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Bible Quotation For Today/The Parable of the king who gave a wedding banquet for his son, but those he invited did not come.
Matthew 22/01-14: "Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. Again he sent other slaves, saying, "Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet." But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized his slaves, maltreated them, and killed them. The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. Then he said to his slaves, "The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet." Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so the wedding hall was filled with guests. ‘But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, and he said to him, "Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?" And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, "Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." For many are called, but few are chosen.

Bible Quotation For Today/I am not writing this to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children.
First Letter to the Corinthians 04/14-21: "I am not writing this to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For though you might have ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers. Indeed, in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. I appeal to you, then, be imitators of me. For this reason I sent you Timothy, who is my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ Jesus, as I teach them everywhere in every church. But some of you, thinking that I am not coming to you, have become arrogant. But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I will find out not the talk of these arrogant people but their power. For the kingdom of God depends not on talk but on power. What would you prefer? Am I to come to you with a stick, or with love in a spirit of gentleness?"

Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on October 24-25/15
Question: "What does the Bible teach about the Trinity?/GotQuestion/October 24/15
Why Lebanon's 'You Stink' movement lost/Sami Nader/Al-Monitor/October 24/15
What the Aleppo offensive hides/Mona Alami/Al-Monitor/October 24/15
Is Palestinian public leaving its leadership behind/Shlomi Eldar/Al-Monitor/October 24/15
The Palestinian Jihad: Lies, Lies and More Lies/This is Not an "Intifada"/Gatestone Institute/October 24/15
Russian Intervention in Syria Boosting Iranian Hardliners/Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
A New Count-Down for a Solution in Syria-In Russian This Time. Will It Work/Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
What Are the Russians Doing in Iraq Now/Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
Washington Tells Moscow: Deconfliction But No Deeper Cooperation/Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
Jew hating and Jew denial: Israel fighting Palestinian terror and the Western media/Barry Shaw/Canada Free Press/October 24/15
Who's Oppressing Palestinian Christians? Georgetown Lecture Blames Israel/Cinnamon Stillwell/Jihad Watch/ Middle East Forum/October 24/15
Is America’s moment in the Middle East at an end/Hisham Melhem/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
Russia’s intervention in Syria: Is it all bad/Abdullah Hamidaddin/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
The Middle East facing the unknown/Eyad Abu Shakra/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
Young Arabs need skills, not just university degrees/Yara al-Wazir/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
Iran’s corruption and human rights overlooked/Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
What the return of the Arab strongman means for the Middle East/By MOHAMAD BAZZI, REUTERS /10/24/2015
Dennis Ross: Israel-US crisis will be resolved/Yitzhak Benhorin/Ynetnews/Published:10.24.15

Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin for Lebanese Related News published on October 24-25/15
Nasrallah: No Substitute for Dialogue at Present
Syrian Girl Freed from Abductors after Four-Day Captivity
Efforts Continue to Salvage Waste Plan
Mashnouq: Assassination Plot Reports against Gulf Envoys not Confirmed
Why Lebanon's 'You Stink' movement lost

Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin For Miscellaneous Reports And News published on October 24-25/15
Eight Iranians Killed in Syria
Sinai Bomb Kills Three Egypt Policemen
Syrian rebels reject Russian help against ISIS
Turkey says won't let Kurds ‘seize’ northern Syria
Syria army battles to retake Aleppo supply line from ISIS
Kerry: Israel promises to keep Al-Aqsa agreement
Syria army battles to retake Aleppo supply line from ISIS
Kerry: Netanyahu agrees to maintain exclusive Muslim prayer right on Temple Mount
Turkey says won't let Kurds ‘seize’ northern Syria
Syrian rebels reject Russian help against ISIS
Germany toughens asylum rules amid migrant surge
Pentagon expects more raids similar to Iraq rescue
Russia Special Forces kill ISIS-linked militant in Dagestan
Islamist candidate shot dead in Egypt's Sinai
No time to waste on Yemen peace talks, says U.N.
Rockets kill nine at Libya protest against U.N. deal

Question: "What does the Bible teach about the Trinity?"
Answer: The most difficult thing about the Christian concept of the Trinity is that there is no way to perfectly and completely understand it. The Trinity is a concept that is impossible for any human being to fully understand, let alone explain. God is infinitely greater than we are; therefore, we should not expect to be able to fully understand Him. The Bible teaches that the Father is God, that Jesus is God, and that the Holy Spirit is God. The Bible also teaches that there is only one God. Though we can understand some facts about the relationship of the different Persons of the Trinity to one another, ultimately, it is incomprehensible to the human mind. However, this does not mean the Trinity is not true or that it is not based on the teachings of the Bible.
The Trinity is one God existing in three Persons. Understand that this is not in any way suggesting three Gods. Keep in mind when studying this subject that the word “Trinity” is not found in Scripture. This is a term that is used to attempt to describe the triune God—three coexistent, co-eternal Persons who make up God. Of real importance is that the concept represented by the word “Trinity” does exist in Scripture. The following is what God’s Word says about the Trinity:
1) There is one God (Deuteronomy 6:4; 1 Corinthians 8:4; Galatians 3:20; 1 Timothy 2:5).
2) The Trinity consists of three Persons (Genesis 1:1, 26; 3:22; 11:7; Isaiah 6:8, 48:16, 61:1; Matthew 3:16-17, 28:19; 2 Corinthians 13:14). In Genesis 1:1, the Hebrew plural noun "Elohim" is used. In Genesis 1:26, 3:22, 11:7 and Isaiah 6:8, the plural pronoun for “us” is used. The word "Elohim" and the pronoun “us” are plural forms, definitely referring in the Hebrew language to more than two. While this is not an explicit argument for the Trinity, it does denote the aspect of plurality in God. The Hebrew word for "God," "Elohim," definitely allows for the Trinity.
In Isaiah 48:16 and 61:1, the Son is speaking while making reference to the Father and the Holy Spirit. Compare Isaiah 61:1 to Luke 4:14-19 to see that it is the Son speaking. Matthew 3:16-17 describes the event of Jesus' baptism. Seen in this passage is God the Holy Spirit descending on God the Son while God the Father proclaims His pleasure in the Son. Matthew 28:19 and 2 Corinthians 13:14 are examples of three distinct Persons in the Trinity.
3) The members of the Trinity are distinguished one from another in various passages. In the Old Testament, “LORD” is distinguished from “Lord” (Genesis 19:24; Hosea 1:4). The LORD has a Son (Psalm 2:7, 12; Proverbs 30:2-4). The Spirit is distinguished from the “LORD” (Numbers 27:18) and from “God” (Psalm 51:10-12). God the Son is distinguished from God the Father (Psalm 45:6-7; Hebrews 1:8-9). In the New Testament, Jesus speaks to the Father about sending a Helper, the Holy Spirit (John 14:16-17). This shows that Jesus did not consider Himself to be the Father or the Holy Spirit. Consider also all the other times in the Gospels where Jesus speaks to the Father. Was He speaking to Himself? No. He spoke to another Person in the Trinity—the Father.
4) Each member of the Trinity is God. The Father is God (John 6:27; Romans 1:7; 1 Peter 1:2). The Son is God (John 1:1, 14; Romans 9:5; Colossians 2:9; Hebrews 1:8; 1 John 5:20). The Holy Spirit is God (Acts 5:3-4; 1 Corinthians 3:16).
5) There is subordination within the Trinity. Scripture shows that the Holy Spirit is subordinate to the Father and the Son, and the Son is subordinate to the Father. This is an internal relationship and does not deny the deity of any Person of the Trinity. This is simply an area which our finite minds cannot understand concerning the infinite God. Concerning the Son see Luke 22:42, John 5:36, John 20:21, and 1 John 4:14. Concerning the Holy Spirit see John 14:16, 14:26, 15:26, 16:7, and especially John 16:13-14.
6) The individual members of the Trinity have different tasks. The Father is the ultimate source or cause of the universe (1 Corinthians 8:6; Revelation 4:11); divine revelation (Revelation 1:1); salvation (John 3:16-17); and Jesus' human works (John 5:17; 14:10). The Father initiates all of these things.
The Son is the agent through whom the Father does the following works: the creation and maintenance of the universe (1 Corinthians 8:6; John 1:3; Colossians 1:16-17); divine revelation (John 1:1, 16:12-15; Matthew 11:27; Revelation 1:1); and salvation (2 Corinthians 5:19; Matthew 1:21; John 4:42). The Father does all these things through the Son, who functions as His agent.
The Holy Spirit is the means by whom the Father does the following works: creation and maintenance of the universe (Genesis 1:2; Job 26:13; Psalm 104:30); divine revelation (John 16:12-15; Ephesians 3:5; 2 Peter 1:21); salvation (John 3:6; Titus 3:5; 1 Peter 1:2); and Jesus' works (Isaiah 61:1; Acts 10:38). Thus, the Father does all these things by the power of the Holy Spirit.
There have been many attempts to develop illustrations of the Trinity. However, none of the popular illustrations are completely accurate. The egg (or apple) fails in that the shell, white, and yolk are parts of the egg, not the egg in themselves, just as the skin, flesh, and seeds of the apple are parts of it, not the apple itself. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are not parts of God; each of them is God. The water illustration is somewhat better, but it still fails to adequately describe the Trinity. Liquid, vapor, and ice are forms of water. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are not forms of God, each of them is God. So, while these illustrations may give us a picture of the Trinity, the picture is not entirely accurate. An infinite God cannot be fully described by a finite illustration.
The doctrine of the Trinity has been a divisive issue throughout the entire history of the Christian church. While the core aspects of the Trinity are clearly presented in God’s Word, some of the side issues are not as explicitly clear. The Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God—but there is only one God. That is the biblical doctrine of the Trinity. Beyond that, the issues are, to a certain extent, debatable and non-essential. Rather than attempting to fully define the Trinity with our finite human minds, we would be better served by focusing on the fact of God's greatness and His infinitely higher nature. “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” (Romans 11:33-34).
Recommended Resources: Making Sense of the Trinity: Three Crucial Questions by Millard Erickson and The Forgotten Trinity by James White.
GotQuestions.org

Nasrallah: No Substitute for Dialogue at Present
Naharnet/October 24/15/Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah stressed the need not to wait for the developments in the region to find solutions for the lingering crises and to adhere to dialogue among the rival politicians in a bid to find solutions. “We should not wait for regional developments to find solutions for our problems. We should take the ongoing dialogue seriously because there is no substitute” said Nasrallah in a televised appearance marking the end of the annual Ashura. Addressing massive crowds that gathered in Beirut’s southern suburb on the occasion, he said: “They have waited for the Iranian nuclear agreement to be finalized thinking that Iran would abandon us, and it did not. They have waited for the fall of Syria, but Syria will not fall. They shall not benefit from this opportunity. "In Lebanon we are the masters of our decisions.”Hizbullah has sent elite forces across the border with Syria to bolster Assad's regime in the face of an Islamist-led uprising. Nasrallah renewed support for the Palestinian people in their fight against “Zionism,” he said: “On this great day I hereby announce that we renew our support for the Palestinian people and call on the Islamic world to back them in defending al-Aqsa.” “We shall continue our struggle to confront the American projects. Just like we defeated Israel, the takfiris and their American masters will be defeated as well.”On the conflict in Yemen, Nasrallah voiced support for its people denouncing the Saudi intervention in the fight, he said: “We denounce the attacks against Yemen and its innocent people. We are proud of their resilience.”

Syrian Girl Freed from Abductors after Four-Day Captivity
Naharnet/October 24/15/Internal Security forces carried out raids on the northeastern border town of al-Qasr and were able to free a Syrian girl who was kidnapped a few days ago. Intelligence bureau of the ISF raided the border town in Hermel and were able to free Abir al-Jaour after four days in captivity, the state-run National News Agency said on Saturday. Al-Jaour, 24, was abducted by Mahdi Nazha from the town of el-Ain and was taken to an undisclosed destination.The security forces confiscated a vehicle and motorcycle that belong to Nazha and investigations continue to find his whereabouts.

Efforts Continue to Salvage Waste Plan
Naharnet/October 24/15/Efforts to find a new landfill in the eastern area of Bekaa continue following the concealed threats of Prime Minister Tammam Salam that he would resign if a solution for the thorny file was not found. “Everyone has sensed the seriousness of the PM on his will to resign if new landfill locations are not found in Bekaa,” unnamed Ministerial sources told the daily An Nahar on Saturday. “This is why the officials have chosen not to postpone Monday’s national dialogue session even if some parties fail to attend,” they added on condition of anonymity. “The promises made by several politicians regarding the trash file went in vain so far and there are no serious intentions,” they added. On the other hand, ministerial sources told al-Nabaa daily that the stalemate in the trash plan have shown that "the government is captive to the approval of Hizbullah on setting a landfill in north Bekaa."A trash management crisis erupted in July when the largest landfill that receives the trash of Beirut and Mount Lebanon was closed. The government approved in September a trash plan that called for waste management to be turned over to municipalities in 18 months, the temporary expansion of two landfills and the reopening for seven days of the Naameh dump south of Beirut. However the implementation of the plan faced wide rejections of residents and municipalities from outside the capital who refuse to receive the trash other than their regions. Early this week Salam has warned that he would take the necessary action if the controversial file was not solved.

