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LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
June 15/15

http://www.eliasbejjaninews.com/newsbulletins05/english.june15.15.htm

Bible Quotation For Today/Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me
Acts of the Apostles 07/44-50: "‘Our ancestors had the tent of testimony in the wilderness, as God directed when he spoke to Moses, ordering him to make it according to the pattern he had seen. Our ancestors in turn brought it in with Joshua when they dispossessed the nations that God drove out before our ancestors. And it was there until the time of David, who found favour with God and asked that he might find a dwelling-place for the house of Jacob. But it was Solomon who built a house for him. Yet the Most High does not dwell in houses made by human hands; as the prophet says, "Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me, says the Lord, or what is the place of my rest? Did not my hand make all these things?"

Bible Quotation For Today/.Whoever becomes humble a child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven
Matthew 18/01-05: "At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, ‘Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’ He called a child, whom he put among them, and said, ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me."

Latest analysis, editorials from miscellaneous sources published on June 14-15/15
Seven trends to watch in the Middle East/By SETH J. FRANTZMAN/J.Post/June 14/15
Iraq and Syria—One Country, One War/Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat/June 14/15
Breaking Yemen's military stalemate is key for Geneva talks/Mohamed Chebarro/Al Arabiya/June 14/15
The U.S. must take initiative to forge Middle East accords/Raghida Dergham/Al Arabiya/June 14/15
Islamic State: The Myth of a Baathist ‘Hidden Hand’/Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi/Middle East Forum/June 14/15
The biggest heist of secret US personnel data in cyber history is still ongoing/DEBKAfile/June 14/15

Miscellaneous Reports And News published on June 14-15/15
Rowhani tells Iranians they will get a good nuclear deal
Rouhani pledges to reach a good nuclear deal for Iranians
Kurds close in on ISIS-held Syria border town
2 bombs hit Syrian city of Homs, 32 wounded
Thousands Flee as Syria Kurds Advance on IS-Held Border Town
Yemen Rebels Seize Provincial Capital near Saudi Border
Maliki blames 'conspiracies' for Iraq losses
Bahrain revokes citizenship of 56 terror convicts
Netanyahu on receipt of Gaza war report: Israel will fight anti-Israel lies
Hamas using Gush Katif as training grounds
Israeli Cabinet approves bill to allow force-feeding hunger striking prisoners
West Bank Palestinian dies after being struck by Israeli army Jeep
Israeli report: 44% of Palestinian killed in Gaza war were terrorists
Orange CEO says his company plans to invest more in Israel
Israel opens probe into Palestinian beating video
Congressmen call on Obama to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital after US court ruling
Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades to be hosted by his Israeli counterpart president Rivlin
Pakistan imposes moratorium on executions during Ramadan
Zoo animals on the loose in Georgia's capital after flooding
Queen honors two Egyptians, Muslim woman in birthday list
Erodgan will ask AK Party to form Turkey coalition
The Taliban's 'Talk and Fight' policy
The U.S. must take initiative to forge Middle East accords
S. Africa Court Bans Sudan President from Leaving over Arrest Warrant
Eight Tunisian workers kidnapped in Libyan capital

Jehad Watch Latest Reports And News
Muslim persecution of Christians worsens in Palestinian territories, Israel
17-year-old Muslim who journeyed to the Islamic State becomes UK’s youngest jihad-martyrdom suicide bomber
Alabama: Imam who said property of “filthy” non-Muslims could be taken in jihad says mosques not to blame for Muslims joining ISIS
UK Muslim leader Asghar Bukhari: Zionists stole my shoe
Boston imam who said “Grab onto the gun and the sword” denies “radicalizing” Muslims
Jihadi who wanted to kill Pamela Geller said he’d kill his family if they refused to live by Sharia

Israeli Druse leader calls for action to prevent 'Druse Holocaust' in Syria
By KARINE ROZKOVSKY, REUTERS/06/14/2015
Thousands of Israeli Druse demonstrated in the North on Saturday night in protest of the slaughter of their kin by al-Qaida-linked rebels in embattled Syria. The al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front acknowledged on Saturday that its members were involved in the killing of Druse villagers in northwestern Syria this week, saying they had violated orders and would face justice. Twenty Druse villagers were reportedly killed in the village of Qalb Loze in Idlib province on Wednesday when Nusra Front members opened fire in an incident that spiraled from their attempt to confiscate a house. Protests by member of the Druse community in Israel occurred particularly in the northern towns of Kfar Rameh, Kfar Sumei and in the Golan Heights. Jaber Hamed, the head of the Sajur Council and Chairman of the Forum of the Druse and Circassian Authority, said the Druse community intended on taking action and making a strong statement against the "massacre of our brothers in Syria.""Our streets are boiling with fury, and we are afraid things have spiraled out of control," he said.
Hamed called for an urgent convening of senior Israeli officials to assess the situation in Syria, and help avert the "Druse Holocaust.""We are in immediate danger, without reason. Therefore, we call on all leaders, including our Muslim brothers, to unite in joining our call for all factions in Syria to stop the massacre of Druse and others," he stressed. "Who more than the Jewish people should understand what we are going through these days, as a minority in the world," Hamed added. The Druse community practices a religion viewed as heretical by the puritanical brand of Sunni Islamism espoused by al-Qaida and Islamic State, the two most powerful insurgent groups in Syria. The Druse faith, related to Islam, Christianity and Judaism, is practiced by around 1.5 million people, mostly in Syria, Lebanon and Israel.

Sami Gemayel elected new leader of the Kataeb Party
The Daily Star/ June 15, 2015BEIRUT: MP Sami Gemayel was elected Sunday as the seventh head of the Kataeb Party, in a move that transfers the leadership of one of Lebanon’s oldest political parties to the third generation of a family that has already produced two men voted to be Lebanese presidents. Gemayel, who won with a majority of 339 votes, will now succeed his father, Amine Gemayel, a former president of Lebanon, who has led the party since 2007. Sami Gemayel’s rival, Pierre Atallah, received 37 votes. Joseph Abu Khalil was elected as the party’s deputy leader and former Minister Salim Sayyegh was elected as second deputy leader.Soon after his election, Gemayel promised the Lebanese to change the pattern of political life in Lebanon. “We will not become the political life of Lebanon, we will let the political life in Lebanon become like us,” a tearful Gemayel said after the announcement. He said that he felt the weight of the responsibility he now bears and vowed to work tirelessly for the sake of the party and the Lebanese people. “I would like to assure all the Lebanese and all sects that I will be faithful to the sacrifices they are making in this period,” Gemayel said. “I would like to assure all the Lebanese and Kataeb [members] that we will work together to attain Lebanon’s recovery.” He promised to stand on the side of every father, every mother and every youth who are struggling every day to stay in Lebanon. Gemayel urged unity within his party, saying “I didn’t come to do this alone.”
Addressing Kataeb officials, he said: “You will go back home late because we will be working around the clock.” Sunday’s polls started at 10 a.m. at the Kataeb headquarters in Saifi on the last day of the party’s 30th General Conference, which kicked off Friday at the Le Royal Hotel in Dbayyeh. The ballot box closed at 3 p.m. and the results were announced at around 9:30 p.m. After casting his ballot, Sami Gemayel told reporters: “The election was democratic. We are proud to be the only party in the East to have a democratic life.” Asked to comment on those who criticized the passing of the party’s leadership from father to son, he said: “The critics do not belong to the Kataeb, and they do not express the will of the Kataeb. They are renegades and the remnants of the Syrian era, when the party was under [Syrian] tutelage.”
The polls come almost two weeks since Gemayel, 34, declared his candidacy and presented his electoral program during a ceremony in his hometown of Bikfaya, after his father announced he would not seek another term. Sami Gemayel was elected to Parliament in 2009. He is the grandson of Pierre Gemayel, who founded the Kataeb in 1936. It would become the most influential Christian party during Lebanon’s 1975-90 Civil War. Sami Gemayel is also the nephew of assassinated President-elect Bashir Gemayel. Amine Gemayel, who served as Lebanon’s president from 1982 to 1988, praised the party’s election and called on lawmakers to go to Parliament to end the yearlong presidential vacuum by electing a new president. “We hope that this exemplary democratic experience will be a message to the Lebanese to fully learn from what happened and elect a president as soon as possible,” he told reporters after casting his ballot.
He said he hoped that lawmakers would follow the Kataeb election pattern by going to Parliament to choose a successor to former President Michel Sleiman, whose six-year tenure ended on May 25 last year. “No country can be stable without a head. The republic must not remain on hold in this manner,” he said. “Today’s Kataeb election, or this unique democratic experience, should be applied to the entire national situation in order for national institutions to be stabilized.”Although he did not seek another term as party leader, Amine Gemayel said: “I will not leave the party. I will be staying in the party alongside all colleagues when the need arises.”Acknowledging that he is a candidate for the presidency, he said: “What matters for me is the swift election of a president who is capable of steering the ship.”

