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LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
June 29/15

http://www.eliasbejjaninews.com/newsbulletins05/english.june29.15.htm

Bible Quotation For Today/False Teachers and Their Destruction
The Bible: 2 Peter 2/1But there were also false prophets among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you. They will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the sovereign Lord who bought them—bringing swift destruction on themselves. 2 Many will follow their depraved conduct and will bring the way of truth into disrepute. 3 In their greed these teachers will exploit you with fabricated stories. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has not been sleeping. 4 For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell,[a] putting them in chains of darkness[b] to be held for judgment; 5 if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others; 6 if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly; 7 and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless 8 (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)— 9 if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment. 10 This is especially true of those who follow the corrupt desire of the flesh[c] and despise authority. Bold and arrogant, they are not afraid to heap abuse on celestial beings; 11 yet even angels, although they are stronger and more powerful, do not heap abuse on such beings when bringing judgment on them from[d] the Lord. 12 But these people blaspheme in matters they do not understand. They are like unreasoning animals, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like animals they too will perish. 13 They will be paid back with harm for the harm they have done. Their idea of pleasure is to carouse in broad daylight. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their pleasures while they feast with you.[e] 14 With eyes full of adultery, they never stop sinning; they seduce the unstable; they are experts in greed—an accursed brood! 15 They have left the straight way and wandered off to follow the way of Balaam son of Bezer,[f] who loved the wages of wickedness. 16 But he was rebuked for his wrongdoing by a donkey—an animal without speech—who spoke with a human voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.17 These people are springs without water and mists driven by a storm. Blackest darkness is reserved for them. 18 For they mouth empty, boastful words and, by appealing to the lustful desires of the flesh, they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error. 19 They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of depravity—for “people are slaves to whatever has mastered them.” 20 If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and are overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning. 21 It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than to have known it and then to turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed on to them. 22 Of them the proverbs are true: “A dog returns to its vomit,”[g] and, “A sow that is washed returns to her wallowing in the mud.”

Latest analysis, editorials from miscellaneous sources published on June 28-29/15
Why Muslims should read the Pope’s Encyclical/Abdullah Hamidaddin/Al Arabiya/June 28/15
The U.N. Charter at 70: Toward a safer and sustainable future/Ban Ki-moon/Al Arabiya/28 June/15
Iran talks to continue beyond June 30 deadline/Omri Efraim/News Agencies/Ynetnews/June 28/15
Terror in Tunisia: Survivors recall bloody beach attack/Associated Press/Ynetnews/June 28/15
Syria, Hizballah torpedo understanding between Druze and Syrian rebel Nusra Front near Israeli border/DEBKAfile/June 28/15
Analysis: Stop the hypocrisy and defeat Islamic State/By YOSSI MELMAN/J.Post/June 28/15
What America's Civil War tell us about Arab civil wars/Hisham Melhem/Al Arabiya/28 June/15
Rebuilding America’s foreign policy post-Obama/Raghida Dergham/Al Arabiya/June 28/15
Confronting Female Genital Mutilation in Iran/Irfan Al-Alawi and Stephen Schwartz/The Weekly Standard/June 28/15

Miscellaneous Reports And News published on June 28-29/15
Iran talks to continue beyond June 30 deadline
Iran talks set to go beyond deadline as differences remain
Netanyahu: Despite late hour, still time for world to get better agreement with Iran
EU’s Mogherini says “not impossible” to get Iran nuclear deal before Tuesday deadline
UK, Canadian, U.S. students may have left Sudan for ISIS
ISIS purportedly threatens to 'slaughter' Christian Arabs living in Jerusalem
Gunmen kill senior Iraqi oil official in Kirkuk
Australian ISIS fighter ‘still alive’ after drone strike: report
Kuwait: Saudi national carried out mosque attack
Saudi soldier killed in shelling by Yemen border
Assad confidante dies of illness: Syria state media
U.S., allies conduct air strikes in Syria, Iraq against ISIS
Fierce clashes rage in Hassakeh
In sign of warmer ties, Israeli official heads to Cairo for talks
Sirens blare in south, rocket falls inside Gaza
Britain warns further Islamist attacks in Tunisia possible
For the first time since 2011: Israeli Foreign Ministry director visits Cairo
French attack suspect: Lone wolf Islamist or 'guy who flipped
Jerusalem think tank to Netanyahu: We must go on the offensive against BDS
Walmart cake wars: The Confederate flag vs. Islamic State
Turkish police use water cannon to disperse gay pride parade
mistakes sex toy flag for ISIS banner at London gay pride parade
Yemen: Houthis partially withdraw from Aden as Hadi loyalists step up resistance
The UAE, a solid gold opportunity for investors

Jehad Watch Latest Reports And News
Islamic State in Palestine” tells Christians to leave by Ramadan’s end or be killed
Islamic State: “Worse is to follow” Tunisia jihad massacre
Guardian: Motives of Muslim who beheaded man “remain unclear”
Islamic State marks gay marriage ruling by throwing 4 gay men off a roof
California: Mortars discovered, highway shut down
US officials warn of Islamic State July 4 attacks
Nigeria: Muslim murders five with suicide bombing at leprosy hospital
France: Jihad murderer took selfie with the severed head of his victim
Australian PM: Islamic State “nothing to do with God…nothing to do with religion”
The Triumph of the Islamic State

No Lebanese Cabinet session yet as Aoun sticks to his guns
Hasan Lakkis| The Daily Star/Jun. 29, 2015 |
BEIRUT: Prime Minister Tammam Salam is still undecided on whether to call the Cabinet to meet as efforts to make MP Michel Aoun soften his unyielding stance on the issue of security and military appointments have failed, heralding an open-ended government crisis. Salam met with Speaker Nabih Berri Saturday in his latest consultations with the country’s rival politicians to end a widening rift over the appointment of senior military and security officers, a contentious issue which cast the Cabinet into paralysis on June 4, prompting the premier to suspend its sessions.
Referring to his meeting with Berri, who has repeatedly said he backed the resumption of Cabinet sessions, he said: “Speaker Nabih Berri still supports the Cabinet and the resumption of Cabinet sessions. This is what I felt during our meeting last Saturday.”Berri told his visitors Sunday that he informed Salam that his ministers would attend any Cabinet session Salam calls for “if this session is held [now] during the month of Ramadan or in two months.”
According to Berri, Salam is mulling calling for a Cabinet session either this week or next week and suggested holding three sessions: one to discuss military appointments, one to pursue deliberations on the state budget and a third one to discuss the Cabinet’s regular agenda.
Speaking to visitors at his Moseitbeh residence Sunday, Salam said he was pursuing his efforts and contacting all the political parties in a bid to resolve the Cabinet crisis, now in its fourth week. “I am in contact with everyone. I have talked with Speaker Nabih Berri on everything. We need to try to reactivate the legislative branch of power and reactivate the Cabinet and Parliament. There is a partnership between the two [branches of power] despite the separation of power,” Salam was quoted as saying. Berri also told visitors that there is a possibility of initiating an exceptional round for Parliament if 13 ministers sign a special decree.
However, the premier struck a downbeat note on the current political stalemate, while warning of external risks threatening the country. “We cannot leave the country as it is. As I have said last Tuesday, I am not the one who is obstructing [the government’s work]. I am not the one who influences the political parties to face developments,” he said. “But I will carry on with the efforts. Like all the people, I am pessimistic about the stagnation amid internal developments and external risks. It is normal for us to make efforts. Everyone must make efforts to address matters and work toward meeting together.”Noting that he and members of his Cabinet have been entrusted with safeguarding the country amid the yearlong presidential vacuum, Salam said: “Consensus among the political parties is required because this government is basically a coalition government. We are hoping for the situation to improve.”Salam indirectly responded to a June 21 speech by the Free Patriotic Movement leader Aoun in which he refused to budge on the issue of security and military appointments and threatened to mobilize his supporters across Lebanon to press for the restoration of what he called “Christian rights.”“The Christians in Lebanon are an essential component of this country’s existence and the homeland’s survival. I am in particular more aware than others of this situation and I have sacrificed several posts to preserve the country,” Salam said.
Backed by their allies in Hezbollah, the Marada Movement and the Tashnag Party, the FPM’s ministers 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. In response, the FPM’s political rivals have accused it of attempting to paralyze the government over the issue of security appointments.
Salam, according to visitors, said he had given time to study the attitudes and demands of the six ministers [the FPM ministers and their allies] which are opposed by the remaining 18 ministers. Ministerial sources said Salam’s speech delivered last Tuesday at an iftar of the Makassed Association in which he said that the Cabinet would meet and make decisions was meant only as a reminder that there is no final decision yet by the Cabinet’s main parties to topple it.
In the meantime, parliamentary sources in the FPM said Aoun is still adamant that it is the Cabinet’s constitutional and legal duty to approve the appointments in top security posts before anything else. The FPM’s ministers will attend any Cabinet session called by Salam, but will insist that security appointments are the first item on the agenda, the sources said. They added that no contacts had been made with Aoun either by Salam or any other party over the Cabinet crisis.
The sources said they did not believe that Salam would call for a session unless he obtained an agreement beforehand from the government’s parties. The same sources said the revival of Cabinet has become directly linked to the presidential election and that the conflict management which led to the formation of this Cabinet in February last year has come to an end. Parliamentary sources in the March 14 coalition are still holding the March 8 alliance, namely Hezbollah and the FPM, responsible for the paralysis in all state institutions. The sources urged Salam to stop taking the March 8 parties’ stances into account and to call for a Cabinet session with whoever attends, saying that the sectarian representation in the Cabinet as stipulated by the National Pact and legality of sessions are secured.

