LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN

August 25/16

Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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http://www.eliasbejjaninews.com/newsbulletin16/english.august25.16.htm

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Bible Quotations For Today

The days are coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it. They will say to you
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 17/20-25/:"Once Jesus was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God was coming, and he answered, ‘The kingdom of God is not coming with things that can be observed; nor will they say, "Look, here it is!" or "There it is!" For, in fact, the kingdom of God is among you.’Then he said to the disciples, ‘The days are coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it. They will say to you, "Look there!" or "Look here!" Do not go, do not set off in pursuit. For as the lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of Man be in his day. But first he must endure much suffering and be rejected by this generation."

Be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.
Letter of James 01/19-27/:"You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls. But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act they will be blessed in their doing. If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.'
 

Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on August 24-25/16
'Al-Ahram' Columnist: Despite Al-Sisi's Call For Revolution In Religious Discourse, Al-Azhar Scholars Continue On Their Extremist Path/MEMRI/August 24/16/
Dr. Ahmed al-Tayeb: Meet the World’s “Most Influential Muslim”/Raymond Ibrahim /FrontPage Magazine/August 24/16
France: The Religious War Few Wish to Face/George Igler/Gatestone Institute/August 24/16
Why There Can Be No "Demilitarized" Palestinian State/Louis René Beres/Gatestone Institute/August 24/16
Omran Daqneesh will soon be forgotten/Diana Moukalled/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
France’s tough act on Muslims is causing divides not fighting terror/Peter Harrison/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
Egypt’s false stability claim/Mohammed Nosseir/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
Turkish-Russian-Iranian nexus poses a threat/Khalaf Ahmad Al Habtoor/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
In Borno State Nigeria, people need a fighting chance/Mohamed Bali/Al Arabiya/August 24/16

Titles For Latest Lebanese Related News published on August 24-25/16
Bkirki Warns against 'Marginalizing' Christians in Cabinet
Berri: Country Can't Bear Postponement, Laxity Affects Civil Servants Wages
Salam 'Won't Postpone' Thursday's Cabinet Session despite FPM Boycott
Salam Vows to Continue Shouldering His 'National Responsibility'
Trash Collection Crisis Looms as Sukleen Says Municipality Blocking Access to Bourj Hammoud Site
Hizbullah Urges Postponing Cabinet Session as 'Consultative Gathering' Rejects 'Paralyzing Govt.'
Murder Charge for U.S. Man in Slaying of Lebanese Neighbor
Garces meets Lebanese officials, participates in meeting by Beirut Municipality
Salam, Moqbel tackle latest developments
Machnouk meets with delegation of traders, Makari
Palestinian factions agree to withdraw gunmen in Ain el Hilwe
Hariri visits Turkey tomorrow, meets Erdogan
Justice Minister sends letter to Judge Hammoud to investigate Houmat Diyar's alleged intention to form armed organization
Abou Faour receives Richard, Girard

Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin For Miscellaneous Reports And News published on August 24-25/16

Canadian study finds “extremism” common in mosque literature
“Extremist literature common in many mosques and Islamic school libraries in Canada, study says”,
At least 120 killed in deadly central Italy quake
Powerful 6.8 magnitude quake hits Myanmar
Bomb blasts kill one, wound 30 in southern Thailand
Archbishop Of Kirkuk Fr. Yousif Toma: Cancer Of ISIS Must Be Removed Before We Can Talk About Return Of Christians
Kerry in Saudi on Yemen Peace Push
Russia Says 'Deeply Concerned' at Turkish Operation in Syria
Germany Backs Turkey's Drive against IS and Kurds
U.S. Urges Americans to Leave Gaza 'as Soon as Possible'
Iraq forces advance in town south of Mosul
Kurds could ‘lose US support if they don’t retreat,’ says Biden
Egyptian ‘guilty of treason’ for leaking classified Saudi document to Iran
Attacker killed after stabbing guard at Coptic church in Egypt
Egypt’s Sisi may run for re-election
American University in Afghan capital attacked
Turkish authorities fire more than 2,800 judges, prosecutors
Saudi foils fresh attack on a restaurant
Clinton leads Trump by 12 points in latest Reuters/Ipsos poll
Philippines’ Duterte: UN pull-out threat a ‘joke’
Maryam Rajavi: The Movement to Obtain Justice for the Victims of the 1988 Massacre is Part of the National Movement for Iran's Freedom
Thirty per cent of Iran’s population are suffering from poverty and hunger ...”
Iran regime arrests 40 boys and girls for attending mixed-gender party
International Day of the Disappeared: Indifference to a humanitarian tragedy
"30,000 Souls Taken" exhibition in Paris highlights young victims of 1988 PMOI massacre in Iran
Iran: Atena Farghadani congratulated Rouhani’s achievements! including high number of executions on the occasion of “Week of Government.”
To combat widespread unrest, Iran's Revolutionary Guard Targets 450 Social Media Users
French Muslim body to meet with government on burkini

Links From Jihad Watch Site for on August 24-25/16
Canadian study finds “extremism” common in mosque literature
Muslims are the biggest threat to Muslims, contrary to Obama and Islamophobia narrative
Muslim cleric from terror sponsor Iran praises Pope for saying Islam is peaceful
Iran expanding jihad terror network in Latin America
Robert Spencer in FrontPage: The Child Soldiers of Jihad
Trump’s Sharia Test Proposal — on The Glazov Gang
Australia: Muslim screaming “Allahu akbar” stabs British woman, authorities search for motive
New study finally acknowledges that Islamic religious zeal inspires jihad
Virginia knife attack may be Islamic State-inspired beheading attempt
Iran says new missiles will be designed specifically to kill US ships
Video: Robert Spencer on Black Lives Matter and the Leftist/Islamic Alliance
Mississippi: Muslim gets 8 years for trying to join the Islamic State
Days after ISIS calls for baseball bat attacks, Muslim migrants attack truckers with bats in Calais
More gay men thrown from building roof in accordance with Sharia

Latest Lebanese Related News published on on August 24-25/16

Bkirki Warns against 'Marginalizing' Christians in Cabinet
Naharnet/August 24/16/Bkirki has warned against violating the National Pact in the cabinet session that will be held on Thursday, stressing that “the country can only be governed through partnership.” “We are counting on Prime Minister (Tammam) Salam's respect for the National Pact, seeing as he knows the structure of the Lebanese formula very well and he cannot continue without the Christian component,” Bishop Boulos Sayah, the Vicar General of the Maronite Patriarchate, told al-Joumhouria newspaper in remarks published Wednesday. “That's why he is supposed to act according to the requirements of the national interest,” Sayah added. “It would be dangerous for the government to continue its functioning without the ministers of the Free Patriotic Movement and the Kataeb Party, knowing that the Lebanese Forces is not part of the government in the first place, seeing as this would prevent Christians from taking part in the country's decisions,” the vicar general said. “Haven't the Lebanese learned that this country can only be governed through partnership? Christians are present and no one can eliminate them or take them back to the approach of marginalization,” Sayah emphasized. He also warned that the cabinet cannot continue to function “without the real representatives of Christians,” cautioning that such a situation “that would lead to the decay” of the State. “They might continue today without us but tomorrow other components might be marginalized, that's why eliminating the Christian component is prohibited,” Sayah added. “Let them find solutions that respect the National Pact and we will not tolerate any violation of the National Pact and the Constitution,” he went on to say. The 1943 National Pact is an unwritten agreement that distributed power among the country's religious communities and set the foundations of modern Lebanon as a multi-confessional state. The FPM's decision is linked to the thorny issue of military appointments. Last week, Defense Minister Samir Moqbel postponed the retirement of Higher Defense Council chief Maj. Gen. Mohammed Kheir after no consensus was reached over three candidates that he had proposed, angering the FPM which says that it opposes term extensions for all senior officers. The movement fears that the extension of Kheir's term could pave the way for a new extension of the tenure of Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji next month. Qahwaji's retirement had been postponed in September 2013 and his term was instead extended for two years.

Berri: Country Can't Bear Postponement, Laxity Affects Civil Servants Wages
Naharnet/August 24/16/Speaker Nabih Berri has stressed that it is necessary for the cabinet to convene as scheduled on Thursday, warning that “the country cannot bear postponement.”“Should the situations continue in this manner and this laxity, you can ask Finance Minister Ali Hassan Khalil about how difficult it would be to pay the salaries of civil servants,” Berri told his visitors in remarks published Wednesday. Later on Wednesday, Berri received a phone call from Prime Minister Tammam Salam during which the speaker confirmed that his ministers will attend Thursday's cabinet session, state-run National News Agency reported. The two leaders "agreed that the cabinet must refrain from taking any important decision during the session," NNA said. Berri's stances come in the wake of Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil's declaration on Tuesday that the FPM's two ministers will boycott Thursday's session as a “warning message” related to the thorny issue of military appointments.Bassil also warned that the country could “face a system crisis after Thursday's session.”

Salam 'Won't Postpone' Thursday's Cabinet Session despite FPM Boycott
Naharnet/August 24/16/Prime Minister Tammam Salam will not postpone Thursday's cabinet session despite the declared boycott of the Free Patriotic Movement's two ministers, sources close to the PM have said. “The session will be held on time and the government shall not be paralyzed whenever a party decides to boycott it in protest at an issue that they do not agree to,” the sources said in remarks published Wednesday in al-Joumhouria newspaper. The sources also rejected the FPM's claim that holding a cabinet session in the absence of the FPM and Kataeb Party ministers would be a violation of the 1943 National Pact, stressing that “all sects will be present and represented.” “What about the other ten Christian ministers (who will attend the session?),” the sources asked. “Claiming that the absence of the FPM and Kataeb is an absence of two Christian components of the government is an inaccurate approach,” the sources added. “Minister Alain Hakim (of Kataeb) is practicing his duties normally at his ministry and the FPM's allies will attend the session, not to mention that the FPM's two ministers have not announced their resignation or informed the premiership of their boycott or resignation. The boycott announcement was issued through the media and this is not a reason to suspend the cabinet's sessions,” the sources explained. FPM chief and Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil announced Tuesday that his movement had decided to boycott Thursday's cabinet session as a “warning message,” cautioning that the country might be plunged into a political “system crisis” if the other parties do not heed the FPM's demands. “The issue has to do with respecting the National Pact in the government's meetings. Will it convene without us? Will it convene in the absence of the Christian forces?” Bassil said. “Will our partners in the country accept a government that governs in the absence of Christians?” he added. The 1943 National Pact is an unwritten agreement that distributed power among the country's religious communities and set the foundations of modern Lebanon as a multi-confessional state. The FPM's decision is linked to the thorny issue of military appointments. Last week, Defense Minister Samir Moqbel postponed the retirement of Higher Defense Council chief Maj. Gen. Mohammed Kheir after no consensus was reached over three candidates that he had proposed, angering the FPM which says that it opposes term extensions for all senior officers. The movement fears that the extension of Kheir's term could pave the way for a new extension of the tenure of Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji next month.Qahwaji's retirement had been postponed in September 2013 and his term was instead extended for two years.

Salam Vows to Continue Shouldering His 'National Responsibility'
Naharnet/August 24/16/Prime Minister Tammam Salam pledged Wednesday to “continue shouldering the national responsibility during this tough period that the country is going through.”“We will remain the guardians of this structure... We will not back down, weaken or bow in the face of the challenges,” Salam stressed. “The current situation does not call for optimism but Lebanon went through a lot of junctures and overcame major tests,” the PM added. “Despite all the chaos and destruction that is surrounding us, we in Lebanon are being envied over our situation due to our domestic cohesion,” Salam went on to say.
Sources close to Salam have said that the PM will not postpone a controversial cabinet session scheduled for Thursday despite a decision by the Free Patriotic Movement to boycott the meeting. In remarks to al-Joumhouria newspaper, the sources also rejected the FPM's claim that holding a cabinet session in the absence of the FPM and Kataeb Party ministers would be a violation of the 1943 National Pact, stressing that “all sects will be present and represented.” The FPM's decision is linked to the thorny issue of military appointments. Last week, Defense Minister Samir Moqbel postponed the retirement of Higher Defense Council chief Maj. Gen. Mohammed Kheir after no consensus was reached over three candidates that he had proposed, angering the FPM which says that it opposes term extensions for all senior officers. The movement fears that the extension of Kheir's term could pave the way for a new extension of the tenure of Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji next month. Qahwaji's retirement had been postponed in September 2013 and his term was instead extended for two years.

Trash Collection Crisis Looms as Sukleen Says Municipality Blocking Access to Bourj Hammoud Site
Naharnet/August 24/16/A new waste collection crisis seems to be looming on the horizon after the Sukleen firm announced Wednesday that its trucks would stop transferring trash to the Bourj Hammoud site due to the municipality's decision to block access to the location. “Due to the inability to transfer waste from the areas mentioned in our contract to the temporary storage site in Bourj Hammoud, which resulted from a decision by the municipality to block access to the site's entrance, the firm has informed the Council for Development and Reconstruction (CDR) that it will no longer be able to collect and transfer waste from the aforementioned areas,” Sukleen said in a statement. It added that it is awaiting “instructions from the CDR in this regard.”Agriculture Minister Akram Shehayyeb, who is in charge of overseeing the government's emergency waste management plan, had warned Tuesday that the alternative to the plan would be the return of the waste management crisis that Lebanon witnessed last year, which saw piles of trash invading the country's streets, forests and riverbanks. He also revealed that Bourj Hammoud's municipal chief had informed the CDR that the municipality would not allow the dumping of waste at the site as of Wednesday should works to establish a landfill remain suspended, out of fear that the piles of waste would become a “mountain of garbage” that poses health and environmental risks to the region. Protesters from the Kataeb Party and civil society groups have been staging a sit-in for several days now outside the site and on August 11 they forced the suspension of works aimed at establishing a seaside garbage landfill there. Kataeb chief MP Sami Gemayel has recently warned of health and environmental risks resulting from the dumping of unsorted and unrecycled waste at the Bourj Hammoud site, noting that “it is easy to find alternatives through endorsing a decentralized waste management plan.” The country's unprecedented waste management crisis erupted in July last year when the country's central landfill in Naameh was closed amid the government's failure to find alternatives.

Hizbullah Urges Postponing Cabinet Session as 'Consultative Gathering' Rejects 'Paralyzing Govt.'
Naharnet/August 24/16/Hizbullah called Wednesday for postponing a controversial cabinet session scheduled for Thursday amid a declared boycott by its main Christian ally, the Free Patriotic Movement, as Christian ministers close to ex-president Michel Suleiman and the March 14 camp announced that they would attend the meeting. “We call for postponing tomorrow's cabinet session,” MP Mohammed Raad, the head of Hizbullah's Loyalty to Resistance bloc, said in a statement. “In light of our evaluation of the repercussions that could arise from the protest move that was announced yesterday by the Change and Reform bloc... and out of our keenness on the need for an atmosphere of positive partnership among all of the cabinet's components, especially during this period, we in Hizbullah call on Prime Minister Tammam Salam to postpone tomorrow's cabinet session,” said Raad. Postponement “would allow further contacts and consultations among the government's various components in order to avoid some ambiguities and hurdles,” the lawmaker added. Later on Wednesday, Hizbullah's State Minister for Parliament Affairs Mohammed Fneish visited Salam at the Grand Serail and announced that his party has not yet decided to boycott the cabinet session. “We are trying to find exits that spare the country a confrontational situation and this is the Hizbullah stance that I have relayed to PM Salam,” said Fneish after the meeting. “PM Salam said that he is in favor of holding the session and that he will be careful in overseeing it to prevent any decision that should not be taken in the absence of the ministers of the Change and Reform bloc,” the minister added. March 8 ministerial sources had told An Nahar newspaper in remarks published Wednesday that Hizbullah's two ministers “will not boycott the session.”Meanwhile, the ministers of the Consultative Gathering announced that they will attend the session, following talks at ex-president Suleiman's residence. “They should not fabricate excuses to paralyze the cabinet's work,” Telecom Minister Butros Harb said after the meeting. Sources close to Salam have said that the PM will not postpone the session despite the FPM's declared boycott. In remarks to al-Joumhouria newspaper, the sources also rejected the FPM's claim that holding a cabinet session in the absence of the FPM and Kataeb Party ministers would be a violation of the 1943 National Pact, stressing that “all sects will be present and represented.” The FPM's decision is linked to the thorny issue of military appointments. Last week, Defense Minister Samir Moqbel postponed the retirement of Higher Defense Council chief Maj. Gen. Mohammed Kheir after no consensus was reached over three candidates that he had proposed, angering the FPM which says that it opposes term extensions for all senior officers. The movement fears that the extension of Kheir's term could pave the way for a new extension of the tenure of Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji next month. Qahwaji's retirement had been postponed in September 2013 and his term was instead extended for two years.