Mashnouq: Assassination Plot Reports against Gulf Envoys not Confirmed
Naharnet/October 24/15/Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq stressed on Saturday that the Lebanese government will provide the necessary security safety for the Saudi and Qatari ambassadors and their embassies in light of reports alleging that they could be targeted by attacks. “Although there are no confirmed reports that the Saudi (Ali Awadh Asiri) and Qatari ambassador (Ali al-Marri) could be targeted by attacks, we have upped the security measures and we are now in control,” said Mashnouq to the Saudi Al Watan daily. British newspapers quoted intelligence sources early this week claiming that the two ambassadors are subject to assassinations plots to incite sedition. For his part, the Saudi ambassador told the daily: “This is not the first time that I and my colleagues are subject to threats being accredited diplomats in Lebanon. We are in constant contact with the Lebanese authorities to investigate the truthfulness of this threat. “No threat will affect our professional performance towards our country or the positions of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia that it has always declared whether at the regional or international levels,” added Asiri. “They will not change the positions of the Kingdom which is known for its wisdom, courage and commitment. When Saudi Arabia takes a firm position no threat could deter it. Threats like that only make us more committed to perform our duties towards our country and brethren Lebanese.”

Why Lebanon's 'You Stink' movement lost
Sami Nader/Al-Monitor/October 24/15
In an act of desperation, young Mohamed Haraz set himself on fire before the Lebanese military court Oct. 16 in protest of the decision to keep activists Waref Suleiman and Pierre al-Hashash under arrest. The two activists were accused of inciting people to riot during an Oct. 8 demonstration. The protest was one of a series of other popular protests in the streets of Beirut since August 2015, sparked by the garbage crisis, government paralysis and rampant corruption at all levels in the state. The people’s anger exploded toward the entire political class, with no exception. The "You Stink" movement began in August 2015, its name a reference both to the piles of trash bags lying in the street and the widespread corruption in Lebanon. To preempt attempts by the political parties to hijack the movement or sway it by pressuring the organizers to share the leadership role with youth organizations affiliated with political parties, the protesters rushed to raise the slogan “All means all,” so as to convey the message that the people’s anger at the political class does not exclude anyone.
The pertinent question today is: Will the movement be able to save Lebanon from the paralysis and disruption plaguing its institutions because of the deep political rifts? Some say the movement reached its peak on Aug. 29 in terms of wide participation, when thousands took to the streets in protest of a corrupt and ineffective government, only to go downhill as the number of protesters began to dwindle in response to the acts of violence that discredited the movement’s peaceful approach. In fact, this civil movement is unlike anything Lebanon has known in four decades. Over the past years, all demonstrations that have taken place were held under political banners and for named, specific goals. They have rarely touched on the citizens’ economic and social concerns, such as the need for clean roads, reliable electricity and job opportunities, among other demands.
Before, any popular mobilization was subject to sectarian considerations, even when raising national slogans. Demonstrations held by the March 14 political camp, for instance, often had a Sunni tint, whereas those organized by the opposing March 8 camp were mostly dominated by Shiites. As for the Christian parties, they have been divided between the two camps, but lately they have taken a somewhat sectarian turn, calling for rights for Christians, even if Christians themselves disagree on how to achieve such demands. While all of them agree on the need for a new electoral law to restore balance to parliamentary representation, they still disagree on which law would best serve the Christian sector. None of this is surprising, as the Lebanese political system is based on sectarian quotas in the state institutions and on the distribution of powers among the different denominations. Further fueling this sense of sectarianism is the current war raging in the Arab regions, from Iraq and Syria all the way to Yemen.
However, this new movement transcends all denominations, gathering young people from different religions and sects and calling for the removal of both literal and symbolic garbage. It is true that the movement’s calls have gone beyond social demands to the overthrow of the regime, but it has remained untainted by sectarianism. The call to topple the regime merely reflects the resentment of the people who have become fed up with rampant sectarianism. Another new slogan, "Badna nhasseb" ("We want accountability"), reflects the will of the Lebanese to hold those in charge of managing their affairs accountable. The supervisory institutions in the country have become virtually paralyzed, and the parliament has failed to elect a president and form a functioning government since May 25. On Nov. 5, 2014, the members of Lebanon’s parliament went so far as to extend their own terms in office.
While the popular movement has so far failed to change the regime, it has managed to promote a new political dynamic.
“Today, the government started to listen to us,” Lea Baroudi, a social activist who has been involved in the protests since the beginning, told Al-Monitor. The authorities have finally broken their silence. On Sept. 16, the financial public prosecutor, Ali Ibrahim, reopened the file of politicians who are not paying their electricity bills. He ordered their power supplies cut until they pay their debts, which go back to the year 2000. The movement’s dynamics have also affected the traditional political parties, which have found themselves rearranging their priorities in line with the public demands. On Sept. 15, the head of the Kataeb Party, Sami Gemayel, declared the establishment of a corruption observatory. An even bigger achievement was made in the waste department, as the government handed over the waste file to Agriculture Minister Akram Chehayeb from Environment Minister Mohammed al-Machnouk, whose resignation the movement has demanded.
In September, the government put forth a comprehensive waste management plan, including steps to start decentralization at the level of the municipalities, which will be authorized to handle the waste issue by granting contracts to the private sector. Although the plan has been rejected by several local environmental organizations such as Lebanon Eco Movement, it would not have seen the light of day had it not been for the popular pressure. However, despite all its achievements, the movement has lost momentum and the weekly calls for protests are no longer mobilizing thousands. “People first sympathized with the movement as it was calling for the removal of garbage from the streets, but this does not justify the acts of violence and vandalism against [property owned by] Solidere, the company that was in charge of developing Beirut's Central District [following the end of the country's civil war in 1990],” one of the leaders of the Future Movement told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. There have also been tactical mistakes, Baroudi said. “We failed to capitalize on the movement’s achievements. We did not celebrate our victory when the government responded to our demands under pressure. Such a step could have showed the public that the demonstrations are fruitful,” she said. “On the contrary, the organizers of the protests dug in their heels, raised the ceiling on their demands, wearing the people out and giving an impression that the protests have become futile.” Baroudi continued, “The main goal has become to clash with the security forces, ignoring the original demands of waste removal, water, electricity and job opportunities, among others. Yet despite all these mistakes, we ought to carry on.”Baroudi may be right. Despite all its shortcomings, Lebanon needs this civil movement. In a country deprived of functioning institutions, the street has begun acting, though with some degree of anarchy, as an opposition force.

Eight Iranians Killed in Syria
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/October 24/15/Eight Iranians, two of them Revolutionary Guards forces, have been killed in Syria in recent days after Tehran increased its advisory missions to help Damascus, a guards spokesman said Friday. "Two guards forces, Abdollah Bagheri and Amin Karimi, were killed yesterday and today on a mission in Syria," General Ramezan Sharif was quoted by Fars news agency as saying. Bagheri, 33, was former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's personal bodyguard and was killed in the northern city of Aleppo. General Sharif said five or six volunteers were also killed, according to the Youth Journalist Club, a state television website. General Sharif also rejected rumors on social media that 15 Iranians were killed recently in Syria. Shiite Iran is a key ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad, standing by him since an uprising against his regime broke out in 2011. Iran provides him with financial aid and military advisers against a range of opposing forces in a civil war that has that has killed more than 250,000 and displaced millions. Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said this week that Tehran has increased the number of its military advisers in Syria.

Sinai Bomb Kills Three Egypt Policemen
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/October 24/15/Three Egyptian policemen were killed in a roadside bombing in Sinai on Saturday, the second such attack in 48 hours in the peninsula where Islamic State jihadists are waging an insurgency. The interior ministry said an officer and two police conscripts were killed when a roadside bomb exploded as their convoy passed in the North Sinai town of El-Arish. Eight police conscripts were also wounded. The military launched a major offensive against the jihadists in September, claiming it killed scores in an attempt to restore order in the peninsula which borders Israel and the Gaza Strip. Attacks have continued however, with the Islamic State group's Sinai affiliate regularly claiming responsibility for roadside bombings and shooting attacks. On Friday, a similar bombing in El-Arish killed a police officer. Elsewhere in Egypt, the Islamic State group said it had planted a bomb at a Cairo road junction close to the pyramids on Friday, which wounded four people as police tried to defuse it. Militants loyal to IS have killed hundreds of Egyptian soldiers and policemen, mostly in North Sinai. The insurgency has swelled since the army's ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in July 2013. A government crackdown targeting Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood movement since 2013 has left hundreds dead and thousands jailed. Hundreds more, including Morsi himself, have been sentenced to death, often in mass trials. Many have appealed and won retrials, while seven have so far been executed by hanging.

Syrian rebels reject Russian help against ISIS
By Al Arabiya with Agencies Moscow Saturday, 24 October 2015/Syria's Western-backed opposition on Saturday rejected a Russian offer to assist them against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group and dismissed Moscow's call for new elections. "Russia is bombing the Free Syrian Army and now it wants to cooperate with us, while it remains committed to Assad? We don't understand Russia at all!" said Lieutenant Colonel Ahmad Saoud, a spokesman for the Division 13 rebel group. Moscow began an aerial campaign in Syria on September 30, saying it was targeting ISIS and other "terrorists".
But moderate and Islamist rebels say they have been the target of Moscow's strikes, and that the campaign is intended to prop up President Bashar al-Assad's regime rather than eradicate ISIS. Samir Nashar, a member of the Syrian National Coalition, the opposition's main political body, was equally dismissive of an alliance between moderate rebels and Russia. "Instead of talking about their willingness to support the Free Syrian Army, they should stop bombing it," he told AFP. "Eighty percent of the Russian strikes are targeting the FSA." The comments came after Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Saturday that Moscow was ready to support Syria's "patriotic opposition, including the so-called Free Syrian Army, from the air". "The main thing for us is to approach the people fully in charge of representing these or those armed groups fighting terrorism among other things," he told Rossiya 1 television station.Lavrov also told the station that he hoped to see political progress in Syria and a move toward new elections. "I am convinced that most serious politicians have learned their lessons and with regards to Syria a correct understanding of the situation is developing," he said. "This gives us hope that the political process will move forward in the foreseeable future, by using outside players, to have all Syrians sit at the negotiating table.""Of course, it's necessary to prepare for both parliamentary and presidential polls," he added. Nashar said the proposal of new elections now was absurd and accused Moscow of trying "to circumvent the demands of the Syrian people for Assad's departure"."The Russians are ignoring the real facts on the ground, with millions who have been displaced inside and outside Syria, where cities are destroyed every day," he said. "What elections are they talking about holding under such circumstances?" Syria last held presidential elections in June 2014, with Assad re-elected for a seven-year term with 88.7 percent of the vote. The election was dismissed by the opposition and condemned internationally. The country last held parliamentary elections in May 2012, and it is in theory due to hold its next legislative vote in 2016.
Cooperation with Egypt and Iran. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shukri have agreed to continue cooperation in order to help find a political solution to the Syria conflict, the Russian Foreign ministry said on Saturday. In a separate telephone conversation later on Saturday, Lavrov and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif agreed to strengthen their cooperation to bring stability and security to the Middle East. The telephone conversation was at Moscow’s request and followed Lavrov’s talks with the United States, Saudi Arabia and Turkey about Syria in Vienna on Friday, the ministry said in a statement on its website.(With AFP and Reuter

Turkey says won't let Kurds ‘seize’ northern Syria
By Humeyra Pamuk Reuters, Istanbul Saturday, 24 October 2015/Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused Kurdish groups on Saturday of trying to grab control of northern Syria, and said Ankara would not allow this to happen. In a speech in southeast Turkey, Erdogan denounced the merging of the Syrian town of Tel Abyad last week into an autonomous political structure created by the Kurds. "All they want is to seize northern Syria entirely," Erdogan said. "We will under no circumstances allow northern Syria to become a victim of their scheming. Because this constitutes a threat for us, and it is not possible for us as Turkey to say 'yes' to this threat." Turkey is alarmed by territorial gains for the Kurds in Syria's civil war, which it fears could stir separatism among its own Kurdish minority. Tel Abyad, on the border with Turkey, was captured in June from Islamic State of Iraq and Syria group militants by Kurdish YPG militia with help from U.S.-led air strikes. Last week, a local leadership council declared it part of the system of autonomous self-government established by the Kurds. Syrian Kurds have established three autonomous zones, or "cantons', across northern Syria since the civil war broke out in 2011. They deny aiming to establish their own state. The YPG's capture of Tel Abyad linked up the Kurdish-controlled canton of Kobane, which was besieged by Islamic State last year, with the bigger canton of Jazeera, which is further east and borders Iraq. Turkey has for the past three decades been trying to end an insurgency by fighters of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which is classified as a terrorist organization by the United States and European Union. The PKK has been staging almost daily attacks in the southeast since July, when a ceasefire fell apart. Ankara accuses the Syrian Kurds' political arm, the PYD, of deep links to the PKK. It has been incensed by the role the Kurds have carved out for themselves, with U.S. support, in the fight against Islamic State in northern Syria. Erdogan also slammed countries who provided assistance to the PYD, although he did not name them. "Right now there are 1,400 PKK members in PYD. There is no point ignoring this, this is a fact," said Erdogan. "But all these countries who seem friendly towards us are trying to make this look the opposite way. Whatever arms assistance they (PYD) receive, it is coming from these countries. We know very well whose arms." Earlier this month, the YPG Kurdish militia announced a new alliance with small groups of Arab fighters, and the group was air-dropped small arms and ammunition by U.S. forces in northeast Syria. Washington has indicated it could direct funding and weapons to Arab commanders on the ground who cooperate with the YPG.