The Futility of Aoun's Proposal for a Popular Christian Statistical survey
Proposal to nowhere
The Daily Star/June. 29, 2015
Discussion of a radical proposal to end the presidential election impasse is refusing to go away, even though it seems the idea has only two principal backers.
When Michel Aoun and Samir Geagea met early this month to bury the hatchet, the session saw them endorse a plan that would lead to the election of a president, after the post sat vacant for more than a year. The proposal is relatively straightforward.
A statistics company (from a sector that is trusted by few people) select a few of the most popular Christian political leaders (in a country where this is known already) to allow Lebanon’s Christian voters to select a president (in Maronite churches and monasteries, which aren’t legally accountable to anyone). Geagea and Aoun have cooked up such a radically new voting mechanism knowing full well that they will be selected as the top two candidates for inclusion on the list, which will likely keep out other leading contenders, who could come from the ranks of the Kataeb or Marada parties, for example. There is also the tiny issue of arbitrarily deciding that only Christians are eligible to elect the head of state, who is supposed to be the president of all Lebanese.
It’s the kind of proposal that causes people to shake their heads in exasperation, if they’re still bothering to tune in and follow the ongoing presidential election drama. However, hundreds of thousands of Lebanese Christians will certainly be interested in following the fortunes of this latest proposal. They are outside Lebanon, because they emigrated out of exasperation at the failure of politicians to improve their lives and give them hope. The latest proposal by Aoun and Geagea will likely confirm to them that they made the right choice.

Two Wounded as Ain el-Hilweh Family Dispute Sparks Clashes
Naharnet/28 June/15/Two people were wounded Sunday evening as a family dispute escalated into armed clashes in the Ain el-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp in Sidon, reports said. “Clashes sparked by a personal dispute are still ongoing in the Ain el-Hilweh camp and two people have been wounded,” MTV reported. Earlier, state-run National News Agency said one person was injured as a family dispute erupted into gunfire in Ain el-Hilweh's al-Zeeb neighborhood. The Joint Palestinian Security Force was trying to contain the situation, NNA added. On June 18, a ceasefire was reached in Ain el-Hilweh after two days of clashes left two people dead and several others wounded. The fighting was triggered by a personal dispute between an Islamist militant and a supporter of the secular Fatah Movement. Ain el-Hilweh, the largest Palestinian camp in the Lebanon, is home to about 50,000 refugees who live in dire conditions and is known to harbor extremists and fugitives. By long-standing convention, the Lebanese army does not enter the country's 12 refugee camps, leaving security inside to the Palestinians themselves.

Al-Rahi: Let our Prayers Guide Officials to Elect a President
Naharnet/28 June/15/Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi urged Lebanon's politicians to head to the parliament and elect a president in accordance with the constitutional principles. “We pray that all lawmakers head to the legislative assembly and elect a head of state in accordance with the constitutional principles,” said al-Rahi during a mass held in Harisa. Lebanon has been living without a president since the term of President Michel Suleiman ended in May 2014. Lawmakers have failed so far to agree on a consensual head of state over differences between the rival March 8 and March 14 alliances.“We pray that warlords drop their weapons and put an end to the conflicts in Syria, Palestine, Libya and other countries. We also pray that all those who are displaced return to their countries,” concluded al-Rahi.

Syria, Hizballah torpedo understanding between Druze and Syrian rebel Nusra Front near Israeli border
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report June 28, 2015/Syrian ruler Bashar Assad and Hizballah leader Hassan Nasrallah have gone all out to stir up adversity between the Druze communitys of the Golan and Israel, and the Syrian rebel Al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front. To torpedo the armistice deal brokered between them earlier this month by the US, Jordan and Israel, 200 Syrian and Hizballah troops were pumped into the Druze village of Khader on the Syrian Golan, 3 km from the Israeli border. Since Friday, June 26, these troops have been attacking Nusra and the other Syrian rebel groups fighting to capture the Golan town of Quneitra. This has stalled the rebel operation for taking control of the highway to Damascus. Rockets from this battle strayed over to the Israeli side of Golan Sunday. debkafile’s military sources reveal that Nusra hit back over the weekend. They warned Druze leaders that if they don’t stop cooperating with Assad and Nasrallah, “their blood will be on their heads.” Fighters of this Islamist group then surrounded another, smaller Druze village, Skaska, on the western slopes of Jabal Druze and threatened to go in and massacre its inhabitants. The Nusra ultimatum, posted Saturday, June 28, made it clear that since Syrian and Hizballah are firing against them from a Druze village, the Druze are held responsible for getting it stopped. Otherwise, they will be deemed collaborators of the Assad regime and in violation of the non-belligerence deal struck between them earlier this month. Our sources add that Syria and Hizballah accompanied the 200-man force which infiltrated Khader, with Iranian and Syrian television crews and a group of Lebanese Druze members. The footage they showed was intended to demonstrate to the world that Lebanese Druze strongly challenged the Syrian rebel takeover of southern Syria including the Golan, and sided with Bashar Assad. The fighting is so far low key between the Syrian and Hizballah troops ocupying the Druze village of Khadar and the Nusra Front fighters. But it is estimated by Israeli watchers that an escalation is not far off and, when it happens, the rebel Islamic group will make good on its threat of retribution against the Druze villagers of Skaska. And then, yet another sensitive corner of the Syrian conflict may go up in flames, possibly putting Israel on the spot again. Already it looks as though Assad and Nasrallah have succeeded in sabotaging the hard-won armistice deal that the US, Jordan and Israel brokered between the Druze and Nusra Front, by forcing the half million Druze of Syria to choose sides between the belligerents. Whichever it is, they will be clobbered.

Lebanese Druse leader: Israel playing a 'very dubious and suspicious role' in Syria
By JPOST.COM STAFF/06/28/2015
The leader of Israel's Druse community in Lebanon, Walid Jumblatt, rejected on Sunday the idea that Israel could be a source of help for the Druse community in neighboring Syria which has come under threat recently by the advance of the Islamic State and the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front.Speaking in an interview to air Sunday night on “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio” broadcast on New York’s AM 970 The Answer and Philadelphia’s NewsTalk 990 AM, Jumblatt stated, “I don’t want at any price the so-called help of the Israelis who are playing a very dubious and suspicious role.”Jumblatt's comments came a week after Israeli Druse attacked an IDF ambulance carrying wounded Syrians for treatment in Israel, killing one person and wounding another. The attackers believed that the wounded Syrians were members of the Nusra Front, which are threatening the Druse community in the village of Hader, just over the border in the Syrian Golan Heights. Israel has rejected the claims that it is aiding the Nusra Front, but Jumblatt suggested that he believes the accusations are true.“The Israelis are welcoming wounded fighters and wounded people from the area of Quneitra. Some Arab brothers. But two days ago, an ambulance carrying wounded people, I don’t know why it was directed inside a Druse village inside Israel. And the Druse attacked this ambulance and killed one of the wounded, which is a horrible act. But this guy was (taken) not far away from the city of Hader in Syria, not far away from Mount Hermon, which would create more animosity between the Druse and the Sunnis. So this is why I say the Israeli play is very dubious and suspicious.” Jumblatt urged the Druse community in Hader to reconcile with the Syrian insurgents threatening their village. “It’s better to open reconciliation with the rebels because it’s an isolated village.”
Some leaders of Israel's Druse community have called on Israel to provide aid to the embattled Druse of Syria. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier this month that Israel is prepared to act to help Druse refugees from Syria. “We are vigilantly following all that is being done along our borders, and my instruction is to take all action necessary,” Netanyahu said in response to questions from MK Hamad Amer (Yisrael Beytenu), who is Druse.

March 14 elects National Council president
The Daily Star/June 28, 2015
BEIRUT: March 14 figures elected former MP Samir Frangieh as the head of the coalition’s National Council Sunday, in the first session for the group since the formation of the council was announced last March. Frangieh, a political writer and a former March 14 lawmaker from north Lebanon, won with a sweeping majority of 237 votes while his opponent Fawzi Farri only received 32. In a terse speech after his win, Frangieh said that the council aims to prepare for an “uprising of peace” that would allow Lebanon to exit the problems of the past and enter a future that is better for all the country’s citizens. Preparations for this “uprising” would require challenging the country’s “sectarian regression” by creating a civil framework that would surpass sectarian divisions, he said.
Working with civil groups and communicating with “forces of moderation and democracy” in the Arab world is another prerequisite, he added. Three hundred March 14 representatives met in Beirut’s Biel complex to elect a president and the heads of 14 specialized committees. The next meeting will be held in three months during which an executive council will be elected. Fares Soueid, coordinator of the March 14 Secretariat General, told Future TV Sunday that National Council is based on three pillars- freedom from sectarian restrictions, a democratic process and full transparency.“The March 14 National Council which gathers Christians, Muslims, Druze, Alewites and Armenians is the perfect response to the segregation of religions and faiths in Lebanon the Arab world,” he said.
The council, according to Soueid, will also work on founding a civil state that respects the rights of its citizens and seeks to separate religion from politics.

