between 2% and 15% depending on the category of goods. He pointed out that oversight and control of pricing violations are the responsibility of regulatory committees and the Economy Ministry, adding that they are well aware of this matter and conduct patrols to curb such violations. "We, as a private sector, cannot control 20,000 points of sale and oversee pricing at each one," he remarked. As the holy month of Ramadan and Easter approach, Bohsali highlighted the anticipated surge in demand for food items and increased consumption. However, he expressed concerns about limited financing options to cover these needs.
Bohsali noted that goods expected to arrive a month ago are only now reaching Lebanon, and those scheduled for February 15 may arrive in the middle of Ramadan, causing delays and potential price hikes due to increased shipping costs.
He concluded by stating that the problem is manageable and will be resolved with an improvement in the supply chain, expressing confidence that the crisis will not persist in terms of price hikes.

Education Minister: 1003 public schools have started receiving financial transfers in dollars from UNICEF
LBCI/January 26, 2024
The Education and Higher Education Minister, Abbas Halabi, announced that 1003 public schools have started receiving financial transfers in dollars from UNICEF. He emphasized that 158 secondary schools had their funds replenished last December. Halabi urged schools that have not yet submitted their budgets to expedite the process and deliver them to the ministry. This ensures that financial support reaches their funds, enabling them to spend on operational facilities and cover salaries and allowances dependent on their budgets. Minister Halabi chaired a meeting of the Higher Education Council, attended by its members. During the session, the council reviewed requests from university institutions and addressed several fundamental issues in higher education, making appropriate decisions for each.

Sheikh Kabalan outlines solutions for Lebanon's economic and sovereign challenges
LBCI/January 26, 2024
In his Friday sermon, Sheikh Ahmad Kabalan considered that "there is no doubt that the country is experiencing a historical crisis, and the stubbornness embraced by the politicians is a suicide for the country. He said: "What we witnessed in the budget exhibition reveals how the country is suffocating, as well as the politicians. The budget is undoubtedly necessary, and voting on it is as important as preserving the country." Kabalan continued: "However, it should not be done without presenting devilish goods, especially regarding some taxes and fees. There is no solution without a state's financial stability that considers the state's social, health, and service roles; otherwise, we destroy the state on the heads of its people." He said, "What is required in this field is an economic vision and a real financial structure for banks, emphasizing the necessity of preserving deposits. Progressive taxation is fair when it targets large incomes, and taxation according to national and social needs is necessary. However, without its exploitation, it loses that necessity." He added, "The country is in a state of war, and what the resistance is doing on the southern front will determine Lebanon's fate and sovereignty for decades. There is no compromise or negligence with Lebanese sovereignty, and what is happening in Gaza, Lebanon, and the Bab el-Mandeb is sovereign. Its interconnection is also a sovereign necessity for everyone, and the enemy on all these fronts is one: Israel and those who support it." In addition, he reminded the government that "ending the displacement crisis is an urgent necessity for the survival of Lebanon. It starts with protecting markets, securing Lebanese labor, and preventing displacement from forming any influential force or investment, regardless of its type and description. "It is necessary to establish national 'data' for displacement, and the sea must be opened. Delaying that is a bigger crisis and a greater national catastrophe. Europe has no sovereignty in this country, and it is unacceptable for the Lebanese army to turn into a maritime guard for Europe, the partner in the Syrian massacre," Kabalan said.

Lebanon's fuel prices on the rise
LBCI/January 26, 2024
On Friday, January 26, 2024, the price of 95 and 98 octane fuel increased by LBP 11,000, and that of diesel rose by LBP 14,000, while the price of gas remained the same.
The prices of hydrocarbon derivatives became as follows:
- Gasoline 95 octane: LBP 1,514,000
- Gasoline 98 octane: LBP 1,554,000
- Diesel Oil: LBP 1,500,000
- Gas Canister: LBP 930,000

Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on January 26-27.2024
UN court says Israel must prevent genocidal acts in Gaza
Associated Press/January 26, 2024
The United Nations' top court stopped short Friday of ordering a cease-fire in Gaza in a genocide case but demanded that Israel try to contain death and damage in its military offensive in the tiny coastal enclave. The court said Israel should do everything it could to prevent any acts of genocide in the Gaza Strip. Israel must do everything to "prevent the commission of all acts within the scope" of the Genocide Convention, said the International Court of Justice. South Africa brought the case, which goes to the core of one of the world's most intractable conflicts, and had asked the court to order Israel to halt its operation.
In the highly anticipated decision made by a panel of 17 judges, the International Court of Justice decided not to throw out the case — and ordered six so-called provisional measures to protect Palestinians in Gaza. "The court is acutely aware of the extent of the human tragedy that is unfolding in the region and is deeply concerned about the continuing loss of life and human suffering," Joan E. Donoghue, the court's president, said. Friday's decision is only an interim one; it could take years for the full case brought by South Africa to be considered. Israel rejects the genocide accusation and had asked the court to throw the charges out. While the case winds its way through the court, South Africa has asked the judges "as a matter of extreme urgency" to impose provisional measures.
Top of the South African list was a request for the court to order Israel to "immediately suspend its military operations in and against Gaza." But the court declined to do that. South Africa also asked for Israel to take "reasonable measures" to prevent genocide and allow access for desperately needed aid. The court ruled that Israel must try to limit death and damage. In a statement Thursday, Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh said he hoped the decision would "include immediate action to stop the aggression and genocide against our people in the Gaza Strip ... and a rapid flow of relief aid to save the hungry, wounded and sick from the threat of slow death that threatens them." On Thursday, Israeli government spokesperson Eylon Levy had said that Israel expected the court to toss out the "spurious and specious charges." Israel often boycotts international tribunals and U.N. investigations, saying they are unfair and biased. But this time, it took the rare step of sending a high-level legal team — a sign of how seriously it regards the case and likely the fear that any court order to halt operations would be a major blow to the country's international standing. An Israeli official said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu huddled with top legal, diplomatic and security officials on Thursday in anticipation of the ruling. He said Israel is confident in its case but discussed "all scenarios." The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was discussing confidential meetings. Israel launched its massive air and ground assault on Gaza after Hamas militants stormed through Israeli communities on Oct. 7 killing some 1,200 people, mainly civilians, and abducting another 250. The offensive has decimated vast swaths of the territory and driven nearly 85% of its 2.3 million people from their homes.
More than 26,000 Palestinians have been killed, the Health Ministry in the Hamas-run enclave said on Friday. The ministry does not differentiate between combatants and civilians in its death toll, but has said about two-thirds of those killed were women and children. The Israeli military claims at least 9,000 of those killed in the nearly four-month conflict are Hamas militants. U.N. officials have expressed fears that even more people could die from disease, with at least one-quarter of the population facing starvation. Ahead of the ruling, Marieke de Hoon, an associate professor of international law at the University of Amsterdam, said she thought the court was unlikely to throw the case out since the legal bar South Africa has to clear at this early stage is lower than the one that would be applied for ruling on the merits of the accusation. "The standard ... is not, has there been genocide? But a lower standard," she said. "Is it plausible that there could have been a risk of genocide that would invoke Israel's responsibility to prevent genocide?"But De Hoon also did not expect the world court to order an end to Israel's military operation. "I think that they will shy away from actually calling for a full cease-fire, because I think they will find that beyond their abilities right now," she said in a telephone interview. Provisional measures by the world court are legally binding, but it is not clear if Israel will comply with them. How the U.S., Israel's top ally, responds to any order will be key, since it wields veto power at the U.N. Security Council and thus could block measures there aimed at forcing Israel's compliance. The U.S. has said Israel has the right to defend itself, but also spoken about the need for the country to protect civilians in Gaza and allow more aid in. The genocide case strikes at the national identity of Israel, which was founded as a Jewish state after the Nazi slaughter of 6 million Jews during World War II. South Africa's own identity is key to it bringing the case. Its governing party, the African National Congress, has long compared Israel's policies in Gaza and the West Bank to its own history under the apartheid regime of white minority rule, which restricted most Black people to "homelands" before ending in 1994.

Top UN court stops short of ordering Gaza ceasefire, demands Israel contain deaths
AP/January 26, 2024
THE HAGUE, Netherlands: The United Nations’ top court stopped short Friday of ordering a ceasefire in Gaza in a case accusing Israel of genocide in the tiny coastal enclave, but demanded that Israel try to limit deaths and damage caused by its military offensive there.
South Africa brought the case, which goes to the core of one of the world’s most intractable conflicts, and had asked the court to order Israel to halt its operation.
While the ruling stopped short of that, it nonetheless amounted to an overwhelming rebuke of Israel’s wartime conduct and adds to mounting international pressure to halt the offensive that has killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, decimated vast swaths Gaza, and driven nearly 85 percent of its 2.3 million people from their homes. In the highly anticipated decision made by a panel of 17 judges, the International Court of Justice decided not to throw out the case — and ordered six so-called provisional measures to protect Palestinians in Gaza.
Many of the measures were approved by an overwhelming majority of the judges. An Israeli judge voted in favor of two of the six. “The court is acutely aware of the extent of the human tragedy that is unfolding in the region and is deeply concerned about the continuing loss of life and human suffering,” Joan E. Donoghue, the court’s president, said. Provisional measures by the world court are legally binding, but it is not clear if Israel will comply with them. After the ruling, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected the genocide claims as “outrageous” and vowed to press ahead with the war.
“We will continue to do what is necessary to defend our country and defend our people,” he said. Friday’s decision is only an interim one; it could take years for the full case brought by South Africa to be considered. Israel rejects the genocide accusation.
While the case winds its way through the court, South Africa has asked the judges “as a matter of extreme urgency” to impose provisional measures. Top of the South African list was a request for the court to order Israel to “immediately suspend its military operations in and against Gaza.” But the court declined to do that. South Africa also asked for Israel to take “reasonable measures” to prevent genocide and allow access for desperately needed aid.
The court ruled that Israel must refrain from killing Palestinians or causing harm to them and that it urgently needs to get basic aid to people in Gaza. It also ruled that Israel should prevent and punish any incitement to genocide, among other measures. Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyadh Al-Maliki welcomed “the significant order.”On Thursday, Israeli government spokesperson Eylon Levy had said that Israel expected the court to toss out the “spurious and specious charges.” Israel often boycotts international tribunals and UN investigations, saying they are unfair and biased. But this time, it took the rare step of sending a high-level legal team — a sign of how seriously it regards the case and likely the fear that any court order to halt operations would be a major blow to the country’s international standing. An Israeli official said that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu huddled with top legal, diplomatic and security officials on Thursday in anticipation of the ruling. He said Israel is confident in its case but discussed “all scenarios.” The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was discussing confidential meetings. Israel launched its massive air and ground assault on Gaza after Hamas militants stormed through Israeli communities on Oct. 7 killing some 1,200 people, mainly civilians, and abducting another 250. The offensive has decimated vast swaths of the territory and driven nearly 85 percent of its 2.3 million people from their homes.
More than 26,000 Palestinians have been killed, the Health Ministry in the Hamas-run enclave said on Friday. The ministry does not differentiate between combatants and civilians in its death toll, but has said about two-thirds of those killed were women and children.
The Israeli military claims at least 9,000 of those killed in the nearly four-month conflict are Hamas militants. UN officials have expressed fears that even more people could die from disease, with at least one-quarter of the population facing starvation.
How the US, Israel’s top ally, responds to any order will be key, since it wields veto power at the UN Security Council and thus could block measures there aimed at forcing Israel’s compliance. The US has said Israel has the right to defend itself, but also spoken about the need for the country to protect civilians in Gaza and allow more aid in. The genocide case strikes at the national identity of Israel, which was founded as a Jewish state after the Nazi slaughter of 6 million Jews during World War II. South Africa’s own identity is key to it bringing the case. Its governing party, the African National Congress, has long compared Israel’s policies in Gaza and the West Bank to its own history under the apartheid regime of white minority rule, which restricted most Black people to “homelands” before ending in 1994.