Syria army battles to retake Aleppo supply line from ISIS
AFP, Beirut Saturday, 24 October 2015/Syrian troops backed by Russian air strikes battled Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group fighters on Saturday in a bid to restore a key supply line to second city Aleppo, a monitoring group said. At least 28 ISIS fighters and 21 troops and militia have been killed in the battle for the road that leads to the government-held sector of Aleppo city, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The jihadists' cutting of the highway from the rest of government-held territory on Friday dealt a blow to the regime, which has launched multiple ground offensives since Russia began an air campaign on September 30. Aleppo was Syria's pre-war economic hub but it has been ravaged by fighting since mid-2012 and is divided between government control in the west and rebel control in the east. The surrounding countryside is controlled by a patchwork of armed groups, including Islamist and moderate rebels as well as ISIS and its jihadist rival, Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front. With the support of Russian air strikes, the army has recaptured territory south of the city in recent days and is seeking to break an ISIS siege of the Kweyris airbase to its east. The clashes to the south of the city have killed at least 16 rebels since Friday, the Observatory said. The army has also been on the attack in Hama and Homs provinces further south. Twelve rebels and 14 troops and pro-government militia were killed in the fighting in Hama province, the Observatory said.

Kerry: Israel promises to keep Al-Aqsa agreement
By Reuters Amman Saturday, 24 October 2015/U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Saturday that Israel had promised to maintain the tradition that only Muslims are allowed to pray at a holy site in Jerusalem, an issue at the center of recent violence. “Israel will continue to enforce its long-standing policy on religious worship ... at the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif, including the fundamental fact that it is Muslims who pray on the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif, and non-Muslims who visit,” Kerry said after meetings in Amman. He added that Israeli officials and the Muslim Waqf, custodians who manage the site which houses the al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third holiest site, would meet to discuss ways of easing tensions and that both would provide 24-7 video surveillance there. Stone-throwing Palestinians clashed with Israeli soldiers in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip during "Day of Rage" protests on Friday while the diplomats tried to end more than three weeks of bloodshed. Kerry said he was cautiously optimistic there was a way to defuse tensions after holding four hours of talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Berlin on Thursday. Israeli authorities also lifted restrictions on Friday that had banned men aged under 40 from using the flashpoint al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem's walled Old City - a move seen as a bid to ease Muslim anger. Police said Friday prayers there ended quietly. But in the West Bank and Gaza, Palestinian medical officials said 45 people were wounded by gunfire, including a 13-year-old critically injured near Ramallah and three photographers near the Gaza border. The Israeli military said it was unaware that journalists had been hurt and that soldiers had fired warning shots in the air before firing on leading instigators trying to breach the Gaza security fence. Also on Saturday, a Palestinian tried to stab a private security guard at an Israeli checkpoint in the West Bank and was shot dead, police said. "A terrorist, who arrived armed with a knife, tried to stab a security guard at the site. In response, the terrorist was shot by the security force at the scene and killed," a statement said. Police said the alleged attacker arrived from the Palestinian side of the Al-Jalama checkpoint between the northern West Bank and Israel. Earlier, a 16-year-old Palestinian stabbed and wounded an Israeli soldier in the West Bank, before being shot and wounded by other troops, the Israeli military said.
One of the worst waves of street violence in years was triggered in part by Palestinian anger over what they see as Jewish encroachment on the compound, Islam's third holiest site and also revered by Jews as the location of two ancient temples. Palestinians are also frustrated by the failure of numerous rounds of peace talks to secure them an independent state in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war. The last round of negotiations collapsed in 2014. More than 50 Palestinians, half of them assailants, have been shot dead by Israelis at the scene of attacks or during protests in the West Bank and Gaza since Oct. 1. Nine Israelis have been stabbed or shot dead by Palestinians. Stabbings and shootings mostly have been carried out by "lone wolf" attackers, many of them teenagers. Palestinian factions, including the militant group Hamas and the Fatah movement of Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas, had called for Day of Rage rallies after Friday prayers, though protests were less intense than in previous weeks. "By the blood of their sons, Jerusalem and the West Bank will write the end of the occupation," said Ismail Rudwan, an official from Hamas, which controls Gaza.
Status quo
Kerry was expected to meet in Amman on Saturday with Abbas and Jordan's King Abdullah, who has a role as a custodian of the Muslim sacred sites in Jerusalem. One of Kerry's goals is to reinforce the status quo at al-Aqsa under which non-Muslim prayer has long been banned there. Netanyahu says Israel has not changed the status quo and has no intention of doing so. The Quartet of Middle East peace mediators, met in Vienna on Friday and urged Israeli and Palestinian leaders to tone down their rhetoric and calm tensions. A statement after the meeting - attended by Kerry, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and the U.N. Middle East coordinator Nickolay Mladenov - called on Israel "to work together with Jordan to uphold the status quo at the holy sites in Jerusalem in both word and practice". An Israeli government source said Netanyahu told Kerry in their meeting that, to curb violence, Abbas and King Abdullah should publicly declare the status quo had not changed. A spokesman for Netanyahu would not confirm the prime minister had made such a demand. Palestinians are also fuming at what they see as excessive use of force by Israeli police and soldiers, with many attackers shot dead at the scene when they might have been detained. One Israeli was killed by soldiers who mistook him for an attacker, and an Eritrean migrant was beaten and shot dead by a crowd of Israelis who thought he had taken part in a shooting. Israeli rights group B'tselem on Friday distributed security camera footage that appeared to show Israeli soldiers kicking a Palestinian man and using a rifle to beat him while he was lying on a storage room floor, before dragging him outside. The Israeli military said in response that the event was being examined and a preliminary inquiry showed the soldiers had acted in accordance to the army's expected standards. B'tselem said it occurred on Oct 6. in the West Bank, near where clashes between Palestinians and Israeli troops were taking place, and that the soldiers then arrested the man. The military described the clashes as a "violent riot".

Kerry: Netanyahu agrees to maintain exclusive Muslim prayer right on Temple Mount
KHALED ABU TOAMEH/REUTERS/J.Post/10/24/2015
US Secretary of State John Kerry said on Saturday that Israel had promised to maintain the tradition that only Muslims are allowed to pray at a holy site in Jerusalem, an issue at the center of recent violence. "Israel will continue to enforce its long-standing policy on religious worship ... at the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif, including the fundamental fact that it is Muslims who pray on the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif, and non-Muslims who visit," Kerry said after meetings in Amman. He added that Israeli officials and the Muslim Waqf, custodians who manage the site which houses the al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third holiest site, would meet to discuss ways of easing tensions and that both would provide 24-7 video surveillance there. Kerry met Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Jordan's King Abdullah in Amman on Saturday. Abbas in the meeting emphasized the need to maintain the “historic status quo” in Jerusalem and the holy sites, Palestinian sources said. The Palestinian leader claimed that Netanyahu is “lying” when he says that he has no intention to change the status quo at the Temple Mount.
Abbas told Kerry that Israel must stop “settler assaults” against Palestinians as a first step towards ending the current wave of violence, the sources said. He also reiterated his charge that Israel was carrying out “field executions” of Palestinians. Abbas also held the Israeli government fully responsible for the violence and called for an international conference to create an independent Palestinian state with east Jerusalem as its capital. The sources added that Kerry briefed Abbas on the outcome of his talks last week in Germany with Netanyahu. “Kerry stressed Washington’s opposition to any change of the status quo at the Islamic holy sites,” the sources said. They quoted Abbas as saying that the Israeli government must adhere to signed agreements with the Palestinians. He said the Palestinians were now waiting to see whether the Israeli government would take serious measures to calm the situation. PLO Secretary-General Saeb Erekat said that Abbas presented Kerry with five files documenting Israeli “violations and continued assaults against Palestinians, including field exactions.”
Erekat said that Abbas demanded during the meeting that the US work towards providing the Palestinians with international protection. “The Israeli government isn’t defending itself,” Erekat said. “Instead, it is defending settlement expansion while unarmed Palestinians are defending their survival, independence and freedom.” Erekat, who attend the meeting between Kerry and Abbas, said that he and the PA president told the US secretary of state that Netanyahu was lying when he says that he’s not changing the status quo at the Temple Mount. “Before the year 2000, tourists used to enter the Haram al-Sharif (Temple Mount) under the guard of the employees of the Wakf Department and non-Muslims were not allowed to pray there,” Erekat said. “But now the Israelis have changed the regulations and tourists visit the site after receiving permits from Israeli authorities and under protection of the Israel Police.” Erekat said that he and Abbas stressed the need to return to the previous procedures, where the Jordanian Wakf Department was responsible for the Aqsa Mosque and the holy sites.
Erekat quoted Kerry as saying that he had heard the same remarks from Jordan’s King Abdullah, whom he met with in Amman also on Saturday. “Kerry told us that King Abdullah was also opposed to any attempt to divide the Aqsa Mosque in time and space (between Muslim and Jewish worshipers),” Erekat said. “The US remains opposed to any change of the status quo.”Abbas also urged Kerry to work towards convening an international conference that would lead to the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the pre-1967 lines, Erekat added. He said that Abbas also held the Israeli government fully responsible for the current wave of violence because of its policy of expanding settlements, “Judaizing” Jerusalem and carrying out “field executions,” as well as land confiscation and “ethnic cleansing.” Kerry, who met separately with King Abdullah, discussed with him the situation in Jerusalem, efforts to breathe new life into the Palestinian-Israeli peace process and the latest developments related to the Syrian crisis, the Jordanian news agency Petra reported. The meeting also touched on the situation in Iraq, as well as endeavors to fight terrorism and extremism, the agency said. Israeli-Palestinian strife has risen sharply in recent weeks as Arab states and Palestinians have accused Israeli forces of violations at al-Aqsa Mosque. Nine Israelis have been stabbed or shot dead by Palestinians along with dozens of wounded and according to Palestinian medics and other sources, 57 Palestinians have been killed since the beginning of the current wave of terror attacks in early October. Among the causes of the turmoil is Palestinians' anger at what they see as Jewish encroachment on the al-Aqsa mosque compound known as the Temple Mount to the Jews and Haram al-Sharif to the Muslims. The compound is Islam's holiest site outside Saudi Arabia and is also revered by Jews as the location of two ancient Jewish temples.

Turkey says won't let Kurds ‘seize’ northern Syria
By Humeyra Pamuk Reuters, Istanbul Saturday, 24 October 2015/Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused Kurdish groups on Saturday of trying to grab control of northern Syria, and said Ankara would not allow this to happen. In a speech in southeast Turkey, Erdogan denounced the merging of the Syrian town of Tel Abyad last week into an autonomous political structure created by the Kurds. "All they want is to seize northern Syria entirely," Erdogan said. "We will under no circumstances allow northern Syria to become a victim of their scheming. Because this constitutes a threat for us, and it is not possible for us as Turkey to say 'yes' to this threat."Turkey is alarmed by territorial gains for the Kurds in Syria's civil war, which it fears could stir separatism among its own Kurdish minority. Tel Abyad, on the border with Turkey, was captured in June from Islamic State of Iraq and Syria group militants by Kurdish YPG militia with help from U.S.-led air strikes. Last week, a local leadership council declared it part of the system of autonomous self-government established by the Kurds. Syrian Kurds have established three autonomous zones, or "cantons', across northern Syria since the civil war broke out in 2011. They deny aiming to establish their own state. The YPG's capture of Tel Abyad linked up the Kurdish-controlled canton of Kobane, which was besieged by Islamic State last year, with the bigger canton of Jazeera, which is further east and borders Iraq. Turkey has for the past three decades been trying to end an insurgency by fighters of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which is classified as a terrorist organization by the United States and European Union. The PKK has been staging almost daily attacks in the southeast since July, when a ceasefire fell apart. Ankara accuses the Syrian Kurds' political arm, the PYD, of deep links to the PKK. It has been incensed by the role the Kurds have carved out for themselves, with U.S. support, in the fight against Islamic State in northern Syria. Erdogan also slammed countries who provided assistance to the PYD, although he did not name them. "Right now there are 1,400 PKK members in PYD. There is no point ignoring this, this is a fact," said Erdogan. "But all these countries who seem friendly towards us are trying to make this look the opposite way. Whatever arms assistance they (PYD) receive, it is coming from these countries. We know very well whose arms."Earlier this month, the YPG Kurdish militia announced a new alliance with small groups of Arab fighters, and the group was air-dropped small arms and ammunition by U.S. forces in northeast Syria.Washington has indicated it could direct funding and weapons to Arab commanders on the ground who cooperate with the YPG.