Samir Frangieh calls for ‘Intifada of Peace’
The Daily Star/June 29, 2015
BEIRUT: Former MP Samir Frangieh called Sunday shortly after his election as head of the March 14 coalition’s National Council on all Lebanese to participate in preparations for what he dubbed an “Intifada of Peace” to lay the ground for a better future for Lebanon.
“I call on all the Lebanese without discrimination to participate in preparations for an Intifada [uprising] of Peace that will put an end to past tragedies and lay the foundation for a better future for all of us,” Frangieh said. He spoke shortly after independent March 14 figures elected him as the head of the coalition’s National Council, in the first session for the group since the formation of the council was announced last March with the aim of developing the coalition’s political platform.
Frangieh, a political writer and a former March 14 lawmaker from north Lebanon, won with a sweeping majority of 237 votes out of the council’s 284-member constituent assembly, while his opponent Fawzi Farri received 32. There were 11 blank ballots and two empty envelopes, and two ballots were canceled. Roughly 350 representatives from all March 14 parties, including the Future Movement, the Lebanese Forces, the Kataeb Party, the National Liberal Party and the March 14 General Secretariat, met in Beirut’s BIEL complex to elect a president, a 14-member bureau and the heads of 14 specialized committees.
In his victory speech, Frangieh said preparations for the “Intifada of Peace” call for the creation of a modern civil framework capable of overcoming confessional and sectarian polarization. “They also call for working with civil groups that face all kinds of violence and discrimination and contacting forces of moderation and democracy in the Arab world that oppose extremism,” he said. Before his election, Frangieh told Future TV: “This council will revitalize the actual participation of independent public voices in determining the decisions of the March 14 coalition.”
The council will give a new push to the principles of the 2005 Cedar Revolution, which resulted in the ouster of Syrian forces from Lebanon, he added. The council’s constituent assembly will hold a new conference within three months to elect its executive office. A preparatory committee formed last March was asked to continue its mission in drawing up the National Council’s new bylaws and political platform. The committee’s members include MPs Marwan Hamadeh, Fadi Karam, Joseph Maalouf, Jean Ogassapian, Ahmad Fatfat and other officials and activists from factions affiliated with March 14. In an opening speech, former MP Fares Soueid, coordinator of the March 14 Secretariat General, said “March 14 independents” refer to those who voluntarily joined the “Independence Intifada” which laid the foundation for the March 14, 2005, movement that eventually led to the withdrawal of the Syrian army from Lebanon, ending nearly three decades of Syria’s domination of its smaller neighbor.
“The word ‘independent’ in the March 14 [coalition] means full and clear commitment to the March 14 cause without being affiliated with a party or subservient to a political leader,” Soueid said. Before the election, Soueid told Future TV that the National Council is based on three pillars – freedom from sectarian restrictions, a democratic process and full transparency.“The March 14 National Council which brings together Christians, Muslims, Druze, Alawites and Armenians, is the perfect response to the segregation of religions and faiths in Lebanon the Arab world,” he said. The council, according to Soueid, will also work on founding a civil state that respects the rights of its citizens and seeks to separate religion from politics.

Hezbollah prepares for fierce clashes near Ras Baalbek
The Daily Star/June 28, 2015
BEIRUT: The outskirts of a northeastern Lebanese border town are set to witness fierce battles between Hezbollah and ISIS, according to a report published Sunday in Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Qabas. Sources from the northern Bekaa Valley indicated that the “nature of reinforcements” that have arrived to areas surrounding Ras Baalbek recently signal to an impeding battle between the party and the extremist group in the coming days. The “reinforcements,” according to the report, consist of rockets and heavy artillery that have been dispatched to the area recently. Al-Qabas also noted that Hezbollah is completing “field preparations” in the area ahead of the imminent clash. The party has intensified its attacks on ISIS in Ras Baalbek after it repelled a militant attack earlier this month, sparking a battle that killed eight Hezbollah fighters and around 50 ISIS militants. It was the most serious border confrontation between the two groups since Hezbollah entered the fighting in Syria three years ago. Hezbollah and the Syrian army have been battling ISIS and Nusra Front fighters in the Qalamoun region along Lebanon's eastern border with Syria since early last month. The allied forces have captured about two-thirds of the rugged border region from the militants since launching the offensive on May 4. Militants are now mostly holed up in northern Qalamoun, on the eastern outskirts of Arsal and Ras Baalbek. Hezbollah chief Hasan Nasrallah vowed to oust ISIS from northeastern Lebanon in a speech delivered earlier this month.

Iran talks to continue beyond June 30 deadline
Omri Efraim/News Agencies/Ynetnews/
Published: 06.28.15 / Israel News
Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif returns to Tehran to consult with leadership over disagreements in negotiations. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Sunday left Vienna for Tehran for consultations with his country's leaders, while Iranian and American officials said talks would continue beyond the self-imposed June 30 deadline. According to an Iranian source, Zarif returned to consult with the Islamic Republic’s leadership amid more than a few disagreements with Western countries. "If the other side ... takes positive steps and does not make excessive demands, we will certainly reach a deal that benefits everyone," Zarif was quoted as saying by state news agency IRNA. Meanwhile, some on the other side of the negotiations table are trying to convey optimism. "If a few days more are needed we will take them," European Union foreign policy chief Frederica Mogherini told reporters on arrival in Vienna. "It is going to be tough... but not impossible. It is a matter of political will," she said before meeting the US, British, German and French foreign ministers.
British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond sounded less encouraging.
"There a number of different areas where we still have major differences of interpretation in detailing what was agreed in (the) Lausanne (framework agreement)," Hammond told reporters on arrival in Vienna. He was referring to a framework deal agreed on April 2.
"There is going to have to be some give or take if we are to get this done in the next few days," he said, adding that there were red lines that could not be crossed. "No deal is better than a bad deal."French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said there were three essential conditions for the deal: “A lasting limitation of Iran's research and development capacity, a rigorous inspection of sites, including military if needed, and the third condition is the automatic return of sanctions in case it violates its commitments."
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commented on the talks at a Sunday morning cabinet meeting. “Two days before the expiration date for attaining an agreement between the powers and Iran, there is no demand for Iran to change its behavior and there is total indifference to all its violations, all its radical demands, and the concessions to Iran keep growing,” he said. “We see before us a blatant retreat from the red lines the powers set for themselves only recently and publicly. There is no reason whatsoever to rush signing this bad agreement that gets worse every day.”Both sides were sure to maintain a cautious pessimism from the beginning of the current round of talks. A Western official said the coming days would be particularly difficult and that the talks could extend beyond the deadline by a day or two.
The controversy has mainly revolved around the issue of sanctions. Last week Iran’s spiritual leader Ali Khamenei declared that a final nuclear agreement would require the West to immediately remove all sanctions as soon as the agreement comes into effect. But Washington and Europe insist on removing sanctions gradually, in proportion with Iran’s compliance. As though these disputes were not problematic enough, US President Barack Obama also received a slap in the face last week in the form of an open letter signed by a group of former senior American advisors and experts, including five who worked for him during his first administration, warning that the agreement being formulated would "fall short of meeting the administration's own standard of a 'good' agreement".

For the first time since 2011: Foreign Ministry director visits Cairo
Reuters/Ynetnews/06.28.15/ Israel News
Dore Gold in Egypt to discuss 'how to push the peace process with the Palestinians forward'; Egyptian official says Palestinian issue is 'heart of conflict in the region'. For the first time since 2011, the Foreign Ministry's director-general, Dore Gold, visited Egypt on Sunday to discuss how to re-launch peace talks with the Palestinians, which have been stalled since last year.
Gold met senior Egyptian officials to discuss "how to push the peace process forward," Egypt's state news agency MENA reported, citing Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman Badr Abdelatty. Among others, Gold met with Deputy Foreign Minister Osama Almajdoub. Israel's Foreign Ministry also confirmed the visit in a statement. A statement released by the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said that "the Palestinian issue was raised in the meeting, as Cairo is a main player and sponsor of this issue. The solutions to promote the peace process were at the top of the agenda for the consultations, and ways to restart talks between the Palestinians and Israel were discussed." Almajdoub, the statement said, "stressed Egypt's unchanging positions regarding the Palestinian issue and the importance of reaching a just, inclusive and sustainable solution based on the principles of international legitimacy and UN resolutions." Almajdoub told Gold that any accord between Israel and the Palestinians must be based on the two-state solution and lead to the formation of an independent Palestinian state. The Egyptian official also said that the Palestinian issue was "the heart of the conflict in the region, it is the Arabs' central problem, and its solution is a basic condition to reaching stability in the region."
Gold's visit to Cairo came a week after Egypt appointed its first ambassador to Israel since 2012. Egypt has also recently shown willingness to allow Israel to open a new embassy in Israel, after the previous one was evacuated in September 2011, when rioters tried to take it by force. Israel has already found a lot to buy, where the embassy will be built, and is currently examining the issue due to the high costs that are entailed in the move - tens of millions of shekels. Israel and Egypt's military-run government, which orchestrated the removal of Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in 2013, share common concerns about militants active in Egypt's Sinai peninsula as well as the Islamist group Hamas, which dominates the Gaza Strip. Israeli security and intelligence officials held talks in Cairo during last summer's Gaza war as part of a successful Egyptian bid to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. The Israeli Foreign Ministry and MENA portrayed Gold's visit as routine, saying it stemmed from his recent appointment to his post as director-general.
**Roi Kais and Itamar Eichner contributed to this report.