UN Court: Israel Must Prevent Genocidal Acts in Gaza
Asharq Al Awsat/January 26/2024
Israel must prevent genocidal acts in Gaza and allow humanitarian aid into the territory, the UN's top court ruled Friday, in a closely watched decision that stopped short of calling for a ceasefire. The International Court of Justice was not deciding whether Israel was actually committing genocide with its military campaign in Gaza -- that process will likely take several years. But it ruled that the "catastrophic humanitarian situation" in Gaza was "at serious risk of deteriorating further" before a final decision, so it issued a series of emergency measures. Israel must "take all measures in its power" to prevent genocidal acts and also stop officials making declarations inciting genocide, the court said. Concretely, the court urged Israel to take "immediate and effective measures to enable the provision of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance". The case was brought by South Africa, which has accused Israel of breaching the UN Genocide Convention. Speaking to reporters on the steps of the gilded Peace Palace in The Hague, where the court sits, Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said the measures were tantamount to a call for a ceasefire. "How do you deliver humanitarian aid without a ceasefire? How do you provide water, access to energy? How do you ensure that those who are injured have healthcare and so on?" she said.
"Without a ceasefire, not one of these things can be done."
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the charge against Israel "is not only false, it's outrageous, and decent people everywhere should reject it". Israel stressed during the hearings that it was acting in self-defense after the Hamas attacks of October 7 and was doing all in its power to ease the plight of civilians.
While steps to help civilians "are to be encouraged, they are insufficient" to protect the rights of the Palestinians, the court ruled. Outside the court, hundreds of protesters on both sides gathered, shouting slogans and waving banners. Noyleyb, a 32-year-old pro-Israeli entrepreneur, who declined to give his last name, told AFP: "It's crazy how the survivors of one genocide are being put on trial for committing a genocide."
'Grossly distorted'
Over two days of hearings earlier this month, lawyers from both sides battled it over the interpretation of this Convention. South Africa accused Israel of "genocidal" acts that were intended to cause the "destruction of a substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnical group." Israel dismissed the case as a "grossly distorted story" and said that if any genocidal acts had been carried out, they had been executed against Israel during the October 7 Hamas attacks.  The question now is whether the court's rulings will be obeyed. Although its rulings are legally binding, it has no mechanism to enforce them and they are sometimes completely ignored -- it has ordered Russia to stop its invasion of Ukraine for example. Netanyahu has already hinted that Israel would not abide by any ruling saying, "no one will stop us", not even a verdict in The Hague. But experts believe that aside from the significant symbolic impact of the ruling, there could be tangible consequences on the ground. "It makes it much harder for other states to continue to support Israel in the face of a neutral third party finding there is a risk of genocide," said Juliette McIntyre, international law expert from the University of South Australia. "States may withdraw military or other support for Israel in order to avoid this," she added. The October 7 Hamas attack resulted in the death of around 1,140 people in Israel, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures. At least 26,083 Palestinians, around 70 percent of them women, young children and adolescents, have been killed in the Gaza Strip in Israeli bombardments and ground offensive since then, according to the Hamas government's health ministry. The court also said Israel should preserve any possible evidence that could later be used in the wider case to decide whether genocide was taking place.
Israel also has to report back within one month on the measures it is taking to conform to the ICJ orders.

More than 26,000 Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes on Gaza since Oct.7 – Gaza health ministry
REUTERS/January 26, 2024
DUBAI: Relentless attacks against infrastructure and cold weather in Gaza are making the Palestinian enclave “completely uninhabitable,” the UN human rights office warned on Friday. “I fear that many more civilians will die,” said Ajith Sunghay, head of the UN Human Rights Office for the Occupied Palestinian Territory. “The continued attacks on specially protected facilities, such as hospitals, will kill civilians, and there will be a further, massive impact on access to health care, safety and security in general of Palestinians.”Israel’s offensive has killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities, with thousands more feared buried under rubble and most of the 2.3 million residents displaced, facing acute shortages of food, water and medicine. Israel launched its offensive in the wake of an Oct. 7 rampage by Hamas militants who killed 1,200 people and seized 240 hostages.
Sunghay said his office was also concerned about the impact of rainy and cold weather in Gaza. “It was entirely predictable at this time of the year, and risks making an already unsanitary situation completely uninhabitable for the people,” he said.
“Most have no warm clothes or blankets. Northern Gaza, where IDF (Israel Defense Forces) bombardment continues, is barely accessible, even to provide basic humanitarian aid.” Sunghay said it would be “disastrous” if the bombardment or the street-to-street fight taking place in Khan Younis moved further south to Rafah, where some 1.3 million people are now massed in the town bordering Egypt in an attempt to evade the Israeli assault.

UN agency probes staff suspected of role in Oct. 7 attacks on Israel
REUTERS/January 26, 2024
Lazzarini did not disclose the number of employees allegedly involved in the attacks
“Any UNRWA employee who was involved in acts of terror” would be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution
GENEVA: The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said on Friday it had opened an investigation into several employees suspected of involvement in the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel by Hamas and that it had severed ties with those staff members.
“The Israeli authorities have provided UNRWA with information about the alleged involvement of several UNRWA employees in the horrific attacks on Israel on October 7,” said Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner-General. “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.”Lazzarini did not disclose the number of employees allegedly involved in the attacks, nor the nature of their alleged involvement. He said, however, that “any UNRWA employee who was involved in acts of terror” would be held accountable, including through criminal prosecution. A spokesperson for UNRWA would not provide further detail on the situation. Israeli government spokesperson Eylon Levy accused UNRWA of announcing the news while the world’s attention was focused on the World Court ordering Israel to prevent acts of genocide against Palestinians and do more to help civilians in Gaza. “Any other day, this would have been a major headline: Israel submits evidence of UN employees’ complicity with Hamas,” Levy wrote on X.
UN CHIEF ‘HORRIFIED’
Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, has been briefed about the allegations, his spokesperson said. “The Secretary-General is horrified by this news,” said spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric. Dujarric added that the UN chief had asked Lazzarini to conduct a probe to ensure that any UNRWA employee shown to have participated or abetted the Oct. 7 attacks be terminated immediately and referred for potential criminal prosecution. “An urgent and comprehensive independent review of UNRWA will be conducted,” Dujarric added. UNRWA, whose biggest donors in 2022 included the United States, Germany and the European Union, has repeatedly said its capacity to render humanitarian assistance to people in Gaza is on the verge of collapse. The US State Department said it was extremely troubled by the allegations, which it said pertained to 12 UNRWA employees. It said it would provide no additional funding to the agency until the allegations were addressed. “The Department of State has temporarily paused additional funding for UNRWA while we review these allegations and the steps the United Nations is taking to address them,” spokesperson Matthew Miller said.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said it would “assess further steps and draw lessons based on the result of the full and comprehensive investigation.”UNRWA, established in 1949 following the first Arab-Israeli war, provides services including schooling, primary health care and humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. Israeli authorities, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have accused the agency of fueling anti-Israeli incitement, allegations it denies. UNRWA has provided aid and used its facilities to shelter people fleeing bombardment and a ground offensive launched by Israel in Gaza following the Oct. 7 attacks, in which Israel says 1,200 people were killed and 240 taken hostage. Israel’s offensive has laid waste to much of the densely populated Gaza Strip and killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, according to health officials in the territory.

Hamas attack: US pauses UNRWA funding over claims of staff involvement
Sarah Fowler - BBC News/January 26, 2024
The US, Germany and the EU are among some of UNRWA's biggest donors
The US is pausing funding for the UN agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, over allegations of staff involvement in the 7 October Hamas attacks. UNRWA says it has sacked several people and ordered an investigation into information supplied by Israel. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was "horrified by this news" and has called for a swift investigation. Hamas killed 1,300 people, mostly civilians, in the unprecedented attack. Another 250 people were taken hostage. The events triggered Israel's retaliatory attacks on Hamas in Gaza, which have killed more than 26,000 Palestinians, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry. Announcing its decision to temporarily halt funding, the US state department said it was "extremely troubled" by the allegations of UN staff involvement in the attacks. The head of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini said, on Friday that Israel had provided his organisation "with information about the alleged involvement of several UNRWA employees in the horrific attacks on Israel on October 7".He said UNRWA had placed a number of employees under investigation and severed ties with them. An adviser to the Israeli prime minister told the BBC that the 7 October Hamas attacks had involved "people who are on their [UNRWA] salaries". Mark Regev said there was information showing teachers working in UNRWA schools had "openly celebrated" the 7 October attacks. He also referred to an Israeli hostage who, on her release, said she had been "held in the house of someone who worked for UNRWA"."They have a union which is controlled by Hamas and I think it's high time that the UN investigated these links between UNRWA and Hamas," he added. UN chief Antonio Guterres said he had asked Mr Lazzarini to investigate "this matter swiftly".He added that the probe must make sure any UNRWA employee "shown to have participated or abetted" in the 7 October attack be sacked and referred for potential criminal prosecution. Washington said it welcomed Mr Guterres's call for a "thorough and swift investigation". The EU also said in a statement it was "extremely concerned" by the allegations and would assess further steps "based on the result of the full and comprehensive investigation". The US, Germany and the EU are among some of UNRWA's biggest donors. The agency provides education, healthcare and humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. However it says it is struggling to get humanitarian aid to many of the estimated 1.7m people - nearly three-quarters of the population - displaced by 12 weeks of fighting. A number of UN facilities where Gazans had taken shelter have been hit in Israeli air strikes. On Thursday, 12 people were killed when a UN shelter was struck in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.

Houthis Fire Missile Close to a Tanker Hauling Russian Oil
Bloomberg/Omar Tamo and Alex Longley/January 26, 2024
Missiles exploded near a ship hauling Russian oil near Yemen, as merchant shipping in the region continues to face near-daily attacks from the country’s Houthi rebel group.A Panama-flagged, India-affiliated ship which was carrying barrels from Russia, saw an explosion about 1 nautical mile away, according to intelligence firm Ambrey Analytics. The UK Navy said it received a report of two missiles exploding near an unidentified vessel. Since mid-November, the Houthis have launched a string of attacks on vessels transiting the region in solidarity with Palestinians following the war between Israel and the militant group Hamas. The knock-on effect has seen swaths of global trade avoiding the waterway — from hundreds of container ships to tankers hauling millions of barrels of oil. There were several other vessels nearby at the time of Friday’s explosions. The incident is the third since the attacks began that happened in the proximity of a ship previously calling at a Russian port. Analysts suspect that in each case, it has either been mistaken identity or that the Houthis were targeting other freighters. Last week, a spokesman for Yemen’s Houthi militants told the Russian newspaper Izvestia that Russian and Chinese ships sailing through the Red Sea would be safe. The rebel group has said it will attack US, UK and Israel-linked ships in response to Israel’s war with Hamas and airstrikes on Yemen. There was no damage to the ship during the incident, the UK Navy said. One vessel in the region at the time of the attack that had been carrying Russian oil was the Achilles, according to ship tracking data compiled by Bloomberg. It sails under the flag of Panama and was signaling “no link with Israel” in its destination field while passing through the Gulf of Aden. Many ships have taken to distancing themselves from the US, UK and Israel in a bid to avoid attack.