Syria army battles to retake Aleppo supply line from ISIS
AFP, Beirut Saturday, 24 October 2015/Syrian troops backed by Russian air strikes battled Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group fighters on Saturday in a bid to restore a key supply line to second city Aleppo, a monitoring group said. At least 28 ISIS fighters and 21 troops and militia have been killed in the battle for the road that leads to the government-held sector of Aleppo city, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The jihadists' cutting of the highway from the rest of government-held territory on Friday dealt a blow to the regime, which has launched multiple ground offensives since Russia began an air campaign on September 30. Aleppo was Syria's pre-war economic hub but it has been ravaged by fighting since mid-2012 and is divided between government control in the west and rebel control in the east. The surrounding countryside is controlled by a patchwork of armed groups, including Islamist and moderate rebels as well as ISIS and its jihadist rival, Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front. With the support of Russian air strikes, the army has recaptured territory south of the city in recent days and is seeking to break an ISIS siege of the Kweyris airbase to its east. The clashes to the south of the city have killed at least 16 rebels since Friday, the Observatory said. The army has also been on the attack in Hama and Homs provinces further south. Twelve rebels and 14 troops and pro-government militia were killed in the fighting in Hama province, the Observatory said.

Syrian rebels reject Russian help against ISIS
By Al Arabiya with Agencies Moscow Saturday, 24 October 2015/Syria's Western-backed opposition on Saturday rejected a Russian offer to assist them against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group and dismissed Moscow's call for new elections. "Russia is bombing the Free Syrian Army and now it wants to cooperate with us, while it remains committed to Assad? We don't understand Russia at all!" said Lieutenant Colonel Ahmad Saoud, a spokesman for the Division 13 rebel group. Moscow began an aerial campaign in Syria on September 30, saying it was targeting ISIS and other "terrorists".
But moderate and Islamist rebels say they have been the target of Moscow's strikes, and that the campaign is intended to prop up President Bashar al-Assad's regime rather than eradicate ISIS. Samir Nashar, a member of the Syrian National Coalition, the opposition's main political body, was equally dismissive of an alliance between moderate rebels and Russia. "Instead of talking about their willingness to support the Free Syrian Army, they should stop bombing it," he told AFP. "Eighty percent of the Russian strikes are targeting the FSA." The comments came after Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Saturday that Moscow was ready to support Syria's "patriotic opposition, including the so-called Free Syrian Army, from the air". "The main thing for us is to approach the people fully in charge of representing these or those armed groups fighting terrorism among other things," he told Rossiya 1 television station. Lavrov also told the station that he hoped to see political progress in Syria and a move toward new elections. "I am convinced that most serious politicians have learned their lessons and with regards to Syria a correct understanding of the situation is developing," he said. "This gives us hope that the political process will move forward in the foreseeable future, by using outside players, to have all Syrians sit at the negotiating table." "Of course, it's necessary to prepare for both parliamentary and presidential polls," he added. Nashar said the proposal of new elections now was absurd and accused Moscow of trying "to circumvent the demands of the Syrian people for Assad's departure". "The Russians are ignoring the real facts on the ground, with millions who have been displaced inside and outside Syria, where cities are destroyed every day," he said. "What elections are they talking about holding under such circumstances?" Syria last held presidential elections in June 2014, with Assad re-elected for a seven-year term with 88.7 percent of the vote. The election was dismissed by the opposition and condemned internationally. The country last held parliamentary elections in May 2012, and it is in theory due to hold its next legislative vote in 2016. Cooperation with Egypt and Iran. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shukri have agreed to continue cooperation in order to help find a political solution to the Syria conflict, the Russian Foreign ministry said on Saturday. In a separate telephone conversation later on Saturday, Lavrov and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif agreed to strengthen their cooperation to bring stability and security to the Middle East. The telephone conversation was at Moscow’s request and followed Lavrov’s talks with the United States, Saudi Arabia and Turkey about Syria in Vienna on Friday, the ministry said in a statement on its website.

Germany toughens asylum rules amid migrant surge
By AFP Berlin Saturday, 24 October 2015/German will toughen up its asylum rules on Saturday, a week ahead of schedule, as it faces an unprecedented number of migrants arriving from Syria and elsewhere. The new bill, adopted by parliament at exceptional speed, had been expected to take effect on November 1. But it was published in the country's legal gazette on Friday, which means it will become operational on Saturday. Peter Altmaier, the minister coordinating the government's asylum policy, told ARD television that the move was "a signal" to would-be asylum seekers. Germany has become Europe's top destination for refugees, most of whom travel through Turkey and the Balkans. It is expecting to receive up to a million migrants this year, after around 200,000 in 2014. Chancellor Angela Merkel has attempted to rally Germans to the task of welcoming hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war and persecution. However she now faces a backlash for her open-door policy and has seen her approval rating fall in the process.The new law seeks to restrict the right of political asylum to exceptional cases for nationals from Albania, Montenegro and Kosovo. These three Balkan nations will be added to the list of "safe" countries, meaning their citizens will not normally be eligible for political asylum. Furthermore the multiple cash allowances available to asylum seekers while their cases are being processed will be replaced by benefits in kind, in a bid to make Germany a less attractive destination for migrants. In addition, expulsion procedures for those denied asylum will be accelerated. "We want to improve and we want to improve quickly, as early as this year, as regards expelling asylum seekers who do not the right to remain here," said Altmaier. Meanwhile agreement appears to be emerging within Merkel's coalition government for setting up a string of "transit zones" on Germany's borders to allow would-be refugees who do not fulfil asylum criteria, such as economic migrants, to be moved out easily and quickly. Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere spoke of "an agreement in principle" on the idea, while stressing that there were still details to be clarified. The Social Democratic Party (SPD), part of Merkel's left-right coalition, have long opposed the idea of refugee "camps" but have finally agreed to the scheme, while stressing migrants should be housed in existing buildings. The SPD has had to take into account the growing unrest at the influx. The surge in arrivals has fueled xenophobia and crimes against refugee shelters, including arson. Security experts are bracing for a rise in unrest, with domestic intelligence chief Hans-Georg Maassen warning in late September of a radicalization of rightwing groups and "a greater willingness to use violence" by all extremist groups. The western city of Cologne is bracing for a demonstration by far-right extremists and football hooligans on Sunday, with thousands of officers to be deployed to prevent a repeat of clashes which left 44 riot police injured last year.

Pentagon expects more raids similar to Iraq rescue
Reuters, Washington Saturday, 24 October 2015/A U.S.-backed military operation that freed 70 hostages who had been held by ISIS in Iraq produced a cache of intelligence, and U.S. forces supporting Iraqi troops are likely to undertake more raids in the future, U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on Friday. Carter said he decided on the rescue mission after intelligence showed that executions were imminent and mass graves had been dug.“When we find opportunities to do things that will effectively prosecute the campaign we’re going to do that ... raids is one of those categories and I suspect that we’ll have further opportunities in the future and we’re going to avail ourselves of them,” Carter said. The U.S.-led coalition against ISIS will also intensify its assault on the group’s oil production and sales enterprise, Carter said, pointing as an example to a recent strike against a pump station and site for crude oil production in eastern Syria. Overseeing those efforts will be Lieutenant General Sean MacFarland, who Carter placed in charge of counter-ISIS activities in Iraq and Syria. Three general had previously shared responsibility. MacFarland pioneered the use of a Sunni force called Sahwa (Awakening) that worked with U.S. troops to defeat al-Qaeda in Iraq six years ago, Carter said. “His efforts will be critical in the coming months as we continue to provide support for capable partners fighting on the front lines,” Carter said.

Russia Special Forces kill ISIS-linked militant in Dagestan
Moscow, Reuters Saturday, 24 October 2015/Russian security forces killed a militant linked to ISIS in the North Caucasus republic of Dagestan early on Saturday, the government’s Anti-Terrorist Committee (NAK) said, according to news agencies. Special Forces and police found Abdula Nustafaev in a house in the village of Gimry and he was killed when he refused to surrender and opened fire, Interfax reported. NAK, which coordinates anti-terrorism operations, said Nustafaev had been behind an explosion at Irganaiskaya power plant in Dagestan in September 2010 and involved in numerous attempts on the lives of law enforcement officers and civilians. He swore fealty to ISIS in 2015, NAK added. Russia is struggling to quell a simmering Islamic insurgency in the North Caucasus, where some rebels have sworn allegiance to ISIS.

Islamist candidate shot dead in Egypt's Sinai
AFP, Cairo Saturday, 24 October 2015/Gunmen shot dead an Islamist candidate in Egypt's parliamentary elections in North Sinai on Saturday, officials said, where militantss are waging an insurgency against the government. Mostafa Abdel Rahman, a candidate for ultraconservative Salafist Al-Nour party which is seen as pro-government, was gunned down by two assailants on a motorbike, police officials said. A party spokesman confirmed his death to AFP. On Saturday, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group claimed credit for two roadside bombings in El-Arish over the past 48 hours that killed four policemen. It also said it had planted a bomb at a Cairo intersection flanked by hotels near the pyramids, which wounded four people when police tried to defuse it on Friday. The Cairo bomb went off at the Rimaya intersection, close to several hotels and 1.5 kilometers (just under a mile) from the Pyramids, it said. It detonated when police used water cannon to try to defuse it, injuring two policemen and two hotel security guards. One of the police was critically wounded, a security official said. In its statement, circulated on social media sites, the ISIS group said it had set off the Cairo bomb to target "the apostate police force." Militants in the Sinai Peninsula pledged allegiance last year to ISIS, which controls parts of Iraq and Syria. The Islamist insurgency in the peninsula has swelled since the army's ouster of Islamist president Mohammad Mursi in July 2013. Militants loyal to ISIS have killed hundreds of Egyptian soldiers and policemen, mostly in North Sinai. A government crackdown targeting Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood movement since 2013 has left hundreds dead and thousands jailed. Hundreds more, including Mursi himself, have been sentenced to death, often in mass trials. Many have appealed and won retrials, while seven have so far been executed by hanging.

No time to waste on Yemen peace talks, says U.N.
AFP, United Nations Saturday, 24 October 2015/The U.N. special envoy for Yemen said Friday he would begin working immediately with the government and militia leaders to determine an agenda and date for peace talks, but warned a “catastrophic” humanitarian crisis loomed. Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed told the Security Council that the Houthi militias and backers of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh had “clearly committed” to carrying out council resolution 2216, which calls for a negotiated withdrawal by the rebels “from Yemen’s key cities and a surrender of all heavy weapons to the state.” He said the Yemeni government of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi - which last month backed away from U.N.-sponsored talks in Oman, demanding that the rebels first withdraw their forces - had agreed to send a delegation to the upcoming negotiations.No date for the talks has yet been set. The Security Council separately issued a statement calling on “all Yemeni parties to resume and accelerate United Nations-brokered inclusive political consultations” and to engage in the talks in “a flexible and constructive manner.” Yemen, one of the poorest countries in the world, has been wracked since March by a conflict that has claimed nearly 5,000 lives, according to the U.N. In that month a Saudi-led Arab coalition launched air strikes against the Houthi militias, a once obscure Shiite group with Iranian backing. Ould Cheikh Ahmed told the Security Council that the already suffering people of Yemen faced a “catastrophic” situation, with up to 21 million people - 80 percent of the population - in need of humanitarian aid. He said matters had grown more dire since the Arab coalition, which supports Hadi, launched its intense bombing campaign. A naval blockade has prevented sea-going vessels from bringing fuel supplies to Yemen, with drastic effects on hospitals in particular, Ould Cheikh Ahmed said. Only one percent of the country’s monthly fuel needs were met by September deliveries, he added. The Security Council said that a U.N. appeal for $1.6 billion in humanitarian funds for Yemen was only 47 percent funded and urged the international community to contribute more. It called on all parties to the conflict to facilitate the urgent delivery of humanitarian aid and fuel for civilian uses, “including through all of Yemen’s ports.” It also urged all parties in the talks to negotiate “with no preconditions and in good faith.”Resolution 2216 provides a “framework” for negotiations, Ould Cheikh Ahmed said, adding that it is up to the Yemeni parties to agree on ways to implement it. An attempt in June to bring the Yemeni parties together at a negotiating table also failed.