Terror in Tunisia: Survivors recall bloody beach attack
Associated Press/Ynetnews
Published: 06.28.15/Israel News
With 38 dead and many more wounded in Friday attack by gunman, tourists left asking the question 'why?' as Tunisia's tourist industry prepares for uncertain future.
Tunisia's postcard destination for tourists is reeling from the terror that blighted another day of play at the Mediterranean seaside resort of Sousse. A man armed with a Kalashnikov and grenades gunned down tourists on a private beach, and then moved methodically through the grounds of a luxury hotel - to the swimming pool, reception area and offices.
At least 38 people were killed and dozens of others wounded in Friday's deadly noon rampage by a young Tunisian disguised as a tourist ready for fun in the sun.
From accounts of the attack by shocked survivors, tourists who stayed on, lifeguards and beach employees who helped at the site of the massacre emerge stories of love and horror.
No one grasped what was happening at first in what became Tunisia's worst terrorist attack. Were the popping sounds and explosions fireworks for yet another celebration?
On Saturday, the private beach of the 370-room Imperial Marhaba Hotel was immaculate with chairs lined up under straw umbrellas - and police tape sealing it off. Only the emptiness and an overturned lounge chair with flowers accumulating hinted at the horror. "Why? Warum?" read a note on one bouquet. "Warum" is German for "why." Sousse is a popular destination for Germans and at least one German was killed in the attack.
Some people cried as they placed their offerings.
Then there are the horrific recollections of the living - many of whom quickly fled Sousse.
'We were trapped'
Tony Callaghan of Norfolk, England, was near the pool around midday when he heard what many others thought were fireworks. With his 23 years in the Royal Air Force, Callaghan knew better.
"I knew it was gunfire ... The hotel was being attacked."
Callaghan, 63, suffered a gunshot wound to his leg and his wife, Christine, 62, had her femur shattered. Both were among those being treated at Sahloul Hospital, the largest in Sousse.
Along with what he said were some 40 people, they had taken refuge in the hotel's administrative offices, not far from the reception area. They climbed to the first floor, "but then we were trapped." Callaghan said he told people to hide because the gunman was following "and shooting coming up the stairs."
His wife stumbled in the corridor and "was screaming 'Help me! Help me!'" Callaghan said shortly before heading for surgery. Another woman had been shot four times, he said, and "was lying in a pool of blood."
The gunfire appeared endless. For Callaghan, it lasted about 40 minutes. "It was, like, incessant."
But no one really counted as they looked to save their lives. Some others suggested it lasted about 20 minutes.
'We saw only black'
The attacker "took time to go to the beach, to the pool, the reception, the administration, climbing the stairs," said Imen Belfekih, an employee for seven years at the hotel. She was among those hiding in the administration offices, along with a fellow employee, who was wounded in the attack.
Belfekih said that the attacker threw a grenade as he climbed the stairs to the rooms where the group was hiding, apparently following the screams of fear. Her colleague was hospitalized with shrapnel wounds.
"We saw only black. It was smoky. Everyone was hiding in offices.... I hid under a desk," she said.
A police officer who was called to the scene told The Associated Press that the gunman threw three grenades - but one failed to explode. He wasn't authorized to speak publicly about the case and asked not to be identified by name.
Belfekih said she was on the beach when she first heard the gunfire. She and her wounded friend only left their hideout "when we heard silence."
The varying accounts of the ordeal made it difficult to understand exactly where the gunman was killed by police. However, he apparently went back downstairs to make an escape. Several accounts put the location outside. And no one who spoke with the AP could clearly describe him."I never saw him because we were running for our lives," Callaghan said.
The hotel manager, Mohamed Becheur, said he had no details about the tragedy that befell his establishment, arriving later when notified and after the attack. He has not officially closed the hotel, though concedes that everyone will shortly be gone. "We may have zero clients today but we will keep our staff," Becheur said. His hotel was a scene of chaos for hours, with people hiding out in halls, offices and bathrooms. 'We chucked everything into bags and went' Marian King, from the Dublin suburb of Lucan, was in her final few hours before departure when chaos struck. Then a British woman ran into the lobby screaming that her husband had been shot and was "lying on a sunbed in a pool of blood." King immediately returned with her son to her room, hiding for two hours in the bathroom as sounds of gunfire continued for what she said was an hour. Others from the hotel joined them.
"There were footsteps in the corridor and people running back and forth, shouting in all languages, every language," she told Irish radio station RTE. Travel agents were calling with rides out of town, and with a 10-minute warning "we chucked everything into bags and went."
On Saturday, a pall hung over sunny Sousse. Scattered sunbathers who said they weren't afraid waded in the water. An occasional police patrol boat skimmed the water, and police on horseback worked the sand. But there was little sign of the violence a day earlier.
But there was lots of praise from tourists for employees of their respective hotels who may soon be out of work if Tunisia's prime industry, tourism, is gutted by the attack. Employees at nearby hotels or those with outlets on the beach joined in the rescue operation, running to the massacre site to lend a hand.
"You hear the gunfire. You can't count the number of times," said Haytham, a lifeguard at the nearby Royal Kenz Hotel. He and others cleared the beach and moved some wounded into ambulances. Visibly shaken, he and a group of tourists laid a bouquet at the doomed beach. Faycal Mhoub, who from his post at the beach offers camel rides, rushed from his circuit when he heard the news, putting tourists in the family home, then went to help moved the wounded.
"I live with the tourists more than with my family," he said. "I don't know how many months or years tourists won't come, but I'll be at my spot."

Kuwait identifies mosque bomber as Saudi national
By Staff writer | Al Arabiya News
Sunday, 28 June 2015
Kuwait has identified the suicide bomber who carried out the country’s worst attack as a Saudi citizen, Kuwait state media reported on Sunday. The interior ministry named the bomber as Fahd Suliman Abdul-Muhsen al-Qabaa and said he flew into Kuwait's airport at dawn on Friday, only hours before he detonated explosives at a Shi'ite Muslim mosque killing at least 27 people and injuring 227. On Saturday, Kuwaiti police arrested the driver who transported a suicide bomber to the mosque where he blew himself up, the official KUNA news agency said. The driver, who was named as Abdulrahman Sabah Eidan Saud, was described as an "illegal resident" born in 1989, who took the bomber to the Al-Imam Al-Sadeq mosque in Kuwait City on Friday. The bomber had been hiding in a house in the Al-Rigga district in the city's southern Al-Ahmadi Governorate. Authorities have also detained the owner of the house where the bomber was staying, a Kuwaiti national who subscribes to "fundamentalist and deviant ideology", the agency said, citing a statement from the Interior Ministry. Criminal act The ministry said authorities will "continue efforts to uncover the conspirators in this criminal act and to reveal all of the information and circumstances behind it." Thousands of Kuwaitis on Saturday braved scorching summer heat to attend the funerals of 18 of the victims killed in the attack, the first claimed by Islamic State jihadists in the small Gulf emirate. The bodies of the remaining eight victims were flown to Iraq's Shiite holy city of Najaf for burial, State Minister for Cabinet Affairs Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah Al-Sabah said.Mourners turned out in large numbers Saturday despite the Ramadan daylight fast and as temperatures hit 45 degrees Celsius (113 Fahrenheit).