Future, Hezbollah to meet as verbal feud intensifies
Hussein Dakroub/The Daily Star/ June 15, 2015
BEIRUT: The Future Movement and Hezbollah will hold a new round of talks Monday amid renewed tension and an escalating verbal feud between the two rival parties over local and regional issues, including the resistance party’s fight against jihadis on the outskirts of Arsal. “Monday’s dialogue session will discuss all key issues, including the latest Cabinet crisis, the subject of military and security appointments, the situation in Arsal and the presidential election crisis,” a senior March 8 source told The Daily Star Sunday. The source said he expected the Future officials to raise last week’s remarks by Hezbollah’s deputy leader Sheikh Naim Qassem on the yearlong presidential deadlock, which are currently at the root of new tension between the two sides, whose strained ties have in the past threatened to plunge the country into sectarian violence.
Monday’s will be the 13th round of dialogue between senior officials from the Future and Hezbollah designed primarily to reduce sectarian and political tensions, exacerbated by the four-year-old war in Syria. Despite the exchange of scathing diatribe, the two sides have been meeting since last December at the residence of Speaker Nabih Berri, the architect and sponsor of Sunni-Shiite dialogue. The new dialogue session comes as Lebanon is in the throes of a presidential vacuum, Parliament being unable to convene over a lack of quorum to elect a president or legislate, and a Cabinet paralysis. The contentious issue of security and military appointments has crippled the government’s work and prompted Prime Minister Tammam Salam to suspend its meetings.
The ministers of MP Michel Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement have said they would not allow the Cabinet to discuss any topic before it addresses appointments of new security chiefs, including the appointment of Aoun’s son-in-law, Brig. Gen. Shamel Roukoz, the head of the Army Commando Unit, as Army commander. Adding to the Future-Hezbollah tension was last week’s speech by Qassem in which he presented the Future Movement-led March 14 coalition with a bitter choice: either elect Aoun as president or face an indefinite presidential vacuum. The parliamentary Future bloc has dismissed Qassem’s remarks as “dangerous and disgraceful” and accused Hezbollah of blocking the election of a new president with such an offer.
In an apparent response to Qassem’s proposal, Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi vowed to prevent Aoun from reaching the presidency, accusing the FPM leader of being committed to the “Iranian project.”“Gen. Aoun will no way become Lebanon’s president. We will prevent anyone [serving] the Iranian project from reaching the presidency,” Rifi told Voice of Lebanon radio station. “Aoun is part of this project and I am against his election as president. Full stop.”In an interview to be published by Al-Liwaa newspaper Monday, Rifi, a leading member of the Future Movement, said his party’s ministers would ask Salam to convene the Cabinet, noting that the situation in the country could not endure the disruption of the government’s work.
“The Constitution granted the prime minister the prerogatives to set a date for a Cabinet meeting and prepare its agenda. Prime Minister Salam must not abandon his prerogatives,” Rifi said. He also lashed out at Aoun, likening him to Roman dictator Nero “who is ready to set the country on fire for the sake of his interests and the interests of his family.”For his part, Qassem struck back at March 14 politicians who had criticized his remarks on the presidential deadlock. “Whenever a Hezbollah official makes a statement ... the next day we find newspapers filled with [March 14] responses,” Qassem said during a memorial ceremony in south Lebanon Sunday.
Describing the March 14 responses as a form of meaningless “wailing,” Qassem said that Hezbollah would not respond to criticism coming from “a helpless group that doesn’t see right [from wrong].” Still, Qassem said Hezbollah extended its hands to the March 14 coalition to cooperate together to save the country. “The March 14 group must understand that we are partners in Lebanon and we will not accept that this country to be their own monopoly,” he said. “Since they have failed to build the state after they had a monopoly over it for a period of time, the solution is for us to cooperate together. We extend our hands on the basis of avoiding monopoly ... It’s better for you to accept our extended hands to work together, or else you will miss the train.”
Hezbollah’s heavy involvement in the war in Syria, particularly its fighting against Nusra Front militants and ISIS in the Qalamoun mountain range on the northeastern border with Syria, has added fodder to long-simmering tension with the Future Movement. Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah has vowed to liberate Arsal’s outskirts from the militants if the Lebanese state fails to do so. Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri and Future Movement ministers and officials have warned Hezbollah against attacking Arsal, saying that protection of the town is the responsibility of the Lebanese state and Army.
The Future Movement’s tense relations with Hezbollah have been further strained by sharp differences over the Saudi-led military intervention in Yemen, with Hezbollah denouncing the kingdom’s offensive in March against Iranian-allied Houthi rebels and the Future Movement strongly supporting it. Meanwhile, Aoun stood firm on his demand for the appointment of new top security and military officers, rejecting term extensions. “The extension of the terms of security chiefs, the Army commander, the chief of army staff, the chief of [Army] Intelligence and the chief of the Internal Security Forces is not legal,” Aoun told supporters at his Rabieh residence Saturday. He called on his followers to be ready to participate in protests across Lebanon “because what is happening in the country is not healthy.”

Israel conspired in massacre of Syrian Druse,’ Lebanese officials say
J.Post/May13/15/Walid Jumblatt, the prominent Lebanese Druse leader, said on Friday that Israel’s intervention was not needed to help his community in Syria just days after a massacre by Nusra Front gunmen claimed the lives of 25 Druse villagers in Idlib. The leader of Lebanon’s Druse said the incident was an isolated one. “Until this moment, numbers say that more than 350,000 were killed in Syria by the Syrian regime and there are more than seven million refugees displaced inside Syria as well as three million outside Syria, between Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey,” said Jumblatt, who is also a member of Lebanon’s parliament and the head of the Progressive Socialist Party. “This was an individual incident and I will deal with it politically through my local and international calls,” he said. Jumblatt, for decades a fierce critic of the Assad regime, went on to accuse Israel and the Syrian government of collaborating to perpetuate the sectarianism and divisions within the war-torn country. Another Druse official in Lebanon, Sheikh Naim Hasan, condemned the killings. He was quoted by the Lebanese newspaper Daily Star as saying that the continued divisions in Syria would serve to benefit “the Zionist regime.” Hasan and Jumblatt were responding to Lebanese Druse who have traditionally supported the government of President Bashar Assad. One of them is Democratic Party leader MP Talal Arslan, who said that Israel had conspired with Islamist terrorists to carry out the Idlib killings. “There is a conspiracy in the Arab media, supported by Israel and the West, to distort the image of Druse in Syria and say that they are weak and fearful,” Arslan said. “I cannot but link what happened with the Druze in Idlib to the joint Israeli-takfiri plan to undermine Syria,” he said. Israeli Druse expressed their anxiety last week, saying they are very concerned about the fate of their brethren across the border in Syria. “We are worried about the Syrian Druse and demand that the world not stand by and do nothing,” said Druse and Circassian Local Councils Forum head Jaber Hamoud. Hamoud, who served 25 years in the army and is also the head of the municipality of Sajur, a Druse town in the Galilee, said that if the world would arm the Druse, they would be able to defend themselves and help prevent Islamic State from reaching Israel and Jordan. “The Druse love peace, but they know how to defend themselves. They need the means, not knives and axes,” he added. President Reuven Rivlin expressed his concern to the United States on Wednesday about the fate of the Druse minority in Syria, saying around 500,000 of them were under threat from Islamist militants in an area near the Israeli border. Israel’s Druse, some of whom have reached the senior echelons of Israel’s military and the government, have been calling for help on behalf of their brethren in Syria, both at home and abroad. “What is going on just now is intimidation and threat to the very existence of half a million Druse on the Mount of Druse which is very close to the Israeli border,” President Reuven Rivlin said after a meeting with General Martin Dempsey, the US military’s top officer. Ariel Ben Solomon and Reuters contributed to this report.

Al-Rahi Laments Presidential Deadlock: Politicians Steering us towards Chaos
Naharnet/May 14/15/Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi lashed out at politicians Sunday, accusing them of steering the country according to their own interests and whims. “No one has the right to deprive the country from it's head of state,” al-Rahi said during sermon from at Our Lady of Lebanon basilica in Harissa. He stressed that “no one is allowed to toss the country and the people in a state of chaos.”“They are managing the fate of the country according to their own desires and interest.”He called on politicians to cooperate and prioritize the affairs of citizens who granted them power. Lebanon has been without a president since May when the term of Michel Suleiman ended without the election of a successor. Ongoing disputes between the March 8 and 14 camps over a compromise candidate have so far thwarted the polls. Al-Rahi is celebrating a mass in Harissa as part of jubilation set to welcome Our Lady of Fatima. The sacred statue arrived in Beirut Friday. The statue will later on Sunday be transferred to Miziara. Al-Rahi also expressed regret a shoot-out in northwest Idlib province by al-Qaida-affiliate al-Nusra Front members, who killed at least 20 members of the country's Druze minority. The Idlib killings were the deadliest since Syria's civil war started in March 2011 against the minority Druze sect, which has been split between supporters and opponents of President Bashar Assad — but has largely stayed out of the fighting.

Lebanese Cabinet Crisis Eclipses Hizbullah, Mustaqbal Dialogue
Naharnet/May 14/15/The government crisis is expected to have a heavy toll on the ongoing dialogue between the Mustaqbal Movement and Hizbullah.According to An Nahar newspaper published Sunday, the upcoming round of talks between the political arch-foes will be affected by the cabinet crisis. Officials representing the two parties will hold a new meeting on Monday. Ministerial sources told the daily that Hizbullah isn't expected to take a lenient stance that would positively impact its ally the Free Patriotic Movement. The sources said that FPM chief MP Michel Aoun is seeking a settlement before easing the government's deadlock. Aoun's recent stance regarding the appointment of high-ranking security and military officials plunged the country into further crises amid the ongoing presidential vacuum. He bluntly rejected any attempt to extend the terms of the officials as he has been lobbying for political consensus on the appointment of Commando Regiment chief Brig. Gen. Chamel Roukoz, his son-in-law, as army chief as part of a package for the appointment of other top security officers.Roukoz's tenure ends in October while the term of army commander Gen. Jean Qahwaji expires at the end of September. Despite the tension, the dialogue between the two rivals seemed to be on track. Hizbullah and al-Mustaqbal officials have been meeting in Ain el-Tineh since December to defuse sectarian hostility linked to the war in Syria.

Berri Warns of Plunging into Further Crises: I Fear Fate of Syria
Naharnet/May 14/15
Speaker Nabih Berri expressed grave dissatisfaction over the ongoing cabinet crisis, expressing fear over the fate of Syria after the attack against Druze in Syria's Qalb Lawzah. “Prime Minister Tammam Salam and I are on the same page,” Berri said in comments published in al-Mustaqbal newspaper Sunday, considering that they are tackling the matter "patiently." “It is forbidden to freeze the country... we should find a solution to reactivate the government and resume legislation at the parliament so we could resolve the presidential crisis,” the speaker pointed out. He noted that the presidential vacuum is a priority, saying: “PM Salam and I are keen, more than anyone, to resolve” the crisis. The presidential vacuum has had a heavy toll on the cabinet and parliament after rival political arch-foes failed to elect a new head of state since the tenure of former President Michel Suleiman ended in May last year. The government was gripped with a crisis over the controversial appointment of high-ranking security and military officials after Free Patriotic Movement chief MP Michel Aoun bluntly rejected any attempt to extend the terms of the officials. He has been lobbying for political consensus on the appointment of Commando Regiment chief Brig. Gen. Chamel Roukoz, his son-in-law, as army chief as part of a package for the appointment of other top security officers. Roukoz's tenure ends in October while the term of army commander Gen. Jean Qahwaji expires at the end of September. Asked about the shoot-out in northwest Idlib province that killed at least 20 members of the country's Druze minority, Berri stressed that the “problem isn't targeting a certain group but the whole Syrian people.” “I fear the fate f Syria,” the speaker said. The Idlib killings were the deadliest since Syria's civil war started in March 2011 against the minority Druze sect, which has been split between supporters and opponents of President Bashar Assad — but has largely stayed out of the fighting.