Rockets kill nine at Libya protest against U.N. deal
By Al Arabiya with Reuters Friday, 23 October 2015/At least nine people were killed and dozens more injured in Libya's second city Benghazi on Friday, Al Arabiya News Channel reported, when rockets hit a protest against a U.N. proposal for a unity government to end a political crisis.Four years after the fall of Muammar Qaddafi, Libya is caught in a conflict that pits the internationally recognized government and its armed backers against a rival government set up by an armed alliance that took over the capital last year. More than 2,000 people had taken to Benghazi's al-Keesh square to demonstrate against the U.N. proposal when at least seven rockets hit the crowds, the hospital sources said. Around 25 more were wounded. Benghazi has become one front in Libya's multi-sided war, with General Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army forces fighting an alliance of Islamist fighters and former anti-Qaddafi rebels.
Indiscriminate shelling and rockets sometimes hit civilian areas in the city, which is split into areas controlled by the rival armed factions. In some neighborhoods, life continues as usual, with banks and restaurants open, while fighting has reduced other areas to rubble. The United Nations has presented a proposal for a national unity government between the two main political factions to end the chaos, but attempts to reach a deal have stalled as both sides face resistance from within their ranks.

What the Aleppo offensive hides
Mona Alami/Al-Monitor/October 24/15
The much-touted attack on Aleppo launched on Oct. 16 has been dovetailed by regime advances in the southern rural areas of Syria. Yet the takeover of the largest Syrian city may prove to be a long and costly battle that President Bashar al-Assad’s regime cannot afford, despite Russian air support. In addition, it may not be the regime’s first priority, as its forces are eyeing supply routes on the city’s southern flank.Thousands of Shiite militiamen were deployed on Oct. 19 in the Aleppo region under the command of Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, from Iran’s elite Quds Force, in an attempt to recapture Aleppo, as reported by The Washington Post quoting officials from three Iraqi militias. The Iraqi Shiite militia, Kataib Hezbollah, has sent approximately 1,000 fighters from Iraq, who are fighting alongside 2,000 members of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. “The control of Aleppo is essential to President Assad’s national legitimacy. Syria was created after the First World War by the union of the provinces of Aleppo and Damascus. Losing Aleppo would mean for Assad that he is the president of half the country. Strategically, Aleppo is vital to regaining the northwest [the provinces of Idlib and Aleppo] and the control of the Turkish border, directly or via the Kurds,” Syria expert Fabrice Balanche, from the Washington Institute for Near East policy, told Al-Monitor.
The battle for Aleppo has been witnessing ebbs and flows for the last three years. The Syrian army was able to lift the siege of Aleppo in spring 2013 and patiently encircled rebels in the eastern districts. In February 2015, its attempt to cut the last road linking Aleppo to eastern Turkey resulted in failure, with rebels reinforcing their positions, explained Balanche. The city is currently divided between regime forces and the opposition, the first occupying the western flank of the city, specifically strategic locations such as the Military Academy, Keliat al Madfaiya (Canon Academy) and the Air Force Academy, according to activist Ahmad, speaking to Al-Monitor from Aleppo. The opposition controls around 60% of the city and is run by two different operating rooms, according to Col. Abdel Jabbar al-Okaidi from the Free Syrian Army. The first operating room is that of Fatah Halab (Conquest of Aleppo) in Aleppo, which includes more than 15 factions that have assembled around it, including the al-Sham Front, Nur al-Din Zanki, al-Safwa Brigade, Faylaq al-Sham, Fastaqim Kama Umirt, the Dawn of the Caliphate Brigades, Sultan Murad and Battalion 16.
The second operating room of Ansar al-Sharia is comprised of Jabhat al-Nusra, Jund al-Aqsa, Ahrar al-Sham, Liwa al-Haqq, Jaish al-Sunna and Ajnad al-Sham.
“Coordination between the two operating rooms is lacking, and factions within Ansar al-Sharia cooperate with Fatah Halab on an individual level mostly, with Jabhat al-Nusra playing a marginal role,” Col. Hassan Hamadeh from Brigade 101 told Al-Monitor. While relations between opposing rebel groups are often wanting, recent Russian strikes have somewhat improved cooperation in certain cases between rival groups within the opposition. Russian strikes and regime forces are currently focusing on the southern countryside, with the brunt of the battle taking place from Jabal Azzan to the city’s southern outskirts, according to Ahmad. “The fighters’ spirits remain high despite the Russian onslaught, as rebels have been able to resist and cause losses among regime forces. Russian strikes are thankfully far from being precise, which is to our advantage,” Okaidi said. In addition, rebels in that region said they had received new supplies of US-made anti-tank missiles from states opposed to President Assad since the start of the offensive last week. Rebels from three groups including the Sultan Murad group fighting in the Aleppo area told Reuters about the delivery of the US-made TOW missiles, adding they were now well stocked. TOW missiles are the most potent weapons against regime tanks.
According to Ahmad, the southern front remains the region’s weakest link, as it has a lower military presence of opposition groups. The region’s town of Al-Eis also bears strategic importance. “It is located on the supply route between Hama and Aleppo and overlooks the Aleppo-Damascus road,” said Hamadeh. Russian strikes are not only facilitating regime advances on the southern front as rebels are also staving off Islamic State (IS) gains on their northern flank. A recent report by the Institute for the Study of War highlighted that the terror organization was benefiting from Russia’s strikes on the Syrian opposition. Oct. 9 witnessed the largest advance since August 2015 by IS against rebels in northeastern Syria. “The Syrian regime and IS have historically leveraged one another’s offensives in order to advance against rebel forces in the northern Aleppo countryside. Both IS and the regime will likely capitalize on the effects of Russian airstrikes on rebels,” according to the report. Early this week, the regime had advanced even farther north to capture a sprawling cement plant from IS. Regime forces are clenching a closing fist around Aleppo city, with the newly captured villages and other facilities in the northeastern Aleppo countryside part of an apparent drive northwest.
According to Hamadeh, this area would be the next target of the regime, which is attempting to link Aleppo to the pro-regime Shiite villages of Nubl and al-Zahra in the Aleppo countryside that have been encircled by rebels for three years now. For now, the conquest of the northern capital appears to remain on the back burner, as Aleppo sources believe that the battle for Aleppo is far from easy due to the size of the city, the remaining large civilian population and the multitude of players."The city is surrounded by rebel Jabhat al-Nusra in the west and IS in the east. The city is also located only 50 kilometers [31 miles] from Turkey, from which rebels receive substantial logistical support. One can hardly imagine that the Syrian army can retake Aleppo completely without control of the Turkish-Syrian border,” Balanche said.

Is Palestinian public leaving its leadership behind?
Shlomi Eldar/Al-Monitor/October 24/15
In the wake of the Oct. 1 attack in Samaria, where Naama and Eitam Henkin were murdered — after which the current wave of terror in Israel broke out — I held talks with several senior Palestinian security officials as well as with a host of veteran Palestinian journalists from the volatile city of Hebron. Everyone was certain beyond any shadow of a doubt that despite the swelling frustration and despair in the West Bank, the people were too weary to embark on a third intifada. One senior Palestinian Authority official told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity, “If [President] Mahmoud Abbas doesn’t want an intifada, there won’t be an intifada.” He was basing himself on the assumption that even if the Palestinians do not like Abbas, the security agencies and the Palestinian establishment have the ground under their firm control. Appearing to make sense and sounding substantiated, those arguments were cited in Al-Monitor's piece titled “Will there be a third intifada?”
Today, in the wake of three very bloody weeks and dozens of attacks and attempted attacks it is abundantly clear that the people on the ground are speaking a different language and do not adhere to the wishes of senior PA officials who have pulled out all the stops to avert a violent uprising. Indeed, in contrast to the second intifada, there are no mass demonstrations throughout the West Bank but rather a small number of confined clashes with Israel Defense Forces troops at flash points. However, the number of terrorists who committed stabbing or vehicular attacks this past month is similar to the number of attacks during the entire second intifada, which was instigated and supported by the Palestinian organizations.
Most of the perpetrators of the stabbing attacks hail from East Jerusalem, yet their actions inspire young people from the West Bank. As a result, a rise in violence across the Green Line has been observed in recent days. Despite feeling confident about their level of control, senior political and security PA officials now realize that they were wrong not only in this assessment, but also about the assumption that the Palestinian public heeds the calls of Abbas. Even in their most pessimistic assessments, they did not foresee an intifada erupting before their eyes and the Palestinian public leaving them behind.
On Oct. 21, Al-Monitor contributor Hazem Balousha wrote an article explaining why Hamas wants an intifada. A source in the organization told Balousha that the movement was interested in an uprising in the West Bank but would rather see it conducted without the movement’s involvement. The argument the source cited was that Hamas was temporarily curtailing its armed activities to avoid an Israeli crackdown on the nascent intifada. Yet, saying “curtail its armed actions temporarily” is a baseless statement because since the end of Operation Protective Edge in August 2014, Hamas has not initiated any offensive actions against Israel. Furthermore, it has actually been taking vigorous action against radical elements in Gaza that are trying to fire rockets at Israel.
Hamas, as has been extensively reported, is more interested in having a long-term agreement with Israel than engaging in another armed conflict, which could bring about the movement’s collapse. This is the reason why the organization pushes for an intifada but does not want to take part in it.
Hamas finds itself between a rock and a hard place. On one hand, if its militants actively join the brewing intifada, Israel will strike them mercilessly. On the other, as a resistance movement, it cannot afford to lag behind and lose its status as the champion of the armed struggle against Israel. The solution chosen is to speak in favor of an intifada and make blustery speeches against Israel while letting others do the work.
Senior PA officials, too, are in a bind, yet their situation is far more complex and dangerous. By now everyone understands that the PA has lost touch with the public. If Abbas’ administration tries to join the cycle of violence — even if only partially — Israel could crush the PA. By contrast, if senior PA officials try to suppress Palestinian violence, they will have to pay a stiff personal and political price. Despite the fact that the uprising is indeed aimed at Israel, it is to a great extent also a loud and clear call of defiance against the PA, its senior officials and activists, but mainly against Abbas. This week, I called a number of senior Fatah and PA officials to hear their assessments and analyses of the situation. For the first time in many years, they all dodged me, giving a variety of excuses. One senior PA official told me, rather amusingly, “At this time I do not want to talk about politics, but if you would like to talk about other things, be my guest.”
Whereas Hamas leaders have found a middle-of-the-road approach and are taking part in the current uprising through words only, PA leaders cannot afford to do even that much. Fatah militants and Tanzim (Fatah's armed militia) leaders have tried organizing demonstrations in the West Bank, but very quickly had to toe Abbas’ line and cease those efforts. On Oct. 11, Abbas met with Tanzim chiefs, imploring them to calm the atmosphere. PA officials understand full well that if the situation shifts from stabbing attacks by so-called lone wolves to mass demonstrations and full-blown clashes, the PA will descend into chaos whose outcome nobody can predict. What this means — and this concern is shared by senior Palestinian political and security officials alike — is that the PA could collapse and they could lose their jobs, influence and standing and be replaced by a new, grassroots leadership. Abbas’ associates are concerned that all they will be remembered for by their own people is security cooperation with Israel, or as they are derisively known in the territories, "ta’amul" — collaborators. The largest Palestinian national movement — Fatah — finds itself in one of its greatest crises. Its leaders and activists understand that any action they take has serious consequences. Abbas, Saeb Erekat and Jibril Rajoub as well as Tanzim leaders are trying to curb the escalation and get the situation under control, while minimizing the damage to their image in the eyes of the Palestinian public. If they fail, this could herald the end of the Fatah movement, at least in its present format.