The U.N. Charter at 70: Toward a safer and sustainable future
Sunday, 28 June 2015/Ban Ki-moon/Al Arabiya
Long before I became Secretary-General, the United Nations occupied a special place in my life. I was six years old when the Korean War broke out. I have memories of my village in flames as my family sought refuge in nearby mountains. But another sight is even more lasting: the U.N. flag. We were saved from hunger by U.N. food relief operations; we received textbooks from U.N.ESCO; and when we wondered whether the outside world cared about our suffering, the troops of many nations sacrificed their lives to restore security and peace. I know from my childhood, and now from decades of public service, the immense difference the United Nations can make. As we mark the anniversary of the adoption of the Organization's founding Charter on June 26, 1945 in San Francisco, my hope is that the human family will come together with greater determination to work for a safer and more sustainable future for "we, the peoples," in whose name the Charter was drafted.
The United Nations at 70 can look back on a proud record of working with many partners to dismantle colonialism, triumph over apartheid, keep the peace in troubled places and articulate a body of treaties and law to safeguard human rights. Every day, the United Nations feeds the hungry, shelters refugees and vaccinates children against polio and other deadly diseases. Our relief workers brave remote and dangerous environments to deliver humanitarian assistance, and our mediators strive to find common ground between warring parties and peaceful solutions to grievances and disputes. The United Nations was founded to prevent another world war, and it has succeeded in that core mission; despite grave setbacks, the past seven decades would surely have been even bloodier without the United Nations.
Yet we are keenly aware that today's landscape is scarred by conflict, exploitation and despair. At least 59.5 million people have fled their homes - more refugees, displaced persons and asylum-seekers than at any time since the end of the Second World War. Violence against women blights all societies. At a time of pressing human needs, huge amounts of money continue to be squandered on nuclear weapons and other destabilizing military arsenals. The consequences of climate change are ever more apparent - and have only just begun. And although the world said "never again" after the Holocaust, and again after genocides in Rwanda and Srebrenica, we continue to witness atrocious crimes by violent extremists and others.
The 70th anniversary falls in a year of potentially momentous decisions on our common future
New powers have emerged since the representatives of 50 nations gathered to draft the Charter, and membership in the Organization has grown to 193. Globalization, urbanization, migration, demographic shifts, technological advances and other seismic developments continue to remake our societies and transform international relations. Yet the Charter's vision of a world of peace, and the values enshrined in the text - dignity, equal rights, tolerance and freedom - remain touchstones for people everywhere.
The 70th anniversary falls in a year of potentially momentous decisions on our common future. Countries are shaping what we hope will be an inspiring new sustainable development agenda and moving towards a meaningful agreement on climate change. Our goal is transformation: we are the first generation that can erase poverty from the earth - and the last that can act to avoid the worst impacts of a warming world.
As the distinctions between the national and the international continue to fall away, challenges faced by one become challenges faced by all, sometimes gradually but often suddenly. With our fates ever more entwined, our future must be one of ever deeper cooperation - nations united by a spirit of global citizenship that lives up to the promise of the Organization's name.
**Ban Ki-moon is the Secretary-General of the United Nations

What America's Civil War tell us about Arab civil wars
Sunday, 28 June 2015/Hisham Melhem/Al Arabiya
150 years after its end, the legacy of the American Civil War, the country’s most cataclysmic, and so far most enduring transformational milestone, continues to reverberate in our politics and to shape our society and culture.
In the antebellum, people used to talk about ‘These United States’, referring to an ambiguous and less coherent nation, but after the war, the people living in this coalition of states became the American citizens of ‘The United States’ of America. And while a victor and a vanquished emerged from the war, the defeated South had to endure more than a century of economic stagnation, political disenfranchisement of millions of African-Americans, through the imposition of ‘Jim Crow’ laws, a system of government-sanctioned racial oppression during which 3446 blacks were lynched. Civil wars rarely end when the fighting stops, they continue in different forms’ including violent ones, as we have seen in the racially motivated killing of nine African-Americans in a church in Charleston, South Carolina at the hands of a young man who seemed to have traveled back to the United States in a time machine from 1862. But if it took a powerful, more cohesive and democratic nation (even if its democracy was flawed then) more than a century, to recover–mostly- from the war, I shudder when I think of how long it will take Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya to recover, if ever, from their seemingly endless catastrophic civil wars.
From the Potomac to the Euphrates
If one of the enduring legacies of the American civil war was to forge a more united country, after a staggering loss of 700,000 combatants, it is now almost unthinkable to anticipate that Syria and Iraq will be able to maintain their territorial integrity as unitary states or more importantly achieve meaningful political reconciliation, a difficult process requiring them to exorcize their sectarian and other cultural daemons. The previous civil wars in Lebanon, Algeria and Sudan, did not lead to any serious attempts at self-criticism or political reconciliation. Denial of human agency is widespread. A sizable number of Lebanese still cling to the myth that their war was caused by others, even when they were doing most of the killings. And depending on their political biases, the outside culprits may be Israelis, Syrians or Palestinians.
The civil war in America was fought mostly by two conventional armies with clear chain of command. The proliferation of militias and armed gangs operating in the South did not alter the fact that when Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox in April 1865, meaningful military resistance ended. The civil wars in the Arab states began as peaceful and spontaneous protest movements against oppressive regimes, but the preponderance of violence employed by the entrenched despots, forced the protestors- this is mostly true in the case of Syria- to gradually turn to violence. The inability of the regimes to decisively crush the opposition, the passage of time, the toxic sectarian factors and the open-ended nature of the conflicts, coupled with the active involvement of regional and international powers and their proxies in the fighting radically transformed these wars in the minds of the combatants into intractable existential struggles.
Civil wars as determinant of Identity
The United States emerged from its civil war as a new nation, with a clearer sense of identity and purpose. At the core of the conflict was the ‘original sin’ of slavery that the Founding Fathers failed to expunge from their new republic, and how the Federal government relates to the States. In 1860 the American South was one of the wealthiest agrarian economies in the world, with solid and secure European markets for its ‘King Cotton’, tobacco and rice. The main pillar for this economy was the institution of slavery, with its unique (free) labor advantage. The North was more populous more advanced and better educated and rapidly industrializing. The civil war, in this context was a clash of competing values and identities. And yet, even in defeat, the South struggled mightily, and mostly succeeded to cling to a romanticized and mythologized ‘Lost Cause’ narrative that was immortalized by popular culture including films such as the racist masterpiece The Birth of a Nation and to a lesser extent Gone with the Wind.
The American civil war changed the map of the United States, and allowed it to expand its writ for the first time from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast, to become later on one nation indivisible. The Arab civil wars, particularly in Syria and Iraq are likely to change the map, the so-called Sykes-Picot map that brought them to life a century ago as new nation states
Similar clashes of identities are at the core of some of the Arab civil wars. The combatants in the Arab civil wars are mostly Arabs, fighting Arabs including those working in tandem or on behalf of Iran. But they are fighting for competing identities. It is very unlikely, at least in the foreseeable future for one group to emerge in any of these Arab civil wars to impose a different identity, and coerce others to accept it. The mythologized antebellum is at heart of the persistent collective memory of those still sympathetic to the Confederacy. It is the defeated South that still reenact with enthusiasm and nostalgia civil war battles; for Southerners reenacting these battles is a re-affirmation of a special history, and paying homage to certain values; Defeated peoples have long memories and they cling longer to their victimhood narrative. For Northerners, these exercises are at best a hobby, or a sport and that they are done ‘for fun’. For the Arab combatants, the Sunni-Shiite cleavage is at the heart of the struggle for a new, dominant identity. For Shiite combatants, say in Syria and Iraq commemorating, or even reenacting the martyrdom of Imam Hussein in Karbala is an act of devotion and solidarity and of trying to experience the same pain and anguish that Imam Hussein must have felt. Here too, we encounter the persistence of collective memories, and the facts that victims or defeated people have long memories, and they keep perpetuate them and live by them.
Fighting other people’s wars
The American civil war is the major such war in modern times where the role of neighbors and outsiders was limited and did not contribute much to the outcome. The U.S. is protected and isolated by two great oceans to the East and West and bordered by two weaker states, Canada and Mexico. The inability of the South to achieve a clear victory at the battle of Antietam in September 1862 ended any hopes the South might have had about earning the recognition of France and Britain. The European on the whole did not challenge the North’s blockade of Southern ports. The war created havoc in the international cotton market, and let to changes in the pattern of producing this commodity in places like Egypt and India. The American civil war did encourage a global arms production to provide to the American combatants. More than 900,000 British Enfield rifles were used in the war. And although the majority of the Union Army soldiers were immigrants born abroad, no ‘foreign’ legions sent by states were involved in the war.
The Arab civil wars are similar to the Spanish civil war, in that all of their neighbors are involved in their wars at different levels. Almost all the neighbors of Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Libya are parties to these conflicts. In fact, it is Iran and its Shiite proxies, particularly Hezbollah in Lebanon that saved Assad’s regime in Syria from imminent fall. The involvement of the neighbors and the West, since it is unlikely to achieve decisive results will prolong these wars.
The maps they are a-changing
The American civil war changed the map of the United States, and allowed it to expand its writ for the first time from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast, to become later on one nation indivisible. The Arab civil wars on the other hand, particularly in Syria and Iraq are likely to change the map, the so-called Sykes-Picot map that brought them to life a century ago as new nation states. After years of wars, sectarian killings and the dislocation of millions, these two countries have been eroding slowly as nation states. They may not break-up formally like the former Yugoslavia, but a de facto partition could persist for years, along with low intensity civil strife. We have seen such cases in recent decades like Afghanistan, Angola, Sudan and Somalia just to name a few. The fact that these wars are not likely to be settled any time soon or maybe ever by the decisive victory of one party as was the case in the American and the Spanish civil wars – a difficult proposition, given the heterogeneous nature of these societies- means that these countries will not be able on their own to solve their problems, a situation that will make their predicament more tragic.