Murder Charge for U.S. Man in Slaying of Lebanese Neighbor
Associated Press/Naharnet/August 24/16/U.S. prosecutors have charged a Tulsa man with first-degree murder and committing a hate crime in the killing of his Lebanese neighbor -- a culmination of what authorities said was the man's violent feud with the family that spanned several years and included a regular barrage of racial insults and personal confrontations. Stanley Majors, 61, was also charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm and threatening a violent act in the Aug. 12 fatal shooting of 37-year-old Khalid Jabara. The hate crime charge is a misdemeanor under Oklahoma law and accuses Majors of intimidating and harassing Jabara and his mother, Haifa Jabara, "because of race, color, religion, ancestry and national origin," according to court papers filed Tuesday by prosecutors. Majors marked at least the 17th case since 2008 where Tulsa County prosecutors filed a hate crime charge, according to court records. The cases include the 2012 Easter weekend shooting deaths of three black residents. Alvin Watts, who is white, and Jake England, who said he was Cherokee Indian, pleaded guilty to the killings in 2013 and were sentenced to life in prison without parole. "The death of Khalid Jabara is tragic and our sympathies are with his family," Tulsa County District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler said in a statement Tuesday. Majors is scheduled for arraignment in district court on Wednesday. An Associated Press message left for Majors' attorney was not immediately returned Tuesday.
Majors spent years in conflict with the Jabara family, often hurling epithets such as "filthy Lebanese," ''dirty Arabs" and "Moo-slems" at his next-door neighbors, authorities said. The Jabaras are actually Christian.
Lebanese emigrants have long been a visible part of the Oklahoma population, with many making their living as merchants, restaurateurs and grocers. "Our parents raised us to be patriotic Americans, proud of our Lebanese heritage and our community's contributions to our country," said Jabara family spokeswoman Rebecca Abou-Chedid. "In charging Majors with a hate crime in addition to first-degree murder, the district attorney's office is making a much-needed and powerful statement that hatred and violence based on race, color, religion, ancestry and national origin has no place in our society."
Shortly after the charges were filed Tuesday, Muslim Advocates and the Arab American Institute demanded in a coalition letter presented by advocacy, civil rights, community and faith-based groups that Tulsa Mayor Dewey Bartlett direct law enforcement authorities to conduct a "fair and thorough investigation" into Jabara's death.
"In the last year, hate crimes targeting Arabs, Muslims, and those perceived to be either have skyrocketed," Madihha Ahussain, Muslim Advocates staff attorney and lead for the Program to Counter Anti-Muslim Hate, said in the letter. "Unfortunately, there has also been a pattern of law enforcement officials minimizing the possibility that these crimes may be motivated by bigotry, sending a dangerous message that hate violence is not taken seriously."Officer Jeanne MacKenzie, a Tulsa Police spokeswoman, said Tuesday that her agency investigates every case "to the fullest.""We don't exclude anything or anybody by race or sexual preference or anything like that," she said. Bartlett said he has scheduled a meeting with the city's public safety departments and the district attorney's office "to make sure we are doing everything in our power to ensure the safety of our community.""The city stands by the Jabara family in this time of need and they will continue to be in our thoughts and prayers," the mayor said in a statement.
The alleged abuse between the neighbors escalated to the point where Haifa Jabara obtained a protective order in 2013 that required Majors to stay 300 yards away and prohibited him from possessing any firearms until 2018. Majors also had a 2009 felony conviction from California for threatening a crime with intent to terrorize. But last year, Majors was accused of plowing his car into Khalid's mother, Haifa Jabara. She suffered a broken shoulder, among other injuries. After Majors struck her, he kept driving, prosecutors said. Officers who stopped him later reported that he was intoxicated. Prosecutors charged majors last September with assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, leaving the scene of a collision violating the protective order and public intoxication. Majors' conflict with the Jabara family also put him at odds with his husband, Stephen Schmauss, who came to befriend Khalid and thought of him as an apprentice, teaching him how to use power tools and computer circuitry. Last week, Schmauss said his husband had killed his "best friend."
Khalid Jabara's slaying drew national attention in the United States, including a mention from presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who said her "heart breaks" for Jabara's loved ones. Schmauss tried to explain Majors' comments, saying his husband is "textbook bipolar" and a diabetic who refuses to take any medication. Schmauss said anything Majors said to the Jabara family was "done under the bipolar situation." While awaiting trial for assault and battery, a judge freed Majors from jail on $60,000 bond, overruling strong objections by Tulsa County prosecutors, who called him "a substantial risk to the public" and pleaded with the court to set a higher bond of $300,000. Schmauss, who claims that his cellphone was shattered when Majors fired at least five rounds from a handgun inside the couple's house the day Khalid Jabara was killed, said in an e-mail that he can't attend his husband's arraignment on Wednesday because he is undergoing radiation therapy for cancer. "My cancer is so painful, requiring me to take strong pain pills that make me sleepy," he said. "I will visit (Majors) on my feel good days in the future.
"I am saddened and may never recover from this event," he said.

Garces meets Lebanese officials, participates in meeting by Beirut Municipality
Wed 24 Aug 2016/NNA - In a press release by the United Nations Information Centre, it said: "UN Special Envoy of the Secretary-General on Disability and Accessibility Lenin Boltaire Moreno Garces began his official visit to Lebanon by meeting with Minister of Social Affairs Rachid Derbass. He also met today with Foreign Minister Gerban Bassil and took part in a roundtable discussion hosted by Beirut Municipality on the rights of persons with disabilities."Release added: "With the Minister of Social Affairs, Moreno Garces discussed how the UN and the Lebanese Government can improve their collaboration to ensure the protection of the rights of persons with disabilities." "We should work together for the full participation and inclusion of persons with disabilities in public life in Lebanon," said Moreno Garces.
He called for the ratification by the Lebanese Republic of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, signed in 2007, and for the implementation of laws and policies, in particular Law 220/2000 related to this issue. He also stressed the importance of ensuring inclusive education to all.
At the roundtable organized by the Municipality of Beirut, Moreno Garces highlighted the Sustainable Development Goals adopted last year by the UN, specifically Goal 11 (Make cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable), which implicitly reflects the importance of developing and enforcing building regulations and codes that provide accessibility to all. "The most difficult barriers to overcome are man-made. It is the societies that disable. It is imperative to transform the discriminatory mentality into a culture of inclusion and accessibility through an agenda of true urban development," he added.
Release concluded: "Tomorrow, Moreno Garces will visit the Bekaa. He will tour a center of the Ministry of Social Affairs for people with disabilities in Taanayel at 9:00 a.m. He will also meet with local officials and Lebanese residents, as well as Syrian refugees with disability, and with the Lebanese Physical Handicap Union in Baalbek. He will conclude his field visit with a press conference at 13:00 inside the Baalbek Temple."

Salam, Moqbel tackle latest developments
Wed 24 Aug 2016 /NNA - Prime Minister, Tammam Salam, met on Wednesday at the Grand Serail with National Defense Minister Samir Moqbel, with talks reportedly touching on most recent security developments on the local arena. Premier Salam then met with Tourism Minister, Michel Pharoun, who reiterated on emerging the need for the postponement of Cabinet session on Thursday, in order to pave the way for dialogue over longstanding predicaments and avoid sideline debates over constitutional and consensual sensitivities. Salam also met with MP Marwan Fares on top of a delegation of Apples' Farmers in northern Beqa, who raised with the Premier an array of matters related to their stringent needs in terms of apple production and marketing.

Machnouk meets with delegation of traders, Makari
Wed 24 Aug 2016/NNA - Interior and Municipalities Minister, Nouhad Machnouk, met on Wednesday with a delegation of traders from Baalbek-Hermel, accompanied by Mufti of Baalbeck Sheikh Khaled Solh, who thanked him for the security plan in the region and his exerted efforts to create a safe and secure environment. In response to a question about threats made against President of Arsal municipality, the Mufti stressed that "the president of the municipality was pressing national efforts in favor of the town and its openness to the neighborhood. He cooperates with all parties." Separately, Machnouk received Deputy House Speaker, Farid Makari, and Tripoli Municipality President, Ahmad Qamareddine.

Palestinian factions agree to withdraw gunmen in Ain el Hilwe
Wed 24 Aug 2016/NNA - Palestinian factions inside Ain-el-Hilwe agreed on Wednesday to withdraw Fatah Movement's gunmen who mobilized after one man identified as Abd Fadda attacked the party's office earlier today, killing Ahmad Reda, aka "al-Bahti." Conferees also agreed to keep Fadda in custody inside the camp for further investigation. The decision was made during an extended security meeting inside the camp.

Hariri visits Turkey tomorrow, meets Erdogan
Wed 24 Aug 2016/NNA - Former Prime Minister, Saad Hariri, will be visiting Turkey on Thursday for a meeting with Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, at the latter's presidential palace in Ankara.

Justice Minister sends letter to Judge Hammoud to investigate Houmat Diyar's alleged intention to form armed organization
Wed 24 Aug 2016/NNA - Justice Minister, Ashraf Rifi, on Wednesday sent a letter to General Prosecutor of Appeal, Judge Samir Hammoud, to unveil the truth regarding the alleged information of Houmat Diyar's intention to form an armed organization.

Abou Faour receives Richard, Girard
Wed 24 Aug 2016/NNA - Public Health Minister, Wael Abou Faour, received on Wednesday at his office US Ambassador to Lebanon, Elizabeth Richard, with talks reportedly dwelling on the most recent developments. Abou Faour also met with United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Representative in Lebanon, Mireille Girard, over the situation of refugees in Lebanon.
 

Latest LCCC Bulletin For Miscellaneous Reports And News published on on August 24-25/16

Canadian study finds “extremism” common in mosque literature
Christine Williams/Jihad Watch/August 23, 2016/Finally, it is being addressed in the mainstream media in Canada that “many mosques and Islamic schools in Canada are placing young people at risk by espousing — or at least not condemning — extremist teachings, a new study says.”This is the second study out of Canada covered by the mainstream media, in a short space of time, investigating the jihadist incursion into Canada, and it’s ruffling some feathers…“The report was not supported by Liberal senators on the committee. It was denounced by the National Council of Canadian Muslims as stigmatizing and failing to offer effective solutions to the challenge of violent extremism. ”Unsurprising! The National Council of Canadian Muslims is formerly CAIR-CAN. CAIR is listed as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Landed Foundation trial, the largest terror financing trial in the history of America. The other study acknowledged that Islamic religious zeal inspires jihad.

“Extremist literature common in many mosques and Islamic school libraries in Canada, study says”,
Jim Bronskill, National Post, August 22, 2016:
OTTAWA — Many mosques and Islamic schools in Canada are placing young people at risk by espousing — or at least not condemning — extremist teachings, a new study says. Co-authors Thomas Quiggin, a former intelligence analyst with the Privy Council Office and the RCMP, and Saied Shoaaib, a journalist originally from Egypt, base their findings on research conducted quietly in mosque libraries and Islamic schools. The study says what worried them was not the presence of extremist literature, but that they found nothing but such writings in several libraries.
“Further research is required to determine the depth and breadth of this problem,” the study says. The authors say openly available material and analysis of social media postings helped confirm their views that many Canadians, including leading politicians, are turning a blind eye to the dangers. They argue the issue is too important to ignore, given that a number of young Canadians have become radicalized to violence. Canadian Muslims with humanist and modernist outlooks are being drowned out by those with extreme views, the study says. “The struggle for the soul of Islam between Islamists and humanists goes on in Canada and the U.S., not just in the Middle East, Europe and South Asia.” The Canadian Council of Imams did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Liberal government plans to announce details soon of its plans for a national office of counter-radicalization to carry out research and co-ordinate activities across Canada. One year ago, the Senate defence and security committee issued a report saying some foreign-trained imams had been spreading extremist religious ideology and messages that are not in keeping with Canadian values, contributing to radicalization. The committee has urged the government to explore imam training and certification in an effort help curb radicalization, one of 25 recommendations it made in the interim anti-terrorism report…… The committee report called on the government to work with the provinces and Muslim communities to “investigate the options that are available for the training and certification of imams in Canada.” The report was not supported by Liberal senators on the committee. It was denounced by the National Council of Canadian Muslims as stigmatizing and failing to offer effective solutions to the challenge of violent extremism.”

At least 120 killed in deadly central Italy quake
The Associated Press, Amatrice, Italy Wednesday, 24 August 2016/A devastating earthquake rocked central Italy early Wednesday, collapsing homes on top of residents as they slept. At least 120 people were killed in hard-hit towns where rescue crews raced to dig survivors out of the rubble, but the toll was likely to rise as crews reached homes in more remote hamlets. “The town isn’t here anymore,” said Sergio Pirozzi, the mayor of Amatrice. The magnitude 6 quake struck at 3:36 a.m. (0136 GMT) and was felt across a broad swath of central Italy, including Rome, where residents felt a long swaying followed by aftershocks. The temblor was felt from the Lazio region into Umbria and Le Marche on the Adriatic coast.The hardest-hit towns were Amatrice, Accumoli near near Rieti, some 100 kilometers (80 miles) northeast of Rome, and Pescara del Tronto further east. Italy’s civil protection agency said the preliminary toll was 37 dead, several hundred injured and thousands in need of temporary housing, though it stressed the numbers were fluid. The center of Amatrice was devastated, with entire buildings razed and the air thick with dust and smelling strongly of gas. Rocks and metal tumbled onto the streets and dazed residents huddled in piazzas as some 39 aftershocks jolted the region into the early morning hours, some as strong as 5.1. “The whole ceiling fell but did not hit me,” marveled resident Maria Gianni. “I just managed to put a pillow on my head and I wasn’t hit luckily, just slightly injured my leg.”Another woman, sitting in front of her destroyed home with a blanket over her shoulders, said she didn’t know what had become of her loved ones. “It was one of the most beautiful towns of Italy and now there’s nothing left,” she said, too distraught to give her name. “I don’t know what we’ll do.” As daylight dawned, residents, civil protection workers and even priests began digging out with shovels, bulldozers and their bare hands, trying to reach survivors. There was relief as a woman was pulled out alive from one building, followed by a dog. “We need chain saws, shears to cut iron bars, and jacks to remove beams: everything, we need everything,” civil protection worker Andrea Gentili told The Associated Press. Italy’s national blood drive association appealed for donations to Rieti’s hospital. The devastation harked back to the 2009 quake that killed more than 300 people in and around L’Aquila, about 90 kilometers (55 miles) south of the latest quake. The town sent emergency teams Wednesday to help with the rescue. “I don’t know what to say. We are living this immense tragedy,” said the Rev. Savino D’Amelio, a parish priest in Amatrice. “We are only hoping there will be the least number of victims possible and that we all have the courage to move on.”
Another hard-hit town was Pescara del Tronto, in the Le Marche region, where the main road was covered in debris. The ANSA news agency reported 10 dead there without citing the source, but there was no confirmation. Residents were digging their neighbors out by hand since emergency crews hadn’t yet arrived in force. Photos taken from the air by regional firefighters showed the town essentially flattened. “There are broken liquor bottles all over the place,” lamented Gino Petrucci, owner of a bar in nearby Arquata Del Tronto where he was beginning the long cleanup.
The Italian geological service put the magnitude at 6.0; the US Geological Survey reported 6.2 with the epicenter at Norcia, about 170 kilometers (105 miles) northeast of Rome, and with a relatively shallow depth of 10 kilometers (6 miles). “Quakes with this magnitude at this depth in our territory in general create building collapses, which can result in deaths,” said the head of Italy’s civil protection service, Fabrizio Curcio. He added that the region is popular with tourists escaping the heat of Rome, with more residents than at other times of the year, and that a single building collapse could raise the toll significantly.
The mayor of Accumoli, Stefano Petrucci, said six people had died there, including a family of four, and two others. He wept as he noted that the tiny hamlet of 700 swells to 2,000 in the summer months, and that he feared for the future of the town. “I hope they don’t forget us,” he told Sky TG24.
In Amatrice, the Rev. Fabio Gammarota, priest of a nearby parish, said he had blessed seven bodies extracted so far. “One was a friend of mine,” he said. Pirozzi estimated dozens of residents were buried under collapsed buildings and that heavy equipment was needed to clear streets clogged with debris.
Premier Matteo Renzi’s office tweeted that heavy equipment was arriving. A 1997 quake killed a dozen people in the area and severely damaged one of the jewels of Umbria, the Basilica of St. Francis in Assisi, filled with Giotto frescoes. The Franciscan friars who are the custodians of the basilica reported no immediate damage from Wednesday’s temblor. Pope Francis skipped his traditional catechism for his Wednesday general audience and instead invited pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square to recite the rosary with him.