The Palestinian Jihad: Lies, Lies and More Lies
This is Not an "Intifada"/Gatestone Institute/October 24, 2015
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6754/palestinian-jihad-lies
First, we are not seeing anything "popular." We are not seeing, as before, thousands of Palestinians participating in the violence or protests.
It is just another wave of terrorism: targeting Jews for being Jews. The terrorists and their apologists do not distinguish between a Jew living in the city of Beersheba, and a Jew from a West Bank settlement. For the Palestinian leaders and media, these Jews are all "settlers" living in "occupied territories."
The appropriate term for the current wave of terrorism is "jihad". The attacks on Jews in Israel and the West Bank are part of the global jihad that has been waged for many years against Jews in particular, non-Muslims in general, and even against other Muslims who might not agree with a differing version of Islam.
This jihad is not aimed at "ending occupation" or protesting against misery and checkpoints. The terrorists do not see a difference between a "left wing Jew" and a "right wing Jew." They do not ask their victims about their political affiliation before knifing them.
In a grotesque rewrite of history, UNESCO declared that two Jewish holy sites, Rachel's Tomb and the Cave of the Patriarchs, were Muslim holy sites.
This is a wave of terrorism based on lies. Palestinian leaders, including Abbas his officials in the Palestinian Authority and his Fatah faction, have been lying to us for months. They told Palestinians that the Jews are "invading" and "desecrating" Islamic holy sites with the purpose of destroying them. Abbas and his officials are urging Muslims to join the jihad against the Jews.
The leaders are now telling us that most of the terrorists were, in fact, innocent civilians who were shot dead by Israelis while on their way to buy food or going to work. Lying has become an integral part of the jihad against Jews. The campaign of lies, distortion and fabrications is not less serious than the terror attacks.
This is yet another phase of the worldwide jihad against all the "infidels" and "enemies of Islam." Those who are murdering Jews today do not hesitate to murder other non-Muslims tomorrow, especially those who are seen as Israel's friends, such as the U.S.
Palestinian leaders in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are calling it a "peaceful popular resistance." They are referring, of course, to the latest wave of stabbings, shootings and vehicular attacks against the Jews in Israel.
In the view of our leaders -- and, unfortunately, many in the international community -- this is a "peaceful popular resistance," an uprising, or an "intifada," like two previous uprisings we had in 1987 and 2000.
What is happening these days in the Palestinian territories and Israel, however, is anything but a "peaceful popular resistance." First, we are not seeing anything "popular." We are not seeing, as before, thousands of Palestinians participating in the violence or protests. These attacks are not protests launched by villagers, residents of refugee camps and members of professional unions in the Palestinian territories.
What we are seeing are pure terrorist attacks carried out mostly by impressionable young men and women whose hearts and minds have been poisoned by the inflammatory rhetoric and incitement of Palestinian leaders, mosques, the media, Facebook and other social media. The terrorists who carry knives or firearms to murder Jews are usually, it seems, disturbed youngsters, who have been fired up by the pervasive atmosphere of hate poured over them daily by their leaders and these leaders' media outlets. The current terrorists are not part of an armed group such as the Tanzim or the Fatah Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, nor a "popular resistance," a street gang, or any organized movement.
Contrary to what Palestinian leaders have been telling us, not to mention the rest of the world, these terrorists do not believe in any form of "peaceful and popular resistance" against Israel. After all, there is nothing peaceful or popular about stabbing or shooting Jews waiting at a bus stop or driving their cars on their way to work or back home. Surely, there is nothing peaceful about murdering a Jewish couple in front of their four children, or stabbing and seriously wounding a 13-year-old boy riding his bicycle on the streets of Jerusalem.
This is, bluntly, just another wave of terrorism: targeting Jews for being Jews. The terrorists and their apologists do not distinguish between a Jew living in the city of Beersheba, and a Jew from a settlement in the West Bank. In the eyes of the Palestinian leaders and media, these Jews are all "settlers" living in "occupied territories." To many of them, and as they repeatedly tell us, all of Israel is "occupied territory."
Official Palestinian maps continue to present Palestine as occupying all of Israel. And there are continual attempts erase history Jewish presence. Last July, Rachel's Tomb, the burial site of a Jewish Matriarch was attacked by explosives launched from slingshots. And just last week Joseph's Tomb, the burial site of a Jewish Patriarch, was torched. These are the same methods al-Qaeda and Da'esh (ISIS) have been using in Bamiyan and Palmyra to try to obliterate any evidence of a pre-Islamic presence other ancient sites. These attack were accompanied by requests from six Arab states — Algeria, Egypt, Kuwait, Tunisia, Morocco ad the United Arab Emirates — to have UNESCO declare the Rachel's Tomb, and Western Wall -- a retaining wall and all that is left of the Jews' Second Temple that the Romans destroyed in 70 CE — part of the Muslim Temple Mount under Palestinian control. The last request was removed before the vote, but in a grotesque rewrite of history, UNESCO did declare that two other Jewish holy sites, Rachel's Tomb and the Cave of the Patriarchs, were Muslim holy sites.
In addition, the official media of the Western-funded Palestinian Authority have been referring to the Jewish victims of the current wave of terrorism as "settlers." A 73-year-old woman who lives in the Western part of the city and who was stabbed at Jerusalem's central bus station two weeks ago was described as a "settler." Similarly, two Jews who were stabbed and wounded in the city of Ra'anana, on the outskirts of Tel Aviv, were also described by Abbas's media outlets as "settlers." Their city, Ra'anana, well within the "1967 line," has also been described by most Palestinian media outlets and journalists as a "settlement."
What does all this show? The answer is very simple: Most Palestinians continue to see Israel as one big settlement that needs to be uprooted and destroyed. It also shows that these Palestinians do not draw a distinction between a Jew living a West Bank settlement and a Jew living in an Israeli city inside Israel. The Jewish victims of this wave of terrorism are all "settlers" and "colonialists" who deserved what happened to them because they are "living on stolen land." This is the message that the Palestinian Authority, Hamas and other Palestinian groups are sending to the Palestinians and the rest of the world: that "settlers" are "legitimate" targets that deserve to be slaughtered and shot dead by a people fighting for "independence and freedom."
The appropriate term for the current wave of terrorism is "jihad" (holy war). The attacks on Jews in Israel and the West Bank are part of the global jihad that has been waging for many years against Jews in particular, non-Muslims in general and even against other Muslims who might not agree with a differing version of Islam.
Almost all the terrorists involved in these recent attacks are affiliated with Hamas and Islamic Jihad, two jihadi groups whose main goal is to destroy Israel by murdering and intimidating Jews. Like Islamic State and Al-Qaeda, the two Palestinian groups are also seeking to create an Islamic caliphate governed by Islamic sharia law.
This jihad is not aimed at "ending occupation" or protesting against misery and checkpoints. Rather, it is a jihad designed to drive the Jews out of the region. Period. The terrorists and their sponsors do not see a difference between an Israeli soldier and an Israeli baby. They do not see a difference between a "left wing Jew" and a "right wing Jew." The terrorists do not ask their victims about their political affiliation before sticking a knife into them.
This is a wave of terrorism based on lies, lies and more lies. Palestinian leaders, including Abbas and his Fatah faction, have been lying to us for months about the nature of the visits of Jews to the Haram al-Sharif, or Temple Mount. They told Palestinians that the Jews are "invading" and "desecrating" Islamic holy sites with the purpose of destroying them. By doing so, Abbas and his officials in the Palestinian Authority and Fatah have actually been urging Muslims to join the jihad against the Jews.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas (right) ignited competition among radical groups as to which faction could incite the most violence. Left: official PA media incite Palestinians, from a young age, to murder Jews.
After the wave of terrorism began, the Palestinian leaders continued to lie about the circumstances surrounding the death of the terrorists. The leaders are now telling us that most of the terrorists were, in fact, innocent civilians who were shot dead by Israel while they were on their way to buy food for their families or going to work. The Palestinian leaders are lying when they tell us that the terrorists were killed as part of a new Israeli policy of "field executions" against young Palestinian men and women. Lying and distorting the truth has become an integral part of the jihad against Jews. The campaign of lies, distortion and fabrications is not less serious than the terror attacks. There is no difference between a Palestinian leader who incites and lies, and a terrorist who grabs a knife and takes to the street to murder a Jew.
It is time for us to open our eyes and see the reality as it is: this is yet another phase of the worldwide jihad against all the "infidels" and "enemies of Islam." Those who are murdering Jews today do not hesitate to murder other non-Muslims tomorrow, especially those who are seen as Israel's friends such as the U.S. and most nations in the West. So let us put things in context and start calling the wave of terrorism by its real name, not an "intifada" or a "peaceful popular resistance." It is a jihad.

Russian Intervention in Syria Boosting Iranian Hardliners
Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
http://mebriefing.com/?p=1991&utm_source=MEB+VOL+-+III_+Issue+100+October+2015&utm_campaign=VOL+III+-+Issue+100&utm_medium=email
The Russian military deployments in Syria have already had repercussions across the region, and particularly inside Iran. Hardline factions, including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the top commanders of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, along with a segment of the Iranian clergy, have jumped on the false assumption that the Russian intervention will “save Bashar Assad,” and, as the result, have moved to shut down any efforts to build upon the P5+1 agreements to deepen cooperation with the United States and Europe. This may prove to be a tremendous missed opportunity and could lead to serious backlash against Tehran. Reflecting these internal shifts within the Iranian power structure, Supreme Leader Khamenei publicly announced recently that there would be no efforts to broaden the cooperation with the United States and the West. He shut off the channels of discussion between Foreign Minister Zarif and US Secretary of State John Kerry. Zarif was internally reprimanded for the impromptu hand-shake with US President Barack Obama during the United Nations General Assembly proceedings in New York City in late September. The Obama Administration has taken note of these power shifts in Tehran, and the President ordered a slow-down in the lifting of US sanctions, which will now be held off until late January 2016 at the earliest. The top leadership of the Quds Brigade of the IRGC, including its commander, Gen. Soleimani, has concluded that the Russian intervention in Syria is a “game changer.” While there have been some short-term shifts in the situation on the ground in Syria, these changes are likely to be short-lived. US estimates are that Iran would have to deploy 15,000-20,000 troops at minimum to genuinely alter the Syria situation, and that is not feasible, given the demands on Iran’s forces in Iraq, and the long lead time before the Iranian economy benefits from the lifting of sanctions. Were Iran to take further actions in league with Russia and Hezbollah in Syria, it would almost certainly lead to new US Congressional sanctions, no longer linked to the Iranian nuclear program, but tied to Iran’s destabilizing actions against neighboring Arab states. Foreign Minister Zarif and other officials who have maintained channels of communication with the US and other Western powers have been given orders to halt all those channels—unless they are approved in advance by Khamenei. If the Iranian situation continues to tilt in favor of the hardliners, due to the false hopes about the Russian actions in Syria, this will feed the overall sectarian dynamic in the region. The Russian bombing campaign in Syria, along with the recent deployment of 1,000 fresh Iranian IRGC troops, is already driving rival Sunni rebel factions to begin talks on joint operations and even mergers. A European proposal, endorsed by the Obama Administration, calls for an “interested parties” meeting on Syria, to include the United States, Russia, European powers, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Jordan. In principle, Iran could have been included in the proposal, which is now being studied in Moscow. However, at the recommendation of John Kerry, Iran was kept out of the proposed consultations, out of fear that, with Zarif, for the time being sidelined, it would only further strengthen the hand of the radical factions in Iran that are banking on a Russian military victory in Syria.