Qassem lashes out at March 14 coalition
The Daily Star/June 14, 2015 /BEIRUT: Hezbollah’s deputy leader Sheikh Naim Qassem lashed out at the March 14 coalition Sunday for their criticism of his remarks on the yearlong presidential deadlock. “Whenever a Hezbollah official makes a statement... the next day we find newspapers filled with [March 14] responses,” Qassem said during a Hezbollah ceremony in south Lebanon. “So much so that we don’t know what they are discussing or what they are responding to.”Describing the groups responses as a form of meaningless “wailing,” the Hezbollah chief said that the party would not respond to criticism coming from “a helpless group that doesn’t see right [from wrong].”In a speech last week, Qassem presented the Future Movement-led March 14 coalition with a bitter choice: either to elect Aoun as president or face an indefinite presidential vacuum.Qassem’s remarks drew heavy criticism from the March 14 coalition, especially The Future Movement, who accused the party of “disrupting the republic and its institutions and hijacking its presidency.”
The Hezbollah chief lashed back at the Future Movement’s criticism by saying that the March 14 coalition “deserves a noble prize for disruption.”“The March 14 coalition is the pioneer of institutional paralysis in Lebanon,” he added.One day ahead of the anticipated dialogue session between Hezbollah and The Future Movement, Qassem called on the rival parties to acknowledge that they are political partners in Lebanon."We do not accept the March 14 coalition to have a monoply over the state. Since they have failed in nation building, the solution will be for us to cooperate and we extend our hands out to you."

Berri and Salam ‘on the same page’: report
The Daily Star/June 14, 2015/BEIRUT: Prime Minister Tammam Salam and Speaker Nabih Berri are “on the same page” in matters relating to the paralysis of state institutions and the year-long presidential impasse, the latter said in a report published Sunday.
Berri and the premier are aiming to tackle attempts to disrupt the Cabinet's work in a prudent and patient manner, the speaker told Al-Mustaqbal newspaper in published remarks, noting that the two are "on the same page" with regards to this issue.
The 13th round of dialogue between Hezbollah and The Future Movement Monday will hopefully delve into the issue of paralysis in the Cabinet, he said, while urging parties to find solutions that would allow state institutions to exit the current state of deadlock.
“The country shouldn’t be paralyzed,” he said. “We need to find a solution to revive the Cabinet and restart legislation in parliament so that we can reach the [election] of a president,” Berri said, noting that no one has forgotten about the need to fill the country’s top Christian post.“Me and the prime minister are more keen on this than anyone else.”The political dispute over the appointments of a new Internal Security Forces chief and Army commander plunged the Cabinet into paralysis earlier this month, with the prime minister canceling last week’s session in light of the impasse. The Free Patriotic Movement has strongly opposed extending the terms of the current security chiefs, demanding the Cabinet appoint a new ISF head and Army commander.The Future Movement and some Christian parties argue that a new Army commander should not be chosen before the election of a new president, who should have a say in the appointment.

Netanyahu on receipt of Gaza war report: Israel will fight anti-Israel lies
By HERB KEINON/J.Post/06/14/2015
Israel will work in all ways possible to fight against anti-Israel lies, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at Sunday’s cabinet meeting upon receiving an inter-ministerial report of last summer's Operation Protective Edge in Gaza. The Foreign Ministry made public the report, which has been in the works for months, in the afternoon. The timing of the release is to preempt the UN Human right's Council commission report on the Gaza operation that is expected to be released this week. Speaking of the Israeli report, Netanyahu said “this presents the true fact that the actions carried out by the IDF were done in accordance to international law.” Netanyahu said the operation was carried out to defend Israeli citizens from a terrorist organization that was carrying out a dual war crime: firing indiscriminately on Israeli citizens while hiding behind their own citizens. “Israel and the IDF are committed to the rules of international law even when fighting terrorist organizations that intentionally violated those rules,” he said. He said that this commitment does not flow from one report or another, but rather from the fact that “Israel is a democratic, moral state that acts in accordance to international law.” The government has been working on the report, and debating the timing of its release, for weeks. It was originally scheduled to be released in March, when the UNHRC report was set to be released, but was postponed after the UN report was postponed since the commission's head, William Schabas, was forced to step down after it was revealed that he had worked briefly as a paid consultant for the PLO in 2012.
The UNHRC report is expected to be the basis of any Palestinian war crimes case against Israel before the International Criminal Court. Israel refused to cooperate with the UNHRC probe from the outset, charging that the commission is tantamount to a kangaroo court, whose conclusions were determined before the investigation even began. Over the weekend a blue-ribbon panel of former diplomats and military experts who, unlike the UN Commission, did have access to Israeli political and military leaders issued a report that will be presented to the UNHRC saying that the IDF did act within the boundaries of international law.

Rouhani pledges to reach a good nuclear deal for Iranians
By REUTERS/06/14/2015/J.Post
DUBAI - Iranian President Hassan Rouhani gave a vigorous defense of nuclear negotiations to a domestic crowd on Sunday, pledging to reach a deal that would lift the hardship of sanctions as the talks enter their final weeks. Speaking at a televised rally in the northeastern city of Bojnord, to mark the second anniversary of his 2013 election victory, Rouhani used sweeping rhetoric to play up the benefits of easing Iran's long international isolation. "With the guidance of the Supreme Leader and the support of the people, we will enrich both uranium and the economy in Iran," he told a crowd of thousands. "We want the nation to be happy and productive, to have a bright economy and social welfare -- and to have centrifuges too." While Iran's negotiating team has crisscrossed the globe trying to seal a nuclear deal, Rouhani in recent months has spent much of his time in provincial cities selling the nuclear talks to a population that harbors deep mistrust of the West. "We will go to the United Nations, where the sanctions against us were written, and there we will have them lifted," he said, portraying the progress in nuclear talks as a diplomatic victory for the Islamic Republic. Iran is aiming to strike an accord with six powers by June 30 that would secure sanctions relief in exchange for some curtailment of its nuclear program, but the negotiators have faced criticism from conservatives who say they are making too many concessions. Rouhani has aimed to portray such critics as out of touch with the daily reality faced by Iranians under sanctions. "Those who say sanctions are not important don't know what is happening in people's pockets," he said, alluding to the high cost of foreign-made goods. Following the pattern of his previous provincial speeches, the president said his government had taken steps on issues including healthcare, food security and the environment, arguing that lifting sanctions would lead to more progress. On Saturday, at a news conference also marking the anniversary of his election, he was more measured about the prospects for the talks, warning that a deal could be delayed if world powers brought new issues into play.
He also said it could take weeks or months for sanctions to be lifted after reaching a deal -- comments notably absent from his soaring rhetoric to the cheering crowd in Bojnord.

Iraq and Syria—One Country, One War
Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat
Sunday, 14 Jun, 2015
About a year ago, US President Barack Obama attempted to justify Washington’s different approach on the crises in Iraq and Syria. While drones, military consultants, and arms have been sent to Iraq, only humanitarian aid—blankets, medicines, supplies—have been sent to Syria. Back then, Obama said his administration was committed to Iraq’s security because the country has strategic value for the US. Regarding the US position on Syria he said meanwhile that it would remain firmly focused on the political and humanitarian fronts since there were no plans for any other kind of American involvement in the crisis.
Naturally, most governments speak about Iraq and Syria separately. But this divide between the two neighbors is based on old maps and is in reality no longer tangible on the ground. There are no borders, border guards, passports, or armies separating Iraq and Syria anymore. Many checkpoints have become mere stopovers for Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militants and other fighters crossing into and out of Iraq’s western Anbar province. War and terrorism have united both countries. And, so, ISIS now seems justified in having named itself the “Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.”
Back when Iraq and Syria’s borders first began to “disappear,” I wrote about how viewing the situation according to the old, traditional rules—border markers, flags, countries, religion—would result in a failure to understand the depth of the crisis. But the picture is now clearer. Current events in Iraq are an indispensable part of developments in Syria, and both countries’ borders are now worn-out old lines jotted on paper at the offices of various foreign affairs ministries around the world. We are currently witnessing a crisis that unites the two countries, all the way from Syria’s Bab Al-Hawa border crossing north of Turkey, to Jordan’s Trebil on the border with Iraq, to Saudi Arabia’s Arar crossing, just south of Iraq. ISIS militants now loom dangerously on the suburbs of both the Syrian capital Damascus and the Iraqi capital Baghdad.
If concerned countries wish to confront this crisis and stop ISIS’s expansion, they must deal with Iraq and Syria as one country, because success and failure in one is now connected to the other. It is no longer relevant that the world, and particularly the United States, categorizes Iraq as an oil-rich country with strategic importance while at the same time categorizing Syria as a mere radish farm! We are before a Siamese twin facing one war against the same enemy.
All this means of course that depending on the Baghdad government will not achieve much. It also means that supporting Shi’ite militias in Iraq via the Shi’ite-dominated Popular Mobilization volunteer forces will deepen wounds and increase collective Sunni resentment toward Baghdad as well increase hostility against the US. Such policies will in the end make ISIS’s pretensions to statehood and being the representative of the majority of Sunnis in both Syria and Iraq, an actual reality.
The remaining reasonable option, after the failure of the above alternatives, is to support opposition Sunni forces in Syria and Sunni tribal forces in Iraq to help them fight ISIS—which claims to be a Sunni group—and to stop using the Popular Mobilization forces and Shi’ite militias in Iraq—which are under the control of the Iranians and actually end up serving the aims of ISIS. It also goes without saying that concrete steps must be taken to resolve the tragedy which the Syrian people are currently experiencing. Syrian Sunnis, who make up around 80 percent of the country’s population, cannot remain silent towards Assad’s regime after his forces have now killed more than a quarter of a million Syrians. Iran and its ally Assad will not begin to accept a political solution that leads to healing the Sunni majority unless an aerial plan is developed to confront and prevent the Syrian regime’s daily massacres. Assad’s air force is currently allowed to fly and drop barrel bombs on civilians as it resumes its ethnic cleansing operation. Meanwhile the Syrian opposition is prohibited from obtaining access to advanced weapons that could help them defend themselves against Assad’s air power. To rub salt in the wound, the international community refuses to impose a no-fly zone, which would put an end to this tragic situation.
In the absence of an adequate understanding and resolution of these crises, ISIS will no doubt expand and find itself more supporters and fighters—even more than the current 100,000 militants fighting alongside it in Iraq and Syria.