Powerful 6.8 magnitude quake hits Myanmar
AFP, Yangon Wednesday, 24 August 2016/ A powerful 6.8 magnitude earthquake hit central Myanmar Wednesday, the US Geological Survey reported, just south of the ancient city of Bagan, a major tourist destination. The quake, which the agency said struck at a depth of 84 kilometers (52 miles), swayed high-rise buildings in the Thai capital of Bangkok, AFP journalists reported. It was also felt in the Indian city of Kolkata, rocking tall structures and sending panicked residents out onto the streets. “Services of the underground railway have been suspended fearing aftershocks of the quake,” Kolkata Metro Railway spokesman Indrani Banerjee told AFP. The quake was felt throughout south and southwestern Bangladesh close to the border with Myanmar, with television footage showing residents running into the streets. At least 20 people were injured as panicked workers tried to flee a building in the industrial area of Savar outside Dhaka, ATN Bangla television reported. “All of us ran to the streets leaving the houses and shops unsecured as the quake seemed very dangerous,” Nazmus Sakib from the southern city of Chittagong close to the Myanmar border wrote on his Facebook wall. There were no immediate reports of casualties in Myanmar, but officials said they were checking early reports of damage to several pagodas in the Buddhist-majority country. The epicenter struck near Chauk, a town on the Irrawaddy River around 30 kilometers south of Bagan, Myanmar's most famous archaeological site and home to more than 2,500 Buddhist monuments. A police officer from Bagan told AFP his team is looking into reports that several temples were damaged. “We received initial information that several famous pagodas were damaged. We need more confirmation from our team on the ground. We haven't heard of anyone being hurt,” he said, requesting anonymity. Soe Win, a regional MP from Chauk, the town near the epicenter in central Magway region, told AFP the tremors lasted for several minutes. “There was also some sound as well. A pagoda collapsed in Salay and a building also collapsed,” he told AFP, adding that he has not yet heard of any casualties. The USGS estimated that the impact would be “relatively localized” but noted that many buildings in the region are "highly vulnerable" to earthquake shaking. Earthquakes are relatively common in Myanmar, though the country has not seen a major quake since 2012. The last major quake struck in a nearby region in April and caused minor damages but no casualties.

Bomb blasts kill one, wound 30 in southern Thailand
Reuters, Bangkok Wednesday, 24 August 2016/Thailand’s military government said on Wednesday there was no connection between two bombings overnight that killed one person in the southern town of Pattani and a wave of deadly attacks on popular tourist spots in the south this month.
One Thai person was killed and 30 wounded when two bombs exploded late on Tuesday at the Southern View Hotel in the coastal town of Pattani, less than two weeks after a wave of as yet unexplained bombings hit seven provinces in the south. No group has claimed responsibility for those bombings, which killed four and wounded dozens, including foreign tourists. Some security experts noted at the time that southern insurgent groups have a track record of carrying out coordinated bombing attacks. Defence Minister Prawit Wongsuwan however quickly ruled out any link between those attacks and the twin bombs in Pattani. “I am sure that the incident in Pattani last night has nothing to do with the seven provinces attacks,” Prawit told reporters at Bangkok’s Government House, without giving any further details. Police said the first explosion in a carpark at the back of the hotel in Pattani caused no casualties. However, the second blast outside the hotel entrance appeared to have been a bomb placed in a stolen hospital pick-up truck that had been mistaken for an ambulance. Since 2004, a low-intensity but brutal war between government troops and insurgents has killed more than 6,500 people in the three southern provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat that border Malaysia. Peace talks between the government and a handful of insurgent groups began in 2013 under the civilian government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, but have stalled since the military overthrew her in 2014. Prawit said the military government would not enter talks with separatist groups until there was peace in the region. It has to be peaceful first and then we can discuss,” Prawit told reporters. Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha said after his weekly Cabinet meeting on Tuesday there were “no quick fixes in the south”. Still, the military insists that security in the south has improved and has said it would reduce the number of soldiers posted there from October. Some 60,000 troops will be stationed in the south this year, down from 70,000 in 2011, said Colonel Yutthanam Petchmuang, deputy spokesman for the military’s Internal Security Operations Command. “When we see the situation constantly improving ... we gradually remove soldiers,” Yutthanam said. There is deep distrust between Muslims and authorities in the region, which rights groups say is partly due to a culture of impunity among military officials operating in the south. The three provinces soundly rejected a referendum earlier this month on a new military-backed constitution, which passed convincingly in most of the rest of Thailand.

Archbishop Of Kirkuk Fr. Yousif Toma: Cancer Of ISIS Must Be Removed Before We Can Talk About Return Of Christians
MEMRI TV Clip No. 5625/August 24/16/
https://outlook.live.com/owa/?id=64855&path=/mail/inbox/rp
In an interview with France 24 TV, Father Yousif Toma, the Archbishop of Kirkuk, denied that the West was encouraging Iraqi Christians to emigrate. "The visas that have been issued in recent years do not come to even one percent of what is needed," he said. Father Toma said that the massive emigration has damaged the balance of society, because the elites are leaving while the poor are left behind. He described solidarity with Iraqi Christians as "modest." The interview aired on August 1.
Following are excerpts
Interviewer: "You are calling upon the Christians to remain in their Arab countries, while there is talk that the West is encouraging the Christians to come by making it easier to obtain visas. Is this true?"Yousif Toma: "I believe that this is not true. It's not accurate. Encouraging? It's more like droplets of rain. The visas that have been issued in recent years do not come to even one percent of what is needed. This need poses a problem, because emigration is by no means a solution for those who are left behind. Who will remain? The poor, the wretched, and the destitute. If a society loses its elite, its balance is lost."
Interviewer: "Okay, so you are encouraging the Christians to stay put. Let's take an example with which you are very familiar - Mosul. Preparations are underway to attack Mosul. The city is under the control of the Islamic State organization. How can a Christian be expected to stay there, knowing full well that he will be slaughtered?"Yousif Toma: "Indeed, not a single Christian is left in Mosul today. The church bells have not tolled in Mosul for two and a half years. Mosul and the Nineveh Plains were left without their Christian inhabitants. Therefore, we hope that Mosul will become once again this wonderful city that had served as a refuge for all people... So are you encouraging them to return? That is what I asked. If the circumstances facilitate their return... But this will take a long time. Today, we must remove this cancer (of ISIS) from our midst, and then we will think about recuperation."

Kerry in Saudi on Yemen Peace Push
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 24/16/U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday to push for peace in Yemen after U.N.-brokered talks collapsed despite global concern over mounting civilian casualties. He was to meet Wednesday night with Saudi Arabia's powerful Deputy Crown Prince and Defence Minister Mohammed bin Salman, ahead of talks Thursday with King Salman, Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir and other Gulf ministers. He will also meet U.N. Yemen envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed and Britain's Middle East minister Tobias Ellwood. Saudi Arabia leads an Arab coalition that began air raids in March last year and later sent in ground forces to support Yemen's internationally recognised government after Huthi Shiite rebels and their allies overran much of the country. As the civilian death toll continues to climb, the kingdom has faced mounting criticism from human rights groups. But there is little expectation of a breakthrough from Kerry's latest visit to the kingdom. Peter Salisbury, associate fellow at London's Chatham House think tank, told AFP there is "mounting pressure" from certain groups within the U.S. government to see the war ended as soon as possible.
"However, the Americans are limited in their ability to produce a meaningful political settlement." He added that neither the rebels nor the government of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi is willing to make the necessary concessions for a peace deal. Seventeen months after the coalition intervened, anti-rebel forces have regained territory but the Huthis still control most of the interior highlands and Red Sea coast. In the southwest, government forces are battling to break a rebel siege of Taez, Yemen's third city. Riyadh says the Huthis are backed by its regional rival Iran. Coalition-supported pro-government forces are also fighting al-Qaida jihadists who have exploited Yemen's power vacuum to expand their presence in the south and southeast.
Civilians suffer
For civilians in Yemen, the Arab world's poorest country even before the war escalated early last year, the humanitarian situation "continues to deteriorate," the U.N. says. More than 6,600 people, roughly half of them civilians, have been killed, while millions lack food, clean water and adequate healthcare.
U.S. officials have repeatedly urged their major Middle East ally to avoid harming non-combatants. A diplomatic source in Riyadh said it is "becoming increasingly clear" that elements of the U.S. administration are alarmed by the civilian death toll. Most recently, the State Department expressed deep concern after 19 people died in an air raid on a hospital supported by the Doctors Without Borders (MSF) charity. As well as providing precision-guided bombs, American forces have assisted the coalition with aerial refueling and intelligence, although they have slashed the number of advisers directly supporting the coalition. Yemeni diplomatic sources said the U.S. wants a deal on Yemen before the end of the year and will insist on the resumption of peace talks. After making no headway, Ould Cheikh Ahmed on August 6 suspended the talks in Kuwait for one month, which triggered an escalation in fighting.
Negotiations ended after the Huthis and forces loyal to their ally, former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, appointed a council to govern Yemen. The move directly challenged Hadi's government, which works from Riyadh and Yemen's second city Aden. The diplomatic source in Riyadh said he expected a push in Jeddah for new peace talks. "I'm pretty sure that's what the Saudis want as well," the source said. Salisbury said the talks should be broadened beyond the rebels and government to include secessionists, and others in the multi-faceted conflict. That, he said, "would send the message that peace in Yemen will be inclusive, not something agreed purely along the lines of elite interests." Kerry arrived from Nigeria and Kenya on a trip focused on counterterrorism. In Saudi Arabia, he will also discuss the conflicts in Syria and Libya, a State Department official said.

Russia Says 'Deeply Concerned' at Turkish Operation in Syria
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 24/16/Russia's foreign ministry expressed deep concern on Wednesday at Turkey's military operation in Syria, warning of rising tension over Ankara's targeting of Kurdish militia fighters at the border. "We are deeply concerned at what is happening in the Syrian-Turkish border area," the ministry said in a statement. Turkey's air and ground operation risks "further degeneration of the situation in the conflict zone," Moscow warned. The Turkish offensive targeting both Islamic State extremists and Syrian Kurdish militias could lead to deaths among peaceful civilians and "flare-ups of inter-ethnic tensions between Kurds and Arabs," it added. Russia, a major ally of the Syrian regime, has strengthened its relationship with Syria's Kurds and a Kurdish representative office recently opened in Moscow. Moscow, which began a bombing campaign in support of Assad in September last year, said it was "convinced that the Syrian conflict can be resolved exclusively on the firm basis of international law." It called for "broad intra-Syrian dialogue with the participation of all the ethnic groups and confessions including Kurds."Ankara has always called for the ouster of Assad as the key to ending the conflict, putting Turkey at odds with both Russia and Iran.

Germany Backs Turkey's Drive against IS and Kurds
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 24/16/Germany on Wednesday said it supported both an unprecedented Turkish operation in Syria to drive out Islamic State jihadists and Ankara's targeting of Kurdish militia fighters at the border. Foreign ministry spokesman Martin Schaefer told reporters that the Turkish air and ground offensive in a key Syrian border town was "in keeping with the goals and aims of the anti-IS coalition."He added that Berlin would not condemn Ankara's action against Kurdish fighters, who are backed by the U.S. as a key ally against IS and who had also been closing in on the town of Jarabulus directly opposite Turkey. "Turkey, rightly or wrongly, believes that there are links between the PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party), which we see as a terror organization, on the Turkish side and elements among the Kurds on the Syrian side," Schaefer said. "We respect that and think that Turkey has the legitimate right to take action against these terrorist activities. Hence we support Turkey on this." The Turkish operation -- named "Euphrates Shield" -- began around 4:00 am (0100 GMT) Wednesday with artillery pounding dozens of IS targets around Jarabulus. Turkish F-16 fighter jets, backed by U.S.-led coalition war planes, also hit targets inside Syria, after tensions had flared following rocket fire from Jarabulus which landed inside Turkey. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan emphasized the operation was also targeting the Kurdish militia fighters over alarm in Turkey about the activities inside Syria of the People's Protection Units (YPG) militia, which Washington sees as an ally but Ankara regards as a terror group.

U.S. Urges Americans to Leave Gaza 'as Soon as Possible'
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 24/16/The United States on Tuesday reiterated its recommendation that Americans in Gaza leave the territory controlled by Hamas, which Washington calls a terrorist group, "as soon as possible."The warning came after the Israeli army said it bombed dozens of targets in Gaza from Sunday to Monday, in response to rocket fire from the strip. Palestinian medical officials said four people were wounded. Washington regularly updates warning notices to Americans traveling to and living in countries around the world. In the case of Gaza, the State Department warned against "all travel" to the territory and "urges those present to depart as soon as possible when border crossings are open."It had issued a similar warning in December 2015. Since January, 14 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israeli territory, the military said. The border area has remained tense since the July-August 2014 war between Israel and Gaza militants that killed more than 2,200 Palestinians and 73 people on the Israeli side. "Gaza is under the control of Hamas, a foreign terrorist organization. The security environment within Gaza and on its borders is dangerous and volatile," the State Department said in its warning Tuesday. As for Israel and the West Bank, a wave of violence there since October 2015 has left Americans dead and wounded, the department said. However, "there is no indication that U.S. citizens were specifically targeted based on nationality." The violence has eased in recent weeks, but an AFP count shows 220 Palestinians and 34 Israelis killed since October 1, 2015 in the Palestinian territories, Jerusalem and Israel. Most of the Palestinians killed were attackers or suspected attackers. A number were killed in clashes with the Israeli army. The State Department on Tuesday also condemned plans, reported by Israeli media, to expand a Jewish military compound in the West Bank city of Hebron by building homes for settlers."If these reports are true... that would represent a deeply concerning step of settlement expansion on land that is at least partially owned by Palestinians," department spokesman Mark Toner said at a press briefing."We strongly oppose all settlement activity, which is corrosive to the cause of peace. And we've said repeatedly such moves are not consistent with Israel's stated desire to achieve a two-state solution," Toner added. Washington regularly condemns its ally Israel for "illegitimate" settlements in the Palestinian territories.

Iraq forces advance in town south of Mosul
AFP, Kirkuk Wednesday, 24 August 2016/Iraqi forces on Wednesday closed in on the center of Qayyarah, officials said, on the second day of an operation to recapture the town from militants. Qayyarah lies on the western bank of the Tigris river, about 60 kilometers (35 miles) south of Mosul, ISIS’s last major urban stronghold in Iraq. Brigadier General Najm al-Juburi from the operations command for Nineveh, the province in which both Qayyarah and Mosul are located, said the town was now encircled. “There are only a few meters left before troops advancing from the west and troops coming from the east meet and complete the siege around Qayyarah,” he told AFP. He said the vast majority of villages around Qayyarah had been retaken since special forces launched the operation on Tuesday. Juburi and other military officials in the area confirmed the progress and said that a nearby oil field and refinery had also been recaptured from IS. “Liberating Qayyarah will mean cutting off Mosul from the southern areas, which will make liberating Mosul much easier,” Juburi said. “This is a blow to the organization of Daesh (ISIS) because it affects their economy, and this after we retook an air base that is now going to be used to attack them,” he said. Iraqi security forces have been operating in the area for weeks, as part of shaping operations for a major offensive on the city of Mosul in the coming weeks or months. They had already retaken the Qayyarah air field, which ISIS was not using because it has no air force but which Iraqi aircraft will soon be using against the militants.Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on Tuesday reiterated his promise that Mosul would be retaken and the country rid of ISIS by the end of 2016. ISIS has suffered a string of setbacks in Iraq and the “caliphate” it proclaimed two years ago has been shrinking steadily for a year. Its fighters are vastly outnumbered in Nineveh but one of the toughest challenges for Iraq will be the mass displacement a broad offensive on Mosul is expected to trigger. The United Nations’ refugee agency on Tuesday warned that it could spark displacement on a scale not seen globally in years.