A New Count-Down for a Solution in Syria-In Russian This Time. Will It Work?
Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
http://mebriefing.com/?p=1989&utm_source=MEB+VOL+-+III_+Issue+100+October+2015&utm_campaign=VOL+III+-+Issue+100&utm_medium=email
Syria’s President Bashar Al Assad paid a secret visit to Moscow Tuesday Oct 20. It was not before Assad returned back to Damascus that news of his visit was aired in the two capitals. On Wednesday 21st, Russia’s President called both Saudi Arabia’s King Salman and Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan to brief them on the results of Assad’s visit. The meeting between the foreign ministers of Russia, the US, Saudi Arabia and Turkey in Vienna was approved during these conversations and in coordination with Secretary John Kerry. The point of agreement emerging from these intense effort is a plan to end the Syrian crisis and convert it into a war against terrorism. The turning point which made the deal negotiable is Assad’s qualified acceptance -in principle- not to remain in power after a transitional period. Saudi Arabia and Turkey insisted that Assad must leave. Kerry said recently that he could stay only for a transitional period. The new Assad position seems to have turned into the point of an acceptable compromise to all parties. Assad acceptance to step down is “in principle” and is conditional on all parties acceptance of a Russian proposal for the nature of the transitional deal and the future political structure that will emerge after. Discussions in Vienna will be centered on the outlines of both parts of the deal. Vienna would be a mere first step in a long road of negotiations about the details of both points. An agreement to keep the development within diplomatic channels was granted in order to avoid weakening Assad internal position in Syria.It is not easy to predict the outcome of this new round of diplomatic efforts. But the main features of the moment are more or less obvious. Mr. Putin moved quickly to harvest the fruits of the impact of his intervention. This intervention gave the impression-which is merely an impression- that the balance of power in the Syrian war has improved in favor of Assad. It therefore gave him a better chance to strike a balanced deal. Just before Putin’s intervention, Assad was losing grounds rapidly. All external assistance did not help in slowing the rapid erosion of his camp. There were some signs that at one point, not in the far future, the Syrian regime will collapse from within.
But while the balance of power was tilting towards the Syrian opposition, the important point has always been the degree to which the sides are aware of that. As Dr. Kissinger told us decades ago, an equilibrium is not achieved by the factual elements of power, but by the consciousness of the balance which is brought about only through testing it. In other words, what is important is consciousness, perceptions, and a clear absorption of the “meaning” and weight of these elements of power. And for that reason, Mr. Putin had to move fast to explore a political solution. He did not want to be dragged to the whirlpool of “testing” a la Vietnam. For it was clear, even to Mr. Putin, that Russia will get tired in Syria fast. And that Mr. Obama was tired even before doing anything meaningful. It is therefore only logical that Mr. Putin had to move diplomatically under the umbrella of the psychological impact that his intervention left and before this intervention is seriously tested. Testing it would have made the Russians bleed, which Mr. Putin cannot afford, or would have forced the Russian President to double down, which is even more difficult to afford.Now, the Obama administration is tired after Iraq and Afghanistan. It does not want to allocate any meaningful resources in the Middle East anymore. The Kremlin sees clearly that it does not have what it takes for a long engagement in Syria. But do the regional players feel the same?
If yes, it will certainly be possible to pull a political solution out of the jaws of the current Syrian madness. If no, the question which will emerge would be: Can the US and Russia fill the space between the regional players’ reluctance to accept a deal and the moment of signing one? In other words, can the two powers exert enough pressure on the regional parties to carry them to the point of signing?
There are arguments in the two sides of any answer.
The Iranian must have understood that the best they can hope for is an enclave in west Syria that will certainly be subject to relentless attacks until they leave. The Arabs must have understood that the continuation of the Syrian crisis encourages terrorist Jihadists to expand. This brings the smiling declaration that a solution is possible. While we do not say that a solution is impossible, the truth is that things are not as simple to justify such a smiling declaration. There are hardliners on both sides of the fence. The ambition to win is alive in the mind of both, more so in the minds of Arabs though.
Syria has never been solely a Syrian crisis. Its regional dimension is genuine and essential. Saudi foreign minister Adel Al Jubeir told his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov that Riyadh cannot accept a political solution that ends with Assad in power. Now, Putin says to the Saudi King: Your Majesty, Assad agreed to leave at the end of a transition. We have fulfilled your condition. Now, let us move ahead. Let us talk about the nature of the transition and what will follow. So, the King authorized Jubeir to go to Geneva. Yet, you cannot end similar wars through cornering its parties or through moral embarrassment. It helps. But it is not enough. There must be incentives and prices to pay. And if we all agree that the Syrian crisis has never been exclusively Syrian, then it should be emphasized that failure to connect a political deal in Syria to the regional geopolitical competition will end up with worsening both.
We should emphasize here that this line of thinking, through which we drew the picture above, is analytical in essence. No hard information was obtained in this short interval of time since Assad’s Moscow visit that can tip one side of the speculation. It is just based on understanding the dynamics of the situation in its general direction. No one wants to complicate the diplomatic mission in Syria. In the contrary. And the example of separating the Iran nuclear deal from all other issues during the negotiations between the P5+1 and Tehran would not help here. The nuclear program was, at least in part, a result of regional competition. But the Syrian crisis is this regional competition. It is its bloodiest manifestation. There will be nothing less than the monumental effort done to get the nuclear deal that a Syrian political solution will take. Words are free. Lots of them can be prepared and groomed and put on the table. Yet, at the end of the day what will count is deeds. Now, what are the chances of success of this new count down (this time in Russian)? Many elements will participate in writing a clear answer to this difficult question.
1) The Syrian Opposition:
Syria’s armed opposition will certainly split along the lines of accepting or refusing a political deal. It should be clear upfront that there is a carrot and there is a stick. The carrot is that the main blocks of the opposition will be almost autonomous in their areas provided that they clear it of ISIL (with regional and international help) and that they respect the basic human rights rules particularly in the case of minorities. We outlined a general concept about what should be done in our article printed almost four weeks ago: “How to Reach a Transitional Truce in Syria”. Relations between the different regions and the central government should avoid, at least in the beginning, infringement on entrenched interests in these regions. However, a commitment to prevent and fight terrorism in all its forms- propaganda, education, incitement, training, and operations should be obtained and verifiable mechanisms for implementation should be approved by all. The idea is to move things in a way that increases the distance between the main opposition blocks and the terrorist groups. Aware of this, practical measures should be lined in this direction and not only in the direction of a truce or a political deal. Al Raqqa is peaceful. It is not abstract peace that should be required. It is a specific peace that is sustainable and that will pave the road to rebuild Syria and put it back together.
Those who will refuse the Arab-Turkish-Russian-American deal that may emerge from the current round of efforts must be informed upfront of the consequences of their rejection. They will be putting themselves in the same camp of ISIL and will be dealt with as such. The main point, however, which should be raised at this delicate moment of talks is that Assad and his allies are intensifying their offensive particularly around Aleppo, Hama and Damascus and that this intensification is not helpful. We should look at that in the following way: Putin does not have the muscles for a long campaign-Assad is desperately trying to improve his positions with the help of the Iranians and the Russians-Shortly, as Moscow hopes, the parties will be gathering around the negotiating table. But how about a scenario in which the parties do not even show up? In this particular crisis, Assad offensive should not be seen as a usual exercise in improving the negotiating terms. This offensive may end up blocking the road to any negotiating table. Take one example: While Assad was in Moscow, Jabhat Al Nusra, the Islamic Union for the Soldiers of Al Sham and Ahrar Al Sham announced the formation of a unified Operation Room. The Room was announced as a nucleus for a unified army in the north and was explained as a response to the Russian-Iranian intervention in Syria.
What we are trying to say here is that the theory that you should intensify the military pressure before you head to the negotiating table would not work in this particular case. There are fighters who will never go to this table whatever happens. This block of Jihadists have all the interest now in pulling everyone to their side as soon as they manages to do. We are talking about a fragmented opposition with different ideological orientations. Then again, what if the counter offensive hits a wall? We understand that the Russian, Iranian and Syrian forces planned to carry this offensive from now until January-February, then there are the sand storms season until spring, then the talks in spring or early summer. But this may end up to be wishful thinking. The opposition may decide to carry on and “test” the balance of power for a longer duration. And in this point lies the main weakness of the Putin-Assad plan. They cannot force their adversaries to the negotiating table. Yet, the expected stand of the opposition will be also shaped by the Arab-Turkish position.
2) The Arab Position:
It has become clear to all that in order to achieve a favorable zero-sum result, it will take a long time and substantial resources. At the end, nothing will be left of Syria. It would resemble the big fish of Ernest Hemingway’s Old Man and the Sea. Yet, the main issue here is the degree to which Iran will preserve its presence in the west of Syria. While it is possible to provide a face saving covers to all players, it will remain important to talk clearly about the content of any deal in its relation to the geopolitical confrontation brewing in the Middle East. A deal in Syria must be a first step in reaching a regional modus vivendi. This will be the most important step in fighting terrorism. Yet, it looks too ambitious to discuss now. In spite of that, the main objective must be reaching such a deal at one point down the road. A Syrian deal will be substantial in this regard, but it would not be sufficient. If not backed by a comprehensive effort to reach a regional deal, it would remain unstable and exposed to regional dynamics. Moscow and Washington can curb excesses in both sides and exert pressure to reach a regional understanding. The process of dialogue will be met with rejectionists in both sides. However, it must start from a modest platform to a higher level. In this sense, it should be a long term process.
3) Iran
Iran should be told by all relevant international players that its aggressive regional policy will bring negative consequences to itself and others in the region. No one is too blind or naïve to believe its soft deceptive public statements. It is amazing to see President Putin condemning the so-called Arab Spring while Tehran was one of the first countries to hail it as a sign of the spread of its revolutionary experience. The two allies should tell us who to believe. Tehran should understand that shaking stability in the region will help those who are determined to attack Shias emerge. But preaching does not always work. What is urgently and badly needed is a new frame work for security in the Gulf, all the while preserving strong Western guarantees to its Arab countries and enhancing those guarantees. We profoundly appreciate recent circulating proposals to introduce a Gulf Security Forum that includes all P5+EU, India, Turkey, Egypt, Iran and GCC states. While such a forum would be unable to stop asymmetric subversive activities, it may provide an important channel to address some other security concerns which could otherwise develop dangerously. The method of presentation (in the case of a deal regarding Syria) is important in determining its chances of success. It is not that any side has defeated the other. It is that both sides care about the Syrian people. It is to save Syria, or what is left of it. The conclusion is that there is a chance that the Putin plan would work. Yet, in realistic terms, it is way more likely that it would not. It will take very heavy lifting to narrow the gap between the two possibilities.

What Are the Russians Doing in Iraq Now?
Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
http://mebriefing.com/?p=1990&utm_source=MEB+VOL+-+III_+Issue+100+October+2015&utm_campaign=VOL+III+-+Issue+100&utm_medium=email
US Marine General Joseph Dunford, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, concluded last week an important visit to Iraq. While the confusion in Baghdad to grant Dunford’s C-17 aircraft a permission to land still remains unexplained, the General did not waste time to get to work. His first mission, as said in Baghdad, was to explain to Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider Al Abadi that allowing the Russians to fly over Iraq’s war zones will complicate the US security mission in Iraq and may result in reducing or cancelling it. Just before the General travelled to Baghdad and Erbil, US officials were keeping telephone lines busy with Prime Minister Haider Abadi and his top aides. Dunford said October 1st that he believes that reports that the Iraqi government wanted Russians to conduct airstrikes in Iraq “are no longer in play”. Yet, it is not believed, even in Baghdad, that the Russians were or are ready to conduct any substantial air missions there. The whole cloud of rumors about an imminent role for Russia’s air force there was merely a reflection of the political atmosphere and a tool in the political fight in Iraq. Sources in the Security Committee in Iraq’s Parliament leaked that Russia is already flying aircrafts “intensively” in all strategic areas and that the “Security Quartet” (Russia, Iran, Iraq and Syria) operation room is “very active”. “We could not have cleaned Biji of ISIL without the help of the new intelligence center which includes the Russians”, a member in the Committee said. The head of the committee Hakem Al Zamli more or less confirmed the leak. “Without the Russian help, the battle of Biji would have been longer and harder. The battle of Mosul is our next step”, he said. But Zamli admitted that Moscow’s help was not in the form of air raids.
There is no evidence whatsoever that the Russians played any operational role in Biji or anywhere else in Iraq. The assessment of the “operation room” by professional military officers is that it “did not make a real difference yet”. The information the Russians have from Iraq is relevant mainly to their fight in Syria
But other reports indicate that the battle of Biji is not fully over. When asked to precise if Biji is totally “clean”, the spokesman for the Popular Mobilization Force (PMF) Ahmed Al Assadi was reluctant to give such a confirmation. “I can say that 90% of Biji is clear of ISIL”.The dynamics in Iraq in relation to Russia’s role could be summarized by the Arabic popular proverb “Your enemy wishes you make a mistake. But your friend forgives any”. In other words, the PMF explains every progress that happens now as a result of the Russian role while they confirm that all past defeats were due to the US. Even American air raids on Biji are hailed as Russian. Yet, it is remarkable to note that Baghdad is full of speculations nowadays about a “US-Russian” division of labor in Iraq. An Iraqi commentator, Hesham Al Hashemi, said that this division of labor is almost “an open secret”. “The US does not see it proper to coordinate with PMF so long as they are not part of the government security forces. Therefore, the Americans chose the front of Ramadi and they left Biji to the Russians and the PMF”. That implies that the PMF units will not participate in the battle of Ramadi.
The PMF, a sectarian force with some thin Sunni masks, witnessed a growing hostility among its ranks toward the US. When US forces refused sectarian atrocities committed against Sunnis in prior battles, PMF commanders accused the US of taking sides. When the US insisted that this ragtag army of zealots raising blunt sectarian banners be excluded from the battles in Anbar, the PMF accused the Americans of supporting ISIL. But the PMF found in the Russian involvement a much needed political breathing space. As this involvement was coordinated with Tehran, and as the Russians do not care much about sectarian sensitivities in Iraq or even the future of Anbar so far as it is squarely put under the control of Shia forces and Baghdad’s government, so they were declared the friends who would be forgiven for any mistakes. No Russian airstrikes were conducted in Biji. Yet, the advance of the PMF there is attributed squarely to Mr. Putin. Substantial air raids were conducted against ISIL by US air force. Yet, the Americans are openly accused of helping the terrorist group. This ridiculous characterization of the US role by pro-Iran Shia forces in Iraq is balanced by ridiculous characterization of the Russian role by some Sunni politicians. One of those politicians told us that Russia is in Iraq to “abort the US fight against ISIL”. “You must understand! ISIL is a gift from up there to the Iranians. They want it to grow. It gives them the opportunity to mobilize the Shias around sectarian views and splits Iraq. When Tehran felt that the Americans are serious to fight ISIL in Anbar, they asked the Russians to come to slow that”. The US made its dismay public after the announcement of the new Security Quartet in Iraq. The speculation in Baghdad now points inaccurately to a nearing decision to allow the Russians to start their own air raids against ISIL. It is merely a part of the ongoing psychological political war in Baghdad.
The situation in Iraq is clear however. Russia provided the pro-Iran Shia forces with tremendous psychological boost. The down side of this dynamic will appear at a later point when Russia shows inability to wage any sustainable campaign when PMF comes under extreme pressure in any of the future battles.
Abadi told General Dunford that Iraq did not invite the Russians to wage an air campaign in Iraq. But the Prime Minister is not the only decider in Baghdad. In certain issues, he may even be the last. The Russians may find themselves under pressure to increase their involvement. The Shia forces may indeed confront dire situations in the battle fields. And things may change. Meanwhile, the Russian role, actual or imaginary, is a good card to try pressure the US as well. But the US can tell Abadi “Good luck. We will focus on arming the Kurds to fight ISIL and see how far the Russians can go in Iraq if they add it to Syria in their operational board. The truth is that the Russians are doing very little in Iraq today. Their activities there is mainly linked to Syria. The psychological impact of their presence there is just that-psychological. That is not to underestimate it, but it is to say that it will be short-lived. It will only be important in as much as it encourages pro-Iran Shia forces, in their current euphoria, to make more stupid mistakes.