Breaking Yemen's military stalemate is key for Geneva talks
Sunday, 14 June 2015
Mohamed Chebarro/Al Arabiya
Anything short of a clear and verifiable victory for either side in Yemen will not pave the way for a political settlement in the upcoming Geneva talks.
The Houthi militias and deposed President Saleh will not be persuaded to return to the previously agreed power-sharing agreement unless they are squeezed militarily and feel their fortune is about to turn.Hence the Geneva meeting risks becoming a platform that undermines the Arab coalition and raises the Houthi and Saleh's profile as victims on the international stage. The Houthis and Saleh are unlikely to discuss the implementation of the U.N. Resolution 2216, as many believe that more than 70 days of Saudi-led air strikes has not led to great losses that would have allowed for the Resolution’s implementation; if the Houthis and Saleh still feel strong, why would they disarm or even discuss sharing power?
Air campaign
After more than 70 days of continued air strike to degrade pro-Saleh and Houthi militias, the Yemeni army did not usher the way yet for all parties to return to the negotiating table. Both sides in the conflict are heading to Geneva with an irreconcilable agenda
Some believe that Houthis and Saleh are emboldened by the bombing of the past three months and the air campaign has militarily failed so far to dislodge them from their bases. They also believe the campaign has failed to see the Houthi grip on power eroded in their northern strongholds or even the capital Sanaa.
Civil war
Also, the 70-plus days of raging street battles in most southern Yemeni towns did not deliver a clear and verifiable victory either. Local resistance fighters allied to the government of exiled President Hadi did not manage to tip the balance of power in Hadi’s legitimately elected government, despite close air support by the Arab force coalition led by Saudi Arabia. Nor did the air drops of weapons and ammunition to pro-Hadi resistance fighters deliver the city of Aden back to the legitimate government.
Resolution 2216
Resolution 2216 will remain an umbrella for the continued air war until further notice. If the Geneva meeting turns out to be a platform for Houthis and Saleh to demonstrate their power and ability to remain in control of land, and through this have the keys to any future settlement for the Yemeni crisis, Geneva could become a burden for the coalition rather than an advantage. Houthis, Saleh and their patron Iran does not yet seem in the mood to announce defeat and or readiness to even bargain. In their strategic calculations Tehran officials see that the frontlines are static in military terms, and no political breakthrough is noticed in the form of massive Yemeni parties and tribes abandoning Saleh and the Houthis' ship, yet. Therefore resolution 2216 for Houthis and Saleh is a merely on paper and could be emptied of any impact on the ground. For them, the international community’s efforts are so far lacking enough teeth to peel off Houthis and Saleh gains. The resolution cannot turn back the clock to the Sanaa take over last September or the departure of President Hadi from Aden in March. In their mind, the role of the U.N. as the facilitator of lengthy power sharing negotiations in Sanaa helped them fortify their power base and allowed them plenty of time to negotiate with one hand and to continue a physical power grab with the other.
The best outcome that one could hope for in the Geneva talks is another humanitarian truce.This is bound to reiterate that the coalition is not waging war a against the Yemeni population, even though it would allow Houthi and Saleh militias to have a breather and prepare for another round of fighting.
International community
For the international community, the Geneva meeting will be another forum for the major players to show they have not lost all their relevance as demonstrated clearly in the Syrian, Iraqi and Libyan crises. The Geneva meeting is for the U.N. a demonstration of its ability and relevance in today’s Middle East to convene meetings for talks with the lowest of expectations for both the international community and the warring parties. Both sides in the conflict are heading to Geneva with an irreconcilable agenda. One side believes itself to be the legitimately elected government and the inheritor and defender of a peace process underpinned by the GCC peace initiative created since Saleh's removal from power after 33 years in office. The other side believes itself to have fought six wars against the central government in the hope to gain a greater role in Yemeni power-brokering mechanisms.

The U.S. must take initiative to forge Middle East accords
Sunday, 14 June 2015
Raghida Dergham/Al Arabiya
President Barack Obama has an opportunity to change the course of events in the Middle East, if he shows enough determination, boldness, and vision. This way, he could enter history as a bold leader. His nuclear and bilateral accord with Iran has turned into fuel for sectarian wars, and wars for dominance. He can take the initiative today before concluding or in conjunction with the nuclear deal, to turn setbacks into breakthroughs between Saudi Arabia and Iran. In Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Lebanon, military, political, and economic conditions are ripe for a deal. The nuclear issue and the issue of the sanctions on Tehran give Washington the ability to seriously and effectively influence the orientations and future of Iran without bringing in regional conditions into the nuclear negotiations. Washington understands this, so all it needs is a decision by the U.S. president, his administration, and the U.S. military establishment in this direction.
The war on ISIS is another reason why Barack Obama should seize the opportunity. His personal legacy, which he seems to have fully invested in the Islamic Republic of Iran, is fragile and could well turn into a historical curse if he does not couple his sprint towards Tehran with wisdom and consciousness regarding the future of the torn Arab region. It is not right for the United States to see itself as the advocate of the Islamic Republic when the latter continues to violate international law and skirt binding sanctions, intervening militarily in the Arab countries. This is exactly what the Obama administration has done and brazenly so over the past two weeks. The U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry seems “desperate” to conclude a deal with Tehran no matter the cost. Both Obama and Kerry are convinced they are making history for the sake of U.S. interests.
The latest example of the U.S. policy of turning a blind eye to Iranian violations for fear for the nuclear negotiations was an official report at the Security Council which revealed -- finally -- that Iran’s violations of international resolutions banning the transfer of weapons to other countries are being overlooked in the council and beyond, to avoid any obstruction of the negotiations regarding Iran’s nuclear program.
Turning a blind eye
The United States is not the only party to turn a blind eye among the five permanent members of the Security Council, which are supposedly responsible for international peace and security. The United States, China, Russia, Britain, and France all deliberately ignored the information they have regarding Iran’s violations and circumvention of Security Council resolutions. This was all stated in a detailed report prepared by the Iran sanctions panel at the Security Council, which mentioned among other things Iran’s attempt to import spare parts for warplanes from Greece sourced from Israel.
The Iran sanctions panel confirmed in its report that Iran continues to transfer weapons unlawfully to Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen, and to Hezbollah and Hamas. However, notifications and reports on these violations from U.N. member states stopped recently in conjunction with attempts to protect and push forward the nuclear talks with Iran. Indeed, at the time when Iran violations were being papered over in the name of nuclear negotiations, Iran, according to the panel, continued to transport weapons and equipment to Syria to defend the regime of Bashar al-Assad. Iran provides military advisers and equipment to Iraq, something that was confirmed by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. The panel said that Iran also supplies weapons to the Kurdistan Regional Government to support its war effort against ISIS.
In Yemen, the panel’s report said Iran’s smuggling of weapons to the Houthis in 2013, and attempts to smuggle in weapons on board a ship are part of a pattern that has been seen since 2009 at the earliest.
On the nuclear issue, the panel said it gathered information pertaining to Iran’s circumvention of Security Council resolutions by importing materials and equipment that have a dual use and can be used in its nuclear program and armament programs. However, the five permanent members of the Security Council turned a blind eye out of fear for the nuclear talks. Tehran was even rewarded with $10.43 billion in April as a preliminary and partial measure towards unlocking its assets frozen in foreign banks. Iran was also allowed under the international agreement to resume oil exports. These two measures reduced pressure on the Iranian economy.
Nuclear talks
The Obama administration is under pressure as it tackles two major issues in the nuclear talks: First, the issue of verifying that Iran will be ready to give full access to international inspection to ensure its nuclear activities are not militarized in any way. Second, how to re-impose sanctions on Iran if it breaches its commitments and violates the relevant international resolution. This issue is full of loopholes and its handling is subject to the state of relations among and between the five permanent members.
Clearly, the report of the sanctions panel exposes these countries and their desperate sprint towards appeasing Tehran, even as it continues to violate international resolutions. In effect, Iran’s record speaks for itself when it comes to violations. And the five permanent members’ record speaks for itself when it comes to exempting Tehran from accountability, if not also giving carte blanche for its regional ambitions.
Such attitudes by the major powers encourage those who want to take revenge against their positions, such as those who see ISIS and its ilk as the best available response to the major powers’ endorsement of Iran and its nuclear and regional ambitions. It is high time to become alert to this, because it has very dangerous repercussions. This policy has implications, not only for the Middle East, but also the countries in question and on their home soil.
Tehran’s encroachment on the Arab countries -- from Iraq to Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen -- must be stopped, and so should be its attempts for sabotage in Gulf countries. What is required is to stop blessing the Iranian policies which fuel sectarian strife between Sunnis and Shiites, and which will lead to more volunteers joining ISIS as they see it to be a response to the internationally backed Iranian violations.
What is required, second, is to let Tehran known seriously not only that the time for sanctioning its actions is over but also that the current stage requires it to do everything it can to allow the United States and the four other permanent UNSC members to reassure and pressure at once the Gulf countries concerned by Iran’s actions, particularly Saudi Arabia.
In Yemen, there is an opportunity available. Saudi Arabia and other countries in the Arab coalition do not aspire to occupy Yemen or to be drawn into a quagmire there. They want to stop Iran encroaching on Yemen through their Houthi proxies, who have received weapons from Tehran illicitly in violation of Security Council resolutions issued under Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter.
Instead of talking in ambiguous language to avoid political confrontation with Tehran and protect the nuclear talks, it would be better for the senior members of the Obama administration to demand Iran to take specific and immediate measures in Yemen. President Obama must intervene politically and in earnest to let Tehran know that Yemen could today be the starting point towards positive Saudi-Iranian accords that would take the Middle East into a new phase, including in the cooperation against ISIS and its ilk.
This requires Iran to force the Houthis -- and it is able to do so -- to withdraw from Aden immediately and set a timetable for a withdrawal from Sanaa. It also requires Saudi Arabia not to cling on irreversibly to Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, and allow Prime Minister Khaled Bahah to reach accords with the Houthis and even former President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
The other leg of the understandings could be in Syria, where the United States seem ready to support the parties it had rushed to designate as terrorist groups in the Security Council, namely Al-Nusra Front. Perhaps the United States is ready to stop exempting Bashar al-Assad from accountability. The aim should be to prevent ISIS from spreading into all parts of Syria.
Terrorist designations
Iran’s interest in reaching understandings with the United States, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar is clear through the weakness and retreat of the regime in Damascus and Hezbollah, which are fighting alongside it. In turn, Russia benefits from distancing itself from Assad, who has grown extremely weak against ISIS and can no longer protect Russian interests against radical Islamists in Russia’s home soil and near abroad. Hence, Russia could be convinced to become part of a deal.
There is no logic in the U.S. president’s shirking of an opportunity for a positive quantum leap, just because he is afraid of its impact on the nuclear talks
The deal could include relabelling Al-Nusra Front to cleanse it from its terrorist designation, while backing it militarily and allowing it to fight both the regime and ISIS. There is talk of defections in the Syrian army that could lead to more joining the rebranded entity. This way, Assad and what he represents could collapse, with an alternative regime being put forward though it is not clear whether another Assad -- Maher Assad, Bashar’s brother -- would have role in it, or whether it will be a regime dominated by the rebranded entity.
Barack Obama is able to take the initiative and broker Saudi-Iranian accords in Syria, which would serve both U.S. and Russian interests. All he has to do is how courage and determination.
Lebanon is another place where Obama could put to use if he so wishes. There is a humanitarian issue there involving the Syrian refugees. The political issue there is presidential elections, holding of which has become crucial. There is also the security issue represented by the possibility of ISIS entering Lebanon to chase down Hezbollah, which had entered Syria to fight alongside the regime in Damascus. All these issues must push President Obama to work on brokering the necessary accords for both Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Then there is Iraq, where 3,500 U.S. troops are present. In Iraq, Iranian-backed Shiite militias are clashing with Sunni leaders, with whom reconciliation is necessary to get them to become supporters and allies against ISIS. Here too, the U.S. president must be frank with Iran over the need for it to cease its inciting and provocative policies in Iraq, and to be frank with Saudi Arabia to get it to engage positively with Sunni leaders and the Iraqi government.
There is no logic in the U.S. president’s shirking of an opportunity for a positive quantum leap, just because he is afraid of its impact on the nuclear talks. The United States is a superpower that must continue to be in a position of influencing, leading, and being bold. The ball now is in Barack Obama’s court.