Why Muslims should read the Pope’s Encyclical
Sunday, 28 June 2015/Abdullah Hamidaddin/Al Arabiya
I have a lot to thank Twitter for. The most recent cause of gratitude is Pope Francis’ encyclical: Laudato Si' (Care of our common home). Just a week ago I wasn't even aware of the word ‘encyclical’. I follow the Pope on Twitter and last week his account was tweeting on the environment, among other social issues. It is from there that I got to know of this document, and I read some of its history from online sources, in particular its emphasis beginning the late 19th century to respond and react to social problems brought about by modernity, technology and capitalism. As a Muslim I have heard a lot about Islam being a religion for the afterlife but also for this life. And that every aspect of our lives has a religious dimension. This idea in itself could lead to different outcomes, but the prevailing one in the Muslim world was that we must implement Sharia law. The ubiquity of religion implies the full reach of religious laws.
So my initial sense to reading some parts of the encyclical was: ‘this feels at home, but a different kind of home.’ I am still trying to crystalize the full sense, but it was clear to me that this was not a call for applying religious laws. Here the Pope was discussing issues which concern us as human beings but adding a spiritual dimension to our approach to those issues. He was spiritualizing our quest for understanding and solutions to the major issues facing humanity.
The ideas in Laudato Si' are not new, nor unique to the Pope. But the spiritual charge that they were given is inspiring, at least to me. Even in the instances I disagreed with him, such as on birth control. I liked the approach, the way spirituality is embedded into my life, without any mention of legislation.
Controversy
The Encyclical stirred much of controversy and debates and will continue to do so in countries and communities with a Catholic or Christian heritage. There were the conservatives who were not happy to see the Pope go green. There were secularists who worry – rightfully most of the time - whenever religion walks out of the temple. There were also the faithful who want the Pope to focus on what really matters, issues such as moral decay. And then there are people like me; non-Catholics who heard of this for the first time.
We are rational beings who can discuss the concerns of humanity from a cost benefit analysis aspect; but we are also moral beings
Now, caring for our world, belief in social justice, empathy with the poor and downtrodden, concerns over the consequences of technology... are not easy issues. They are complicated and deeply intertwined with power and interests. Moreover they are not matters waiting to be recognized and raised by a religious authority. Spiritualizing those issues can have a strong impact towards finding and implementing solutions.
Rational and moral logic
We are rational beings who can discuss the concerns of humanity from a cost benefit analysis aspect; but we are also moral beings who can discuss the plight of others and the obligation that those who are better off have towards the less privileged. A religious authority will not add to the rational or the moral discussion of our concerns as humans. But there is something more about us. We are also spiritual beings. At least many of us believe that. Here it is where a religious authority matters. It adds a spiritual dimension to the discussions on humans and humanity's wellbeing. While rational and moral logic is enough for many there are those who would benefit from having a spiritual dimension. When taking care for nature is connected to our faith in God is takes a different form and we respond to it with a different fervor.
The Pope in my view was speaking as a rationalist. Presenting conclusions he made based on his own rational thinking. He was also speaking as a moralist. Insisting on the obligations we have towards each other and towards the earth we live on. But he was also speaking as a religious authority insisting that the major issues of our life need to be part of our spiritual path. He was saying that opening our hearts to God is not merely about rituals but about empathy and care and preserving the blessings God be sowed upon us.
And I am not talking about spiritualizing the issues, but their conclusions. Belief in global warming should not be part of one’s faith because the Pope or other religious authority raised it. But concern for our earth should be a spiritual issue and it can only become that when endorsed by a religious authority with a long standing tradition and a legitimacy rooted deeply in history and practice.
As a Muslim I find his statement extremely comforting. It doesn't matter to me whether or not he shares my faith. Nor does it matter to me that I agree with the specifics of his conclusions or not. What matters to me is that the Pope created a new spiritual common ground between followers of all faiths. Previously God was the main common ground for those with a spiritual inclination, morality was another important common ground.
All of this might sound like a daydream to some. Violence and terror have been plaguing our lives to the point where some of us are now believing that it is our fate. Last Friday’s triple terror attacks can easily drive despair into our hearts; and we have had many bloody days. For some of us, Bloody Friday is an affirmation of our tragic fate; a sign of the beginning of a long dark terror campaign and sectarian civil war. But there are many others who refuse to surrender to terror; who refuse a fatalistic attitude towards the future of humanity; who insist on holding on to hope no matter what and celebrate all efforts to bring people together in peace and empathy for one another. I believe the Pope's Encyclical is such an effort. It should be celebrated and embraced by people of all forms of belief or even nonbelief.

Rebuilding America’s foreign policy post-Obama
Sunday, 28 June 2015
Raghida Dergham/Al Arabiya
As part of brainstorming sessions in U.S. intellectual and political circles, much is being said about how the United States could coexist with the Islamic Republic of Iran when it has been empowered by a final nuclear deal and an upgraded bilateral relationship like the one being sought by the Obama administration.
One of the clear consequences of Obama’s insistence on a deal with Tehran is perpetuating division in the United States: One faction focuses on the appeasement of Iran considering that there is no alternative to a nuclear deal, even if it is full of loopholes, and that American-Iranian rapprochement will embolden moderates, rein in hardliners and undermine Iran’s regional expansion plans. The other faction sees that the nuclear agreement will not curb the nuclear ambitions of the Iranian theocracy, and that at best, it would delay an Iranian nuclear bomb by a decade. This faction also believes that lifting the sanctions on Iran would practically allow it to execute its nuclear plans, which would launch a nuclear arms race in the Gulf and invalidate the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
This factions sees that the primary beneficiary of such an outcome would not be the moderate forces but the Revolutionary Guards, they key sponsor of Iran’s regional expansion from Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon to Yemen, establishing militias that undermine the states in these countries—mirroring ISIS, whose doctrine is the destruction of nation states in the Arab region to establish its caliphate.
The first faction embraces the U.S. pivot away from traditional allies, including in the Arab region, and closer to Iran. It sees this as a wise policy, based on its interpretation of 9/11 which blames Arab actors for the terrorist attacks.
The second faction stresses that it was Iran and its allies that killed the largest number of Americans, and not the Arab countries or even al-Qaeda and ISIS. For this reason, senior members of the second faction want to redesign U.S. policy in the Middle East post-Obama, and they have ideas worth pausing at as part of the necessary brainstorming that the Arab region must take part in.
Under the title “The realignment of the Arab region in the international arena: Beyond politics, economics, and security threats,” an Arab-regional-international workshop will be held in October to discuss the options available and come up with recommendations on how to overcome various challenges. The Beirut Institute, an Arab think-tank founded by myself, will convene the Beirut Institute Summit in Abu Dhabi as an opportunity to come up with positive and practical ideas.
Some of the participants have already started submitting proposals, including figures closely involved in long-term U.S. policymaking. The autumn scheduling is meant to coincide with the start of the U.S. presidential election campaigns. The idea is that the Arab region must start thinking seriously about the future, instead of remaining fixated on what Barack Obama is doing.
By this autumn, the Arab region will likely have to start accepting the new reality of the American-Iranian relationship built by Barack Obama. And regardless of who the next president will be, be they a Democrat or a Republican, U.S. policy in the Middle East will be shaped by the ties with Iran and the putative nuclear deal and its implementation.
The new president
An American strategist who was involved in decision-making for decades believes rebuilding the U.S. Middle East policy post-Obama is not difficult, and says this will depend on three things the new U.S. president will have to do:
First, reestablishing the alliance with Egypt, not just verbally, but also by doubling U.S. military aid to $3 billion a year and inviting President Sisi to the White House, to reaffirm the Camp David accords and restore defensive ties. This alone, he says, can reassure Egypt and stop it from seeking alternative partners including Russia. This, he argues, cannot be achieved as long as there are American restrictions on Egypt. Egypt is crucial in the war on ISIS, especially in Libya, and is a key partner in broader U.S.-Arab relations, especially in the light of the firm strategic alliance among Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.
Second, Libya needs an intervention similar to the NATO-led intervention in the past, in support of the legitimate government in Tobruk. Hesitation and complacency will allow ISIS and similar extremist groups in Libya to grow and threaten other North African nations. The positions of Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Egypt must get real support from Washington, and there is no option but to defeat the Tripoli-based government and ISIS in Libya. This requires supporting Khalifa Haftar’s forces, which are fighting both al-Qaeda and ISIS.
Third, always according to the U.S. strategist, political and military decisions concerning Kurdistan should be made: Sending military aid directly to Erbil and not via Baghdad, and declaring that the United States does not mind for Kurdistan to export oil and even welcome Kurdish oil in U.S. energy markets, as this would help Kurdistan fund its war with ISIS.
These are the views of veteran U.S. policymaker, meant to prevent the deterioration of U.S. influence in the Middle East. Some may agree with them, others may not, but they are strategic ideas and not just a diagnosis followed by surrender. And this is exactly what’s needed: Pragmatic ideas to take U.S. policy into a new approach following recent shifts in its policy.
By this autumn, the Arab region will likely have to start accepting the new reality of the American-Iranian relationship built by Barack Obama
Some may protest the idea of allowing the Kurds to secede from Iraq, which is implicit in the qualitative shift in U.S.-Kurdish relations. In fact, the moderates are in Sulaymaniyah as they are in Amman, and a million Kurds have been displaced. There is a need for the Arab countries, led by Saudi Arabia, to reassess. Kurds in the Arab region as part of the Arab fabric just like Shiite Arabs are. It is time for a new and radically different relationship with both components, and it is crucial to correct the impression that only Sunni Arabs are Arabs as in the Saudi perception. Kurds and Shiites in the Arab countries are an essential part of the multiethnic mosaic, and Arab interests require addressing this problem.
Arab interests also require practical ideas in light of the nuclear deal and the upgrading of the American-Iranian bilateral relationship. There is a dire need for a change in strategy from Yemen to Lebanon.
In Yemen, there is no alternative to choosing between an exit strategy, one that would secure the Saudi-Yemeni border, and escalating militarily to secure Aden, Hudeidah, and Taez, with measures in Sanaa. The options boil down to securing the cities and gradually clawing back territory, or withdrawing from Yemen in an organized international framework supported by a Marshall plan to rescue Yemen economically and humanitarianly. The aerial bombardment campaigns will not achieve anything more, and it would be best to reduce air strikes and focus them as part of a new strategy.
In Syria, the Kurds do have a place in a new military strategy based on bringing the Kurdish forces together with moderate rebel forces. This, in turn, would require a shift in how Syria is dealt with. The Gulf countries need to think profoundly about the subject, especially in light of the possible lifting of the sanctions on Iran.
Economists speak of a golden age in Iran if the sanctions are lifted under a nuclear deal. They say Iran’s oil exports could increase from 1 million barrels per day to 2 million barrels, worth $75 million a day or $2.2 billion a month. This would be enough cash for the Revolutionary Guard to finance its plans. The Revolutionary Guard already used Iraq’s budget to finance its war in Syria in the past, when former Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki made the Iraqi treasury the equivalent to an ATM to finance the adventures of the Revolutionary Guard in Syria.
After the sanctions are lifted, Tehran will be able to pump money not only into its war in Syria, but also into Hezbollah in Lebanon, which in turn will radically alter the path and fate of Lebanon. Since Lebanon is in a state of complete vacuum, Hezbollah would be able to impose its demands there.
ISIS is being used as a pretext in Lebanon, since Hezbollah and ISIS are fighting in Syria. But if the Arab strategy wants to be wise, it must give Lebanon due attention before it is too late. Because while ISIS wants Damascus and Baghdad, and not Beirut, it could be lured into Lebanon. Losing Lebanon to Hezbollah or ISIS would be a major loss for Arab strategy and for the United States, whether under Obama or a new occupant of the White House.
The Obama administration does not want to pay attention to such “trivial” issues standing in its way towards a positive legacy represented by a deal with Iran. The administration is in a willful coma, it seems.
However, the United States is not bound by its administration. True, major U.S. policies are developed in their broad outlines for the long term on a strategic basis, and various administrations implement them with some changes here or amendments there. However, policies are not detached from reality, and all this shapes decision-making. For this reason, it is possible to see institutions operating for years and decades to shape decision making.
Think-tanks and workshops are part of the dynamic of influencing strategic decision-making, which is what the Arab region needs.
Bleak prospect
The picture appears bleak in the context of the nuclear deal with Tehran. Ali Khamenei has dictated seven near-impossible conditions he dubbed “red lines”. These could be part of the art of negotiations but they could lead to detonating the entire nuclear talks.
Logically, there is no room today for an agreement. Khamenei made it clear that Tehran insists on having the U.S. and international sanctions lifted as soon as a deal is concluded, before Iran dismantles any nuclear capabilities. He said nuclear research would not be frozen and military sites would be off-limits. As for the issue of reimposing sanctions in the event Tehran fails to abide by its commitments, Russia and China will be there to guarantee any such bid would be vetoed.
But politically, it seems illogical that we have reached this point in the negotiations only for them to fail. Ultimately, it is more important to develop strategies in preparation for any outcome. Once again, an Arab collective brainstorming is crucial and urgent.