US, Iraq to begin talks soon on ending mission of US-led military coalition in Iraq
Associated Press/January 26, 2024
The United States and Iraq will begin talks soon to wind down the mission of a U.S.-led military coalition formed to fight the Islamic State group in Iraq, both governments have said. The Pentagon said the size of the U.S. military footprint in the country will be part of the discussions. The announcement comes as U.S. forces in Iraq have been increasingly targeted by Iran-backed militias, though the U.S. says the talks were first discussed last year and the timing is not related to the attacks. Officials said Thursday that delegates from Iraq and the U.S. mission in Baghdad will meet for the first time on Saturday to begin setting up the process for the talks. Officials confirmed the start date on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing planning. Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh told reporters at a briefing that the U.S. has received no requests from Iraq to withdraw American troops. But she acknowledged that troop totals will be part of the ongoing talks, and any decisions would depend on the security environment. Since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war on Oct. 7, Iran-backed militants have struck American military installations in Iraq more than 60 times and in Syria more than 90 times, with a mix of drones, rockets, mortars and ballistic missiles. On Saturday, Kataib Hezbollah launched the militia's most serious attack this year, firing multiple ballistic missiles at al-Asad Air Base, a large air base in western Iraq where U.S. troops have trained Iraqi security forces and now coordinate operations to counter IS. The U.S. responded Tuesday, hitting three known Iranian militia locations and killing some of those fighters, which led to protests for U.S. forces to leave.
The situation highlights the risk of the U.S. being drawn into a wider conflict in Iraq and beyond as anger over Israel's bombardment of Gaza and U.S. support for Israel fuels the strikes by Iranian proxies. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement that the talks between the U.S. and Iraq are part of a higher military commission that was agreed upon last summer, before the war. The discussions will focus on the "transition to an enduring bilateral security partnership" between the two countries. Iran-linked factions in Iraq are likely to claim as a victory the announcement about the talks on ending the U.S.-led mission. A U.S. defense official who spoke on condition of anonymity to provide additional details about the commission said the U.S. and Iraq have been discussing this for months and the "timing is not related to recent attacks." The U.S. will maintain the "full right of self-defense" during the talks, he said. Iraq's foreign ministry said in a statement that Baghdad aims to "formulate a specific and clear timetable that specifies the duration of the presence of international coalition advisors in Iraq" and to "initiate the gradual and deliberate reduction of its advisors on Iraqi soil," eventually leading to the end of the coalition mission and a "move to comprehensive bilateral political and economic relations with the coalition countries."
The ministry said Iraq is committed to ensuring the " safety of the international coalition's advisers during the negotiation period in all parts of the country" and to "maintaining stability and preventing escalation."Iraqi officials have periodically called for a withdrawal of coalition forces for years, particularly in the wake of a U.S. airstrike in January 2020 that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis outside the Baghdad airport. The U.S. is part of a multinational coalition of forces in Iraq, but it was not clear what the eventual U.S.-Iraq agreements would mean for those other nations. On a background phone call with reporters Thursday to provide additional details on the Iraq-U.S. talks, a U.S. official said on the condition of anonymity that each of those nations would maintain its own bilateral relations with the government of Iraq. An eventual reduction in forces also raises questions about how the U.S. would be able to similarly sustain its counter-IS mission in Syria without troops in Iraq. The forward bases in Syria, where the U.S. maintains about 900 troops, get airlift and logistical support from the U.S. installations in Iraq. The official would not discuss how an Iraq drawdown might impact those operations. The U.S. has had a continuous presence in Iraq since its 2003 invasion. Although all U.S. combat forces left in 2011, thousands of troops returned in 2014 to help the government of Iraq defeat IS. In the years since, the presence of U.S. forces conducting counter-IS missions and training has been a lightning rod for an increasingly influential faction of Iran-aligned militias and politicians in the country. There are an estimated 2,500 U.S. troops deployed to Iraq now. More than 70 U.S. personnel have received minor injuries including brain injuries from the militia attacks against U.S. bases there, and one U.S. service member has been seriously injured since the militias began their attacks. The U.S. has struck militia targets in return, including some linked to the Popular Mobilization Forces, a coalition of mainly Shiite, Iran-backed paramilitary groups that is officially under the control of the Iraqi military although in practice it largely operates on its own. Iraqi officials have complained that the U.S. strikes are a violation of Iraqi sovereignty. Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this month, Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said there is no longer justification for the coalition's presence in the country and that the Iraqi army is capable of tracking and fighting the remaining IS cells. "We are a sovereign country, and therefore it is only natural that we moved towards this position," he said. "This is a request from the people, and this is a democratic country." An Iraqi government official said Baghdad had sent a written request to the White House in November for the withdrawal of the coalition forces. The official said that Iraqi and U.S. officials were at odds over the time frame, with U.S. officials proposing a two- to five-year timeline while the Iraqis wanted a more immediate withdrawal.
The official was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. U.S. forces would likely remain in the semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region, whose government has closer ties to Washington.

Attack on Iraqi Kurdish gas field leads to major power cuts
BAGHDAD (Reuters)/January 26, 2024
A drone attack on one of Iraq's largest gas fields has led to a temporary suspension of production, resulting in major power cuts across the country's northern Kurdistan region, officials said on Friday. No group has claimed responsibility for the explosive drone that struck Khor Mor gas field in the Sulaimaniya region of northern Iraq overnight. It damaged a liquid gas storage tank but caused no injuries, according to the field's United Arab Emirates-based operator, Dana Gas. Dana Gas said production was temporarily suspended to put out a fire, which was extinguished, and a resumption of operations was expected soon. Kurdistan's electricity ministry said the attack had led to a 2,800 megawatt drop in power production. U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Alina Romanowski condemned the attack, saying it "exposed millions to power outages in mid-winter".Local sources said power from the network had been totally absent in the region since after the attack. Pearl Petroleum, a consortium of Dana Gas and its affiliate Crescent Petroleum, have the rights to exploit the Khor Mor and Chemchemal fields, two of the biggest gas fields in Iraq. Iraq has witnessed near-daily drone and rocket attacks since Israel's war in Gaza began in October, mostly targeting bases housing troops belonging to a U.S-led military coalition. They have been claimed by the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of hardline pro-Iran militias. In a separate incident on Thursday, an explosive-laden drone targeting U.S. forces at a base near Erbil airport in Iraq's northern Kurdistan region was shot down by air defences, the region's counter-terrorism service said.

Washington Tells Baghdad US Troops Withdrawal Comes at Cost
London: Ali al-Sarry/Asharq Al-Awsat/January 26, 2024
Reliable sources revealed to Asharq Al-Awsat the contents of a letter delivered by the US authorities to the Iraqi government, regarding arrangements for the withdrawal of international coalition forces. The message included the withdrawal method and timetable, as well as obligations of the Iraqi side, stressing that if the withdrawal occurs, it will come at a price, and will not halt the deterrent attacks on pro-Iranian armed groups. In a statement late on Wednesday, the Iraqi Foreign Ministry said that a "significant message” had been received from Washington, and that Prime Minister Mohammad Shiaa al-Sudani would study it carefully. The sources explained to Asharq Al-Awsat that Washington does not object to transitioning to a new phase of bilateral relations, but withdrawing forces (by any means) will not put end to the deterrent attacks against armed groups loyal to Iran, as long as they continue to harm the security and stability of the region. The letter also indicated that the expected technical negotiations to arrange the withdrawal will not be easy and fast, and will take the necessary time to ensure that all issues are settled. According to the sources, “Washington encouraged Baghdad through the letter to understand and realize the consequences of the withdrawal, including the financial and economic obligations that bind the two countries.”Also, all Iraqi oil revenues have been paid into an account controlled by the US Treasury since 2003, in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 1483, which was intended to help Iraq manage its resources in a transparent manner. Following the US message to Baghdad, political forces have engaged in intense discussions to find the appropriate way to deal with “this sudden move.”

Iraq Forms ‘Military Committee’ to Schedule US Withdrawal
Baghdad: Hamza Mustafa/Asharq Al-Awsat/January 26, 2024
Iraq announced the success of negotiations with the US government to launch a Higher Military Committee to set a timetable for a phased withdrawal of the troops and ending the US-led international coalition’s presence in the country. The Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the move comes "in fulfillment of its national obligations and in line with the growing capacity and efficiency of the Iraqi government," declaring the success of the ongoing negotiations with the US. The statement explained that the negotiations concluded with the "necessity of launching the Higher Military Committee (HMC) at the level of working groups to evaluate the threat and danger of ISIS and the situational and operational requirements." The two parties also agreed on strengthening the capabilities of the Iraqi security forces "to put a clear timeline that specifies the duration of the presence of the US-led international coalition's advisors in Iraq."
The statement added that one of the committee's goals is to start "the gradual and deliberate reduction of its advisors in Iraq , ending the military mission of the coalition against ISIS, and shifting to comprehensive bilateral relations with the coalition countries." Iraq renewed its commitment to maintain the "safety of the international coalition's advisors during the negotiation period in all parts of the country, and maintaining stability and preventing escalation."Earlier, the State Administration Coalition, an alliance of Shiite, Sunni, and Kurdish political parties, held a meeting and called on all countries to respect Iraq's sovereignty and ensure its internal security is not threatened. During the meeting, the coalition denounced and rejected all attacks on Iraqi territory, calling on all countries to respect Iraq's sovereignty.
The coalition affirmed its support for government efforts aimed at conducting bilateral dialogue with the international coalition to redetermine the relationship, with the end of its unique mission to assist Iraq in its war against the terrorist organization.
Meanwhile, Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein discussed Spain's role in the international coalition with his Spanish counterpart Jose Manuel Albares Bueno. Spain is part of the US-led international coalition tasked with training and advising the Iraqi security forces in their fight against ISIS.
During a joint press conference at the Iraqi Foreign Ministry headquarters in Baghdad, Hussein explained that the Spanish soldiers helped Iraq In its war against ISIS.
He valued Spain's role as a member of the NATO mission and assisting the Iraqi forces. For his part, the Spanish minister said they discussed military attacks targeting Spanish bases, adding that the two parties will hold meetings with military officials in Baghdad to discuss protecting the military forces.
- Approval after rejection
Earlier, local media reported that Washington had yet to respond to Iraq's request regarding the activation of the bilateral committee to begin the US withdrawal from Iraq, which Prime Minister Mohammad Shia al-Sudani had announced on Jan. 04. Sudani chaired a meeting of the Ministerial Council for National Security, during which the latest developments in the security situation in Iraq were discussed. The talks focused on the recent attacks in Iraq, constituting a flagrant violation of Iraqi sovereignty. It emphasized taking all necessary political, diplomatic, and security measures to protect Iraq's sovereignty and preserve its security.
- Withdrawal scenario
Political science professor at al-Nahrain University Yassin al-Bakri stated that the timing of the message, its circumstances, and the way it was announced suggest that it includes strict definitions about the nature of the US presence in Iraq. Bakri estimated that the US officials would demand clear and serious commitments regarding the protection of their advisors while holding the Iraqi government responsible for the security, political, and economic repercussions. He told Asharq Al-Awsat that US demands mean Iraq may pay the price. He explained that it was essential to consider how political forces would view a tense relationship with the US. It is clear that there is no consensus on the withdrawal request, said the expert, noting that Sunnis and Kurds want the US forces to remain in Iraq, and there are parties within the Coordination Framework that understand the repercussions of this move.
He explained that the conflict now is between the concept of "state and non-state," linking the domestic interest with the repercussions of the escalation in Iran.

Implications of the US-Led Coalition's Withdrawal from Iraq
LBCI/January 26, 2024
Has the countdown begun for the withdrawal of the US-led international coalition against ISIS from Iraq? This coalition has been present there since 2014, currently comprising around 2,500 US troops and hundreds of troops from other countries. Recently, Iraq has witnessed mutual attacks between Islamic factions in Iraq backed by Iran and the United States. These factions seek to pressure the United States due to its support for Israel in its war on Gaza. An Iraqi-US high military committee was formed. According to LBCI, representatives from both Iraq and the United States, including military leaders and experts, have been appointed. According to the Iraqi Foreign Ministry, this committee's mission is to assess the ISIS threat, enhance the capabilities of the Iraqi security forces, and formulate a clear and specific timeline to determine the duration of the presence of international coalition advisors in Iraq. This includes gradually reducing their presence on Iraqi soil and ending the military mission of the coalition against ISIS. As for the United States, the mission of this committee is to discuss transitioning the coalition's mission against ISIS into a natural bilateral security partnership with Iraq rather than negotiating the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq. Does this mean that Washington will withdraw from Iraq? Regarding the first meeting of the committee it will commence in the coming days, as confirmed by the political advisor to Iraqi Prime Minister Fadi Al-Shammari. However, the withdrawal of the international coalition will not be quick and may have consequences: Firstly, according to Reuters, starting negotiations will contribute to easing the political pressure on the government of Mohammed al-Shia al-Sudani by the coordination framework, which includes Iran-affiliated parties. Secondly, attacks on US forces may decrease by 75 percent, according to what an Iraqi source asserted to LBCI.

Canada to re-start Turkey arms exports after Sweden NATO backing -sources
Jonathan Spicer/Reuters/January 26, 2024
Canada and Turkey have reached a deal to restart Canadian exports of drone parts in exchange for more transparency on where they are used, and it would take effect after Ankara completes its ratification of Sweden's NATO bid, two sources told Reuters. After 20 months of delay, Turkey moved swiftly this week to endorse Sweden's membership in the western military alliance, including a parliamentary vote and presidential sign-off, leaving Hungary as the sole ally yet to ratify it. Turkey is expected to send the final documents to Washington as soon as Friday, which would clear the way for Canada to immediately lift the export controls that it adopted in 2020, the two sources said, requesting anonymity. The agreement was reached in early January after months of talks, said one person familiar with the process. A second person familiar with the plan said the sides agreed it would take effect after Sweden's ratification was complete.Turkey's foreign ministry declined to comment. Canadian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Charlotte MacLeod told Reuters that while the export controls currently remained in place, Ottawa aimed to resolve the issue with Turkey given its status as a NATO ally.
"Canada and Turkey continue to engage in frank exchanges on our bilateral, economic and commercial relations," she said. Sweden's lengthy bid process frustrated some NATO members over what they viewed as Turkey's transactional approach, which led to concessions from Stockholm and other allies regarding arms exports and counterterrorism measures. U.S. leaders have said Turkey's ratification of Sweden's NATO membership clears the way for Ankara's long-sought purchase of U.S. F-16 fighter jets. Canada suspended drone technology sales to Turkey in 2020 after concluding its optical equipment attached to Turkish-made drones had been used by Azerbaijan while fighting ethnic Armenian forces in Nagorno Karabakh, an enclave Baku has since retaken. Ottawa halted talks on lifting them in 2022 when Ankara raised objections to both Finland and Sweden's NATO bids. But it re-started talks after a NATO leaders summit in July last year, Reuters reported at the time.
END-USER TRANSPARENCY
Under the agreement, Ankara would provide Ottawa information on the end-users of Canadian-made equipment, especially if re-exported to non-NATO members, the sources said. The "notification process", standard under the international arms trade, covers Wescam sensors used in Turkey's Bayraktar TB2 drones and other dual-use goods and arms-related exports.The first source said the deal improves transparency and communication between the sides and aims to avoid disagreement as in 2021, when Canada said Azerbaijan's use of the camera equipment violated Turkey's end-user assurances. Ankara has repeatedly criticised export controls as contrary to the spirit of the NATO alliance. In the past it also faced trade embargoes by France, Germany and Sweden over tensions in the eastern Mediterranean and its operations in northern Syria. While Ankara has called on Canada to lift the restrictions, it has also said that it will soon be able to produce the drone parts it imports, including optical equipment, on its own. Several countries, including Ukraine, Ethiopia and Pakistan, have bought Turkish drones after their battlefield successes.
On Tuesday, Turkey's Foreign Ministry said it hosted Canada's associate deputy foreign minister, Cindy Termorshuizen, for talks on "regional and international issues", without elaborating. On Friday, President Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey's ratification of Sweden was welcomed by "Canada, Sweden, and all Western countries", and was viewed as a source of strength within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Under NATO rules, Turkey must deposit the final document - the instrument of ratification - at the U.S. State Department archives to complete its Sweden ratification. Canada was the first NATO country to ratify the entry bid Sweden made in 2022 after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