Seven trends to watch in the Middle East
By SETH J. FRANTZMAN/J.Post
06/13/2015 22:03
To say the Middle East is experiencing trying times would be an understatement. The region is experiencing unprecedented chaos and lacks political and economic direction. The assumption is that most of this will go on for years to come, and it will likely get worse before it gets better. There are a number of trends and developments that are worth watching, some of which are being ignored by the media. In no particular order, the following are what anyone interested in the future of the region should be paying attention to:
The Lebanese Presidency
Hezbollah has been holding the Lebanese presidency hostage since March of last year. Since May, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah has increasingly demanded that Michel Aoun be made president. Lebanon’s is not a normal democratic political system; the presidency is reserved for a Christian. That means that the two major political blocs, one run by Hezbollah and the other by those allied with Sa’ad Hariri, each field a candidate for president. Since the last Christian president stepped down Hezbollah has refused to play ball and has neutered the power of the Christians in the country by refusing to consent to the election of a president from the rival camp. In short, it wants a puppet president.
Hezbollah is well on the way to controlling Lebanon – and parts of Syria, as well. Nasrallah’s recent speeches marking Nakba Day and the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon have been laced with language prepping Lebanon for greater involvement in the Syrian civil war. In addition, Lebanon is spearheading the battle of Arsal-Qalamoun to wipe out Sunni Islamists there. The weakening of the president in Lebanon is one of the last nails in the coffin of Christian leadership in the Middle East, as Christian minorities are increasingly deracinated from their ancient homelands.
The Saudi-Gulf Alliance
When Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council launched air strikes in Yemen in March, this heralded a major shift in Saudi policy. Except for dabbling in the Bahrain crises during the Arab Spring, Saudi Arabia and the GCC have previously relied on the Americans to shield them. This was part of the Saudi-US pact.
Saudi Arabia and the Gulf provide the oil, the US provides the protection. But the rise of Iran, and US policy regarding the Islamic Republic, have unsettled the Gulf and the Saudis. Especially the prospect of Iran sitting astride the Bab-el-Mandeb and Hormuz straits, giving it a choke-hold on the region’s oil.
Testing their mettle in Yemen has been important for the Saudis. Commentators in the kingdom have now become outspoken about the problems with Iranian influence. Some are openly predicting war. There are rumors of a nuclear arms race. The Saudi-Gulf alliance is key to stabilizing the region and projecting Sunni power as a counterbalance to IS. With Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan weakened, there is a need for these royalist regimes to play a role.
The Rise of Nusra
In late may Al Jazeera released an interview with Nusra Front leader Abu Muhammad al-Julani. Covered by a black hood, with his group’s trademark black flag on the table and speaking softly, Julani explained Nusra’s goals were very different from those of IS. He tried to placate fears of sectarianism, arguing that although his men are devout Sunni Islamists, they aim merely to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad and will not persecute minorities. One could read this as a brilliant media coup by a savvy leader, but then, if Julani is that forward-thinking, the implication is that he is strategically positioning his group for the future.
Nusra Front is often ignored, partly because of its name, which doesn’t lend itself to easy reading, and partly because it lurks within an umbrella group called Jaysh al-Fatah, the “army of conquest,” which is made up of other rebel factions. It is principally ignored, however, because IS is the real threat to the region, and known for its horrific actions. But Nusra is the player to watch. IS is over-extended and under attack on numerous fronts. Nusra is gaining ground in Idlib and is one of the groups actually fighting the Syrian army, Hezbollah and their Iranian allies in Qalamoun on the border between Lebanon and Syria. If they can emerge from that contest even partially victorious they may end up being more influential than IS in the long run.
Kurdistan Independence
Since the 1990s and especially since the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 the Kurds in the country have been striving for increased independence from Baghdad.
Autonomy grew in 2005 with the new Iraqi government’s structure that allowed the Kurdistan Regional Government to function almost like a mini-state.
Later the arrival of IS on the scene isolated the Kurdish region and its military forces from the central government in Baghdad, which became weakened in the face of the Sunni onslaught and the rising power of the Shi’ite militias. Kurdistan has become a sort of island in the storm raging around it. The success of the Kurdish- backed HDP in the recent Turkish elections and the increasing independence of the Kurdish region in Syria, Rojava, mean prospects have never been better for the Kurds. But can they transform these prospects into an independent state?
Mahmoud Abbas’s Successor
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was born in Safed in Mandate Palestine in 1935.
He was elected president in 2005 and was supposed to serve a four-year term. The success of Hamas in legislative elections in 2006 made the PA wary of holding more and they were indefinitely postponed. The problem with finding a successor to Abbas is that the Palestinians need someone younger than his aging lieutenants such as Ahmed Qurei (78), Nabil Sha’ath (77). If the PA is plunged into uncertainty and chaos that will bode ill for both Israel and Jordan – and particularly for the Palestinians.
The Destruction of Arab Education
A BBC article recently gave readers a peek inside life in Mosul, the regional capital of IS in Iraq. Mosques are being blown up, private libraries having their contents dumped in the streets and many parents were keeping their children home from school to avoid IS indoctrination. Across the region education has been the main victim of the chaos, political uncertainty, civil war and murderous onslaughts of various groups.
The long-term affect is that there will be an Arab “lost generation” which lacks basic education from Libya to Iraq. The problem isn’t just that some are being indoctrinated with pre-modern Islamist views and have gotten used to seeing people being whipped in public, beheaded or stoned, it is that even the majority rejecting these views are being deprived of means to advancement. The educational failings today will have an impact for the rest of the century.
Three Leaders’ Challenges
Iran’s “Mr. Fix-It,” General Qasem Soleimani, has been the brains behind the extension of Iranian influence to Syria, Iraq and Yemen. But rumors that Iran is infiltrating thousands of troops into Syria to prop up Assad’s ailing army may give him too much influence over too wide an area. When Iran’s policy comes crashing down, Soleimani’s concept of projecting Iranian power to the “near abroad” will have been over-sold.
Similarly Turkey’s Erdogan’s dreams of transforming the power of the Turkish presidency seem to have been temporarily frustrated in the recent Turkish elections. If his party, the AKP, stumbles again it might be good for Turkish democracy and secularism, but it will lead to political instability.
Egypt’s Abdel Fattah Sisi is the mirror image of Erdogan, trying to combat extremism and reform the religious community. He too is well-received abroad and is not particularly liked in the region. His dreams of building a new capital city with help from the Gulf States is nice, but probably just a mirage. His courts keep sentencing Muslim Brotherhood members to death, but the Brothers will not be so easily vanquished, and if Sisi can’t inspire Egyptians he will prove merely a momentary stopgap to another round of violence.

The biggest heist of secret US personnel data in cyber history is still ongoing
DEBKAfile Special Report June 14, 2015
The White House has admitted that systems containing deeply personal information, submitted by current, former and prospective federal government employees for security clearances, had been “exfiltrated.” If the breach of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) was conducted by hackers linked to China, as suspected, access to the Standard Form 86 submitted by an estimated 41 million federal employees provided them with what may be the world’s largest stolen data base of US intelligence and military personnel. This is a “gold mine” of unencrypted data that leave US intelligence officers, for example, open to blackmail or coerced recruitment. While officials speak of two hacks, debkafile’s cyber security and intelligence experts report that it was a single breach and is still ongoing. Known to experts as an “Advanced Persistent Threat,” it amounts to slow, continuous penetration by a computer virus, planted in an individual computer of a network which duplicates itself gradually and insidiously.
Access may have been initiated by sowing particles of malicious code months or even years ago in the mega network of thousands of computers and terminals holding all the records of US federal employees. It could have happened when A OPM staff member surfed rogue Internet sites, opened a contaminated Word or Excel file – or even inserted a Memory Stick (Disk On Key). The bad news is that it is not over and the damage may not be reversible. Not only was it discovered belatedly, but more of those malware particles are certainly buried inside communications and data bases serving OPM, waiting for a remote signal from the hackers’ command and control centers, which are believed to be working for China.
According to our experts, it is almost impossible to totally sanitize all the affected computers, servers, switches and other components. The only practical remedy would be for the OPM to totally segregate its computers from the public Internet and severely restrict and supervise data transfers into the system’s different segments. This device would act like highway roadblocks that allow police officers to inspect each individual vehicle. According to the information published by cyber intelligence magazines, the hackers got away with copies of every Standard Form 86 filed by US intelligence and security personnel and passed it on to an unknown destination. This form lists mental illnesses, drug and alcohol use, past arrests and bankruptcies. Applicants are required to list contacts and relatives, potentially exposing any foreign relatives of US intelligence employees to coercion. Both the applicant's Social Security number and that of his or her cohabitant are required, as well as driver’s license, passport and phone numbers.
The hack made available to a foreign agency all the personal particulars including photos of every officer employed by US security agencies. "Recent events underscore the need to accelerate the administration's cyber strategy and confront aggressive, persistent malicious actors that continue to target our nation's cyber infrastructure," the White House statement said. However, the global ramifications can’t be overlooked of a weapon that knows no borders. In February, the big US medical insurance firm Anthem reported that the administrative data of “only” 80 million clients were hacked. Smaller breaches may not be reported at all, but are believed to be taking place daily. In all, America’s government, health and financial in infrastructure is under tremendous constant cyber attack.
China is believed to possess the biggest data base in the world, larger even than the US National Security Agency. Its super computers are operated and maintained by thousands of staff around the clock, their data bases constantly supplemented by information hacked from every US institution, public or private.