Kurds could ‘lose US support if they don’t retreat,’ says Biden
Agencies Wednesday, 24 August 2016/US Vice President Joe Biden called on Syrian Kurdish forces to “move back across the Euphrates River,” at a joint press conference with Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim in Ankara on Wednesday, warning them they will lose US support if they don’t.
“They cannot - will not - under any circumstance get American support if they do not keep that commitment,” said Biden. Biden indirectly expressed support for the Turkish operation launched Wednesday to clear ISIS militants from the town of Jarablus and deter Kurds from further expanding in northern Syria. Meanwhile, Yildirim said that Turkey would not accept the creation of a new Kurdish entity inside Syria and its territorial integrity must be maintained. The premier added that a joint solution must be found to end the crisis in war-torn country. Also on the agenda was the failed July 15 coup in Turkey and the Pennsylvania-based preacher Fethullah Gulen, who Ankara accuses of masterminding the putsch and wants to see extradited. Yildirim said Turkey and the United States should never allow incidents to harm their relations, but said his government expected the legal process for the extradition of Gulen to be conducted without delay. Biden said he also understood the “intense feeling” in Turkey over the cleric, and also expressed his guilt for not coming to the country sooner after the coup. “We are cooperating with the Turkish authorities,” said Biden, though he added that legal standards must be met. The US vice president assured Turkey that the United States had “no intention of protecting a person who harms our ally.”(With AFP, Reuters)

Egyptian ‘guilty of treason’ for leaking classified Saudi document to Iran
Saudi Gazette, Riyadh Wednesday, 24 August 2016/An Egyptian expatriate was sentenced to six years in prison for leaking a classified Saudi document to the Iranian Embassy. Riyadh Penal Court reported the Egyptian man obtained classified documents of the Saudi military’s next moves and plan of combat. The man leaked the document to an Iranian embassy official in Beirut, Lebanon. The court investigated the case and revealed the man had gone to a sorcerer to cast sorcery on the man’s sponsor. The man also violated the Saudi Labor Law by working for someone other than his sponsor. The court concluded by sentencing the man to six years in prison and fining him SR5,000. The court also exiled the man from the Kingdom after he completes his imprisonment. This article first appeared in the Saudi Gazette on Aug. 24, 2016.

Attacker killed after stabbing guard at Coptic church in Egypt
The Associated Press, Cairo Wednesday, 24 August 2016/Egypt's state news agency says a knife-wielding attacker has been shot and killed after he stabbed a guard at a Coptic church. MENA says the attack happened early on Wednesday at the Virgin Mary church in Cairo's eastern suburb of Nozha. The report says other church guards at the scene killed the assailant, whose identity and motives were unclear. MENA said that authorities are investigating. Attacks on Coptic churches in Egypt have stepped up over the past years, especially after Coptic Christians sided with the Egyptian army in the military's 2013 ouster of the Islamist President Mohammed Mursi. Scores of churches were stormed, looted, and torched afterward. Most of the assaults took place in southern Egypt.
Christians make up some 10 percent of Egypt's 91 million people.

Egypt’s Sisi may run for re-election
Staff writer, Al Arabiya English Wednesday, 24 August 2016/Egyptian president Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi for the first time on Tuesday publicly expressed his willingness to run for a second presidential term in the 2018 elections “if it is the will of the Egyptian people,” Ahram Online reported. Sisi announced his possible re-election bid in a statement on his official Facebook page. Using a quote from an interview he gave to national newspapers, the Egyptian president said that he “can never fail to respond to the will of Egyptians. I am subject to the will of the Egyptian people.” Sisi was first elected to office by a landslide 96.1 per cent in May 2014 after years of political instability and street protests. Under the Egyptian constitution, he qualifies for one more four-year term, if he is re-elected in 2018.

American University in Afghan capital attacked
The Associated Press, Kabul Wednesday, 24 August 2016/The president of the American University in the Afghan capital says a militant attack is underway on the campus. Mark English tells The Associated Press that security forces are on the scene after Wednesday's attack and that “we are trying to assess the situation.” Witnesses say they heard explosions and automatic gunfire. It was not immediately clear if anyone was wounded. Police spokesman Sediq Sediqqi says police and intelligence agency personnel are at the campus, on the western outskirts of Kabul. He says police believe there is just one assailant.
The attack comes two weeks after two university staff were kidnapped from their car by unknown gunmen. Their whereabouts are still unknown.

Turkish authorities fire more than 2,800 judges, prosecutors
Reuters, Istanbul Wednesday, 24 August 2016/Turkish authorities fired more than 2,800 judges and prosecutors on Wednesday, in the latest purge related to the July 15 coup, broadcaster CNN Turk reported. Turkey has sacked or suspended some 80,000 people from the civil service, judiciary, police and courts following the attempted putsch, which it blames on followers of the US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen. The government says Gulen’s followers spent years infiltrating institutions with the goal of overthrowing the state. The cleric, who has lived in self-imposed exile in rural Pennsylvania since 1999, denies the charge and has condemned the coup.

Saudi foils fresh attack on a restaurant
Staff writer, Al Arabiya English Wednesday, 24 August 2016/Saudi Arabia has foiled a new attack on a busy restaurant on Wednesday after it thwarted a suicide bombing the day before on a mosque in the Eastern Province, Al Arabiya News Channel reported. The interior ministry said the attack was foiled “hours before” a Saudi and a Syrian attempted to carry out their suicide bombing offensive in the restaurant, located in the Eastern Province’s Tarout island. Al Arabiya News Channel’s correspondent said Tarout Restaurant is a hot spot for local tourists who visit the eatery to try traditional food.
The ministry also named the would-be bombers; it said the Saudi was Abdullah Abdulrahman Al-Ghunaimi while the Syrian was Hussain Mohammed Ali. Photos of the Saudi, Syria:The incident followed a previous attempt by two non-Saudis to attack a mosque in Um Al-Hamam village in the Shiite-dominated enclave of Al-Qatif in the kingdom’s Eastern province. The man, who attempted the attack on Al-Rasoul Al-A’dham mosque, was wearing an explosive belt and was eliminated by Saudi security forces. The interior ministry, meanwhile, said on Wednesday that the eliminated man was from Pakistan. These thwarted attacks come after a series of bombings taking place in early July this year, which included a blast near Prophet Mohammed’s mosque in Madinah, two suicide bombings in Al-Qatif, as well as a bomb targeting near the US consulate in Jeddah. Saudi witnessed violent bombings in 2015 as well, including blasts claimed by ISIS. The so-called Sunni militant group ISIS has previously targeted the mainly Shiite Al-Qatif to stir up sectarian strife in the country.

Clinton leads Trump by 12 points in latest Reuters/Ipsos poll
Reuters, New York Wednesday, 24 August 2016/Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton leads Republican rival Donald Trump by 12 percentage points among likely voters, her strongest showing this month, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll released on Tuesday. The Aug. 18-22 poll showed that 45 percent of voters supported Clinton, while 33 percent backed Trump ahead of the Nov. 8 election. Clinton, the former US secretary of state, has led Trump, a New York businessman, throughout most of the 2016 campaign. But her latest lead represents a stronger level of support than polls indicated over the past few weeks. Earlier in August, Clinton’s lead over Trump ranged from 3 to 9 percentage points in the poll. The poll also found that about 22 percent of likely voters would not pick either candidate. That lack of support is high compared with how people responded to the poll during the 2012 presidential election between Democratic President Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney. “Those who are wavering right now are just as likely to be thinking about supporting a third-party candidate instead, and not between Clinton and Trump,” said Tom Smith, who directs the Center for the Study of Politics and Society at the University of Chicago. During the latest polling, Clinton faced renewed scrutiny about her handling of classified emails while serving as secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, and Trump’s campaign chief, Paul Manafort, resigned after a reshuffle of the candidate’s campaign leadership team. Clinton held a smaller lead in a separate four-way poll that included Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson and Jill Stein of the Green Party. Among likely voters, 41 percent supported Clinton, while 33 percent backed Trump. Johnson was backed by 7 percent and Stein by 2 percent.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll was conducted online in English in all 50 states. Both presidential polls included 1,115 respondents and had a credibility interval, a measure of accuracy, of 3 percentage points.

Philippines’ Duterte: UN pull-out threat a ‘joke’
AFP, Manila Wednesday, 24 August 2016/President Rodrigo Duterte has said his threat to pull the Philippines out of the United Nations for criticizing his deadly crime war was just a “joke”, while attempting a light-hearted wordplay on genocide. Duterte on Sunday said he may withdraw the Philippines from the world body after a UN human rights expert said last week his encouragement of security forces to kill drug suspects violated international law. “Can’t you take a joke,” Duterte told reporters on Tuesday when asked if he was serious. Nearly 2,000 people have been killed since Duterte was sworn into office on June 30 and immediately launched his war on crime, according to the national police chief. Duterte has insisted most of the 756 people confirmed killed by police were drug suspects who resisted arrest, while the others died due to gang members waging warfare against each other. However rights groups, some lawmakers and others have said security forces are engaging in unprecedented extrajudicial killings. The US State Department also this week said it was “deeply concerned” about reports of extrajudicial killings. Duterte on Tuesday criticized Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur on summary executions who said he was violating international law, branding her “ambitious” and “brainless”. Duterte also said Callamard had accused him of genocide, which she did not. “That’s the invention of a woman who wants to commit suicide,” Duterte said, before offering his wordplay. “You can think of genocide, suicide or what, side by side, upper side, whatever, what if upper side or even upside?”

Maryam Rajavi: The Movement to Obtain Justice for the Victims of the 1988 Massacre is Part of the National Movement for Iran's Freedom
Wednesday, 24 August 2016/NCRI - Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, President-elect of the Iranian Resistance, sent a video message on Wednesday to an exhibition in Paris' Mairie du 2e commemorating the 28th anniversary of the 1988 massacre of 30,000 political prisoners in Iran. The following is the text of Mrs. Rajavi’s remarks:
The time has come for the UN to adopt a resolution, condemning this crime. The international community must prosecute Iran's ruling mullahs
Mr. Mayor,
Ladies and gentlemen of the City Council,
Dear friends,
Let me begin by honouring the anniversary of the liberation of Paris, and by paying homage to the heroes who sacrificed their lives for freedom and taught the lesson of perseverance. They showed that we can and we must defeat the enemy even if it appears to be powerful and invincible. It was not the military force, but the power of faith in human values that liberated Paris. Such faith will also be the force to liberate my country which is enchained by a religious dictatorship.
These days, we are commemorating the anniversary of the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners in Iran, a hideous genocide carried out by the mullahs' religious dictatorship.
In summer 1988, Khomeini issued a decree for the massacre of prisoners affiliated to the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran, in which he wrote, "Whoever --in prisons across the country-- continues to persist on his/her position of hypocrisy, is considered the enemy of God and is punishable by death."
Khomeini's Chief Justice asked him whether the decree applied to the prisoners who had already been sentenced to limited jail terms. Khomeini replied, "If anyone, at any stage, persists on hypocrisy, his/her sentence is death. Annihilate the enemies of Islam, at once."
Twenty-eight years after the massacre, an audio recording was published this month of a meeting between Montazeri, Khomeini's incumbent successor, and the officials responsible for the massacre. The meeting had been held in the midst of the carnage.
In this meeting, the officials responsible for the massacre said that they had asked every single member of the PMOI whether they still adhered to the PMOI's ideas. Those who responded positively, were executed. The officials also explained about their plans on how to continue the massacre.
In this meeting, Montazeri said: "The Iranian people are repulsed by the velayat-e-faqih” and “later, they will say that Khomeini was a bloodthirsty and brutal figure.” He added that this was "the greatest crime committed during the Islamic Republic."
Montazeri also revealed in this meeting that Khomeini had made his decision some three to four years before the massacre was actually carried out, to execute "all members of the Mojahedin, including those who read their newspaper, those who read their magazine, and those who read their statements."
Based on this audio recording, those massacred included 15-year-old girls and pregnant women. It was because of such protests that Montazeri was ousted from his position and remained under house arrest until the end of his life.
You might be surprised to learn that one of the main officials responsible for that massacre, namely Mostafa Pour-Mohammadi, is today the Minister of Justice in Rouhani's cabinet.
Western governments have so far remained silent on this great crime against humanity. The time has come for the UN to issue a resolution censuring this crime. The international community must prosecute the mullahs ruling Iran.
We have organized a movement, both inside Iran and on the international level, to obtain justice. This litigation is part of a national movement for Iran's freedom. The martyrs’ families as well as this movement demand that the names of the victims, addresses of their graves and names of the perpetrators of this crime be published.
I urge you and all advocates of human rights to join the people of Iran in this quest for justice.
And I thank you all very much.

Thirty per cent of Iran’s population are suffering from poverty and hunger ...”
NCRI /Wednesday, 24 August 2016
Gulf news published an article today August 24, 2016 titled: “Iran’s abject poverty amidst all its riches”
In this article Mohammad Al Asoomi, in his opening paragraph, after mentioning that “Thirty per cent of Iran’s population are suffering from poverty and hunger ...” expertly defuses the hypocritical narrative used by Iranian regime, stating: “This is not a statement issued by the Iranian opposition group known as the Mujahideen Khalq Organisation (MEK), nor by other Iranian organizations abroad. Or for that matter by any Arab body. It is an official statement issued last week by Ali Akbar Saari, attached to Iranian health ministry,”
The statement has angered ordinary Iranians, who see tens of billions of dollars’ worth of oil revenues getting wasted in financing terrorist organizations or in wars that Iran has nothing to do with. How can one imagine such a high percentage of poor in a country rich in natural resources, particularly in oil and gas.
Iran produces about 4 million oil barrels a day, more than half of which is exported. It is considered one of the world’s three largest gas producers and exporters.
Raising this question is confusing, but will go away when we gain awareness of the economic approach and corrupt economic management embraced by the government. The payroll scandal that toppled many high-profile officials within the regime is merely one example of corruption and mismanagement.
It was expected that the nuclear deal between Iran and the P5+1 group of world powers would improve economic conditions in the republic, but this has not happened. This can be attributed to many reasons, most notably the influence of the mullahs and other power centres who share the gains resulting from the signing of the deal.
As the Iranian regime and its Supreme Leader insist on a hostile approach towards neighbours and wasting the country’s fortunes to serve illusive ideological, sectarian and chauvinist ambitions, the people will continue to suffer. The proportion of poor, hungry and the unemployed has already reached a high of 30 per cent, and will continue to rise among the youth specifically.
The greatest mistake committed by Iran is its policy of indulgence in Arab domestic affairs and its plans to expand the sphere of influence beyond its own borders. Iran does not understand that Arab policies look like the Empty Quarter’s sands, which can swallow up foreigners unfamiliar with the Arab nature, notably Iranians who have yet to understand how dangerous its interference in Arab domestic affairs could be.
No doubt, the obstinacy of Iranian clerics and leaders will inevitably lead to more losses and further economic deterioration and waste of wealth in absurd wars. Iran wasted billions in funding interventions in Syria, Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen, and financing terrorist organizations in the Arabian Gulf and Shiite campaigns in Africa. All these funds have vanished to no avail, and the Iranian people paid dearly.
On the other side, the Gulf countries have managed to safeguard their security, thanks to the fusion of the people and its leadership. In Yemen, the signs of victory looming over the horizon can be seen.
In Syria, the final decision will be determined by Washington and Moscow, while not a single force can decide the fate of Lebanon because it can be determined only by national consensus.
So, is there a sane man among these religious leaders, including the Supreme Leader, who has the courage to think deeply, objectivity and logically to be able to solve the equation of oil and poverty? Can they move on from fanaticism, sectarian ideology and odious chauvinism to raise the living standards of their people and leverage their natural resources for development?
Yet, we do not think so because the regime consists of power centres, mostly from the clergy whose interests are strongly attached to such a sectarian approach, without which they cannot continue to accumulate their fortunes while disregarding peoples’ suffering.
This apparently means that there is only one way for salvation that can solve Iran’s equation of oil and poverty as called for by the Iranian opposition’s conference in Paris last month. Tehran can play a positive developmental role that can be of benefit to its own people and neighboring nations through bilateral cooperation and joint projects based on mutual interests.
But Iran’s extremist totalitarian regime, which seeks to dominate and expand its influence, will not do so.