An unlikely challenger to Putin brings a rare show of defiance, creating a dilemma for the Kremlin
AP/January 26, 2024
They have lined up by the thousands across Russia in recent days, standing in the bitter cold for a chance to sign petitions to support an unlikely challenger to President Vladimir Putin. Boris Nadezhdin has become a dilemma for the Kremlin as he seeks to run in the March 17 presidential election. The question now is whether Russian authorities will allow him on the ballot. The stocky, bespectacled 60-year-old local legislator and academic has struck a chord with the public, openly calling for a halt to the conflict in Ukraine, the end of mobilizing Russian men for the military, and starting a dialogue with the West. He also has criticized the country’s repression of LGBTQ+ activism. “The collection of signatures has gone unexpectedly well for us,” Nadezhdin told The Associated Press in an interview Wednesday in Moscow. “We didn’t expect this, to be honest.”Nadezhdin’s name is a form of the Russian word for “hope,” and although he is highly unlikely to defeat the still-popular Putin, the lines are a rare sign of protest, defiance and optimism in a country that has seen a harsh crackdown on dissent since its troops rolled into Ukraine nearly two years ago. Nadezhdin is running as a candidate for the Civic Initiative Party. Because the party is not represented in parliament, he's not guaranteed a spot on the ballot and must collect over 100,000 signatures, with a limit of 2,500 from each of the dozens of the vast country's regions, not just the biggest, more progressive cities. Putin, who is running as an independent candidate rather than as the candidate of the United Russia ruling party, has collected over 3 million. Waiting to sign a petition in St. Petersburg, Alexander Rakityansky told AP he went through a “period of apathy when I thought I couldn’t do anything.” Now, however, he sees Nadezhdin’s campaign as a chance to exercise his civil rights. Originally from Belgorod, the Russian border city hit by repeated Ukrainian attacks, Rakityansky said he backed Nadezhdin so his hometown “doesn’t get bombed and people don’t die on the streets.”Online videos have shown queues of supporters not just in Moscow and St. Petersburg but also in Krasnodar in the south, Saratov and Voronezh in the southwest and beyond the Ural Mountains in Yekaterinburg. Even in the Far East city of Yakutsk, 450 kilometers (280 miles) south of the Arctic Circle, Nadezhdin's team said up to 400 people a day braved temperatures that plunged to minus 40 Celsius (minus 40 Fahrenheit) to sign petitions. “Our weather conditions are not perfect and it’s generally accepted that it’s difficult to involve people in the north in some kind of activity, but people are coming every day,” said Alexei Popov, the head of Nadezhdin’s election team in Yakutsk. He said they had initially expected about 500 signatures in total for the entire region.
At a petition collection site in Moscow, Kirill Savenkov, 48, said he supported Nadezhdin because of his stand on Ukraine and peace negotiations. Others said they wanted a real alternative to Putin, who they suggested had led the country into a dead end. “The economy is really falling, people are getting poorer and prices are rising,” said Anna, 21, of St. Petersburg, who refused to give her full name because she feared for her security. Putin, she said, has not done “anything good for the country.” Nadezhdin's campaign got a boost after opposition leaders abroad, including former tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and supporters of imprisoned opposition politician Alexei Navalny, urged Russians to support any candidate who could deny Putin a share of the vote. Exiled opposition activist Maxim Katz said on YouTube that whatever the outcome, Nadezhdin's candidacy shows “there is one thing we know right now: Conversations about civic apathy in Russia are very far from reality. What we have is not civic apathy but a civic famine — an enormous hidden potential.”Some analysts say the surge of support for Nadezhdin has surprised even the Kremlin, although Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday that “we don’t see him as a rival.” Analysts say the election's outcome is a foregone conclusion and that Putin will stay in power for another six years, but some also suggest it's still a moment of genuine political risk for the Kremlin, which must project an aura of legitimacy for the balloting to be seen as a genuine contest.
For Putin to win a convincing victory, he needs his supporters to turn out and his critics must stay home with no “glimmer of hope,” said Ekaterina Schulmann, a political scientist and nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center in Berlin. “This is why Nadezhdin is such a problem," she said in an interview. "He provides a shadow of hope.”Nadezhdin's supporters lining up in Moscow and St. Petersburg told AP it gave them the rare opportunity to be with like-minded people who want a different leader from Putin, 71, who has ruled Russia for 24 years.
“I understood that these are the people who want to change the current government and I want to be a part of this,” said Margarita, a 28-year-old student who also declined to give her surname for fear of retribution. So far, Russia's Central Election Commission has approved three candidates who were nominated by parties represented in parliament that largely support Kremlin policies: Nikolai Kharitonov of the Communist Party, Leonid Slutsky of the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party and Vladislav Davankov of the New People Party. Kharitonov ran against Putin in 2004, finishing a distant second. In December, authorities barred from the ballot Yekatarina Duntsova, a former regional lawmaker who had called for peace in Ukraine. The commission cited technical errors in her paperwork. Duntsova was probably barred because authorities “don’t know her, and so in their terms she is unpredictable. And above all they dislike unpredictable things,” Schulmann said. Although there have been claims that Nadezhdin secretly has the Kremlin’s approval to run and is seen as kind of a spoiler candidate, he still could be ruled ineligible.He has appeared as a pundit on Russian television and even criticized the conflict in Ukraine during a talk show on state-controlled NTV in September 2022 — a rare level of visibility not enjoyed by other opposition politicians such as Navalny and Vladimir Kara-Murza, both now imprisoned.
In that appearance, Nadezhdin said Putin was misled by intelligence services that apparently told him Ukrainian resistance would be brief and ineffective.
In his AP interview, Nadezhdin said he believes he has been allowed to run because he is a known entity and has not specifically criticized Putin.“I personally know Putin,” he said, saying he met him before he became president in 2000, adding that in the 1990s, he was an assistant to then-Prime Minister Sergey Kiriyenko, now Putin's first deputy chief of staff. Schulmann said that while authorities could allow Nadezhdin to run, it's a “dangerous gamble.”“I think they will cut him off at the next stage when he brings those signatures,” she said, suggesting the Central Election Commission could declare some of them invalid and bar him from the ballot. She suggested authorities could also threaten him and his team with prison if he later urged his supporters to protest. The election is the first since Putin annexed four Ukrainian regions and the first in which online voting will be used nationwide. Critics suggest that both are opportunities to rig results in favor of Putin — something the Kremlin has denied it will do. No matter what the actual outcome, some analysts and political opponents suggest that the sight of those lining up in the cold for Nadezhdin reveals more about Russia today than the vote itself. Although Nadezhdin indicated he believes Putin's team did not initially perceive him as a risk, he said “the Kremlin administrators are now in a difficult position.” If he were in their shoes, he said, “I would now be thinking, ‘Why did we let him do this?’”

Putin says Ukraine shot down plane, not clear if deliberately or in error
REUTERS/January 26, 2024
MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin said a Russian military plane that crashed near the border with Ukraine on Wednesday was shot down by Ukrainian air defenses, whether on purpose or by mistake.Moscow accuses Kyiv of downing the Ilyushin Il-76 plane in Russia’s Belgorod region and killing 74 people on board, including 65 captured Ukrainian soldiers en route to be swapped for Russian PoWs. It has not presented evidence. Ukraine has neither confirmed nor denied that it shot down the plane and has challenged Moscow’s account of who was on board and what happened.
“I don’t know if they did it on purpose or by mistake, but it is obvious that they did it,” Putin said in televised comments, his first on the crash. “In any case, what happened is a crime. Either through negligence or on purpose, but in any case it is a crime.”Ukraine disputes Russia’s assertion that it was warned in advance that a plane carrying Ukrainian prisoners of war would be flying over Russia’s southwestern Belgorod region at that time. It has also said there were discrepancies in a list published by Russian media of the 65 Ukrainians alleged to have been on the aircraft. Putin said the plane could not have been brought down by Russian “friendly fire” because Russia’s air defense systems have safeguards to prevent them attacking their own planes. “There are ‘friend or foe’ systems there, and no matter how much the operator presses the button, our air defense systems would not work,” he said. Putin said the missiles fired were mostly likely American or French, but this would be established with certainty in two to three days. An adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Putin’s comments amounted to a “classic disinformation” campaign.
“First of all, look at it. We are fighting but (for Putin) Ukraine is doing something wrong in terms of the rules and customs of war,” Mykhailo Podolyak told Ukrainian television. “And secondly, there is something much more important for the Russians. They want to take away our right to receive missiles from our partners for our air defense systems.” Russia’s Investigative Committee earlier reported that Ukrainian identity documents and tattooed body parts had been recovered from the site of the crash.

Biden administration tells Congress it intends to sell Turkey F-16s after Erdogan approved Sweden’s NATO membership
Jennifer Hansler, CNN/January 26, 2024
The Biden administration told Congress it intends to sell F-16 fighter jets to Turkey after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signed off on Sweden’s accession to NATO on Thursday – a development that caps off more than a year of quiet, complicated negotiations. The State Department sent the formal notification about the proposed $23 billion sale to Congress on Friday after Turkey’s instruments of ratification were formally deposited at the department. The State Department also sent Congress a formal notification of its intent to sell $8.6 billion worth of F-35s to Greece. Congress is expected to approve both sales. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was extensively engaged for months with Turkish officials and US lawmakers to reach the deal to stop Erdogan’s obstruction of Sweden’s NATO bid that would see Turkey receive the fighter jets – one of its top requests of the US. When Sweden, along with Finland, first applied to join the defensive alliance in May 2022, Turkey sought to pull the US directly into the negotiations – a move the US rebuffed, according to a US official. However, the administration was cognizant the US had a key point of leverage – the F-16s – if that became necessary. Once Turkey approved Finland’s accession in March 2023, Blinken worked intensely behind the scenes to try to get Sweden’s approval done by last summer’s NATO summit in Vilnius, Lithuania. During a trip to Turkey in February 2023, Blinken met with Erdogan, who stressed the need for the US to give Turkey the F-16s before he would approve Sweden’s membership into the alliance. Blinken, in turn, told the Turkish president multiple times that members of Congress would not approve the sale of jets until Turkey allowed Sweden to join NATO. It was at this point, the US official said, that the administration decided to leverage the jets more directly. The process moved forward more quickly with the appointment of Hakan Fidan as Turkey’s foreign minister. Fidan was seen as having a closer relationship to Erdogan than his predecessor. Blinken and Fidan met on the margins of a conference in London in late June 2023 to hash out details of a potential deal. Following that meeting, Blinken discussed the matter with then-Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Robert Menendez – who had long opposed the sale of the jets to Turkey – and other members of Congress. The New Jersey senator and others made clear that they wanted to ensure Greece’s support. Blinken engaged extensively with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis to discuss what Greece would need to feel comfortable with neighboring Turkey receiving the jets. Turkey and Greece have an incredibly tense relationship. After those initial months of negotiations, the first hurdle was cleared at Vilnius, when Erdogan publicly committed to move forward on Sweden’s accession. The intensive effort shifted to ensuring that the Turkish parliament would vote in favor of accession. As the US worked to solidify the deal, Blinken and Fidan spoke weekly over the autumn and winter, the US official said. The top US diplomat spoke with Greek Prime Minister half a dozen times. He spoke extensively with Menendez and his successor, Sen. Ben Cardin, and the leadership of the House Foreign Affairs Committee to try to assuage their concerns about the F-16 sale. The Turkish Parliament finally voted in favor of Sweden’s NATO accession Tuesday, and Erdogan signed off on the instruments of ratification Thursday. The documents were then sent from Turkey to the US to be physically deposited in a vault at the State Department, which serves as the treaty depositary for NATO, on Friday. This was the final step needed before the agency sent the formal notifications about the F-16 sales to Congress. The US official said this was to assure Congress there was no way for Turkey to back out of the deal. Hungary still must approve Sweden’s NATO bid for the nation to finally become a member.