Islamic State: The Myth of a Baathist ‘Hidden Hand’
Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi
IHS Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Monitor
June 2015/Middle East Forum/http://www.meforum.org/5312/isis-baathist-hidden-hand
Originally published under the title, “Enemy of My Enemy: Re-evaluating the Islamic State’s Relationship with the Ba’athist JRTN.”
Since the full-blown revival of Iraq’s Sunni insurgency at the beginning of 2014, there has been much misunderstanding of the relationship between the Islamic State and insurgents of Baathist orientation, principally represented by the Jaish Rijaal al-Tariqa al-Naqshabandiyya (JRTN).
Much of the discourse on this subject attempts to tie the JRTN to the Islamic State, arguing that a so-called “alliance of convenience” between the two groups has been key to the Islamic State’s maintenance of power in areas outside of government control. Linked to this theme is the portrayal of the Islamic State as somehow Baathism reincarnated, most commonly noting the former careers that many leading figures in the group had in the security apparatus of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein’s government.
The common notion of a Baathist-Islamic State “alliance of convenience” is mistaken.
As such, it is worthwhile to trace the relationship between the JRTN and the Islamic State from the initial emergence of the former until the present day, primarily focusing on the aftermath of the United States’ military withdrawal from Iraq at the end of 2011, in order to highlight that the common notion of the “alliance of convenience” is mistaken and that there is a clear dividing line between the two groups.
Whatever coordination took place in mid-2014, in particular, soon dissipated as the Islamic State consolidated power and local territorial control at the JRTN’s expense, so that the JRTN has largely descended into irrelevance. Consequently, whatever the veracity of claims by Shia militias that the JRTN leader and former aide to Hussein, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, was killed in mid-April 2015, the JRTN’s impact on Iraq’s security situation in the face of the wider Islamic State threat is minimal.
Ideology and Beginnings
The JRTN was founded at the end of 2006 following Hussein’s execution in December, officially as part of a Douri-led coalition called Al-Qiyadat al-Ula lil-Jihad wal-Tahrir, or the Supreme Command for Jihad and Liberation (SCJL). Although the coalition nominally included other groups, at least in the beginning, in practice the JRTN has become interchangeable with the SCJL.
JRTN leader Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri was reported killed in April.
The goal of the JRTN can be summed up as aiming to resurrect Iraq’s Baathist state that existed before the US-led invasion in 2003. The Sufi religious aegis of the Naqshbandi order, deriving from the cultivation of the sect during the Hussein era, should be viewed as secondary, though it does help to separate the JRTN from the Salafist-jihadist ideology of the Islamic State, as will be discussed subsequently.
The primacy of Baathist ideology is illustrated by the JRTN’s pan-Arab logo portraying a unified Arab world, as envisaged by Baathism, as well as the first point of the JRTN’s creed as stated on its official website, “Our army believes that Iraq is an Arab, Muslim state that cannot be separated from the Arab Islamic Ummah.”
The term “Arab Islamic Ummah” is a key part of Iraqi Baathist discourse, reflecting not only the classical pan-Arabism but also the Islamic face that Hussein tried to give his regime following the 1990-91 Gulf War. Also in keeping with official Baathist ideology is a superficial anti-sectarian stance, reflected in point 16 of the JRTN creed, which states, “Our army believes in the outlawing of the establishment of sectarian, racist, and regionalist blocs and parties and their possession of weapons.” Indeed, the JRTN even claims non-Sunni members, describing itself in a July 2014 statement as an “extension of the prior national Iraqi army,” with members from all sects and ethnicities, including Arabs, Kurds, Shia, Sunnis, Turkmen, and even Christians, Mandaeans, and Yezidis.
Linked to this point is a rejection of any notion of dividing Iraq, which implicitly entails the repudiation of concepts of federalism by sect that has gained increasing popularity among Iraq’s Sunni population, especially the more ‘moderate’ sections of the pro-insurgency movement, such as the Islamic Army in Iraq (IAI). The IAI set up an activist wing after the US withdrawal – named Al-Hirak al-Shaabi al-Sunni – to work for the goal of a Sunni federal region. In contrast, therefore, the JRTN stands out as an inherently rejectionist and revolutionary actor in Iraq’s Sunni insurgency.
The fact that the IAI showed itself to be more amenable to compromise within the system was also demonstrated by the large number of its fighters and commanders who ended up joining the Sunni Awakening (Sahwa) movement from the beginning of 2007 onwards, which proved key in driving back the Islamic State’s predecessor, the Islamic State in Iraq (ISI).
JRTN operations have been relatively unsophisticated, with no suicide attacks, coordinated VBIED attacks, or sustained territorial assaults.
However, there is much less evidence of extensive JRTN participation in the Sahwa. Consequently, by the time of the US withdrawal, one could affirm with reasonable confidence that the two main Sunni insurgent actors in Iraq were the ISI and the JRTN. Partly on the basis of the consistent shared rejection of the post-2003 Shia-dominated political order in Iraq, allegations emerged from security officials even in this period of collaboration between the JRTN and the ISI, with the JRTN reportedly assisting the ISI in carrying out vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED) attacks in various parts of Iraq, including Kirkuk, Ramadi, and Tikrit. Although unverified, the reports are somewhat credible as during 2010-11 the ISI was a weakening organisation under heavy security force pressure and was unable to impose its will over other groups in the same way the Islamic State is currently able. By comparison, the type of JRTN operations officially advertised by the group’s own media always tended to be much less sophisticated than those of the ISI, with no suicide attacks, coordinated VBIED attacks, or sustained territorial assaults.
Images released by JRTN in 2014
Rather, JRTN operations entailed more basic hit-and-run guerrilla operations, particularly the use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs), rockets, and mortars. One operational video, for example, dated 25 November 2011, features an IED attack purportedly targeting a vehicle of “the American enemy” in northern Baghdad. In this video, the JRTN claims the IED was manufactured locally “and with [the] co-operation of members of the government army,” referring to the new Iraqi army of the Baghdad government. The fact that the group might have had local sympathisers in the security forces at this stage is not surprising. Despite the US withdrawal, most officially advertised JRTN video operations post-2011 continued to portray attacks as targeting “the American enemy”, as though the perceived occupier was somehow still present. This was probably related to the fact that in the immediate aftermath of the US withdrawal, the Sunni narrative of Iranian influence over a supposed “Safavid” – a pejorative term used in Sunni discourse to mean an Iranian client – government in Baghdad did not yet have sufficient currency to give credibility to attacks on Iraqi government forces that might end up harming civilians through collateral damage. The available videos on JRTN operations indicate a reach across predominantly Sunni areas of Iraq, ranging from Diyala province in the east to Anbar province in the west, and from the Baghdad area and surrounding belt all the way to Ninawa province in the north.
However, to understand further where JRTN influence was particularly strong, it is best to examine the JRTN’s activist front organisation, known as Intifada Ahrar al-Iraq (IAAI), or the Uprising of the Free People of Iraq.
IAAI and Protests in Iraq
The link between the IAAI and the JRTN is demonstrated by numerous lines of evidence, despite the fact it was initially denied by IAAI spokesperson Dr. Ghazi Faisal. First, the IAAI regularly shares official JRTN statements on its official and linked social media pages, while declining to do so with other insurgent groups. Second, IAAI discourse exactly mirrors that of the JRTN, using the same revolutionary rhetoric, the same forms of address in its statements, and the same superficial anti-sectarian messaging. Third, it is notable that the same areas where the JRTN was seen as traditionally strong became strongholds for protests organised by the IAAI in 2013.
Protests that broke out in 2011 were nationwide on the model of the Arab Spring demonstrations and tended to focus on popular grievances such as the provision of public services, government corruption, and calls to end the US occupation and perceived foreign interference. In this context, the IAAI announced itself on 24 February 2011, urging a “violent/tremendous revolution against the occupation, oppression, and tyranny”, and calling on “Iraqis from Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen, Sunnis, Shia, Muslims, Christians, and the rest of the other religions, sects, and ethnicities” to rise up. Playing on the notion of nationwide grievances and resentment at the US occupation, the first IAAI statement made the US presence in Iraq the focus of its anger, rather than sectarian-tinged talk of the “Safavid” government.
Still frame from an IAAI video showing a May 2011 protest in Rawa, western Anbar province
The IAAI also launched a video channel at this point, filming and uploading footage of some of the protests. Among some of the demonstrations captured on camera by the IAAI and shared on its channel was a local protest held in Rawa, in western Anbar (currently controlled by the Islamic State), in May 2011 featuring a banner reading, “The tribe of the people of Rawa rejects foreign intervention and demands the departure of the occupier”, and chants of “Iran, out, out. Iraq will remain free. With blood, with soul, we sacrifice for you oh Iraq.” The IAAI undoubtedly hoped to capitalise on the wave of popular protests, but little ultimately came out of the 2011 demonstrations.
The IAAI would have to wait until the beginning of 2013 for its status to become prominent. Unlike the 2011 protests, these demonstrations had a distinct Sunni sectarian element, focusing on grievances such as de-Baathification legislation introduced in May 2003 – seeking, at a minimum, its total repeal – and the detention of friends and relatives by the security forces. However, the IAAI used the protests to push its revolutionary agenda, for example releasing a song in March 2013 entitled “Our people want the downfall of the government“. Other familiar JRTN themes came out in other songs released by the IAAI in this period, such as the song “The People have Revolted“, featuring lyrics including, “We won’t stop until Baghdad, bringing down the ruling system and the constitution” and “we reject all rule of division”. At IAAI protests, there was a familiar JRTN slogan – “Qadimun ya Baghdad“, or “Coming, oh Baghdad” – in reference to the notion of retaking the capital and overthrowing the government. The most prominent IAAI protest sites were at Hawija in Kirkuk province, and the cities of Mosul and Tikrit, with notable influence also in Diyala and Fallujah – which gained notoriety for the presence of some protesters waving ISI flags.
It was clear that the IAAI was not going to be reconciled to the system, whatever concessions the government might make. Rather, its aim was to revive a full-blown insurgency through confrontation, and the government played right into the IAAI’s hands with the Hawija massacre in April 2013, which resulted in the killing of dozens of apparently unarmed protesters by security forces. Following the incident, the JRTN’s military spokesperson released a statement invoking the traditional Quranic justification for defensive jihad, while emphasising that the “patience of this oppressed people will not last and the peacefulness of their demonstrations and sit-ins will not continue”. The immediate aftermath of the massacre led to an apparent upsurge in JRTN activity, with reported attacks at Mosul airport, and in Abu Ghraib, east Mosul, Fallujah, the Hamrin Mountains, the Tariq camp near Fallujah, Tikrit, and Tuz Khurmato. The JRTN also briefly seized control of the town of Sulaiman Bek.