Iran regime arrests 40 boys and girls for attending mixed-gender party
NCRI/Wednesday, 24 August 2016
NCRI – Iran’s fundamentalist regime has arrested 40 boys and girls in a raid on a party days after dozens of similar arrests were made during a string of raids on mixed-gender parties across the country.
The latest arrests were made in a raid on an overnight mixed-gender party in the Ziarat Village near Gorgan, in northern Iran, the regime’s Prosecutor-General in the city said on Wednesday, August 24.
“The plan to combat social vice and improper veiling is underway by the prosecutor’s office, and the Judiciary will deal with such cases decisively,” said Seyyed Mostafa Haqi, the notorious mullah who is Gorgan’s Prosecutor-General. His remarks were reported on Wednesday by the Mizan Online News Agency which is affiliated to the regime’s Judiciary.
In Shiraz, southern Iran, 63 young men and women were arrested last week in two separate swoops on parties that were deemed “unlawful” by the mullahs’ fundamentalist standards.
“After receiving reports about two parties held in the middle of the night in north-east Shiraz, a joint operation was carried out by the police and another security agency and 63 half-naked boys and girls were arrested,” Colonel Yousef Malek-Zadeh, commander of the regime’s State Security Forces (police) in Shiraz said on Friday, August 19. His remarks were carried on Friday by the Tasnim news agency, affiliated to the regime’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) Quds Force.
Malek-Zadeh added: “In these two mixed-gender parties that took place last night, boys and girls had gathered together under the guise of a birthday celebration. With the arrival of the police, all of them were arrested and sent before the judiciary.”
“Given the attraction of the gardens in the vicinity of Shiraz, the police have tried to fully monitor all the venues and gardens in this region. Police deputies and commanders stringently monitor these venues through snap inspections,” he said. “With the arrival of summer, police monitoring of these venues has been stepped up.”
Separately the regime’s prosecutor-general in Amol, northern Iran, announced on Friday that 20 university students were arrested for attending a mixed-gender party.
Ali Talebi said: “These individuals were arrested at 11pm last night in a residential property in Hezar Street.”
“Following their arrest these individuals were handed over to the local judiciary for prosecution,” he said. His remarks were carried on Friday by the state-run Entekhab website.
“We will deal with anyone in this city who disturbs public order,” he added.
On Tuesday, August 16, state-media reported the arrest of more than 60 boys and girls for attending a mixed-gender party in a park near the capital Tehran.
The arrests took place during a raid on the party which was held in Tehran's Sorkheh Hesar National Park, east of Tehran, the Fars news agency, affiliated to the IRGC, reported on Tuesday, August 16. The raid was carried out by the IRGC's para-military Bassij force with a warrant from the regime's Judiciary signed by Tehran's deputy prosecutor.
The youngsters were caught dancing and partying, and the state-media report claimed that the young women had violated the regime's so-called Islamic dress code.
The report added that the prime suspect behind the "unlawful" party was an individual, identified only as Fariborz G., who had organized the event via social media on the internet.
Commenting on the recent spate of arrests, Shahin Gobadi of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said:
“The clerical regime has never been so isolated at home and loathed by the Iranian people, in particular by the youth and women. As such, it is resorting to more and more repressive measures to confront this growing trend. This once again proves that the notion of moderation under Hassan Rouhani is a total myth. But it also indicates the vulnerable and shaky state of a regime that cannot even tolerate private festivities of the people, particularly the youth. It is becoming more evident that the mullahs are totally paranoid of any social gathering in fear of a popular uprising.”
Last month, the regime arrested 150 boys and girls for attending a mixed-gender birthday party near the capital Tehran.
The arrests took place at an overnight party in a garden in the vicinity of Islamshahr, south-west of Tehran, according to Colonel Mohsen Khancherli, the regime's police commander for the west of Tehran Province.
Khancherli told the Tasnim news agency, affiliated to the regime's terrorist IRGC Quds Force, on July 25: "After we obtained a report about a mixed-gender party in a garden in the vicinity of Islamshahr in the west of Tehran Province, an operation was carried out by the police and another organization, leading to the arrest of dozens of boys and girls."
"Some 150 boys and girls had gathered at the mixed-gender party under the guise of a birthday party in this garden which is situated next to a studio where unlawful music was produced and recorded. Upon arrival of the police, all those present were arrested and sent before the judiciary," he said.
Khancherli claimed that given the popularity of gardens in the west of Tehran Province, the regime's suppressive state security forces (police) are constantly monitoring venues and gardens in that area, with police commanders carrying out snap inspections of sites.
"With the arrival of summer, the police surveillance at these sites will be stepped up," he added.
This followed news days earlier that more than 50 young Iranians were arrested by the regime's suppressive state security forces at a party near Tehran.
The Tasnim news agency reported on July 22 the arrest of more than 50 young men and women at a party in the town of Davamand, east of Tehran.
Tasnim quoted Mojtaba Vahedi, the head of the regime's judiciary in Damavand, as saying that the organizers of the party had invited people to attend via online social networks.
Vahedi added security forces initially monitored the social sphere and after carrying out the necessary investigations obtained a warrant to clamp down on the party and arrest the party-goers.
Judicial files have been opened against those arrested at the party, Vahedi said. He added: "Families must be more vigilant regarding their children to make sure they do not end up in such circumstances."
Some 35 young men and women were flogged in May for taking part in a mixed-gender party after their graduation ceremony near Qazvin city, some 140 kilometers northwest of Tehran, the regime's Prosecutor in the city said on May 26.
Ismaeil Sadeqi Niaraki, a notorious mullah, said a special court session was held after all the young men and women at the party were rounded up, the Mizan news agency, affiliated to the fundamentalist regime's judiciary, reported on May 26.
"After we received information that a large number of men and women were mingling in a villa in the suburbs of Qazvin ... all the participants at the party were arrested," he said.
Niaraki added that the following morning every one of those detained received 99 lashes as punishment by the so-called 'Morality Police.'
According to Niaraki, given the social significance of mixed-gender partying, "this once again required a firm response by the judiciary in quickly reviewing and implementing the law."
"Thanks God that the police questioning, investigation, court hearing, verdict and implementation of the punishment all took place in less than 24 hours," Niaraki added.
The regime’s prosecutor claimed that the judiciary would not tolerate the actions of “law-breakers who use excuses such as freedom and having fun in birthday parties and graduation ceremonies.”
Similar raids have been carried out on mixed-gender parties across Iran in recent months.

International Day of the Disappeared: Indifference to a humanitarian tragedy
ICRC – News release No. 16/93/24 August 2016
The president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Peter Maurer, has called on governments to urgently address the humanitarian issue of missing people: those who disappeared during armed conflict or other situations of violence, natural disasters or migration.
Speaking ahead of the International Day of the Disappeared on 30 August, Mr Maurer said that concerted efforts were needed to ascertain and document the fate of people who had gone missing and to provide families left behind with answers and effective support.
"This is a tragedy affecting millions, but it remains vastly unacknowledged and under-reported. Such indifference is extremely disturbing,” Mr Maurer said. “Disappearances are often a sensitive social and political issue, but that is no excuse for inaction. Governments must generate the political will necessary to provide answers. Steps must be taken to prevent disappearances, and to collect all the information available when people do disappear, because, at some point, this information might help bring answers to families and other loved ones."
Exactly how many people are missing throughout the world is not known, but the ICRC estimates their number to be at least in the hundreds of thousands. They include combatants missing in action, children who became separated from their families when they fled their homes or were forced to join armed groups, detainees unable to contact their families, and internally displaced people and migrants who have lost touch with their loved ones. It should be remembered that large numbers of people are at risk of disappearing every year.
The lack of accurate figures is itself part of the problem. Numbers cannot, however, convey the depth of suffering endured in each individual case. It should therefore be cause for immense concern that the issue of missing people – the full scale of the problem and its impact on families, communities and societies – is often simply ignored.
The ICRC is calling on governments to step up their response, to develop suitable legal frameworks, and the necessary systems and procedures, to account for people reported missing, and to provide effective support to families.
"Those with influence and in a position to help, should take the opportunity of the International Day of the Disappeared to recommit themselves to this issue,” Mr Maurer said. “To remain in the dark, not knowing what has happened to someone you love: imagine the pain this must cause. For the sake of humanity, more has to be done."
**Note to Editors: (products embargoed until 30 August):
Ahead of the International Day of the Disappeared, the ICRC has commissioned a GRAPHIC NOVEL AND ANIMATION from Positive Negatives positivenegatives.org – an agency that produces literary comics that seek to draw attention to human rights abuses and social issues worldwide. This story, “Enrique’s Shadow”, is one woman’s testimony from Colombia, where nearly 79,000 people are estimated to have gone missing during armed conflict and other violence. The story focuses on her 15-year-old brother, Enrique, who ‘is disappeared’ by an armed group. Twenty years later, his family are still searching for him, still struggling with the wounds caused by his disappearance.
Enclosed is an IN BRIEF document (including AV material from different places) with background information, our call for action, global facts and figures, and information on the ICRC’s humanitarian work on this issue.
You are invited to join us for an event, "Clarifying the fate of missing persons: Challenges in international humanitarian law and international human rights law", in the Humanitarium space at ICRC headquarters in Geneva on 30 August from 12 to 2 p.m. (CET). A panel-debate will be held to discuss current challenges in international humanitarian law and international human rights law pertaining to the issue of missing persons and their families. Two short films highlighting the issue, from Nepal and Kosovo, will be screened during the event. Related information and the audio recording will be made available on familylinks.icrc.org
For further information, please contact:
Maria Puy Serra, ICRC Geneva, +41 79 218 76 10
 

"30,000 Souls Taken" exhibition in Paris highlights young victims of 1988 PMOI massacre in Iran
Wednesday, 24 August 2016/NCRI - This Tuesday and Wednesday, an exhibit in the mayor's office of Paris' 2nd district will commemorate the 28th anniversary of the 1988 massacre of 30,000 members and supporters of the People's Mojahiden of Iran (PMOI), the main Iranian resistance group.
The event features posters with portraits of the victims, stating their name, age, and and occupation (many were university students), as well as news article from the time and from later revelations about the extent of the killings. Memoranda, including possessions of prisoners who were executed, are laid out around the room. The overall effect is a chilling evocation of the inner lives of the slain political dissidents.
The 1988 massacre was part of an attempt by the Iranian government to suppress political dissent. The mass arrest of PMOI members was increased before a fatwa was decreed calling for the extermination of PMOI members. What followed was a three-month process of virtually nonstop hanging of political prisoners. The criteria for execution was based on a single question: "What is your political affiliation?" If a prisoner responded that they were PMOI affiliates, they were killed on the spot.Although the public knew the massacre had occurred, its extent was not revealed until 2001 (previously, it was thought that a few thousand had been executed).

Iran: Atena Farghadani congratulated Rouhani’s achievements! including high number of executions on the occasion of “Week of Government.”
Wednesday, 24 August 2016/NCRI - Cartoonist Atena Farghadani who was arrested on January 2015 for drawing a caricature of the members of Majlis (parliament) and was released on May 2016, congratulated Rouhani’s achievements including high number of executions on the occasion of the “Week of Government.”
“Week of Government.”
I congratulate all the statesmen on Government Week!
Congratulations on the rising death penalty statistics in Iran! Congratulations on the joining of women to men and children's scavenging on the streets! Congratulations on the soaring unemployment rate! Congratulations on the inclining the students to peddle in streets and subways! Congratulations on the rising child labor statistics! Congratulations on provoking violence and crimes in society! Congratulations on the rising addiction and psychedelic drugs statistics! Congratulations on the tragedy facing women in Qarchak Prison! Congratulations on extortion and raging inflation! Congratulations on the increasing suicide rate! Congratulations on the water crisis imprudence! Congratulations on whipping up the hard workers instead of kissing their hands! Congratulations on shutting down the factories and destroying the private sector and production in business! Congratulations on the cultural and historical heritage which are on the verge of annihilation! Congratulations on illegal imports! Congratulations on the destruction of farmers in Iran! Congratulations on the flight of students, businessmen, and elites! Finally, I warmly congratulate you on Government Week for the astronomical salaries you receive because of the great jobs you do. ..!

To combat widespread unrest, Iran's Revolutionary Guard Targets 450 Social Media Users
Tuesday, 23 August 2016/NCRI - Following the revelation of a shocking audio tape by the relatives of Hossein-Ali Montazeri, Khomeini's former heir about the massacre of 30000 political prisoners mostly the members of People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran ( PMOI/MEK) 28 years ago (August 14, 1988) by Iranian regime, this tape was distributed widely on social networks.
Today Aug 23, 2016 The Associated Press from Tehran reported that:
"The cyber-arm of Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guard says it has summoned, detained and warned some 450 administrators of social media groups in recent weeks,"The announcement Tuesday, carried on a website affiliated with the Guard's cyber arm, says those detained used social media like the messaging app Telegram, which is popular in Iran.The announcement says those detained or summoned made posts that were considered immoral, were related to modeling, or which insulted religious beliefs. It says the Guard only took action after "judicial procedures" were completed, without elaborating.
In May, authorities announced an operation targeting those involved in modeling on Instagram.

French Muslim body to meet with government on burkini
AFP, Paris Wednesday, 24 August 2016/ The head of the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM) will meet Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve on Wednesday to discuss the burkini bans at the center of a bitter row over Muslim integration. The CFCM “is concerned over the direction the public debate is taking,” the president of the body, Anouar Kbibech, said in a statement calling for an urgent meeting with Cazeneuve, citing the “growing fear of stigmatization of Muslims in France”.The interior ministry later announced the meeting would take place on Wednesday afternoon. Kbibech noted that a few days ago a woman was fined on a beach in Cannes while wearing a simple headscarf and accompanied by her children. The 34-year-old mother, who gave her name only as Siam, told AFP she had been sitting on the beach in leggings, a tunic and a headscarf, when she was fined. “I had no intention of swimming,” she said.
The CFCM said it was also worried about the photos that have emerged of a Muslim woman removing her tunic on a beach in Nice while surrounded by four police officers. The images, which have gone viral, have widely been interpreted as the woman being ordered to remove her tunic by police, although the circumstances remain unclear. She was wearing a sleeveless shirt underneath. “We have seen images of police officers forcing a woman on a Nice beach to remove her tunic when she wasn't even wearing a burkini,” said the statement from the CFCM. “With the difficult and critical situation France is facing after the tragic attacks which deeply affected the country, the CFCM calls for wisdom and responsibility from everyone.” “Today, we need more acts of peace and tolerance,” said Kbibech. France's highest administrative court, the State Council, will on Thursday examine a request by the Human Rights League (LDH) to scrap the bans adopted by some 15 towns and cities across the country. Lower courts have supported the decision by French mayors, with a tribunal in the Riviera city of Nice -- where a crowd was mowed down in July in a grisly truck attack -- said the burkini could “be felt as a defiance or a provocation exacerbating tensions felt by” the community.
 