US warship downs incoming missile fired from Yemen
Agence France Presse/January 26, 2024
Yemen's Houthi rebels launched a missile Friday toward a U.S. warship patrolling the Gulf of Aden, forcing it to shoot down the projectile, officials said. The attack marks the latest by the rebels in their campaign against ships traveling through the Red Sea and surrounding waters, which has disrupted global trade amid Israel's war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. An anti-ship ballistic missile came near the USS Carney, an Arleigh-Burke class destroyer that's been involved in American operations to try and stop the Houthi campaign since November, the U.S. military's Central Command said. "The missile was successfully shot down by USS Carney," the statement said. "There were no injuries or damage reported." The Iranian-backed Houthi rebels did not immediately acknowledge the attack, though they typically take several hours afterward to claim their assaults. The British military's United Kingdom Maritime Operations, which oversees Mideast waterways, earlier reported the attack as happening southwest of Yemen's port city of Aden. The American statement again took pains to avoid saying the Houthis directly targeted the Carney, something that Washington has been doing since the attacks began in November. That's likely aimed at trying to not have the Red Sea crisis grow larger as experts worry about the Israel-Hamas war morphing into a wider conflict. However, the U.S. and Britain have launched multiple rounds of airstrikes in the time since targeting Houthi missile depots and launcher sites in Yemen, a country that's been wracked by conflict since the rebels seized the capital, Sanaa, in 2014. Since November, the rebels have repeatedly targeted ships in the Red Sea, saying they were avenging 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 global trade between Asia, the Mideast and Europe.Since the airstrike campaign began, the rebels now say they'll target American and British ships as well. On Wednesday, two American-flagged ships carrying cargo for the U.S. Defense and State departments came under attack by the Houthis, forcing an escorting U.S. Navy warship to shoot some of the projectiles down

The Lone Star State: Texas's Struggle for Independence and Current Political Challenges
LBCI/January 26/2024
Do you know who "The Lone Star State" is? It's the state of Texas in the United States, nicknamed "The Lone Star State," to indicate its previous status as an independent republic and to remind of its struggle for years for independence from Mexico in 1836. This state is predominantly Republican. While it has its own laws, it is part of the federal American union governed by it. It is at odds with the Democratic American administration to the extent that Republicans in it refuse to recognize the results of the 2020 presidential elections and, therefore, do not recognize the authority of Democrat Joe Biden as president of the country. Texas has never stopped fighting illegal immigration and preventing migrants from Mexico from sneaking into the United States by building a barrier of barbed wire. Last October saw escalating disputes between the federal government in Washington and the Republic of Texas after the state filed a lawsuit against President Biden's administration for what it described as the deliberate destruction of parts of its border fence with Mexico by federal officials. Does the US federal security have the right to remove part of the wire? The Supreme Court sided with the federal government in its decision, considering that federal agents have the right to cut the barrier if they deem it necessary, especially since federal security falls under state administration, which is a higher authority than state administration. The court's decision on the eve of the US presidential elections angered Texas residents and increased their calls for declaring independence from the United States.  This demand has been raised before. In June 2022, the Republican Party in the state announced its intention to pressure local authorities to hold a referendum in the coming years to determine the fate of the state within the country.
However, according to the US Constitution, Texas cannot legally secede from the United States. In any case, the National Guard still controls the largest point of entry for illegal migrants from Mexico to the United States, and it appears that President Biden will not back down from the Supreme Court's decision.  However, such a decision will allow Republicans, led by Biden's fierce rival Donald Trump, to play the immigrant card in the confrontation. Trump was one of the staunchest advocates of building a wall with Mexico and ultimately closing the borders. A new card in the presidential struggle, so who will prevail?

Latest English LCCC  analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on January 26-27.2024
Canada: Nearly 100 Churches Torched, Four during Christmas, 2023
Raymond Ibrahim/January 26/2024
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/126421/126421/
About 100 churches have been vandalized, torched, or desecrated over the last two-and-a-half years—not in Egypt or Nigeria, but in Canada (mapped and listed here). While this phenomenon received a bit of media attention, after some 30 churches were initially torched in the summer of 2021, that number has significantly grown to 96, with the authorities doing little, aside from offering implicit approval for these anti-Christian terror attacks.
Background: According to Canadian “mainstream” media—all of which are left of Left—unmarked graves of natives were recently discovered in residential boarding schools, and the Catholic Church is being accused of sadistically killing its young scholars and trying to cover it up.
The problem, however, is that this widely shared narrative is inherently false (see here and here): these graves were once marked and therefore known, and most of those presumably buried in them died of natural causes. The deaths, moreover, took place primarily in the early 1800s. Apparently some plague—epidemics were especially common back then—broke out in these church-sponsored boarding schools for natives, in part due to the lack of hygiene and proper medical treatment (in comparison to modern standards and technology). As Jeff Fynn-Paul, author of the enlightening new book, Not Stolen: The Truth About European Colonialism in the New World, writes,
Recent claims of ‘hundreds’ of graves found at Indigenous schools in Canada—claims that were propagated by the board of the Canadian Historical Association no less—have proven to be almost entirely unfounded… [T]he notion that these schools were set up for maleficent ends has been debunked roundly for anyone who cares to look into it.But since when did those who hate Christianity care to look into facts when a good pretext is handy? They much prefer to run with claims of innocent young natives being tortured, murdered, and secretly buried by dastardly clerics. As the recent report states, “In response to these announcements [of mass graves], far-left radicals have used this opportunity as an excuse to terrorize Catholic and other Christian communities by targeting churches.”
If “far-left radicals” have been the foot soldiers, far-left politicians—that is, the Canadian ruling elite—have provided them with cover.
On June 30, 2021, after the first two dozen churches were torched, Harsha Walia, the then head of British Colombia’s Civil Liberties Association—which claims to “promote, defend, sustain, and extend civil liberties and human rights”—tweeted in regards to the churches: “Burn it all down.” (So much for her championing the “civil liberties and human rights” of Canadians; apparently they only apply to some people, not others.)
A Punjabi born and raised in Bahrain, it made sense for Walia to respond in this manner. Not only is the Islamic world the epicenter of church burnings, but Pakistan and India are so anti-Christian that they are currently ranked as the seventh and eleventh worst persecutors of Christians in the entire world. In India alone, 2,228 churches were attacked or torched in 2023 (and 160 Christians slaughtered).
But what explains the similar response from many white Canadian leaders? Prominent Newfoundland lawyer, Caitlin Urquhart, merely parroted Walia—“Burn it all down.” Heidi Mathews of Harvard Law School described the vandalization and torching of churches as “the right of resistance to extreme and systemic injustice.” Gerald Butts, a close confidant of the Canadian prime minister, said the attacks were “understandable.”
As for the fearless leader of Canada himself, after offering the usual lip service and saying that ongoing church attacks are “unacceptable,” Justin Trudeau said:
I understand the anger that’s out there … against institutions like the Catholic Church. It is real, and it is fully understandable given the shameful history that we’re all becoming more and more aware of.
So, attacks on Christian churches are “unacceptable”—but they’re also “understandable.” Considering that these two words cancel each other out, Trudeau’s was a call for no action—hence why some 60 more churches have been attacked since he spoke. As Ezra Levant said on July 7, 2021,
He [Trudeau] introduced an anti-hate crime bill in parliament that’s targeting mean tweets and Facebook posts, but literally you have church after church being torched by Antifa-style terrorists and he’s almost silent on the matter, and his right hand man [Gerald Butts] finds it understandable.
The denial continues. After stating that four churches were torched in the days leading up to this last Christmas, 2023—a recent report states that, “as it turns out, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have — so far — zero evidence that any of the church arsons have any link to anti-Christian animus.” “None of the, of the files we’ve solved, showed any particular affinity against the churches whatsoever,” Cpl. Troy Savinkoff, a RCMP spokesman, was quoted as saying, before emphasizing that there’s no evidence that the fires are linked or part of any “concerted effort” against churches.
That all of these ongoing attacks on churches in Canada are motivated first and foremost by a hate for Christianity is amply demonstrated by the fact that a Coptic church was also torched to the ground in Canada—with the authorities, once again, failing to do their duty properly.
The question begs itself: What on earth do the non-European Copts, Egypt’s native Christians—who began migrating to Canada over a century after these graves were first dug, primarily to escape religious persecution—have to do with this issue? Nothing, they just happen to be Christian—their church boasted a crucifix atop its steeple—and that’s all that matters, all that warrants hate crimes and indifference for them in Leftist Canada. Evil, after all, never needs an excuse to manifest itself, though a pretext always offers good cover.
And so, what was once the preserve of the Islamic world—hostility for and attacks on churches—is now a regular and acceptable feature of Canada. Considering that radical Leftists and radical Muslims believe in the exact opposite things, when it comes to torching churches, they are, rather tellingly, close allies. This speaks volumes about what truly animates them both, and what is at the core of their belief systems.