Netanyahu: Despite late hour, still time for world to get better agreement with Iran
By HERB KEINON/J.Post/06/28/2015
The world still has time to stiffen its terms and insist on conditions in a nuclear agreement with Iran that will prevent that country from arming itself with nuclear weapons and receiving a windfall from sanctions relief to finance its global aggression, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday. Netanyahu's comments came at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting, just two days before the deadline for an agreement was set to expire. His comments came before news that the talks will extend pass the Tuesday deadline.
Netanyahu bewailed that the world powers were ignoring Iran's human rights violations, spelled out in a recently release State Department report on human rights violations around the world, as well as Iran's support for continuing to assist the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad which is slaughtering its own people. “Two days before the final date set for the talks on achieving an agreement between the major powers and Iran, all of these things are being pushed aside,” he said. “Practically, there is no demand that Iran change its behavior and its violations are being completely overlooked. Its extreme demands, as well as the concessions to Iran, are increasing. We see before our very eyes a pronounced retreat from the red lines which were recently declared – in public – by the major powers. There is no reason to hasten this bad agreement, which is becoming worse by the day.” That Iran led the State Departments list of human rights violator because of executions, torture, political arrests, repression of minorities and the LGBT community, as well as other restrictions of freedom, puts the lie to claims that the election of Iranian Present Hassan Rouhani has changed the character of the Iranian regime, Netanyahu said. Netanyahu said this report joins another recent report issued by the American administration which determined that during the talks with the major powers Iran has stepped up its aggression in the region. “Iran tramples on human rights, disseminates terrorism and is preparing a vast military infrastructure while the talks with it – despite the foregoing reports – continue as usual,” he said.