Latest LCCC Bulletin analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on on August 24-25/16

'Al-Ahram' Columnist: Despite Al-Sisi's Call For Revolution In Religious Discourse, Al-Azhar Scholars Continue On Their Extremist Path

الأزهر يعارض تغيير المسار المتطرف
MEMRI/August 24/16/Special Dispatch No.6585

http://eliasbejjaninews.com/2016/08/24/memri-al-ahram-columnist-despite-al-sisis-call-for-revolution-in-religious-discourse-al-azhar-scholars-continue-on-their-extremist-path%d8%b8%d8%a7%d9%84%d8%a3%d8%b2%d9%87%d8%b1-%d9%8a%d8%b9/

Recently, articles have been published in the Egyptian press attacking Al-Azhar, Egypt's supreme religious authority, on the grounds that its scholars are not doing enough to implement the call of Egyptian President 'Abd Al-Fattah Al-Sisi to "revolutionize" religious discourse, but instead continue to cultivate extremism. Two particularly harsh articles were penned by Ahmad 'Abd Al-Tawab, a columnist for the official daily Al-Ahram. He wrote that one reason for the recent spate of attacks on Copts[1] is Al-Azhar's extremist curricula, which poison people's minds. He added that, despite ostensibly welcoming Al-Sisi's call to reform the religious discourse, Al-Azhar has in fact done nothing to realize this call. [2] The following are excerpts from his articles:
Al-Azhar's Poisonous Curricula Are Responsible For Attacks On Copts; Al-Azhar Accuses Anyone Who Disagrees With It Of Heresy
In his first article, 'Abd Al-Tawab wrote: "[Let me say,] without beating about the bush, that the Al-Azhar institutions have not taken a single serious step in response to President Al-Sisi's call for a religious revolution.[3] [Here is] one example of this strange state of affairs. The state collects taxes from all its citizens, Muslims and Copts, which join its other revenues that benefit both Muslims and Copts. These funds pay for various public [services], among them education, which includes Al-Azhar and its institutions and university. [Yet Al-Azhar's] students are taught using poisonous curricula that harm the tax payer more than anyone else, and especially the Copts! In other words, society pays to train, educate and cultivate a group [of graduates] that hates society and is hostile to it and attacks it as it pleases! To this very day, Al-Azhar, with its curricula, continues to teach its students to level accusations of heresy at anyone who disagrees with them and to define the construction of churches as a crime. In some of the classes [taught at Al-Azhar], it is stated that churches should be banned in [all] countries that the early Muslims conquered by the force of arms, including Egypt. In addition,[students] are taught that anyone who does not pray – or even prays without first performing the ritual ablutions – must be killed, and the crime of his murder can be taken lightly.
"Some researchers and intellectuals make an effort to inform the public of these frightening facts, among them [Egyptian lawyer and Islamic researcher] Ahmad Abdu Maher. He points out that Al-Azhar scholars have accused him of heresy while they refuse to accuse ISIS of heresy.[4] In fact, some Al-Azhar scholars have [even] said that participating in the [international] coalition to fight ISIS is treason against Allah and His Messenger.
"Hence, it is a mistake to say that the attacks currently taking place against Copts in Minya and elsewhere are the acts of individuals [and not part of a larger phenomenon]. [Al-Azhar] students will continue to study until they attain a certificate or a license to preach at a mosque, and then they will spread what they learned among the worshipers.
"Nearly two years have passed since the President's call [for a religious revolution], which was [ostensibly] welcomed by the Al-Azhar scholars. But time proves that they [merely pretended to] show flexibility, so that the wave would pass [over them] quietly. This underscores the importance of forming a national committee to handle this task, which can include Al-Azhar scholars as long as they are not a majority that will take over [the committees'] decisions. Otherwise we will be swept into further waste of time and effort and enable extremism to increase even more."[5]
Al-Azhar Is Not Helping To Promote Al-Sisi's Religious Revolution
In his second article, 'Abd al-Tawab discussed Al-Sisi's meeting with Al-Azhar Sheikh Al-Tayeb following the uniform sermon crisis,[6] and repeated his claim that, despite ostensibly welcoming Al-Sisi's call to reform the religious discourse, Al-Azhar has in fact done nothing to promote this cause. He wrote: "There is a need, even a crucial need, for this revolution [as part of] the effort to institute a constitution that lays the foundations for a modern state. [This must be done] by strengthening the freedoms and defending them, including the freedom of worship, of scientific research, of literary and artistic creativity, etc., and also by strengthening all the international treaties to which Egypt is signatory.
"Al-Azhar's clerics were quick to welcome the president's call for a [religious] revolution, but this was never translated into action on the ground. In fact, for more than two years [Al-Azhar's] activity has been in the opposite direction: it has mercilessly attacked anyone with a differing opinion without hesitating to use the weapon of accusations of heresy, or to file lawsuits that placed several people behind bars, and this based on laws that are assumed to require amendment as soon as possible in order to adapt them to the new constitution."
"The hoped-for change [in the religious discourse] will not be achieved by means of a breakthrough in combatting extremist ideology on the internet. That is a waste of time and effort [because it is an attempt to] treat the symptoms and the outcomes [of extremism] instead of focusing on the right things – such as [reforming] the curricula that still contain horrifying expressions, improving the teachers and adapting them to the spirit of the times, dismissing extremists from senior positions, and enforcing the [state] law instead of [holding] traditional reconciliation [sessions with the Copts]..."[7]
Endnotes:
[1] Recently there has been an escalation in attacks on Copts in Egypt, especially in the rural governorates of Minya and Beni Suef, and mainly due to rumors that Copts are using private homes in various villages as churches.
[2] In a third article about Al-Azhar, 'Abd Al-Tawab criticized its involvement in Egypt's foreign policy, after Al-Azhar Sheikh Ahmed Al-Tayeb met with Egypt's new ambassadors. Al-Ahram (Egypt), August 18, 2016. Also noteworthy was an article by Al-Ahram columnist Muhammad Al-Dasuqi, who likewise wrote that this institute was not reforming the religious discourse (Al-Ahram, Egypt, June 20, 2016), and an article was by journalist Khaled Al-Montasser, who wrote in Al-Watan on June 24, 2016 that Al-Azhar was delaying the publication of a comprehensive paper on the renewal of religious discourse written by senior Al-Azhar scholar Dr. Salah Fadl. Al-Watan also published a series of articles about corruption in Al-Azhar's institutions. See Al-Watan (Egypt), August 3, 2016; July 13, 20, 27, 2016; June 8, 15, 22, 29, 2016, May 4, 11, 25, 2016; April 13, 20, 2016.
[3] Al-Sisi called for a "religious revolution" in a December 2014 speech. Even before this he endorsed the call made by Mansour Adly, who served as interim president of Egypt before Al-Sisi's election, to "renew the religious discourse." See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 6114, Egyptian Columnists On Al-Sisi Regime's Campaign For 'Renewal Of Religious Discourse' As A Way Of Fighting Terrorism, July 23, 2015.
[4] On Al-Azhar's refusal to call ISIS heretical, see MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 5910, Al-Azhar: The Islamic State (ISIS) Is A Terrorist Organization, But It Must Not Be Accused Of Heresy, December 21, 2014.
[5] Al-Ahram (Egypt), July 25, 2016.
[6] On this affair, see MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 6556, Egypt's Al-Azhar Opposes Ministry Of Religious Endowments Plan For Uniform Friday Sermon, August 4, 2016.
[7] Al-Ahram (Egypt), August 6, 2016. "Traditional reconciliation" refers to extra-judicial "community justice meetings" that have been used to affect a reconciliation between Muslims and Copts following clashes between the communities. Many Copts, as well as others in Egypt, have protested this practice, claiming that it is used as a way to avoid prosecuting Muslims for violence against Copts or to persuade the Copts to forgo their legal rights. See for example Al-Ahram (Egypt), July 9, 2016; Al-Yawm Al-Sabi' (Egypt), July 27, 2016; copticsolidarity.org, August 8, 2016; dailynewsegypt.com, May 29, 2016. The "Egyptians against Discrimination" rights group recently held a demonstration in front of the prosecutor general's office in Cairo in which they protested these reconciliation meetings and accused the state of "conspiring" with the perpetrators of attacks on Copts. Al-Ahram (Egypt), August 16, 2016; Al-Wafd (Egypt), August 15, 2016.
 

Dr. Ahmed al-Tayeb: Meet the World’s “Most Influential Muslim”
التناقض الكبير بين مواقف د. أحمد الطيب لمفاهيم الإسلام عربياً وغربياً
Raymond Ibrahim /FrontPage Magazine/August 24/16
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/2016/08/24/raymond-ibrahim-frontpage-magazinemeet-the-worlds-most-influential-muslimdr-ahmed-al-tayeb%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D9%86%D8%A7%D9%82%D8%B6-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%83%D8%A8%D9%8A%D8%B1/

https://outlook.live.com/owa/?id=64855&path=/mail/inbox/rp

There’s nothing like knowing Arabic—that is, being privy to the Muslim world’s internal conversations on a daily basis—to disabuse oneself of the supposed differences between so-called “moderate” and “radical” Muslims.
Consider the case of Egypt’s Dr. Ahmed al-Tayeb. Hardly one to be dismissed as a fanatic who is ignorant of the true tenets of Islam, Tayeb’s credentials and career are impressive: he holds a Ph. D in Islamic philosophy from the Paris-Sorbonne University; formerly served as Grand Imam of Egypt, meaning he was the supreme interpreter of Islamic law; and since 2003 has been president of Al-Azhar University, considered the world’s leading institution of Islamic learning. A 2013 survey named Tayeb the “most influential Muslim in the world.”
He is also regularly described by Western media and academia as a “moderate.” Georgetown University presents him as “a strong proponent of interfaith dialogue.” According to The National, “He is considered to be one of the most moderate and enlightened Sunni clerics in Egypt.” In February 2015, the Wall Street Journal praised him for making “one of the most sweeping calls yet for educational reform in the Muslim world to combat the escalation of extremist violence.”
Most recently he was invited to the Vatican and warmly embraced by Pope Francis. Al Azhar had angrily cut off all ties with the Vatican five years earlier when, in the words of U.S. News, former Pope Benedict “had demanded greater protection for Christians in Egypt after a New Year’s bombing on a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria killed 21 people. Since then, Islamic attacks on Christians in the region have only increased.”
Pope Francis referenced his meeting with Tayeb as proof that Muslims are peaceful: “I had a long conversation with the imam, the Grand Imam of the Al-Azhar University, and I know how they think. They [Muslims] seek peace, encounter.”
How does one reconcile Tayeb’s benevolent image in the West with his reality in Egypt?
For instance, all throughout the month of Ramadan last June, Tayeb appeared on Egyptian TV explaining all things Islamic—often in ways that do not suggest that Islam seeks “peace, encounter.”
During one episode, he reaffirmed a phrase that is almost exclusively associated with radicals: in Arabic, al-din wa’l-dawla, meaning “the religion and the polity”—a phrase that holds Islam to be both a religion and a body of rules governing society and state.
He did so in the context of discussing the efforts of Dr. Ali Abdel Raziq, a true reformer and former professor at Al Azhar who wrote a popular but controversial book in 1925, one year after the abolition of the Ottoman caliphate. Titled, in translation, Islam and the Roots of Governance, Raziq argued against the idea of resurrecting the caliphate, saying that Islam is a personal religion that should no longer be mixed with politics or governance.
Raziq was vehemently criticized by many clerics and even fired from Al Azhar. Concluded Tayeb, with assent:
Al Azhar’s position was to reject his position, saying he forfeited his credentials and his creed. A great many ulema—in and out of Egypt and in Al Azhar—rejected his work and its claim, that Islam is a religion but not a polity. Instead, they reaffirmed that Islam is both a religion and a polity [literally, al-din wa’l-dawla].
The problem with the idea that Islam must govern the whole of society should be obvious: Sharia, or Islamic law, which is what every Muslim including Tayeb refer to when they say that Islam is a polity, is fundamentally at odds with modern notions of human rights and, due to its supremacist and “anti-infidel” aspects, the source of conflict between Muslims and non-Muslims the world over.
That this is the case was made clear during another of Tayeb’s recent episodes. On the question of apostasy in Islam—whether a Muslim has the right to abandon Islam for another or no religion—the “radical” position is well known: unrepentant apostates are to be punished with death.
Yet Tayeb made the same pronouncement. During another Ramadan episode he said that “Contemporary apostasy presents itself in the guise of crimes, assaults, and grand treason, so we deal with it now as a crime that must be opposed and punished.”
While his main point was that those who do not follow Islam are prone to being criminals, he especially emphasized those who exhibit their apostasy as being a “great danger to Islamic society. And that’s because his apostasy is a result of his hatred for Islam and a reflection of his opposition to it. In my opinion, this is grand treason.”
Tayeb added what all Muslims know: “Those learned in Islamic law [al-fuqaha] and the imams of the four schools of jurisprudence consider apostasy a crime and agree that the apostate must either renounce his apostasy or else be killed.” He even cited a hadith, or tradition, of Islam’s prophet Muhammad calling for the execution of Muslims who quit Islam.
Meanwhile, when speaking to Western and non-Muslim audiences, as he did during his recent European tour, Tayeb tells them what they want to hear. Recently speaking before an international forum he asserted that “The Quran states that there is no compulsion in religion,” and that “attempts to force people into a religion are against the will of God.” Similarly, when meeting with the Italian Senate’s Foreign Policy Commission Pier Ferdinando Casini and his accompanying delegation, Tayeb “asserted that Islam is the religion of peace, cooperation and mercy…. Islam believes in freedom of expression and human rights, and recognizes the rights of all human beings.”
While such open hypocrisy—also known as taqiyya—may go unnoticed in the West, in Egypt, human rights groups often call him out. The Cairo Institute for Human Rights recently issued a statement accusing Al Azhar of having two faces: one directed at the West and which preaches freedom and tolerance, and one directed to Muslims and which sounds not unlike ISIS:
In March 2016 before the German parliament, Sheikh al-Tayeb made unequivocally clear that religious freedom is guaranteed by the Koran, while in Cairo he makes the exact opposite claims…. Combating terrorism and radical religious ideologies will not be accomplished by directing at the West and its international institutions religious dialogues that are open, support international peace and respect freedoms and rights, while internally promoting ideas that contribute to the dissemination of violent extremism through the media and educational curricula of Al Azhar and the mosques.
At any rate, if Tayeb holds such draconian views on apostasy from Islam—that is, when he’s speaking in Arabic to fellow Muslims—what is his position concerning the Islamic State? Last December, Tayeb was asked why Al Azhar refuses to issue a formal statement denouncing the genocidal terrorist organization as lapsing into a state of kufr, that is, of becoming un-Islamic, or “infidel.” Tayeb responded:
Al Azhar cannot accuse any [Muslim] of being a kafir [infidel], as long as he believes in Allah and the Last Day—even if he commits every atrocity…. I cannot denounce ISIS as un-Islamic, but I can say that they cause corruption on earth.
As critics, such as Egyptian talk show host Ibrahim Eissa pointed out, however, “It’s amazing. Al Azhar insists ISIS are Muslims and refuses to denounce them. Yet Al Azhar never ceases to shoot out statements accusing novelists, writers, thinkers—anyone who says anything that contradicts their views—of lapsing into a state of infidelity. But not when it comes to ISIS!”
This should not be surprising considering that many insiders accuse Al Azhar of teaching and legitimizing the atrocities that ISIS commits. Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah Nasr, a scholar of Islamic law and Al Azhar graduate once exposed his alma mater in a televised interview:
It [Al Azhar] can’t [condemn the Islamic State as un-Islamic]. The Islamic State is a byproduct of Al Azhar’s programs. So can Al Azhar denounce itself as un-Islamic? Al Azhar says there must be a caliphate and that it is an obligation for the Muslim world [to establish it]. Al Azhar teaches the law of apostasy and killing the apostate. Al Azhar is hostile towards religious minorities, and teaches things like not building churches, etc. Al Azhar upholds the institution of jizya. Al Azhar teaches stoning people. So can Al Azhar denounce itself as un-Islamic?
Similarly, while discussing how the Islamic State burns some of its victims alive—most notoriously, a Jordanian pilot—Egyptian journalist Yusuf al-Husayni remarked on his satellite program that “The Islamic State is only doing what Al Azhar teaches. He went on to quote from textbooks used in Al Azhar that permit burning people—more specifically, “infidels”—alive.
Meanwhile, Tayeb—the face of and brain behind Al Azhar—holds that Europe “must support all moderate Islamic institutions that adopt the Al-Azhar curriculum,” which “is the most eligible one for educating the youth.” He said this during “a tour [in Germany and France] to facilitate dialogue between the East and the West.”
As for the ongoing persecution of Egypt’s most visible non-Muslim minorities, the Coptic Christians, Tayeb is renowned for turning a blind eye. Despite the well-documented “severe persecution” Christians experience in Egypt; despite the fact that Muslim mobs attack Christians almost “every two to three days” now—recent examples include the burning of churches and Christian homes, the coldblooded murder of a Coptic man defending his grandchild from Muslim bullies, and the stripping, beating, and parading in the nude of a 70-year-old Christian woman—Tayeb recently told Coptic Christian Pope Tawadros that “Egypt represents the ultimate and highest example of national unity” between Muslims and Christians.
Although he vociferously denounces the displacement of non-Egyptian Muslims in Buddhist Myanmar, he doesn’t have a single word for the persecution and displacement of the Copts, that is, his own Egyptian countrymen. Instead he proclaims that “the Copts have been living in Egypt for over 14 centuries in safety, and there is no need for all this artificial concern over them,” adding that “true terrorism was created by the West.”
Indeed, far from speaking up on behalf of Egypt’s Christian minorities, he has confirmed that they are “infidels”—that same label he refused to describe ISIS with. While he did so in a technical manner—correctly saying that, as rejecters of Muhammad’s prophecy, Christians are infidels [kafir]—he also knows that labeling them as such validates all the animosity they feel and experience in Egypt, since the mortal enemy of the Muslim is the infidel.
This is consistent with the fact that Al Azhar encourages enmity for non-Muslims, specifically Coptic Christians, and even incites for their murder. As Egyptian political commentator Dr. Khalid al-Montaser once marveled:
Is it possible at this sensitive time — when murderous terrorists rest on [Islamic] texts and understandings of takfir [accusing Muslims of apostasy], murder, slaughter, and beheading — that Al Azhar magazine is offering free of charge a book whose latter half and every page — indeed every few lines — ends with “whoever disbelieves [non-Muslims] strike off his head”?
The prestigious Islamic university—which co-hosted U.S. President Obama’s 2009 “A New Beginning” speech—has even issued a free booklet dedicated to proving that Christianity is a “failed religion.”
One can go on and on. Tayeb once explained with assent why Islamic law permits a Muslim man to marry a Christian woman, but forbids a Muslim woman from marrying a Christian man: since women by nature are subordinate to men, it’s fine if the woman is an infidel, as her superior Muslim husband will keep her in check; but if the woman is a Muslim, it is not right that she be under the authority of an infidel. Similarly, Western liberals may be especially distraught to learn that Tayeb once boasted, “You will never one day find a Muslim society that permits sexual freedom, homosexuality, etc., etc., as rights. Muslim societies see these as sicknesses that need to be resisted and opposed.”
To recap, while secular Western talking heads that don’t know the first thing about Islam continue squealing about how it is being “misunderstood,” here is arguably the Muslim world’s leading authority confirming many of the cardinal points held by ISIS: he believes that Islam is not just a religion to be practiced privately but rather is a totalitarian system designed to govern the whole of society through the implementation of its human rights abusing Sharia; he supports one of the most inhumane laws, punishment of the Muslim who wishes to leave Islam; he downplays the plight of Egypt’s persecuted Christians, that is, when he’s not inciting against them by classifying them as “infidels”—the worst category in Islam’s lexicon—even as he refuses to denounce the genocidal Islamic State likewise.
Yet this well credentialed and respected scholar of Islam is considered a “moderate” by Western universities and media, from Georgetown University to the Wall Street Journal. He is someone whom Pope Francis trusts, embraces, and quotes to reassure the West of Islam’s peacefulness.
In all fairness of course, Tayeb is neither a “moderate” nor a “radical.” He’s merely a Muslim trying to be true to Islam. Put differently, he’s merely a messenger.
Critics would be advised to take it up with the Message itself.