A Hundred Days after Gaza's October 7 (Part 2 of 4)/Inconvenient History from the SS Einsatzgruppen to Hamas/
Gwythian Prins/Gatestone Institute./January 26, 2024
The BBC has used UNRWA voices -- preferably, it seems, antipodean ones -- as purportedly objective third-party commentators. That is deeply irresponsible journalism, and the BBC most likely knows why that is so.
Thus, according to the Covenant and echoing the Mufti in 1943... there is not, and cannot anywhere be a Jewish state in this world. It is what is written: here we are told that Jews in Palestine are incompatible with "true statehood" and the Mufti will tell us that it is Allah's will that Jews shall forever stateless.
It is important to remember that these are thrice legitimate Jewish lands: once from original patrimony; once by international mandate and the third time by force of arms after successfully countering assaults in 1948, 1967 and 1973. Anti-Semitic exceptionalism, however, means that only the Jewish state is not allowed to enjoy the peace of victory that winning wars brings to other nations.
Ever since the Abraham Accords, were adopted on 15 September 2020, many regional states have shown that they would prefer to skirt around the ever-rejectionist "Palestinians" and to normalise relations with the amazing mighty midget Israel, which is the region's creative powerhouse in every cultural and technological domain, as well as, by necessity, its dominant military power. Most significantly that includes the Saudis, whom Iran's Ayatollahs have declared their sworn enemies.
In his platform speech, [the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin] al-Husseini responded by stating that Germany "understood the Jews perfectly and decided to find a final solution to the Jewish menace," and... "Allah has determined that there never will be a stable arrangement for the Jews, and that no state should be established for them."
Thus, in anti-Semitic ideology... the inconvenient history which can be traced in evidence from the SS liquidation task forces -- the Einsatzgruppen -- to Hamas, is detailed, documented and direct.
Adolf Hitler meets with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, on November 28, 1941. (Image source: German Federal Archive)
Death, torture, abduction, ending an era in Israel that began in 1948, came literally on the wings of that morning, 7 October, 2023. The hopes and ambitions for peace springing from Camp David and the Oslo Accords, all the rational faith in diplomacy through the quadrilles of the chanceries, were set back to nothing. That realisation is seeping across the traumatised populace of Israel. Nothing can ever be the same again.
The phone videos show smiling young people at, ironically, a Supernova music festival close to the Gaza border, swaying to music in the desert dawn as specks in the sky grow larger. They materialise as the first wave of the attack, the terrorists with automatic rifles, in motorized para-gliders, who start to kill from the sky, soon followed, through defences breached by bulldozers, by ground assault teams on motorcycles and in light trucks. They, in turn, were followed by thousands of men who would murder, rape, torture, burn babes alive, mutilate and kidnap hostages like Noa Argamani, seized and filmed pleading for her life on the back of a motorbike driven away by a burly Gazan.
There is no secret about the regional history, but it is tangled and too often treated as inconvenient. Customary international law and written League of Nations texts subsequently incorporated by the United Nations, hold that Israel, since its re-establishment, has the agreed right to "defensible borders" and an Article 51 UN Charter sovereign right of self-defence. The only point under endless contestation is where those borders should run.
The inter-war litany of letters, conferences, mandates and commissions of inquiry is as familiar as it is convoluted: McMahon-Hussein; Sykes-Picot; San Remo, the Balfour Declaration, the June 1922 White Paper reversed in the July 1922 League of Nations Mandate to Britain, which incorporated the Balfour Declaration, Article 2 instructing the mandate power to bring Balfour's main object of permitting the re-creation of the Jewish homeland in Palestine into effect. Then came a further about-face with the Passfield White Paper of October 1930. Next the Arab Revolt of 1936 brought the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, to the fore as chairman of the Arab Higher Committee – his only formal role but not his only role in Middle East history: in his lifetime he never had any substantive claim to speak for all Arabs.
The 1936 Arab Revolt was ignited by followers of Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, a Jew-hating Syrian preacher, like-minded with al-Husseini, whom the British had killed in November 1935. The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades of Hamas -- presently led Mohammed Deif, who is listed as a "specially designated global terrorist" by America -- are named after him. Another about-face, in reaction to the Revolt, came with the Peel Commission of 1937, which deemed the Mandate impossible to maintain and therefore partition essential, but on terms aligned to Balfour. It indicated the need for expelling Arabs from Jewish lands.
Another Arab revolt, intensified, was examined by the Woodhead Commission, which once more reversed British support for a Jewish homeland. The principles of that pro-Arab switch -- inscribed in the May 1939 White Paper and during the Second World War -- brought armed Zionists into violent conflict with the British. As authorities for the British Mandate in charge of the area at the time, they strove to prevent Jewish refugees escaping the Holocaust from reaching or settling in what was then called Palestine.
Meanwhile, contrarywise, the Palestine Jewish Brigade fought with the Allies against the Nazis. In this manner, crabwise, by agonized degrees, the region reached the end of the British Mandate and the re-establishment in 1948 of the State of Israel, born in war and, through a sequence of existential wars -- 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973 -- plus many continuous lower-level operations, to today's "Operation Swords of Iron" in Gaza.
It is no secret that Tehran pulls the strings of its puppets Hamas, Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and the Yemenite Houthis, as demonstrated by the role and death of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps senior adviser General Seyed Razi Mousavi in a pinpoint IAF airstrike in a Damascus suburb on 25 December 2023. It is also no secret that Arabs are present within the former British Mandate areas because in 1948 their leaders and spokesmen, including the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, rejected the solution of a two-state partition that the newly-minted "United Nations" offered and which Ben Gurion had been willing to accept, imperfect as it was in terms of both patrimonial claims and defensibility.
It is important to remember that these are thrice legitimate Jewish lands: once from original patrimony; once by international mandate and the third time by force of arms after successfully countering assaults in 1948, 1967 and 1973. Anti-Semitic exceptionalism, however, means that only the Jewish state is not allowed to enjoy the peace of victory that winning wars brings to other nations.
Hajj Amin al-Husseini rejected this "two-state solution" in 1947. He preferred to call for "...the destruction of the Jewish element residing in the Arab sphere under the protection of British power" (not his words but Hitler's) to which disobligingly, by force of arms, the Israelis declined to agree. In consequence, for four generations, those Arabs whose chance for a flourishing future the Mufti and his colleagues betrayed, have since been trapped in the grim limbo of the deliberately maintained pressure-cooker camps of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). In UNRWA schools in Gaza, they are taught the Muslim Brotherhood credo to prefer death by martyrdom over life.
Graduates of those schools most likely include those who committed the 7 October attacks. The BBC has used UNRWA voices -- preferably, it seems, antipodean ones -- as purportedly objective third-party commentators. That is deeply irresponsible journalism, and the BBC most likely knows why that is so. Sadly, UNRWA is deeply, perhaps irremediably, prejudiced.
There is also no secret that many regional states have grown tired of "the Palestinians" -- a name shared with Jews and Christians during the British Mandate for Palestine until 1948 but now appropriated by Arabs alone. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas will no more accept Israel's right to exist than do Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Yahya Sinwar. Not surprisingly, the drafter of the 1964 Palestinian National Covenant, Ahmed Shukairy, first chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), was an aide to the Grand Mufti, as is obvious from its uncompromising fundamentalism. Article 20, for instance, states:
"The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate for Palestine and everything that has been based on them, are deemed null and void. Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood."
Thus, according to the Covenant and echoing the Mufti in 1943, which we shall come to shortly, there is not, and cannot anywhere be a Jewish state in this world. It is what is written: here we are told that Jews in Palestine are incompatible with "true statehood" and the Mufti will tell us that it is Allah's will that Jews shall forever stateless. Eternally, the Wandering Jew. Like a dark angel, the double helix always hovers over the Arab view of this history.
Ever since the Abraham Accords, were adopted on 15 September 2020, many regional states have shown that they would prefer to skirt around the ever-rejectionist "Palestinians" and to normalise relations with the amazing mighty midget Israel, which is the region's creative powerhouse in every cultural and technological domain, as well as, by necessity, its dominant military power. Most significantly that includes the Saudis, whom Iran's Ayatollahs have declared their sworn enemies.
Therefore, if we seek for the proximate geopolitical cause of 7 October we are looking at a salamander deliberately biting its own tail. It was Iran's intention to smash that rapprochement, if possible. It may well not be possible. The Abraham Accords were one of the triumphs of the Trump Administration; and it should not be assumed that they have been obliterated. For evidence, look only at the arrivals and departure boards at Israel's Ben Gurion Airport. As Western airlines since 7/10 have suspended flights to Israel, the same is not true for Etihad from Abu Dhabi or Emirates from Dubai. Note also Saudi restraint, particularly in the Red Sea in respect of US and UK warship action against Houthi missiles and boats, made necessary by epic geopolitical bungling by both Iran and the Biden administration.
It was President Joe Biden's disastrous incompetence in de-listing Ansarallah ("the Houthis") from its proscribed status as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) and as Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGT) on 12 February 2021, presumably as part of an unwise attempt to resurrect former President Barack Obama's misconceived 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear diplomacy with Iran's Ayatollahs, who are a regime with which diplomacy alone cannot be a viable option. The "Iran deal", as it was called, signalled Western fecklessness or -- in the hard eyes of Islamists -- weakness. Biden combined Obama's Iran foolishness with withdrawing armament supplies from Saudi Arabia, which was seeking to suppress the Houthis. He thus drove Saudi towards the Chinese Communist Party for supplies. His Red Sea blunder over the Houthis was a twin to his shambolic withdrawal from Afghanistan which fired the starting gun for Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine, China's revived "interest" in Taiwan, and Iran's increased expansion to create a "Shiite crescent", a process which had never stopped. Re-proscribing the Houthis now, as has just happened, is to shut the stable door long after the horse has bolted.
Hamas, the acronym for Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiya (Islamic Resistance Movement), and Al Qaeda and Islamic State are all the spawn of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Brotherhood was founded in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna, an admirer of Hitler. After al-Banna's assassination in 1949, his successor, the more intellectual and even more remorseless Sayyid Qutb, became the ideologue of the Brotherhood.
Qutb's many works, notably Milestones, described the stark division of the world into the realm of the Muslim righteous and that of unbelief and chaos – jahiliyyah – of the Christians, Jews and other "unbelievers". His doctrine of Salafist jihadism was the well-spring for Al Qaeda, for Islamic State and for the Hamas Charter of 1988 which is uncompromisingly anti-Semitic to its core. Article 7, for example, quotes a Muslim hadith [the acts and sayings of Mohammad]:
"The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him."
As evidence of the fabricated Jewish ambition to occupy all lands from the Nile to the Euphrates, Article 32 cites The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the most notorious (and faked) anti-Semitic libel that emerged from the disintegration of Tsarist Russia.
Yet in all the intertwined and contested origins story, it is the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, who for present purposes, is our leading Person of Interest. Hajj Amin al-Husseini was a friend of al-Banna, a member of the Brotherhood and was, for a period, within its leadership. He was a practical as well as passionate anti-Semite, an unconditional supporter of the Third Reich, and also a boastful self-promoter.
During the war, the Mufti and his entourage lived in Berlin in fine style on an annual budget of 4,993,860 Reichsmarks ($1,997,544 at prevailing exchange rate). His personal Nazi stipend was 802,200 Reichsmarks ($320,000). Only few foreign supporters of the Third Reich were so embraced; and the Nazis made a huge investment in him. Al-Husseini served as a Nazi propagandist. However, Hitler was not naïve about the Mufti's self-promotion as his conduct towards him showed.
The Mufti went to see Hitler on 28 November 1941 to drink lemonade (Hitler disliked coffee in his presence) and to congratulate Hitler on his work in killing Jews. He sought audience to offer material Arab support to the Nazi war effort -- the invasion of the USSR was reaching furthest penetration close to Moscow and the Einsatzgruppen (the genocide liquidation squads) were hard at work. According to an official German record of the meeting, he told Hitler that:
"The Arabs were Germany's natural friends because they had the same enemies as had Germany, namely the English, the Jews and the Communists. Therefore they were prepared to cooperate with Germany with all their hearts and stood ready to participate in the war, not only negatively by the commission of acts of sabotage and the instigation of revolutions, but also positively by the formation of an Arab Legion."
In March 1943, Heinrich Himmler, commander of the SS, together with a group of Muslims, asked that the Mufti might assist in raising a Bosnian Muslim SS Division. It was incorporated into the SS order of battle as the 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Handschar (1st Croatian). But in the winter of 1941 the Mufti's heart's desire was different.
The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, inspects the Bosnian Muslim 13th Waffen Mountain Division of the SS Handschar in November 1943. (Image source: German Federal Archive)
On 28 November, al-Husseini twice requested but did not obtain from Hitler a "counter Balfour" written declaration, even as a secret document. Hitler was wary of him. However, Hitler did state to him verbally, for the record, that once German forces commanded the Middle East theatre, Germany's objective would be "...solely the destruction of the Jewish element residing in the Arab sphere under the protection of British power. In that hour the Mufti would be the most authoritative spokesman for the Arab world."
Yet, this was by no means the end of the matter. Others in the Nazi High Command were more willing to indulge the Mufti and it seems, were considerable enthusiasts for Islam. Most notable among them was Himmler, who regarded Islam as a "manly and soldierly" religion. He wrote that Muslim men would make excellent SS soldiers because Islam "promises them Heaven if they fight and are killed in action." Therefore, on the 26th anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, on 2 November 1943, the Nazis laid on an extravagant, broadcast "protest rally" at the Luftwaffe Hall in Berlin at which al-Husseini was the star and to which representatives from across the Muslim world were invited.
The event is described in detail by the historian Dr. Joel Fishman in "Heinrich Himmler's Telegram"; the most sensational news in his article was that on 29 March 2017, the National Library of Israel had discovered the original of the telegram which Himmler sent to the Grand Mufti for his rally: a text which al-Husseini had read out (as has long been known).
The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, meets with Heinrich Himmler, commander of the SS, in 1943. (Image source: German Federal Archive)
It was the "anti-Balfour" document that al-Husseini had long craved. In it, Himmler applauded "the firm foundation of the natural alliance between National-Socialist Greater Germany and the freedom-loving Muslims of the whole world" and "followed with special sympathy the struggle of the freedom-loving Arabs, foremost in Palestine, against the Jewish intruders." He commiserated on the anniversary of the "wretched Balfour declaration" and extended "heartfelt greetings and wishes for the successful pursuit of your struggle." The Grand Mufti could hardly have asked for more.
In his platform speech, al-Husseini responded by stating that Germany "understood the Jews perfectly and decided to find a final solution to the Jewish menace, which will contain their mischief in the world..." and, in another incendiary passage that still burns down the years, claimed that "Allah has determined that there never will be a stable arrangement for the Jews, and that no state should be established for them." This, according to Fishman, is the moment of fusion between religion and politics that created Islamism.
Thus, in anti-Semitic ideology, in the genocidal anti-Semitic mission and in studied and consistent inhumanity, the inconvenient history which can be traced in evidence from the SS liquidation task forces -- the Einsatzgruppen -- to Hamas, is detailed, documented and direct.
*Gwythian Prins is Research Professor Emeritus at the London School of Economics and a past member of the British Chief of the Defence Staff's Strategy Advisory Panel.
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Question: “Should a Christian attend a gay wedding?”
GotQuestions.org?/January 26/2024
Answer: First, a word of encouragement: if you are the kind of friend that a gay couple would invite to their wedding, then you are probably doing something right. When Jesus ministered, those who were despised by society, the tax collectors and the sinners, drew near to Him (Matthew 9:10; Luke 15:1). He was a friend to them.
Further, no one sin is greater than another. All sin is offensive to God. Homosexuality is just one of many sins listed in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 that will keep a person from the kingdom of God. We all sin and fall short of God’s glory (Romans 3:23). It is only through Jesus Christ that we may be saved from sin’s eternal consequences. (Please see What does it mean that Jesus saves?)
Some would contend that a Christian should have no qualms about attending a gay wedding and that one’s presence at a gay wedding does not necessarily indicate support for the homosexual lifestyle. Rather, they view it as extending Christ’s love toward a friend. The thought is that one’s presence at a wedding ceremony is an act of love and friendship toward the person—not toward the lifestyle or spiritual choices. We do not hesitate to support friends and loved ones who struggle with other sins. Showing support and unconditional love could open doors of opportunity in the future.
The problem is that a gay wedding is a celebration of two people who are living a lifestyle that God declares to be immoral and unnatural (Romans 1:26-27). “Marriage should be honored by all” (Hebrews 13:4), but a gay wedding dishonors marriage by perverting its meaning. Unlike weddings of those in other faiths, a gay wedding does not qualify as a marriage, according to what God declares marriage to be. A marriage between a non-Christian man and non-Christian woman is still a marriage in God’s eyes. It is still a fulfillment of the “one flesh” relationship that God intends (Genesis 2:24). Even a marriage between a believer and an unbeliever is a valid marriage (1 Corinthians 7:14), even though God commands believers to avoid such marriages (2 Corinthians 6:14).
A gay union is not a marriage in God’s eyes. God ordained marriage to be between a man and a woman for a lifetime; to take that holy and blessed union and link it to something God declares to be unholy is unconscionable. How can we ask God’s blessing on a union that He declares to be unnatural?
Suppose a Christian could attend a gay wedding and somehow communicate clearly that he is supporting only the individuals getting married and not their lifestyle. The individuals he is supporting are still holding an event which celebrates their immorality. There is no way around the fact that a gay wedding ceremony is a celebration of sin. We support an alcoholic friend by helping him refrain from drinking, not by going to a bar with him. We support a friend addicted to pornography by making him accountable and getting him help, not enabling him to hide his addiction. In the same way, we support a homosexual friend by helping her out of the lifestyle, not by signing a guest book at a celebration of homosexuality. We do not truly help our friends by attending an event where their sin is applauded.
It is admirable to show love to a friend. It is good to seek opportunities to witness to and show kindness and love to our gay friends. However, such motivations are misguided when it comes to attending a gay wedding. It is never our goal to drive our friends away from Christ, but Christians have a responsibility to stand up for righteousness, even if it results in pain, division, or hatred (Luke 12:51-53; John 15:18). If invited to a gay wedding, it is our conviction that a believer in Jesus Christ should respectfully decline and find other ways to express love, respect, and care.