ISIL exploited the new level of instability in Iraq arising from JRTN actions in 2012.
Subsequent violence in Iraq has never dipped below pre-Hawija massacre levels, so the incident, the wider Sunni demonstrations, and the JRTN’s involvement in the post-incident escalation can be interpreted as a key turning point in the revitalisation of Iraq’s Sunni insurgency. At this stage too, focus on the “Safavid” angle becomes more apparent in the JRTN’s propaganda, with an official JRTN video on the “operations of liberating Sulaiman Bek” featuring an “assault on the Safavid militias and destruction of a tank”. Similarly, a JRTN video from the Fallujah area on 25 April 2013 is entitled “Bombing of a base of the Safavid militias in Fallujah.” However, evidence is lacking of co-ordination in this upsurge between the JRTN and the ISI – which had become the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in April 2013 following the decision by emir Ibrahim al-Badri (alias Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi) to expand into Syria and attempt to subsume Jabhat al-Nusra. Furthermore, in the protests themselves, the issue of people showing up with ISI/ISIL banners was a localised problem in Fallujah and Ramadi, and not one affecting IAAI protest sites in particular.
What can be said with certainty though is that ISIL, having already intensified operations in 2012, exploited the new level of instability in Iraq – which had arisen thanks in no small part to the actions of the JRTN – to accomplish some of its most daring operations yet. The most notable of these was the Abu Ghraib prison break in July 2013, in which hundreds of jihadi veterans of the insurgency against the US were released, significantly strengthening ISIL’s ranks. To better scrutinise any seeming alliance of convenience and co-ordination between ISIL and the JRTN, it is necessary to more closely examine the events of late 2013/early 2014, as the security situation in Iraq descended into a full-blown insurgency with the loss of government control over significant cities, beginning with Fallujah and culminating with Mosul, Tikrit, and other towns in the north and west of the country in the summer of 2014.
Descent into Chaos
The fall of Fallujah from government control in early January 2014 can be ascribed in large part to failures on the part of then Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, who decided to dismantle the Ramadi protest site by force in December 2013 on the grounds that it was a base for ISIL, despite the fact that ISIL militants had only occasionally appeared when the site was largely empty and the protests were dissipating on their own. Later that month, security forces arrested Sunni member of parliament Ahmad al-Alwani, killing his brother and five of his guards during the operation, causing widespread anger across Anbar province.
In an attempt to ease tensions, the army was ordered to withdraw from Fallujah and Ramadi in the hope that the local police could deal with the situation, but the result was that ISIL – in co-ordination with other insurgents, including the JRTN – exploited the security vacuum to seize control of Fallujah and parts of Ramadi, although Ramadi was re-taken by security forces and pro-government militias several days later. Media coverage at the time tended to portray Fallujah as having fallen under ISIL control, when in reality a variety of Sunni militant groups had taken over the city in conjunction with ISIL, including the JRTN, the IAI, Jaish al-Mujahideen, and the 1920s Revolution Brigades.
ISIL of course would have an interest in downplaying the presence of the other smaller factions, and vice-versa. On account of the other factions, though, ISIL initially had to adopt a more conciliatory approach, not targeting the families of local police. In line with its approach in Syria whenever it entered an area where other factions were present, it also set up a Virtue and Vice Committee/Islamic court. Gradually, ISIL began to subsume its rivals through a mixture of co-option and coercion, providing incentives to pledge allegiance, so that by May-June 2014 it had become the dominant group in the city. Evidence for the JRTN’s presence in Fallujah was found on the IAAI’s media channel. For example, on 10 January, the IAAI uploaded a video featuring insurgents in Fallujah, one of whom proclaimed that its aim was to conquer Baghdad, and that they were not members of Daesh, a pejorative term for ISIL based on its Arabic acronym.
Like the fall of Fallujah, the capture of cities in the north of Iraq – above all Mosul and Tikrit – was not the work solely of ISIL, which changed its name to the Islamic State in June 2014. Indeed, the wider insurgency beyond the Islamic State initially seemed ecstatic about the lightning offensive across northern and western Iraq. However, rather than a case of co-dependence between the Islamic State and other factions, as had been the case for some time in Fallujah, it is clear these advances against the government were being spearheaded by the former – which by then represented by far the most powerful insurgent force in the country – and the other factions were trying to ride this wave in a bid to carve out their own spheres of influence. However, the Islamic State was no longer in the business of compromise and issued a charter for Mosul in mid-June, shortly after capturing the city, making clear that not only had the era of “Safavid” government passed, but also that of Baathism.Throughout the beginning of 2014, the IAAI also released videos of self-proclaimed “Military Councils for the Revolutionaries of the Tribes” in a variety of locations across Iraq, playing on typical JRTN themes of superficial cross-sectarianism, including supposed Kurdish and Shia tribal councils. In mid-January it also announced the formation of a unifying body known as the General Military Council for Iraq’s Revolutionaries (GMCIR), which features a political wing where the participation of the JRTN is openly acknowledged. It is also clear that the GMCIR includes other insurgent factions ideologically close to JRTN, such as the 1920s Revolution Brigades.
By mid-2014, JRTN was visibly marginalized even in Tikrit, the spiritual heartland of Baathism.
Furthermore, in a statement issued by its newly formed “Committee to Administer the Affairs of the Mosques” in Mosul, the Islamic State explicitly affirmed that it would not tolerate any other group displaying banners. Within approximately one month, following on from the group’s declaration of a caliphate on 29 June, a sophisticated administration was emerging within Mosul, with various declared diwans (Islamic State departments), such as the Diwan al-Taaleem, issuing examination timetables for Mosul University’s various colleges.
A similar pattern of the marginalisation of the JRTN and other non-Islamic State militants emerged even in places where the JRTN would be expected to have had more influence, including Tikrit – the spiritual heartland of Baathism – with other groups pushed out to the rural peripheries. The fate of JRTN forces in places such as Mosul was best summarised by an account given to IHS Jane’s in late December 2014 by a Mosul resident, “They are present but have no influence; some of them gave allegiance, some of them were detained, and some of them fled.” Were the ‘alliance of convenience’ more than a short-term, pragmatic gambit, the Islamic State might have made some concessions to JRTN sensibilities, but in fact the group indulged in all its worst excesses to the anger of the JRTN, including the destruction of shrines and heritage sites – which was particularly offensive to the JRTN’s Sufi image – the genocidal targeting of Yezidis, and the displacement of Christians from Mosul.
Consequently, the JRTN distanced itself from these Islamic State actions in its statements, while sticking to its standard practice of not mentioning the Islamic State by name and blaming its deeds on supposed agents of the Baghdad government and Iran.
JRTN Decline
As the JRTN’s influence declined in the face of the Islamic State’s local dominance, the group tried to portray itself as defiant on the path of the so-called ‘revolution’ despite its clear distancing from the Islamic State’s worst actions. In mid-to-late 2014, unverified local reports emerged that the US-led international coalition against the Islamic State was reaching out to the JRTN in a bid to form a local Sunni force to combat the Islamic State – although this has since been denied by US ambassador Brett McGurk. In a statement circulated on JRTN social media pages, but not its official website, this outreach was portrayed as a sign of desperation and a list of JRTN demands was posted, reflecting the US’ inherent inability to come to an understanding with the JRTN.
JRTN has become totally marginalised and reflects a bygone era of Iraq’s once-diverse Sunni insurgency.
The actual party in desperation was the JRTN, however, which in the past six months has tried to turn to Saudi Arabia and aligned Arab states in a bid to bolster its position – largely through the provision of funding. This has been reflected in effusive praise for the deceased Saudi King Abdullah as a champion of the cause of the “Arab Islamic Ummah”, congratulations extended to the new monarch King Salman, and a eulogy to the Jordanian pilot Muaz al-Kasasbeh who was burnt alive by the Islamic State, portraying him as a “martyr” carrying out the obligatory duty of defending the “Arab Islamic Ummah” and its heritage. Most recently, the JRTN has declared its firm support for the Saudi-led coalition’s Operation Decisive Storm against Zaidi Houthi militant group Ansar Allah in Yemen, hailing it “the great historic operation” to halt Iranian expansionism. The IAAI also released a song praising the operation.
In an audio message attributed to Douri in April, prior to reports of his claimed death, he clearly distances himself from ‘takfiri’ thought – a reference to the Islamic State – and hails the old pan-Arab nationalism of former Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser, while trying to tie his cause to that of Saudi Arabia. The veracity of his claimed killing is now readily in doubt following another audio message released in May. As far as dating the speech goes, it is almost certainly from after the reported claims of his killing, as he makes reference to a controversy postdating his alleged death over the status of the town of Nukhayb in Anbar province. In this recording, the denunciation of the Islamic State is even clearer, as he condemns the June 2014 massacre of Shia security forces by Islamic State militants at Camp Speicher in Tikrit and makes clear that there is no alliance between the JRTN and the Islamic State, stating about the latter, “They declare the Baath to be kuffar [disbelievers].” Undoubtedly part of this speech reflects justifiable pushback against portrayals of the Islamic State as Baathism resurrected. It also seems that Douri is not under any illusions about the Islamic State’s strength relative to his group, as he speaks of the current fighting in Anbar and how 90% of the province is under the control of the Islamic State and affiliated “armed men”.
In conclusion, therefore, the JRTN cannot be seen as the local Sunni force that will turn the tide against the Islamic State. It has become totally marginalised and reflects a bygone era of Iraq’s Sunni insurgency, which used to be much more diverse. Now is the era of the Islamic State, and policy-making and analysis must do away with notions that the Islamic State is maintaining localised power and territorial control in Iraq because of any ‘alliance of convenience’ with Baathists, or that the Islamic State is somehow Baathism in disguise. The fact that senior figures within the group might have had a past in Saddam Hussein’s security apparatus does not automatically make those figures Baathists in secret alliance with the JRTN. Rather, the true ideological forerunner lies in the Islamist and Salafist ideas that gained currency in the last decade of Hussein’s rule thanks to the regime’s efforts to seek an Islamic facade, fused with the brutal jihadism brought to Iraq by the founder of the ISI’s predecessor Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and his contingent following the US-led invasion.
**Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi is a research fellow at Middle East Forum’s Jihad Intel project.