France: The Religious War Few Wish to Face
George Igler/Gatestone Institute/August 24/16
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/8737/france-religious-war
Until a few years ago, the unique recipe for secularism adopted by the French seemed able to guarantee the assimilation of the country's burgeoning number of Muslims, something now, by criminal and terrorist activity in the country, proven a resolute failure.
Next year's election results might signal the beginning of the end for laïcité, the long-held French principle of strict prohibition against religious influence in the determination of state policies.
The remains of St. Denis, the patron saint of Paris, who was decapitated in the year 250 during the brutal pagan persecution of Christians, lie north of the French capital in the basilica that bears his name.
The church is historically noteworthy as the first proper work of Gothic architecture, a style influenced by the Crusades. The basilica is now a rarely visited Parisian landmark, lying as it does within the profoundly Islamized enclave of Seine-Saint-Denis.
"You Christians, you kill us," were the words of the ISIS knifeman who slit the throat of 85-year old Father Jacques Hamel. The elderly priest officiating at the altar of the church of Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray -- a mere three kilometres from the centre of Rouen in Normandy -- was slain on July 25, as the two terrorists also took nuns hostage. The terrorists were then shot by police.
On August 5, police swept down on a man shouting "Allahu Akbar" ["Allah is the Greatest"] on the Champs-Élysées, the famous central thoroughfare of the capital of France. Video of the arrest shows passers-by: veiled Muslims, tourists, and presumably indigenous French men and women.
Both of these incidents, when aligned with recent mass outrages across France, including the Bataclan Theatre slaughter on November 13, and the mass carnage caused by a jihadist plot in Nice on July 14, point to a startling reality.
Despite the rhetoric by the government of Prime Minister Manuel Valls on removing dual nationality from those guilty of terrorism offences and closing extremist mosques (20 of France's 2,500 alleged mosques have been closed down to date), the violent consequences of jihadism are a daily reality and concern stalking the heart of most French metropolitan districts.
At 7.5% of the population, Muslims in France make up the highest concentration of Muslims of any country in Europe, according to Pew Research.
For decades, those warning of the inevitable consequences of mass Muslim immigration, during a time in history when Islamic fundamentalist doctrine was on the rise worldwide, have been maligned, prosecuted, imprisoned or assassinated.
With the security infrastructure now proving inadequate to cope with the sheer scale of enthusiasm for religious war amongst those Islamists born in France, and those able to enter the country -- thanks to the open border policies of the EU -- the threat continues to increase day by day.
Close to the Champs-Élysées, which runs between the Louvre museum and the Arc de Triomphe, lies the official residence of the president of France.
Presently occupied by the Socialist François Hollande, who closely courted the Muslim vote to gain power in 2012, many French people are looking towards the presidential elections scheduled for April and May 2017, to provide a new occupant of the Élysée Palace in the form of Marine Le Pen.
Le Pen leads the Front National, a party with deeply disturbing roots in the form of its anti-Semitic founder Jean-Marie Le Pen (father of Marine Le Pen), who in the wake of the Bataclan attack called for the return of the guillotine.
The form of execution made infamous during the French Revolution preceded successive Republics in France that were rigorously antithetical to the inclusion of religious matters in political affairs.
Until a few years ago, the unique recipe for secularism adopted by the French seemed able to guarantee the assimilation of the country's burgeoning number of Muslims, something now, by criminal and terrorist activity in the country, proven a resolute failure.
People in France intimately link the ascendancy of the Front National with the increased incidence of terrorism in France, given the rigorous unwelcoming line the party has taken on Islamic immigration.
In response to the Nice massacre, in which a Tunisian resident of France named Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel ploughed a truck into revellers enjoying fireworks, the leader of the Front National called for the resignation of the French Interior Minister.
"In any other country in the world, a minister with a toll as horrendous as Bernard Cazeneuve -- 250 dead in 18 months -- would have quit," she added.
Marine Le Pen also went on to excoriate, "the same old solemn declarations," from France's present government, which appear to follow every terrorist outrage -- a situation that led Le Pen to remark:
"The war against the scourge of fundamentalism hasn't started, it must now be declared. That is the deep wish of the French, and I will put all my energy so that they are finally heard and the necessary fight is finally undertaken."
In a telling move, the president of the regional council of Nice, Christian Estrosi, added to the chorus of criticism of the government. He questioned whether, despite being in a state of emergency, France had either the policing numbers or expertise to face its terror threat.
After a cascade of terrorist massacres that began with the slaughter of the staff of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo on January 7, 2015, the most terrorism-scarred country in Europe has erupted into successive outpourings of grief. Now, admits Time magazine, this grief is turning into anger.
In order for the Front National to prove successful at next year's Presidential Elections, it will need to defeat the other right-wing force in France, and survive through two rounds of voting.
The Union pour un mouvement populaire party (UMP) is led by former President Nicolas Sarkozy, who exclaimed after Nice that, "Someone who shoots at French people, someone who kills, someone who wants jihad, does not have a place in France."
Yet, for many, as the president of France from 2007-12, Sarkozy bears significant responsibility for creating the conditions in which fundamentalism was able to take root and prosper in France.
If Le Pen proves the eventual victor in the next presidential elections in France -- a nation increasingly focused on religious affairs, occasioned by the country's radically altering demography -- a significant change in its political direction will undoubtedly arise.
The election results might signal the beginning of the end for laïcité, the long-held French principle of strict prohibition against religious influence in the determination of state policies.
A rising star of the Front National is Marion Marechal-Le Pen, Marine Le Pen's niece, who has stated that, "Christians must stand up to resist Islam." The 26-year old has also urged her fellow countrymen to join the military adding that, "Either we kill Islamism or it will kill us."
In response to the Nice massacre, 2,500 young French people have joined the nation's reserve forces.
A conservative Catholic favouring the "traditional family," Marion Marechal-Le Pen has repeatedly spoken of "true French" identity, and demanded that Muslims adopt values rooted in Christianity, according to the BBC.
Echoing her niece's views, Marine Le Pen erupted in fury at the sight of French riot police dragging a priest and his congregation from the church of St Rita in Paris on August 3, prior to its scheduled demolition to make way for a parking lot.
"And what if they built parking lots in the place of Salafist mosques, and not of our churches?" she said.
On August 3, French riot police dragged a priest and his congregation from the church of St Rita in Paris, prior to its scheduled demolition to make way for a parking lot. Front National leader Marine Le Pen said in fury: "And what if they built parking lots in the place of Salafist mosques, and not of our churches?" (Image source: RT video screenshot)
It is not necessary to speculate about the scenes on French streets that would result from similar footage if the same treatment were meted out to an imam and his congregation.
A new focus on religious minority issues in France, in the fraught desire to create some sort of harmonious balance in an increasingly divided nation, seems probable.
How successful such efforts are likely to be, however, remains to be seen.
**George Igler, between 2010 and 2016, worked with those facing death for criticizing Islam across Europe.
© 2016 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

Why There Can Be No "Demilitarized" Palestinian State
Louis René Beres/Gatestone Institute/August 24/16
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/8740/demilitarized-palestinian-state
Any treaty or treaty-like compact is void if, at the time of its entry into force, it conflicts with a "peremptory" rule of international law – that is, one from which "no derogation is permitted." As the right of sovereign states to maintain military forces for self-defense is always such a rule, Palestine would be within its lawful right to abrogate any pre-independence agreement that had (impermissibly) compelled its own demilitarization.
The Palestinian Authority (PA), now officially a Nonmember Observer State to the United Nations General Assembly, will likely seek next month a Security Council resolution favoring full Palestinian sovereignty, probably as part of a cooperative Security Council initiative with France. Following such an initiative, the current U.S. president, or the next U.S. president could then be moved to accept the PA position on the grounds of some prior Palestinian "demilitarization." Unfortunately, any such acceptance would be without any legal or practical value; therefore, no state of Palestine should ever be approved because of any apparent promise of demilitarization.
Whoever wins the November election, the next U.S. president will have to deal with the continuing issue of Palestinian statehood. For the moment, agreeing to any such new Arab sovereignty -- a 23rd Arab state -- would appear to be contingent upon some prior acceptance of Palestinian "demilitarization." After all, for a new president to disregard this seemingly prudent contingency would immediately place the United States in stark opposition to Israel.
More precisely, it would put Washington at odds with the core requirements already laid down explicitly by Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Nonetheless, there is substantial irony to this obligation. Simply put, meaningful Palestinian demilitarization could never take place. In essence, international jurisprudence could not allow it. First, international law would not necessarily expect Palestinian compliance with any limitations on negotiated agreements concerning national armies and armed forces.
But what if the government of a fully sovereign Palestinian state were in fact willing to consider itself bound by some pre-state agreement to demilitarize? There is still a big problem. Even in these improbable circumstances, the new Palestinian Arab government could likely identify ample pretext and opportunity to invoke lawful "treaty" termination. Here are some specific examples:
Palestine could withdraw from any such agreement because of what it would regard as a "material breach," a purported violation by Israel, one that had allegedly undermined the object or purpose of the accord. It could also point to what international law calls Rebus sic stantibus: "permissible abrogation," known more popularly as a "fundamental change of circumstances." If Palestine should declare itself vulnerable to previously unforeseen dangers, perhaps even from interventionary forces, or the forces of other Arab armies or insurgencies that it could claim might be trying to occupy it, it could lawfully end its previously codified commitment to stay demilitarized.
There is another reason why any hopes for Palestinian demilitarization must remain unsupportable. After declaring independence, a Palestinian government -- any Palestinian government -- could point to particular pre-independence errors of fact, or to duress, as appropriate grounds for invoking selective agreement termination. In this regard, the grounds that may be invoked under domestic law to invalidate contracts could also apply under international law, whether to actual treaties, or, as in this particular case, to lesser treaty-like agreements.
Further, strictly speaking, recalling the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969), an authentic treaty must always be "between states."
Above all, however, any treaty or treaty-like compact is void if, at the time of its entry into force, it conflicts with a "peremptory" rule of international law -- that is, one from which "no derogation is permitted." As the right of sovereign states to maintain military forces for self-defense is always such a rule, Palestine would be within its lawful right to abrogate any pre-independence agreement that had (impermissibly) compelled its own demilitarization.
The next U.S. president, it follows, should take no comfort from any purportedly legal promises of Palestinian demilitarization. Should the government of any future Palestinian state choose to invite foreign armies or terrorists on to its territory, even after the original government had been overthrown by more militantly jihadist or Islamic forces, it could do so not only without practical difficulties, but also without necessarily violating international law.
In the end, the core danger to Israel of presumed Palestinian demilitarization would be far more practical than legal. The illusion of demilitarization without the ability to enforce it could be a potentially lethal threat. Even now, prevailing versions of the Middle East peace process generally stem from the persistent misunderstanding of Palestinian history and goals. From the start, every Palestinian faction has regarded all of Israel as "Occupied Palestine." From the beginning, not a single Palestinian faction has ever expressed satisfaction with a new state that would be confined to West Bank (Judea/Samaria) and Gaza.
Palestinian Authority leaders, official television, schools and media outlets often display maps showing Palestine stretching from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea. The maps do not show the existence of Israel.
The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was formed in 1964, three years before there were any "Israeli-Occupied Territories." What, then, was the PLO originally planning to "liberate?" Even now, the Palestinians remain as divided as ever; it remains unclear, therefore, who can speak with real authority for any still-plausible Palestinian state. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas is in the eleventh year of his four-year term; should he agree to anything substantive, others could later legitimately claim, long after land may have been irreversibly "exchanged," that he had no legal authority to make a decision, and they would be right.
Moreover, for Israel and the United States, this insurmountable condition of fragmentation complicates any still-lingering hopes hope for Palestinian demilitarization.
A Palestinian state -- any Palestinian state -- could represent a mortal danger to Israel, especially if it should appear at approximately the same time as Iranian nuclearization. This danger could not be removed or even reduced by any pre-independence Palestinian commitments to demilitarize.
The next U.S. president will need to be prepared to do whatever is necessary to prevent the creation of another enemy state. Palestine would have a high probability of quickly becoming a new launching point for jihadist terror attacks around the region, and possibly the world.
*Louis René Beres is Emeritus Professor of International Law at Purdue University.
© 2016 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

Omran Daqneesh will soon be forgotten
Diana Moukalled/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
How long will the shock of Syrian boy Omran Daqneesh’s photos last? Will we remember his gaze, the dust that covered him, his bloodied forehead and beautiful hair for just a few days, or perhaps a little more? One could not but be touched by the photos of Daqneesh, who escaped death following bombing either by the Syrian regime or Russia in Aleppo. He was in shock and unable to even shed a tear as he sat on a chair in an ambulance. His photo made us cry a lot, while he himself could not cry or voice his fear. However, the real sorrow is that despite global media attention, the effect of his photo will quickly fade away and meet the same fate as thousands of others taken in Syria in the past six years. This happened with the photo of Syrian boy Aylan Kurdi who drowned in the Mediterranean, and with 11,000 photos documenting what the regime has done in its prisons. For the past six years, we would grieve over a photo then forget about it the next day. Laziness and lack of interest soon prevail over emotions, so pressure to reach a solution decreases.For the past six years, we would grieve over a photo then forget about it the next day. Laziness and lack of interest soon prevail over emotions, so pressure to reach a solution decreases
Modern war coverage
Perhaps the Spanish civil war was the first conflict to be covered with close-up photos of the battlefield and civilians. It has been decades since photojournalists began documenting wars and circulating their brutal images. With the war in Syria, thanks to the development of cameras, smart phones and social networking sites, it is possible to circulate photos across the globe in seconds. This has happened a lot during the conflict. In Syria, photojournalists, citizens and activists have made exceptional efforts to cover events in order to convey the truth of what is happening. In risking their lives to take these photos, they all share the desire to have them contribute to ending people’s suffering and not repeating tragedies. However, in Syria a photo’s ability to achieve change has been destroyed. Photos conveying violence continue to surface, yet no one can put an end to the violence. We have been touched by Daqneesh’s photo, but when it comes to the Syrian tragedy, the only thing we are capable of is looking the other way. This article was first published in Asharq al-Awsat on Aug. 22, 2016.