Turkiye, Iran manage tensions during Raisi’s visit
Sinem Cengiz/Arab News/January 26, 2024
After twice delaying his visit to Turkiye due to the rapid escalation of conflict in the Middle East, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Wednesday arrived in Ankara, where he was received by his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan. In his first official trip to Iran’s neighbor since his election in 2021, Raisi headed a large delegation that included the country’s foreign, energy and interior ministers.
The visit saw a number of deals inked between the two sides, along with a four-hour meeting between Erdogan and Raisi on topics of mutual concern and also divergence. Relations between Turkiye and Iran have always been complex and multidimensional.
The primary concerns that the two countries are currently addressing revolve around the Gaza war. The press conference between Erdogan and Raisi predominantly centered on this conflict, showcasing distinct approaches. While Raisi’s tone was harsh, Erdogan maintained a measured tone. The latter coincides with the ongoing improvement in Turkish-American relations, as marked by this week’s approval by Ankara of Sweden’s entry into NATO.
In regard to the Gaza war, the two leaders want to contain the ongoing escalation; however, there are differences in their approach. Iran expects Turkiye to impose a trade embargo and halt commercial relations with Israel. During a recent meeting of the Turkish and Iranian foreign ministers, this topic was also raised by the Iranian side, but the Turkish side avoided using definitive statements.
Turkish-Israeli trade relations have not seen a change since Oct. 7. Even during the decades-long tension between the two countries, trade did not halt between Ankara and Tel Aviv. This is because, as it does with Iran, Turkiye compartmentalizes its relations with Israel. They see eye to eye on the Mediterranean and the Caucasus, while clashing when it comes to the Palestinian cause.
Over the past two decades, Turkiye and Iran have jockeyed for the leadership of the Palestinian cause. But in the latest Gaza war, both have taken a stance that does not overshadow the efforts of the other. Even if Raisi raised the topic of a trade embargo at the leadership level, this is unlikely to produce a sea change in Turkiye’s policy.
Even if Raisi raised the topic of a trade embargo on Israel, this is unlikely to produce a sea change in Turkiye’s policy
On the other side, Iran aims to strengthen its trade ties with Turkiye. Tehran considers Ankara as its major economic partner in the face of the economic sanctions it faces from the West. Ten new agreements covering the fields of energy, tourism and trade were signed during Raisi’s trip.
Apart from the shared objective of enhancing their trade connections, Iran serves as one of the primary suppliers of energy to Turkiye. These agreements and commitments at the leadership level are significant in overshadowing some of the troublesome bilateral issues they face by focusing on economic gains.
There is also an expectation that a new border gate will be opened between the two countries in Turkiye’s Van province. During Raisi’s visit, a meeting on border security was held in Van by the relevant authorities from the two sides.
In addition to the Gaza war, Iraq, Syria and the Caucasus are the main topics of divergence in Turkish-Iranian relations. Last week, Iran launched missile and drone strikes into both Iraq and Syria. Turkiye has maintained a cautious stance regarding these attacks; nonetheless, it is likely they will have unsettled Ankara. Iran views Turkiye’s influence in Iraq — whether through its military deployments or the relationship it has with the Kurdistan Regional Government — as a potential challenge to its own strategies there. Turkiye’s spy chief held a critical visit to Iraq a day before Raisi arrived in Ankara. It is significant to note this visit within the overall developments. The Turkish government has, in recent years, sought to deepen its influence in northern Syria and Iraq, where its policies are at odds with those of Iran. Tehran’s attack on Idlib, where Turkiye is an influential actor, was an expected but at the same time disturbing action.The Caucasus is one of the least-mentioned but also most important areas of competition between the two
Iran and Turkiye have assumed opposing stances in Syria since the beginning. In 2017, the two countries, along with Russia, managed to establish the Astana peace process in an effort to resolve the conflict. However, in reality, this format has only served to prevent conflict between Iran, Russia and Turkiye, while also dividing their spheres of influ­ence. While Raisi was on his trip to Ankara, the deputy foreign ministers of Iran, Turkiye and Russia held their 21st round of talks in the Astana process in Kazakhstan.
The Caucasus is one of the least-mentioned but also most important areas of competition between Tehran and Ankara. While these two regional powers have traditionally managed to balance their interests, their rivalry has started to take a prominent shape in the last few years. As a consequence of the Nagorno-Karabakh war of 2020, which ended with a victory for Azerbaijan over Armenia thanks to Turkish and Israeli support, Iran’s influence in the region has started to fade and Ankara’s footprint has been consolidated.
The prospect of a “less Iran, more Turkiye” dynamic heightens Tehran’s apprehensions toward Ankara. Iran fears a weak Armenia seeking rapprochement with Turkiye and an empowered Azerbaijan cultivating closer ties with Israel, while Ankara aims to shape the developments in the region in its favor.
Despite this ongoing rivalry on different fronts, the dynamics of Turkish-Iranian relations fluctuate between a managed rivalry and restricted cooperation. In other words, the compartmentalization of different issues has been the primary driver of the relationship between Tehran and Ankara. This practice is likely to persist as a guiding principle in the future.• Sinem Cengiz is a Turkish political analyst who specializes in Turkiye’s relations with the Middle East. X: @SinemCngz

Macron’s rightward shift is not without its risks
Zaid M. Belbagi/Arab News/January 26, 2024
Having chosen to focus on foreign policy since the beginning of his beleaguered second term, French President Emmanuel Macron has become increasingly beholden to right-wing sentiment due to his failure to win a parliamentary majority. The centrism and pan-Europeanism of his initial term has been sidelined, with his government now pandering ever more to the right-wing sentiment that made itself so evident during the 2022 election. Following a Cabinet reshuffle this month, this trend has now reflected itself in the makeup of the government itself.
Ahead of the 2022 presidential election, Macron rebranded his La Republique en Marche party as Renaissance in an effort to reclaim the political center. This was also in the hope of diverting voters away from the right-wing momentum of Marine Le Pen’s Nationally Rally and Eric Zemmour’s Reconquest, as well as the emerging threat of France Unbowed, the left-wing coalition led by Jean-Luc Melenchon.
Though Macron won the presidential election, the electoral challenges were sufficient that his party did not gain a majority in parliament and therefore Renaissance formed the “Together” coalition with other liberal and centrist parties, such as the Democratic Movement and Horizons, in order to form a government. Though Renaissance is a centrist, liberal and pro-European party, recent months have indicated a shift toward right-wing policies in a bid to court younger and more euroskeptic voters.
Recent months have indicated a shift toward right-wing policies in a bid to court younger and more euroskeptic voters
The new French Cabinet has eight male and seven female members, with nearly half of them having connections with right-wing political parties. This is an unprecedented level of right-wing influence, marking a clear shift. Those with links to the right include Labor Minister Catherine Vautrin, Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu and Equality Minister Aurore Berge. The strong representation of rightist and center-right candidates in Macron’s reshuffled Cabinet has drawn attention from critics and supporters alike.
However, the appointment of Gabriel Attal as France’s youngest prime minister has been met with the most hesitation and criticism. Though ostensibly belonging to the centrist Renaissance party, a large part of Attal’s popularity as a public official is tied to several controversial decisions he made as education minister last year, including banning the abaya in public schools. Despite, or perhaps owing to, his Tunisian heritage, Attal has been keen to pursue xenophobic policies.
At the age of just 34, critics have pointed at his relative lack of experience, noting that his selection as prime minister was likely due to his popularity among right-wing voters. With polls consistently having shown young French voters to be more euroskeptic and nationalistic than their older counterparts, Attal’s appointment has been perceived as an effort to appease the younger electorate and limit the support for the far-right. Having selected a populist for the post of PM, as opposed to the more typical French selection of a technocrat, the trajectory of Macron’s remaining time in office is clear.
The reshuffle was followed by protests this week against a highly controversial immigration control bill that was passed by parliament last month but has not yet been signed into law by the president. Seeking to counter and control immigration to France, as well as reduce the benefits and protections available to existing immigrants, the bill has caused huge political divisions.
By calling for ‘civic rearmament,’ Macron is appealing to the right and risks alienating vast swaths of the country
In restricting immigrants’ ability to bring their families to France, limiting the access of non-EU nationals and unemployed foreigners to state welfare and removing automatic French citizenship for children born on French soil to non-French parents, the revised bill was only eventually passed with the support of National Rally. It caused great tension within the coalition, with Health Minister Aurelien Rousseau resigning in protest.
This sentiment indicates that right-wing and far-right parties will do well in the upcoming European Parliament elections. Taking place in June, the elections come amid a rightward political shift in the Netherlands, Hungary, Poland, Germany and Italy. Given France’s role within the union, the increased euroskepticism of the French electorate and the right-wing nature of the new Cabinet is of concern.
There is no doubt that Macron’s adoption of right-wing rhetoric and policies is an effort to court the right, while simultaneously empowering the center-right, so as to split Le Pen’s vote. Macron has defeated the National Rally leader twice, in the 2017 and 2022 presidential elections, but he cannot run again. Nevertheless, recent polling data shows that National Rally is ahead of Renaissance by 8 points. So, it may be that Macron is seeking to attract her voters, which will have the overall effect of moving the French political system further to the right.
Macron’s shift is therefore an appeal to the supporters of traditionally right-wing parties to lend support to Renaissance, a party that he is attempting to portray as the most appropriate reflection of the country and the politics of its coalition partners. By calling for “civic rearmament,” stronger law and order mechanisms and for “France to stay France,” Macron is appealing to the right and risks alienating vast swaths of the country. By playing on traditionally right-wing narratives concerning the dilution of French culture due to the growing multiculturalism of society, Macron may limit Le Pen’s gains in the European Parliament elections and prevent a National Rally-led government in 2027. However, he is also highly likely to alienate his centrist and center-left supporters, who have contributed to the president’s two electoral victories, while also making France an altogether more intolerant place.
• Zaid M. Belbagi is a political commentator and an adviser to private clients between London and the GCC. X: @Moulay_Zaid