Muslim persecution of Christians worsens in Palestinian territories, Israel
June 14, 2015 4:10 am By Ralph Sidway
Christians fear ISIS influence is expanding. Mob violence against Christians, anti-Christian billboards and graffiti, and jihadist rhetoric have Christians concerned: “Feeling afraid. Feeling cornered. Feeling, ‘Maybe this is not my place. Maybe I just need to get out of here. I don’t want to deal with them. I don’t trust them anymore.’”Just as in Egypt, imams in Jerusalem and elsewhere in Israel and the Palestinian territories are whipping up the Muslim faithful with sermons like this: “When you face a polytheist enemy [i.e. a Christian who worships the Holy Trinity], you should give him three options – they must convert to Islam, or pay the jizya [tax on non-Muslims], or else you should seek the help of Allah and fight them. You should fight them even if they do not fight you.” (Sheikh Issam Ameera, imam at Al-Aqsa mosque, Jerusalem)“Christians Suspect Islamic State Influencing Muslims in Palestinian Territories, Israel — Increased radicalization seen in attacks, rhetoric,” Morningstar News, June 11, 2015:

Christians Suspect Islamic State Influencing Muslims in Palestinian Territories, Israel — Increased radicalization seen in attacks, rhetoric,”
Morningstar News, June 11, 2015:
Billboard in Nazareth issues Islamic threat to Christians.
ISTANBUL, Turkey (Morning Star News) – After months of Islamic State (IS) committing horrific violence in the Middle East and North Africa, Palestinian Christians say a large number of Muslims in the Palestinian Territories and Israel have become “radicalized” and are much more aggressive toward them.Anti-Christian hostility boiling under the surface for years has come into plain view in the past few months in the form of physical attacks, incendiary religious speeches and inflammatory billboards, they said.
Palestinian Christian leaders said not all Muslims in the Territories and Israel have become extremists, and elders within the Muslim community are trying to dampen the effects of extremist ideology, but enough Palestinians have become radicalized that many Christians feel unsafe or, at minimum, openly unwanted. Whereas tensions between Christians and Muslims previously were seen as issues between individuals, there is now a definite “us vs. them” mentality from Islamic extremists, Christian leaders said.
“Since I was a child this has been happening in the Christian Quarter and in the Muslim Quarter [in Jerusalem’s historic Old City area], but not in this way,” said Rami Fellemon, a Palestinian Christian and director of Jerusalem Evangelistic Outreach, headquartered in East Jerusalem. “Many people are sitting here, and in their own mind they are thinking, ‘What the heck are we doing here in this country? Let’s leave the country.’ Others have resentment toward Muslims now. They don’t understand why they are doing this in such a way.”
Ramped-up hostilities from radicalized Muslims come on top of attacks on Palestinian- and Christian-owned properties by ultra-Orthodox Jewish zealots, in addition to the day-to-day difficulties Israeli officials impose on Palestinians in the Territories.
“They feel like even more of a minority now and feel hated by both sides [Jews and Muslims],” Fellemon told Morning Star News. “It’s a terrible feeling. Feeling afraid. Feeling cornered. Feeling, ‘Maybe this is not my place. Maybe I just need to get out of here. I don’t want to deal with them. I don’t trust them anymore.’”
Opinions differ as to when attitudes started to change in the Territories, but most agree it happened some time in 2014, either during a retaliatory military campaign by Israel against Hamas for the June 12 kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers, or when the IS territorial expansion in the Middle East started in earnest.
In February, Christians in Israel’s heavily Muslim town of Nazareth were alarmed to find a billboard posted downtown ordering them not to spread their faith or even talk about Jesus in a way that contradicts the Islamic version of His life.
Quoting from Surah 4:171 in the Koran, the sign reads in Arabic, “O People of the Scripture, do not commit excess in your religion or say about Allah except the truth. The Messiah, Jesus, the son of Mary, was but a messenger of Allah and His word which He directed to Mary and a soul [created at a command] from Him. So believe in Allah and His messengers. And do not say, ‘Three’; desist – it is better for you. Indeed, Allah is but one God. Exalted is He above having a son.”
The billboard was placed just outside the Greek Orthodox Church of the Annunciation, which, according to tradition, was the site where the angel Gabriel told Mary that she had been chosen by God to give birth to Jesus, the promised Messiah. According to local media reports, area Christians are too afraid to ask to have the sign removed. None of the Christians interviewed by Morning Star News were willing to talk about the sign.
That month in East Jerusalem, in the Old City area, on Feb. 26 someone started a fire at a seminary building used by the Greek Orthodox Church near the Jaffa Gate. No one was injured, and although no one was ever arrested, ultra-Orthodox Jewish groups were widely thought to be responsible.
Islamist anti-Christian sentiment has not been limited to billboards. On May 1, Sheikh Issam Ameera, an imam at the Al-Aqsa mosque (built on the Temple Mount in the Old City area), posted online a video of a sermon entitled “The Islamic State is the keeper of religion and state” in which he essentially told fellow Muslims that they must be in a constant state of war and conquest against the “polytheist enemy”, i.e., Christians, as well as against Jews.
“Today, our honorable Islamic scholars talk about defensive jihad, ‘Fight for the sake of Allah those who fight you, but do not transgress, for Allah does not like transgressors,’” Ameera says in the video. “In other words, you should always be polite, never go against anyone, and never point your weapon at anyone, unless someone attacks you. In all other cases, everything must be peaceful? No! When you face a polytheist enemy, you should give him three options – they must convert to Islam, or pay the jizya [tax on non-Muslims], or else you should seek the help of Allah and fight them. You should fight them even if they do not fight you.”
Ameera repeats that “polytheists” are enemies that must be fought with Allah’s help.
“Let the scholars hear this: You should seek the help of Allah and fight them – only when they fight you? No! When they refuse to convert to Islam, and refuse to pay the jizya,” he preaches. “In such a case, it is meaningless to let them keep enjoying their life in this world, eating from the sustenance bestowed by Allah, yet disbelieving in Him. No! Against their will, we shall subjugate them to the rule of Allah.”
Three days later, a disagreement between a Christian and a Muslim in the Old City escalated into a mob attack against Christians. According to several witnesses, 60 to 80 Muslims in their 20s rampaged through the Christian Quarter immediately after the argument, throwing stones at houses and businesses. The young men also attacked an area Ethiopian Orthodox Monastery, where they spray-painted anti-Christian messages on the building and destroyed a cross.
“When they came, it was a wave of anger that was … you cannot describe it, you cannot understand it,” Fellemon said. “Because when one kid is fighting with another kid, and 60 to 80 people come and start smashing doors and throwing stones on windows and doors of Christian families and smashing the cross of the convent, this is totally not about a kid hurting a kid. This is more about Islam and Christianity. It’s more about persecution.”
The attack on the Ethiopian monastery was considered particularly sinister because it took place two weeks after Islamic State released a video in which they beheaded or shot 28 Ethiopians for being Christians and threatened other attacks against Ethiopian Christians. The slogans spray-painted in the Christian Quarter caused concern among Palestinian Christians because they were the same statements made in the video, where IS called Christians “worshipers of the wooden cross.”
There is some debate as to what is causing the change in attitudes of Palestinian Muslims toward Palestinian Christians, particularly those of Muslim youth in the Territories. Christians are asking how far IS ideology has penetrated Palestinian society. Has IS arrived in the Territories, or are the anti-Christian attitudes there the natural outcome of other radical Islamic groups in the region since 1980s? There is evidence for both theories.
The IS graffiti, scrawled word for word in the Christian quarter from the video of the slain Ethiopians, is thought to show that some Muslims are embracing IS ideology or, at minimum, are being influenced by it. Hizb al-Tahrir, an Islamist party in Palestine, has placed a recruiting billboard between Jerusalem and Ramallah inviting Muslims into IS and its caliphate. Ameera of the Al-Aqsa mosque is a leading member of the same party.
On May 11 the Islamic hostility appeared to be mitigated when a traditional elders council between Muslim and Christian leaders took place in Jerusalem. According to every Christian interviewed, the Muslim leaders apologized earnestly for the actions of those who attacked the Christian quarter. One Christian leader said they appeared to be almost shamed by the actions of the mob, which may show that the majority of Muslims in the Territories are tolerant towards the Christian minority.
The group issued an “honor pact” in which further attacks were foresworn. But on May 24, Muslims attacked another group of Christians near the Damascus gate. Details about the attack are scarce, other than that one man was slightly injured and that Israeli police broke it up. Nashat Filmon, general director of the Palestinian branch of The Bible Society, said recent hostilities in Jerusalem could be the related to IS.
“The dark ideology of ISIS is spreading all over the region like cancer,” he said. “This is also including the Holy Land. Christians, overall, live here in peace and harmony with Muslims in Jerusalem and the West Bank, but incidents do happen from time to time, and it’s true that these incidents have recently increased, especially in the Old City of Jerusalem.”
He added that some incidents could have been inspired and encouraged by Muslim extremists “and ignorant individuals or groups or others who are interested in making a problem.”
Fellemon said that although he thinks IS may have some influence in the Territories, the terrorist group is a part of the larger problem of militant Islam in the Territories and not the other way around.
“Are they [those who attacked the Christian quarter] ruled by ISIS? I don’t think so,” he said. “Are they inspired by ISIS? It is hard for me to answer yes or no because ISIS is inspired by radical Islam. So maybe I would answer and say, ‘Yes, they are inspired by radical Islam.’”…