France’s tough act on Muslims is causing divides not fighting terror
Peter Harrison/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
There’s no denying the fact that the French have good reason to be angry – they have fallen victim to numerous attacks carried out by people either pledging allegiance to, or claiming to be influenced by ISIS in the past couple of years. The terror group made its intentions perfectly clear towards France when it said it would target the European nation. Its official spokesman Abu Mohammed al-Adnani urged Muslims to “kill a disbelieving American or European - especially the spiteful and filthy French”. But the French are not the only European nation to be targeted by what former UK Prime Minister David Cameron referred to as the Death Cult. There have been numerous cold blooded killings in the streets of Britain carried out by people claiming to be doing so in the name of Islam. But the way the two nations have reacted to the ongoing threat has seemingly been very different. France has systematically targeted Muslim women by banning full faced veils, and even now prevented them from wearing the Burkinis on several of the country’s beaches – citing public order as its justification. Arguably the moves have led to increased prejudice and violence towards Muslims living there, despite them being France’s largest minority group and the highest concentration of Muslims in all of Europe – that’s a lot of tax payers contributing to French society. Following the spate of attacks across France, including the murder of a priest and the lorry which ploughed in crowds in Nice on Bastille Day there has been an increase in hate crimes against Muslims in the country. There are those in the British Isles who believe that the country has gone to the other extreme, with the rights of suspected militants being apparently protected more than the safety of law abiding citizens.
Stigmatizing population
Yet France’s government seems to be playing right into the hands of ISIS by stigmatizing it’s five million Muslims with acts like banning full-body bathing suits, rather than combatting the divisions.
Recently French PM Manuel Valls warned that the militants were aiming to “set the French people against each other (and) attack religion in order to start a war of religions”. French newspaper Le Monde reported that ISIS’ strategy ‘was to make life so uncomfortable for Muslims in France that they would end up joining the militants’. Britain has slightly more than three million Muslims – and only a truly ignorant person would try to claim that these Muslims lead their day-to-day lives free of bigotry and harassment. Indeed after various attacks in the UK there have been calls for Muslims to stand up and denounce the militants. This in itself sparked a great deal of debate in Britain and eventually most agreed it was unreasonable to expect every Muslim to denounce every incident carried out by someone claiming to be carrying out a heinous act in the name of Islam. And of course there are extreme right wing groups that have been created for the sole purpose of pushing Islam out of Britain. But it seems the difference with the UK is that eventually sense does seem to have prevailed and the government – while not even close to being perfect – has avoided creating any legislation that is as blatantly prejudice as the burka ban.
There are those in the British Isles who believe that the country has gone to the other extreme, with the rights of suspected militants being apparently protected more than the safety of law abiding citizens. It took the British government eight years of legal battles before it was able to extradite Abu Hamza to the US where he was to face terror charges.
And more recently Anjem Choudary – described by British press as Europe’s most prolific hate preacher – who mocked British efforts to bring him to justice for two decades, was convicted of terrorism offences after signing an oath of allegiance to ISIS. Generally most Muslims do condemn the outrageous attacks that have been carried out in the two countries – why wouldn’t they? There have been many Muslims who have died in these attacks too. The question I’m left asking is with France fast approaching a general election in 2017, is the seemingly populist politics approach a last ditch attempt by President Hollande to win votes, given his very low standing in the polls? One final point – I don’t write this as a French hating Brit – I’m anything but. But in my view there does need to be balance reached to avoid the inevitable cracks in society which this fine mainland European nation seems to be cultivating. Banning the burkini does nothing to fight terror, it does everything to breed prejudice. And in Britain maybe a tougher approach towards known militants should also be addressed.

Egypt’s false stability claim!
Mohammed Nosseir/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
The fact that the vast majority of Egyptians live in impoverished areas working insecure jobs and earning meager incomes that barely allow them to survive discredits, by default, the Egyptian state’s “stability argument”! At the same time, the tiny portion of wealthy Egyptians who is supposed to be enjoying a stable, luxurious life, still has to deal with various unexpected challenges that make their lives vulnerable as well. The Egyptian state is attempting to advocate a state of ‘stability’ that – even before the outbreak of any revolutions – hasn’t existed for several decades. The Egyptian government is doing its utmost to pacify and control Egyptian society; it employs seven million citizens in various government entities (when less than one-fifth of this number is truly needed) and expends over half of the national fiscal budget on government employee wages and food and energy subsidies. While these efforts, and other government policies, are meant to create some degree of stability for Egyptian citizens, they come at the expense of any possible upgrading of the state’s deteriorating services (in the areas of health, education, infrastructure and many others). Nevertheless, the vast majority of Egyptians year for stability. Maintaining that a dysfunctional state is substantially better than a collapsed one, they are happy to engage with the obsolete system of state institutions. Their belief that they are backed by the state prevents them from digesting the fact that, to provide better services to citizens, our state institutions are in dire need of immediate reform.
Egypt is in acute need of a society that is driven and guided by citizens of real merit, rather than by people whose achievements were realized through loyalty to, and affiliation with, the ruling regime
The ‘big brother’
The Egyptian state has been playing the role of “Big Brother”; a role much admired by many Egyptians – even when the big brother himself is ailing. The state is trading the possibility of realizing any kind of genuine development against the false claim of stability. It wants Egyptians to value its overall dysfunctionality, along with its repressive policy, in return for something that does not really exist. It continues to re-appoint old-school, mentally-rusty executives at the head of most critical key state organizations; yet another indication of how the Egyptian state is living with outdated apparatuses that constitute clear barriers to any modernization for the sake of asserting the existence of stability. Rather than build a productive society, the false claim of stability in Egypt has helped to establish a stagnated, laidback society that is totally dependent on state resources. Moreover, the exaggerated assertions concerning stability that are made by a number of untrustworthy citizens only serve to further weaken the state’s argument in favor of stability. The dilemma here is that the state, regrettably, does not realize that it itself is the cause behind our present challenges. In truth, a dynamic society is definitely superior to a stable society. Egypt is in acute need of a society that is driven and guided by citizens of real merit, rather than by people whose achievements were realized through loyalty to, and affiliation with, the ruling regime.
We need a society where the entire population regularly contributes to the emergence of innovative ideas, not one that waits for the head of each organization to make single-handed decisions (often based on personal desires and usually lacking technical validation). Moving from one entrepreneurial citizen’s mindset to that of another is certainly more beneficial than enduring the same old school mentality for decades. Stability, in my view, will happen once Egypt has established true democratic pillars that its citizens can rely on. It will happen when Egypt, a nation of 91 million inhabitants, no longer relies on a single person – the ruler – but is led instead by a large number of well-educated, politically mature and trustworthy citizens. We will have stability when Egyptians are able to trust their authorities and institutions completely and when they can feel reasonably confident that, in case of difficulty, their legal rights will be ensured – without the need for ‘connections in high places’ or any other form of corruption.

Turkish-Russian-Iranian nexus poses a threat
Khalaf Ahmad Al Habtoor/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
The Turkish leadership, which reportedly ordered the shooting down of a Russian warplane last November and hurled volleys of insult at his Russian counterpart, now refers to President Vladimir Putin as his “dear friend”.Putin must be inwardly smirking but he is going along with this buddy-buddy charade because it serves his interests. He knows that a Turkish embrace is a virtual blast of cold air between Ankara and its Western allies. From his perspective anything that weakens NATO is a plus point. The Russian side is certainly aware that his punitive economic retaliation against Turkey in response to the incident – combined with Russia’s deployment of an advanced surface-to-air missile system on Syrian soil hampering Turkey’s campaign against Kurdish groups – triggered Erdogan’s charm offensive. Just days ago, Turkey’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Mevlat Cavusoglu arrived in Tehran presumably to seal the fledgling Turkish-Iranian-Russian pact for greater cooperation to end the conflict raging in Syria despite the fact that until now they have been on the opposite page. Like President Barack Obama and his Secretary of State John Kerry who have been shamefully outfoxed by Putin in Syria, Ankara has muted its insistence that President Bashar al-Assad must go and is no longer demanding that Iran and its terrorist groups must withdraw. The Turkish fervor to work toward a free Syria unyoked from one of the most brutal regimes in living history has been replaced by his determination to annihilate Syrian and Iraqi Kurds with links to the secessionist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), including those armed and advised by the US to confront the ISIS. Coincidentally or otherwise, in recent weeks, the Syrian Air Force has launched a bombing campaign against Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG)-dominated towns and cities in the north of the country despite US warnings, which makes one wonder whether such attacks have been carried out at Turkey’s behest. It was not so long ago that Turkey was being feted in the GCC as a leading brotherly country, someone who could be trusted to stand by the Sunni Arab world
NATO partners
To say this budding nexus is of great concern to Turkey’s NATO partners and another of Turkey’s new best friends, Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, is an understatement. In recent months he has gone out of his way to mend fences with Israel retreating on his pledge that the siege on Gaza must be lifted before relations could be restored. Israel welcomed the détente with an ally of the United States, especially one with a powerful military machine working closely with the United States, GCC countries and Jordan to cleanse Syria of the Assad regime and its combat cohorts Iranian Revolutionary Guards and Hezbollah militias as well as Islamic State terrorists. But now that Ankara has seemingly defected to the other side, joining forces with a Russian-Shiite front dedicated to keeping Assad in power, this will undoubtedly throw that renewed intelligence-sharing partnership into disarray.
Simultaneously, the relations between Turkey and the United States have been at an all-time low since the unsuccessful coup attempt. Polls show that a majority of Turks, including those holding prominent positions in the government and media, believe the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) either knew it was about to happen or was the instigator in collaboration with the self-exiled billionaire cleric Fethullah Gulen. The accusatory drumbeat was so ear-shattering that President Obama felt obliged to publicly deny the US had anything to do with it.
The Turkish leadership wants its arch enemy’s head on a platter and if the US declines to serve him up due to a lack of hard evidence, not only does Ankara threaten worsening relations, the US military’s use of Turkey’s Incirlik Air Base could be curtailed.
Washington that stores tactical nukes at the base has had a taste of what may be in store. In July, Ankara closed the airspace over Incirlik and according to various media outlets, including the Jerusalem Post, “1,500 US airmen and their families” were locked down even as anti-American Turkish protesters trampled US flags outside. US senators and commentators are now clamoring for the 50 or so vulnerable nukes to be transferred out of country.
This is a situation which could develop in one of two ways. So far, the Obama administration appears inclined to kowtow to Turkey’s demands. Vice President Joe Biden is visiting Ankara; he says the issue of Gulen is scheduled to top the discussion agenda. Officials from the Department of State and the Department of Justice will also shortly travel to Turkey to pursue inquiries. Note, too, that whereas EU heads of state have openly criticized Turkey over the government’s increasingly authoritarian bent, its relentless purges and ambitions to reinstate the death penalty, White House admonitions have ranged from extremely mild to zero.
Pivot as a ploy
Some pundits suggest that Erdogan’s Russian/Iranian pivot is a ploy to give him greater leverage with the United States and NATO. Others say he is attempting to walk a tightrope unwilling to burn his boats with western powers and their Sunni Arab allies but keen to hedge his bets within the Russian-led camp.
It was not so long ago that Turkey was being feted in the GCC as a leading brotherly country, someone who could be trusted to stand by the Sunni Arab world. These strange new alliances and shock U-turns are beginning to feel like a stab in the back. This worrying rearranged geopolitical scenario, not to mention the never-ending horrors unleashed on helpless Syrian communities, not only result from Obama’s weak leadership but also the unwillingness of Arab leaderships to keep their promise to rescue the Syrian people from the dictator and his Hezbollah cronies. I cannot count the number of columns I have written urging the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and/or the Arab League to cut the head of the snake before it multiplies. I am tired of issuing warning after warning that are inevitably unheeded. I have been saying for years that the US will one day make a Grand Bargain with Iran when such an eventuality seemed remote.
To be frank, we have been lacking in commitment in Syria as well as in Iraq where pro-Iranian, government-approved militias slaughter Sunnis and destroy their homes and businesses. Moscow on the other hand has shown commitment. Putin has put his money and his air power where his mouth is and it may be that Erdogan has been lured by what he perceives to be the winning side. The way this is panning-out gives me chills. Obama shakes hands with the ayatollah conspirators in Syria’s bloodshed, he refers to Saudi Arabia and other Sunni states as freeloaders and has now chosen to cut US military advisers working with the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen while US lawmakers consider a vote to bar weapons sales to the Kingdom. Add to that the Turkish-Russian-Iranian-Syrian axis and anyone with half a brain can envision gathering storm clouds. When will we learn our life and death lesson! Sunni Arab states are being either physically eroded, thrust into sectarian conflicts or undercut economically. Is this all part of a greater blueprint to destroy Saudi Arabia, Gulf States, Egypt and Jordan? Do not think they would not try it, particularly now that Turkey has distanced itself from the unofficial Sunni Arab bloc! The West is only interested to go where its bread’s buttered and thanks to Mr Obama, the mullahs have plenty of butter to spare. My fear is that this is all happening under the US umbrella. It is complex and so much is hidden but the jigsaw, admittedly incomplete, points in that direction. We will find out in due time.
Once again, I strongly urge our leaderships to trust no one and rely on no other state but those within our own sphere that share our vision and fears. GCC states and their closest allies need to get proactive diplomatically and militarily. What happened to the Joint Arab Force for instance? Egypt’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Sameh Shoukry says it is still in progress but why is it taking so long? Enough sleep walking into the hell that is being prepared for us! We must shore up our defensive capabilities, unify our armies and, if need be, make our uniforms at the ready. As soon as we begin depending on ourselves instead of hanging on to America’s coattails, the more secure we and our loved ones will be.

In Borno State Nigeria, people need a fighting chance
Mohamed Bali/Al Arabiya/August 24/16
At this year’s Olympic Games, the Nigerian men’s football team won a bronze medal. It wasn’t easy; their achievement was hard-won both on and off the pitch. In the words of team coach Samson Siasia, “We struggled to get here. But there is a oneness, a team spirit and a willingness to overcome.” The team, and their many supporters held onto the hope of an Olympic medal, and it paid off. That hope is all anyone can ask for. With so many economic disparities at play in the world of sport, and with seemingly endless scandals, we need heroes like these. They had a fighting chance for success, and they took it. However, as the Olympic Games played out in all their grandeur and glory, a bloody ground war was being waged in Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger. Having displaced more than 2.7 million people, this war continues. In Borno State, Nigeria, 500,000 people, forced from their homes, are in desperate need of hu-manitarian assistance. They need food, water, shelter and emergency medical care. Up to 15% of children screened in local communities have been diagnosed with severe acute malnutrition. In an effort to get the medical treatment they need, people are moving en-masse. The effect of this has been to overwhelm the city hospitals. So many people on the move, in unstable and un-safe environments, heightens the risk of infectious diseases spreading. There is already a mea-sles epidemic that our organization, Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) is working to contain. When we respond, to disasters like this, we respond with medical aid, devoid of politics. For us the sides of a conflict are not a determining factor in whether or not we act, nor are the race, re-ligion or beliefs of those we treat. For us, as a medical humanitarian organization, the determin-ing factor is need, and in this situation, the needs are abundant. MSF has teams in place to address the urgent medical needs and malnutrition, but if we are to make a real difference, there needs to be a significant scale-up in aid operations
Yearning for normal life
Right now these people do not have the chance to lead normal lives. They have little choice but to head to refugee camps, to cities, to anywhere there may be supplies and a reprieve from vio-lence. We hear many stories like this in the press every day. Perhaps we have even become inured to distant suffering. I hope not, but I certainly believe we must change the way we see those in need. We must not accept suffering and indignity as a status quo, lamenting its exist-ence but believing it to be perpetual. When we give, when we contribute, when we act, we must know that the people we are acting for only need the means to act for themselves, to be given an option other than fleeing or suffer-ing. Right now that means giving people in Borno State basic supplies and health care. MSF has teams in place to address the urgent medical needs and malnutrition, but if we are to make a real difference, there needs to be a significant scale-up in aid operations. The 500,000 people I refer to are not nameless victims, each of them has their own aspirations, dreams for the future, loved ones. It may be that among that 500,000 are future Olympians, fu-ture heroes, future examples for our children to follow.Can we save everyone? Probably not, but we can do a lot, we can alleviate suffering and give people that fighting chance they deserve. If the aid community responds, and responds now, a lot can be done. For that to happen, people like you must believe it can.