No surprises in Saudi desire for two-state solution
Rabbi Marc Schneier/Arab News/January 26, 2024
On Sept. 22, 2023, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stood triumphantly at the podium of the UN General Assembly and proclaimed to the world, including those so-called pundits who doubted his peacemaking ability and acumen, that the Abraham Accords, signed by Israel with the UAE, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan in 2020, had “heralded the dawn of a new age of peace.” Then he asserted boldly: “But I believe we are at the cusp of an even more dramatic breakthrough: an historic peace between Israel and Saudi Arabia.”
In recent weeks, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE have been telling both Israel and the Biden administration that they are prepared, with the support of Egypt and Jordan, to offer massive aid for the reconstruction of Gaza, but only on the condition that the Israeli government works toward Palestinian statehood. In remarks at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland, last week, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan stated: “Peace and security for Israel is intimately linked with Palestinians’ peace and security. We are fully on board with that.”And in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria that was broadcast on Sunday, Prince Faisal emphasized that creating a Palestinian state alongside Israel is “the only way we’re going to get the benefit. We need stability and only stability will come through resolving the Palestinian issue.”
Netanyahu’s reaction has caused confusion and potentially the collapse of this vital diplomatic initiative
However, Netanyahu’s reaction to the Saudi declaration has caused confusion and potentially the collapse of this vital diplomatic initiative, which is so badly needed at this critical juncture. Some details of the Saudi initiative may be new, but the underlying premise is clearly not. Saudi officials have been consistent for more than a decade when discussing normalization with Israel alongside the creation of a Palestinian state.
When I privately met with Defense Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman and Prince Faisal in Riyadh in 2020, they both explicitly stated the position of the Kingdom. They said the country was calling for the emergence of a Middle East that included a future Palestinian state and Israel living side by side in peace and security. In fact, this offer has been extended by Saudi Arabia since the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative.
So, why is Netanyahu acting surprised by the offer to spearhead the reconstruction of Gaza in exchange for a two-state solution? Why is the Israeli PM now reacting as if the Saudi position on the Palestinian state is breaking news? How else could Netanyahu proclaim to the world from the UN stage that we are on the cusp of the ultimate prize — normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia — without admitting to himself that the creation of a Palestinian state would be the condition for that grand prize? The Kingdom’s position on normalization has not changed, even in the midst of the current crisis in Gaza
No one can argue that the Saudi position, as reiterated by the minister of foreign affairs and reemphasized by the Biden administration, presents any element of surprise. The Kingdom has, time and time again, expressed a hope and desire for normalization with Israel in exchange for a Palestinian state. Its position on the pathway for normalization has not changed, even in the midst of the current crisis in Gaza. Mr. Prime Minister, let us embrace this historic opportunity.
We must recognize Saudi Arabia’s framework for its consistency and authenticity as an expression of the Kingdom’s aspiration for a transformative Middle East of peace, prosperity and coexistence.
• Rabbi Marc Schneier is president of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding and a noted adviser to many Gulf states.

Israel Endangers Jews
Sawsan al-Abtah/Asharq Al-Awsat/January 26, 2024
"As a Jew, I believe that Israel now puts my life in danger because it incites hatred against me and fuels anti-Semitism worldwide," Rony Brauman tells us. He comes from a long line of Zionists, and he was shaken by the suffering of the Palestinians, so much so that he suddenly realized that the narratives he had believed in were a lie. Since the attack of October 7, Brauman believes that "the Zionist project, which had originally been meant to protect Jews, has totally failed" and backfired.
The former president of Doctors Without Borders was born to Zionist parents. Brauman’s father fought in World War II and became a military instructor in France, training Jews who had fled Central Europe before sending them to fight and expel the Palestinians. The year of the Nakba, his father came to Palestine to fight for the establishment of the state of Israel. Rony Brauman was born in Jerusalem, and he grew up believing in the discourse that the existence of a Palestinian people was just an empty slogan. The Arabs, he believed, have 22 countries and vast territory, and relocating a few people from one area to another that is nearby was a terrible thing to do. It was only after the First Intifada of 1987, when Brauman saw young children throwing stones at Israeli soldiers in their insurgency, and dying for Palestine, that he believed that this nation did indeed exist and had rights in this land.
“The blindfold was suddenly torn off"... Brauman, who returned to France with his family at the age of five and gravitated towards liberation movements, joined protests in support of Vietnam before becoming a doctor because of his desire to serve humanity. Nonetheless, Palestine was not something he thought about. It did not trouble him in the slightest, until his late twenties. His father had raised him to believe that victors ultimately impose their narrative and vocabulary. Israel triumphed in 1948 and 1967, enhancing its standing and allowing it to impose its narrative. He stopped questioning it, so much so that he traveled to the ends of the Earth for work but never thought of visiting his place of birth.
Brauman is not among those who disavowed Zionism recently. However, he presents an ideal case for understanding how the massacres in Gaza have changed how Jewish people around the world see Israel, especially young people. Indeed, many Jewish youths are saying that they have woken up to truths that had been hidden from them, and their number grows after every major juncture.
One trend has begun emerging in recent years in parallel with the rapid rise of the Israeli far-right and its shocking rhetoric. Sylvain Cypel, an experienced expert in Israeli society who has worked for "Courrier International" and then "Le Monde," is part of this wave. His book "The State of Israel Against the Jews" seemed provocative when it was published two years ago. It levels harsh accusations against Israel, and Sylvain Cypel believes there are now two Judaisms: the Judaism of Israel and its supporters across the globe, who are influential and powerful, and the second is an “evil” Judaism that includes anyone who directs the slightest criticism of successive Israeli governments, their racism, and colonialism.
Thus, the Palestinians and every Jew who deviates from the official narrative are subjected to violence and repressed, as French-Israeli sociologist Eva Illouz tells us.
For forty years, Israel has been governed by an alliance of the Likud and racist far-right-wing parties. "In the face of this (criminal) and (suicidal) evolution of Israeli society, critical thinking seems paralyzed." And "Those in power exploit the memory of the Holocaust to terrorize critics." The Jewish writer Sylvain Cypel complains of a legal arsenal established to this end, whereby associations calling for the expulsion of Palestinians are supported and in countries allied with Israel, boycotts are banned, even if those boycotting are Jews. Human rights organizations are made to register as "foreign agents" if their funding does come from within Israel. Moreover, the Knesset has passed a "cultural loyalty" bill to prevent artists from criticizing the state. "It is also working on another bill that guarantees immunity for any soldier or member of the Israeli special services suspected of committing a crime on duty". The author of the book considers this a "license to hunt and kill Palestinians."
Let's not forget the Nation-State Law, which grants every Jew the right to reside in Israel and recognizes it as their land- a right denied to the Palestinian residents of the country. Thus, apartheid has become an undeniable legal reality.
The increasing influence of fanatics and the certainty that the future will be worse, have driven thousands of Israelis to migrate and terrorized some of the Jews residing abroad, who are aware of the danger that the actions of a government thousands of miles away, which is seen as to represent in the in world’s eyes, puts them in. In the United States, nearly half of young Jewish voters feel that Biden’s support for Israel is excessive, according to a survey conducted a few days ago, but this sentiment is not necessarily shared by their elders.
More importantly, American Jews are extremely concerned about anti-Semitism. 96 percent of them agree that it is a serious problem in the United States. Youths are as worried about the spread of Islamophobia in their country as are of anti-Semitism, indicating that their aversion encompasses all forms of racism.
An overwhelming majority, 91 percent of American Jews, refuse to be silenced and banned from criticizing Israel. That reminds us of Sylvain Cypel's claim that "the American Jewish community is freeing itself from the Jewish state and paving the way for other possibilities." Sylvain, also agrees with Brauman’s assessment "that Zionism is undeniably failing."
"It has given rise to a totally abhorrent apartheid regime, based on the lie that is systematically pushed by the state, and it is backfiring on Israel and the Jewish people."

Iran-Pakistan: The Beautiful Vase Has Been Chipped
Sawsan al-Abtah/Asharq Al-Awsat/January 26, 2024
If you had asked me just a couple of weeks ago I might have assured you that Pakistan is the last county with which the Islamic Republic in Tehran would pick a fight. I might have cited many reasons for that opinion.
First, A recent demise of the classical reasons for antagonism between nation-states.Their border, almost 1,000 kilometers long, was fully demarcated in 1964, ending ambiguities left behind by the British when they withdrew from the subcontinent in 1947. Relations were never marred by irredentist pressures on either side. Nor did Iran and Pakistan compete over access to natural resources, including water, or competition over markets.
History, too, designated Iran and Pakistan as natural friends. Iran had been a source of inspiration for two generations of Muslims in the subcontinent who dreamt of a separate homeland. Many of them even adopted surnames that indicated an Iranian rather than Indian origin: Gailani, Isfahani, Shirazi etc.
The great poet Muhammad Iqbal, who wrote in Persian, propagated the idea of a new Muslim state alongside Iran. His ode “To the Persian Youth” is now a classic of Persian literature, a love letter from a man who never actually visited Iran.
During the independence struggle, the Persian phrase “Pakistan zinda baad!” became the war cry of millions from Baluchistan to East Bengal.
The founding fathers of the new Muslim state chose the Persian word Pakistan (Land of The Pure) to name the nascent state whose national anthem was also written in Persian. Not surprisingly, Iran was the first country to recognize the new state and set up a vast embassy in its first capital Karachi. There were also numerous intermarriages, including by President Iskandar Mirza and, later, Prime Minister Zulfiqar Al-Bhutto.
Tight links between the two neighbors was formalized when, along with Turkey, they created the Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) and, later, the Regional Cooperation for Development (RCD). Joint top brass meetings and frequent diplomatic exchanges helped bring the two closer in all domains.
In the 1965 war between India and Pakistan, over the Ran-e-Kutch (Thigh of the Bellwether) marshlands, Iran helped the latter to victory by supplying non-lethal military equipment as well as cut-price oil and interest free loans. That helped Field Marshal Muhammad Ayub Khan to pose as a war hero and forge a dictatorial system with Tehran’s constant support.
A year later, the Shah of Iran played peacemaker by preventing a war between Afghanistan and Pakistan over the Northwest Frontier Province where ethnic Pashtuns formed a majority of the population.
In 1971 anther military dictator General Muhammad Yahya Khan led Pakistan into a much bigger war with India that led to the secession of East Pakistan (renamed Bangladesh). Despite massive Iranian support the Pakistani army had suffered a major defeat, one that tempted India to prepare for further operations that could have rendered Pakistan unsustainable as a functioning nation-state.
There, too, intervention by Iran, along with the USSR and the US, helped restrain Indian ambitions and prevented a larger conflagration.
In a stern message to New Delhi, the Shah said: "Iran has no aggressive intentions, but it will not accept any attempt to liquidate Pakistan. The USSR and India must be fully aware of our resolution.... We do not want a new Vietnam on the frontier of Iran."The statement shocked India that had rich historical links with Iran and was engaged in massive industrial and trade projects with Tehran. With the conflict ended, Iran granted Pakistan a $600 billion low-interest loan to help the war-shaken nation regain its bearings. With General Zia ul-Haq’s military coup in Islamabad and later the fall of the Shah in Tehran the loan was never fully paid.
The mullahs who seized power in Tehran in 1979 continued close ties with Pakistan in the hope of launching a massive conversion campaign in the world’s 3rd most populous Muslim nation. In 1980 once the US had cut diplomatic ties with the Islamic Republic in Tehran, the mullahs chose Pakistan to represent Iranian interests in Washington. The decade-long Soviet intervention in Afghanistan also provided a measure of diplomatic convergence between the two. That was reaffirmed when both Tehran and Islamabad gradually moved towards closer ties with Beijing.
Over the years Pakistan, through the “father” of its own atomic bomb Abduul-Qadir Khan, also helped Iran develop its nuclear capacity close to what is known as the threshold level, that is to say having the scientific and technological ability to produce a nuclear warhead. Iran repaid that favor by supplying Pakistan with cut-price oil and gas. Nevertheless, bilateral relations remained bogged by an attraction-revulsion accent. Islamabad and Tehran never quite trusted each other. Tehran continued financing militant Shiite groups in Pakistan while Islamabad refused to allow Iran to open a branch of the Imam Khomeini University in Karachi.
We now know that both sides also tolerated the presence of dissident ethnic Baluch groups on their soil. In 2022, Tehran claimed that some 80 anti-Iran armed groups were based in Pakistani territory. Those groups had allegedly been responsible for dozens of attacks claiming over 300 victims among the Iranian military notably one of the rising stars of the Revolutionary Guard General Nur-Ali Shushtari.
It was on such grounds that Tehran ordered direct military action against targets deep inside Pakistani territory forcing Islamabad to retaliate to avoid losing face.
Last week, Pakistan claimed that the three villages it had bombed in southeast Iran, killing 11 people, sheltered secessionist Baluch groups.
Despite attempts by both sides to pretend that the recent clashes were a passing storm, it is clear that something deeper and more lasting may be involved.
Tehran is sore that China decided to locate the trade-cum-security hub it wants to build in the Indian Ocean in the Pakistani port of Gawadar on the Arabian Sea rather than in the Iranian port of Gavatar a few kilometers to its west.
Tehran fears that China’s choice indicates Beijing’s lack of confidence in Iran’s stability once the “Supreme Guide” Ali Khamenei bows off stage while Pakistan would retain a measure of stability because its system does not depend on a single leader. Both Tehran and Islamabad are anxious to patch things up as quickly as possible. But one thing is clear: the beautiful vase filled with flowers has been chipped.