Analysis: Stop the hypocrisy and defeat Islamic State
By YOSSI MELMAN/J.Post/06/28/2015
The immediate knee-jerk reaction to Friday’s three-pronged terrorist onslaught was to tell the international community, “Enough. Stop the hypocrisy.”
The day was one of the most difficult failures ever experienced in the global campaign against terrorism. More specifically, it was a failure in the effort to stop the phenomenon known as Islamic State.
Nearly 100 people were killed in supposedly unrelated terrorist attacks. Thirty-seven tourists – mostly Germans and British – were killed in a resort on the Tunisian coast.
Attacks also claimed the lives of 27 Shi’ite worshipers in a mosque in Kuwait; one man in France who was decapitated; and 30 soldiers from Burundi who were serving in a peacekeeping capacity in Somalia. That’s almost 100 people on three different continents in four countries.
All of the evidence points to ISIS, which took responsibility for the attacks in Tunisia, France and Kuwait. In Somalia, the perpetrators are terrorists belonging to the local outfit al-Shabaab, whose leaders are torn between swearing allegiance to al-Qaida or making common cause with ISIS.
From the Western point of view, there is no significant difference between the two. Both are seen as murderous organizations that have targeted the West, Arab governments, moderate Muslims, Shi’ites and Sunnis.
They are also seen as one and the same by other religions and ethnic minorities in the Middle East, particularly Kurds, Druse and TUI, said they had about 6,400 customers across Tunisia at the time of the attack, including several of the people killed and wounded.
They sent 10 planes to evacuate tourists and said 1,000 already had been repatriated. They also said they would cancel all their holiday packages to Tunisia for at least the next week.
TUI’s German tour operator TUI also organized flights for tourists wishing to return home and its Belgian airline, Jetairfly, sent six empty planes to bring tourists back from the island of Djerba and from Ennfida airport on Saturday.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier confirmed one German had been killed, but said there may be others.
Tobias Ellwood, a junior minister at the Foreign Office in London, told reporters in London the British death toll could rise, since there were several who had been seriously wounded.
“This is the most significant terrorist attack on British people since 7/7,” he said, referring to attacks on the London transport system on July 7, 2005, that killed 52 people.
Tunisian authorities said the gunman was not on any watch-list of potential terrorists. But one source said Rezgui appeared to have been radicalized over the last six months by Islamist recruiters.
As one countermeasure, Prime Minister Essid said Tunisia plans, within a week, to close down 80 mosques that remain outside state control for inciting violence.
Several thousand Tunisian jihadists have gone to fight in Syria, Iraq and neighboring Libya, where some have set up training camps and vowed to return to attack their homeland.
Meanwhile, Kuwait detained the owner of a car that took a bomber to a Shi’ite mosque to carry out the country’s worst ever terrorist attack, officials said on Saturday, as thousands calling for national unity turned out to bury some of the 27 killed.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing against 2,000 worshipers praying at the Imam al-Sadeq Mosque on Friday. Officials said the bombing was clearly meant to stir enmity between majority Sunnis and minority Shi’ites and harm the comparatively harmonious ties between the sects in Kuwait.
In a statement, the information ministry said Kuwait would faced the situation with “unity and solidarity.”
It reiterated what it called the government’s strong stance on the freedom of religion and opinion, noting these were rights protected by the constitution.
The Interior Ministry, which reported the vehicle owner’s arrest, said it was now looking for the driver who vanished shortly after Friday’s blast in Kuwait, which has been spared the rampant violence of neighboring Iraq and the recent spate of Islamic State bombings of Shi’ite mosques in Saudi Arabia, another neighbor.
A security source told Reuters “numerous arrests” had been made in connection with Friday’s bombing.
At the burial site in the Sulaibikhat district, some waved Kuwaiti flags while others bore the large mourning banners, in red, black or green, that are typical of Shi’ite funerals.
Chants from the crowd included “Brothers of Sunni and Shia, we will not sell out our country;” “No Sunni, no Shia, we are one Islam;” “The martyrs are the beloved of God;” and “Down with Daesh! Down with Daesh,” an acronym for Islamic State.
One group of mourners said they had traveled from Qatif in Saudi Arabia, where 21 people were killed by an Islamic State suicide bombing in May.
Two Iranian nationals were among those killed, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham was quoted as saying by Iranian state media on Saturday.
Relatives of seven of those killed wept and prayed over their shrouded corpses at a mosque on Saturday, where they were waiting to be taken to the Shi’ite holy cities of Najaf and Karbala in Iraq for burial.
In France, a delivery man with known Islamist connections beheaded his boss and left the body, daubed with Arabic writing, at the site of a US-owned gas factory in southeast France before trying to blow up the complex.
The assailant rammed his delivery van into a warehouse containing gas canisters, triggering an initial explosion, and was arrested minutes later as he tried to open canisters containing flammable chemicals, prosecutors said on Friday.
Police found the head of the victim, the 54-year-old manager of the transport firm that employed the suspect, dangling from a fence.
“The head was discovered hanging on the factory’s wire fence, framed by two flags that included references to the shahada, or [Muslim] profession of faith,” Paris public prosecutor Francois Molins told a news conference.
France is still coming to terms with attacks by Islamist gunmen who killed 17 people in January at a satirical weekly newspaper and a Jewish food store.
“There should be no doubt as to our country’s ability to protect itself and remain vigilant,” said President François Hollande, returning to Paris from an EU summit in Brussels.
Hollande said there were inscriptions on the headless body, and police sources said they were in Arabic, but officials did not reveal their content.
No group claimed responsibility for the French attack and the motive was unknown.
The attacker was injured in the blast and arrested at the site. His wife, sister, and a third person were taken into custody for questioning.
Police questioned employees for several hours at the transport company run by the victim and seized the suspect’s car.
A cleaner at a neighboring business described the victim of the attack as a friendly and polite man, “always saying good morning or good evening and have a nice weekend to his staff.”
France, which has contributed aircraft to the international coalition fighting Islamic State insurgents in Iraq, has long been named on Islamist sites as a primary target for attacks.
The site of Friday’s attack belonged to Air Products , a US industrial gases and chemicals company. It was immediately ring-fenced by police and emergency services.
The company’s chairman and chief executive is Seifi Ghasemi, who in 2011 testimony to a US Senate committee described himself as Iranian- born. Mainly Shi’ite Iran is a sworn enemy of Sunni-dominated Islamic State.
There is no evidence the three attacks were deliberately coordinated.
But coming so close together on the same day on three different continents they underscored the far-reaching and fast-growing influence of Islamic State, Western politicians said.
The ultra-radical group, which has claimed direct responsibility for the Kuwait attack, clearly now poses a threat far beyond its heartland in Syria and Iraq.
It urged its followers this week to escalate attacks against Christians, as well as Shi’ites and Sunnis fighting with the US-led coalition.
On June 23, Islamic State spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani urged jihadists to turn the holy month of Ramadan into a time of “calamity for the infidels... Shi’ites and apostate Muslims.
“Be keen to conquer in this holy month and to become exposed to martyrdom.”
The Pentagon was looking into “whether or not these various and far-flung attacks were coordinated centrally or whether or not they were coincidental,” spokesman Col. Steve Warren said, noting Islamic State had claimed responsibility for one attack.
The US State Department said later there was no indication they were coordinated on a tactical level, but were clearly all terrorist attacks.
Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said police should be vigilant and prepared, especially ahead of the US Independence Day holiday on July 4.
Britain, which said at least five of its nationals were among those killed in Tunisia, summoned its emergency committee to discuss that attack and the one in France.
“This is a threat that faces all of us, these events that have taken place today in Tunisia and France, but they can happen anywhere – we all face this threat,” British Prime Minister David Cameron told reporters.
**Herb Keinon contributed to this report.

Confronting Female Genital Mutilation in Iran
Irfan Al-Alawi and Stephen Schwartz
The Weekly Standard
June 28, 2015
http://www.meforum.org/5346/iran-fgm
Excerpt of an article originally titled "Confronting Female Genital Mutilation in Iran and Iraqi Kurdistan."
Iran's Hormozgan province has the country's highest rate of FGM.
Female genital mutilation or cutting (FGM/C) exists in the Islamic Republic of Iran even while the redoubt of clerical dictatorship is absent from a recent survey of FGM in 29 countries, published by UNICEF. The UN agency examined states in Africa and the Middle East. The UNICEF document did not specify them in full, but named eleven. Four – Djibouti, Egypt. Guinea, and Somalia – are Muslim, and feature "universal" incidence of FGM, or a rate above 90 percent of all women.
In Muslim lands outside Africa, FGM is considered a recent phenomenon. An émigré Iranian cleric, Hassan Yousefi Eshkevari, has condemned the practice, arguing that it is unsupported by the Koran or any other Islamic sacred texts. He has declared, "For the past 1,400 years there was no reflection of this topic in books by Islamic scholars or clerics."
Kameel Ahmady, an Iranian social anthropologist, has shone a bright light on FGM in Iran, with a new, self-published study. Ahmady returned to Iran after he "worked in Africa for a number of humanitarian relief NGOs and was given the opportunity to observe UN projects to combat FGM in countries like Egypt, Somalia, Kenya and Sudan."
Stop FGM Middle East says the world must "put Iran on the map of FGM-affected countries."
In the northwestern and southern provinces of Iran, Ahmady, as noted by the advocacy group Stop FGM Middle East, interviewed 3,000 women and 1,000 men over ten years. The research disclosed widespread incidence of FGM in West Azerbaijan on the Iranian border with Turkey and Iraq, and in Hormozgan on the shores of the Persian Gulf. Repeated inquiries revealed that while FGM is declining, it is still common in some areas. In western Azerbaijan, FGM dropped from 39 percent to a current level of 21 percent. FGM fell less steeply in Hormozgan, where 68 percent said in 2011 that they had undergone genital cutting, but the figure decreased to 60 percent in 2014.
The substantive nature of Ahmady's work has led Stop FGM Middle East to call for a new international focus on the problem in Iran. The same organization has supported the Iranian investigator Rayeyeh Mozafarian, author of an academic thesis on the social and cultural background of FGM in the Hormozgan community of Qeshm Island.
Rayeyeh Mozafarian has interviewed hundreds of FGM victims in Iran.
For that effort, Rayeyeh Mozafarian interviewed 400 victims of FGM. She published an important book on the atrocious custom, The Razor and Tradition (Tigh O Sonnat) in 2013 – FGM is, in Iran, frequently carried out using razor blades. She has lobbied the UN for action on Iran, but the international body has failed to take notice of the situation in the Islamic Republic.
Stop FGM Middle East reports further that local anti-FGM campaigns have emerged in Iran. In the western Iranian province of Kermanshah, which is a center of FGM, two activists, Elham Hosseini and Osman Mahmoudi, have introduced classes on FGM for women and parents. They are training 50 psychology students to educate women against accepting imposition of FGM, and offer psychotherapy to those who have suffered it. Therapy for FGM is provided for married couples as well as women. Husbands often demand acceptance of FGM from their wives and daughters.
In his work on FGM, Kameel Ahmady learned,
Being male and having a 'non-traditional' background in the sense that I lived abroad... my detailed questions about this extremely sensitive topic – the cutting of the most private part of a woman's body – created resistance and bewilderment. I found that my research was not taken that seriously by some locals, especially the men. Some people, including some of my own relatives, were of the opinion that this subject is not an honorable one for an educated man . . .and the project was deemed not a 'manly' job.
Meanwhile, according to Stop FGM Middle East, some Iranian authorities have denounced FGM but the clerical regime has failed to act against it. Finally, the campaigners against cruelty insist, the world must "put Iran on the map of FGM-affected countries."
Iran cannot be expected to act soon against FGM – especially as its rulers hew to the devious and obstinate course visible in its shadow-play "negotiations" over its nuclear ambitions, and given the repressive habits it applies against internal dissent.
Irfan Al-Alawi is executive director of the London-based Islamic Heritage Research Foundation. Stephen Schwartz, a fellow at the Middle East Forum, is executive director of the Center for Islamic Pluralism in Washington, DC.