Washington Tells Moscow: Deconfliction But No Deeper Cooperation
Middle East Briefing/October 24/14
http://mebriefing.com/?p=1992&utm_source=MEB+VOL+-+III_+Issue+100+October+2015&utm_campaign=VOL+III+-+Issue+100&utm_medium=email
The United States and Russia have reached a deconfliction agreement, which aims to avoid any possibility of an incident in the skies over Syria. But at the same time, the Obama Administration has made clear that they will not, at this time, go any further in cooperation with Russia in Syria. The decision by the US Administration, which could be altered if Russian behavior changes, was made on the basis of a detailed analysis of Russia’s actual military moves, and the fact that they have persistently misrepresented their actions in Syria in conversations with American diplomats and military officers. Russia has opened three or four new fronts in the Aleppo area, involving a streamlined command and control structure, involving the Syrian Army, Hezbollah, reinforcements from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, and some Shia militias from Iraq and Lebanon. The Pentagon concluded this week that the military operations were pre-planned well in advance and the Russians misled the US.In the short-term and medium-term, the Pentagon informed the National Security Council, the Syrian government forces, with the aid of Russia, Iran and the Hezbollah, will make territorial gains. But they will be hard-pressed to hold those territories and will sustain significant casualties. In short, the Pentagon and the US Intelligence Community (USIC) have concluded that Russia is heading for a quagmire. While the near-term advantage will favor the Syrian Army, it will come at a high price. The United States and the Saudis will increase the flow of weapons and ammunition to the non-Islamic State rebel forces, and this will increase the attrition of the Syrian-Russian forces, at the same time that they will be battling against ISIL.
Another element in the newest Pentagon battle assessment is the evidence that Russia is building a second permanent air base in the north of the country. Both the United States Government and NATO officials have warned the Russians that they see this as a serious problem. Between a permanent Russian air base in the north of Syria and the expanded Russian naval presence in Crimea, Turkey, a key NATO country, will be facing a two-front challenge from Russia. If the Russians go ahead with this plan, it will deepen the conflict and assure that the NATO-Russian relations will be frictional for a longer time.
While Russia has demonstrated its new generation of guided missiles, including those fired from ships from their Caspian Sea fleet, the majority of the Russian bombing sorties have been conducted with “dumb bombs. The Russians are, in the Pentagon and USIC analysis, willing to increase civilian casualties in a cost savings move, limiting the use of more precision, but far more costly weapons systems. If the Russians are poised to conduct a two-front buildup against NATO, targeting Turkey and also maintaining pressure on Ukraine, while the West is engaged in a prolonged war against jihadists, this will ultimately prove to be a very bad miscalculation on the part of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Another element of the assessment presented to the White House is that the Russian primary goal at this time is to save President Bashar Assad. This, in turn, will reinforce the view that Russia is backing the Shi’ite Crescent that Jordan’s King Abdullah II warned about several years ago. Ultimately, if Russia pursues this course, they will become the number one enemy of the Islamic State, virtually assuring that ISIL will open an internal front against Moscow in the Caucasus and Central Asia. The Pentagon also reported to the NSC that if Russia emerges as a key partner in the Iranian-Iraqi-Syrian-Lebanese Shia Crescent scheme, this will catalyze alliances among rival jihadist groups that would have been unthinkable just weeks ago. Another feature of the recommendations recently passed along to the NSC was that the US should encourage the Iraqi Army to carry out increased operations against ISIL targets. There are, according to the latest Pentagon estimates, several Iraqi divisions that are sufficiently combat ready to launch operations, in partnership with US air support and with strong US input into the planning and execution. In the final phase of the deconfliction negotiations between the Pentagon and the Russian Ministry of Defense, President Putin directly weighed in and ordered the Russian negotiators to make concessions to complete the deal. Key US demands were accepted, and the Russians made clear that they were interested in deeper talks about cooperation against the Islamic State.
Secretary of State John Kerry, who remains the principal US interlocutor with Russia, through Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, had blunt conversations over the weekend with the Russians, making clear that the US understands the Russian game, and believes they are making some serious miscalculations. Kerry made clear that, whatever administration follows Obama, it will take a much harder line against Moscow. Therefore, there is a one year window of opportunity to solve the Syria crisis, through a diplomatic process that includes all of the relevant armed opposition groups. The US is betting that, at some point in the coming months, the Russians will realize that they are slipping into a quagmire and will revive their entire approach. The key to the entire US revised assessment and strategy is that no side is capable of absolute victory. President Obama, in the view of the Pentagon and the USIC, has done a poor job of articulating this assessment, but the “no win” evaluation is why the Administration has rejected American “boots on the ground.” It is also why the current assessment is that Russia will sooner or later reach the same conclusion and change their game plan.

Jew hating and Jew denial: Israel fighting Palestinian terror and the Western media
Barry Shaw/Canada Free Press/October 24/15
The old argument used to be that Palestinians were fighting and demonstrating to achieve a state of their own, and that it was Israeli obstinacy that was fermenting Arab violence against Jews. On top of that, a misinterpreted by much of the media positioned Palestinian rage being caused by excessive Israeli military attacks against defenseless Palestinians. This was also known as “disproportionate force.”Why wouldn’t a put-upon population rise up in anger when they are so “oppressed” and “occupied,” so they say. When I put pen to paper to expose the Jew hatred at the core of the Palestinian cause in my book “Fighting Hamas, BDS and Anti-Semitism” I did so to expose the facts and anecdotal evidence that this perception was dangerously flawed and the real burning rage behind a violence that has been going on for a hundred years was primeval anti-Semitism. Though many were in denial, preferring to reference Israeli policies not in line with conventional left-wing Western thinking, the overwhelming weight of in excess of three hundred pages of undeniable incidents, together with the eruption of anti-Jewish tirades during the numerous pro-Palestinian demonstrations and such expressions by some European politicians during and after the 2014 Gaza conflict, made the thrust of my book resoundingly relevant.
If further evidence of what lies at the heart of Palestinian thinking and planning was needed the outpouring if Palestinian anti-Jewish rhetoric, incitement, and the deliberate hunting and targeting of Jews for knife, gun and rock wielding Palestinian attacks should leave nobody in any further doubt about what is at play here. Despite the stark reality that the Palestinian cause was never about creating a new and peaceful state that would instantly solve all the problems of the Middle East but rather about killing Jews and destroying the “abomination” of a Jewish state,” a tiny island of progress in the midst of a radical and bloodthirsty Islamic region, many leading politicians and a media in denial still hold to the mistaken notion that only by granting a volatile Palestine statehood will the area calm down. If there has been any recent abomination it has been with the government of South Africa officially welcome Hamas leader, Khaled Maashal, on the same day that this internationally designated terrorist organization announced it would initiate renewed suicide bombings against Israelis.
Following the declaration from Palestinian Authority head, Mahmoud Abbas, that “every drop of blood spilled in Jerusalem is pure blood as long as it’s for the sake of Allah” and that this blood must be spilled because the Jews were desecrating the Islamic holy places “with their filthy feet,” a lie so preposterously dangerous, hordes of knife and rock wielding Arabs went in search of Jewish victims. All the attacks were executed by Palestinian Arabs and all of the victims were Israeli Jews Israelis, tense with the expectations of knifing attacks on the streets of their towns, were subjected to world headlines defining them as the perpetrators and Palestinians as the innocent victims. The Reuters bureau chief, Luke Baker, falsely tweeted that undercover Israeli police threw stones at Israeli security forces and incited Palestinian youth to do the same. This was repeated by AFP and EuroNews.
You will find most media headlines leave the identity of the assailant anonymous as in “Jerusalem bus and car attacks leaves dead and wounded,” or “Jerusalem attack kills three,” or The Independent’s headline that reads as if Israelis were doing the attacking when, in fact, they were the victims of Palestinian Arabs attacks, “Israel attacks” Guns, cars and knives are the new weapon of war in Jerusalem.”You would never know that all the attacks were executed by Palestinian Arabs and all of the victims were Israeli Jews. So incensed was Lord Michael Grade, former chairman of the BBC Trust, that he wrote a letter of complaint slamming the BBC correspondent, Orla Guerin, for her misreporting of the ongoing violence carried out by Palestinians against Israelis. He was upset by her “equivalence between Israeli victims of terrorism and Palestinians who have been killed by Israeli security forces in the act of carrying out terror attacks.” His letter follows an appalling BBC headline which described a Palestinian youth who carried out an assault that killed two Jewish men, seriously injured a woman and wounded her two year old son thus, “Palestinian shot dead after Jerusalem attack claims two.”
The twist of this headline leads the BBC audience in to falsely believing that the Palestinian was the innocent victim of a Jerusalem attack by known assailants. Nowhere in this headline would an audience know that Jews had been murdered in a vicious attack. Much of the Western media choke on identifying the victims of Palestinian violence as Israeli Jews. So egregiously frequent have these incident of untruthful reporting been that a frustrated Prime Minister Netanyahu asked BBC’s Lyse Doucet at a Jerusalem press conference, “Are we living on the same planet?”When much of the Western media choke on identifying the victims of Palestinian violence as Israeli Jews you know there is a serious breach of trust at play that must be addressed. Sadly, these headlines are commonplace as editorial discretion repeatedly tilts a bias that fails to allow the truth and honest reporting to shine through.One of the truths is that there is a deliberate Palestinian policy to incite their followers to attack Israeli Jews and deny them any rights, not to sovereignty, not to heritage in Jerusalem, not even to life.es Israel today will surely visit you tomorrow.
**Barry Shaw is the author of ‘Fighting Hamas, BDS and Anti-Semitism.’
**Barry is the author of ISRAEL - RECLAIMING THE NARRATIVE which is available at Israelnarrative.com or at Amazon Kindle.
Barry can be reached at: theviewfromisrael@gmail.com

Who's Oppressing Palestinian Christians? Georgetown Lecture Blames Israel
Cinnamon Stillwell/Jihad Watch/ Middle East Forum/October 24/15
Naim Ateek, trying to rally Palestinians at an Israeli security checkpoint between Jerusalem and Bethlehem
Amid widespread and ongoing Islamist attacks against Christians in the Middle East, Rev. Dr. Naim Ateek, co-founder of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center, informed an audience at Georgetown University that "the government of Israel" and Israeli "settlers" pose the greatest threat to Palestinian Christians. A Palestinian Anglican priest now living in the U.S, Ateek's claims are typical of Sabeel, an organization that advocates "resistance to the Israeli occupation" by blaming the plight of Palestinian Christians on Jews rather than Islamic supremacism in Palestinian society. The recent lecture sponsored by Georgetown's Saudi-funded Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU) was titled "Christians in the Holy Land" and included Jonathan Kuttab, co-founder of the Mandela Institute for Palestinian Prisoners.
Ateek claims that the American media is hiding "what's really happening" from the public.
About fifteen students, faculty members, and activists, including School of Foreign Service Professor Yvonne Haddad and Kathy Aquilina, program director of the non-profit organization Initiatives of Change, attended the discussion. In keeping with ACMCU events, Ateek and Kuttab were in agreement on almost all of the issues and no alternate point of view was represented. Despite strong evidence of media bias against Israel, particularly in coverage of the current crisis, Ateek claimed that the American media is hiding "what's really happening" from the public. The news is terrible when you're looking at what the settlers are doing, what the government of Israel is doing. . . . It's very extreme. I think people need to know and the news does not reflect the reality of the situation back at home. . . . If they [Americans] would see what's happening there, I think they would begin to change but they are not able to see.
Pointing to Israel's demographics, Kuttab, a human rights attorney, argued that the government is not pluralistic: Israel thinks if they become less than 51 percent they would be totally squashed, and as long as they have the 51 percent majority, they can squash the non-Jews. The problem is with the basic premise that Israel is and was intended to be a Jewish state for Jews rather than a state for Jews and Arabs who happen to be indigenous. To the contrary, Israel's Knesset, or parliament, currently has thirteen Arab members, while the country is one of the few in the region where Arabs, including women, have the right to vote. Moreover, according to the U.S. State Department's International Religious Freedom Report for 2014, Israel's Supreme Court has "repeatedly held that the Basic Law on Human Dignity and Liberty protects freedom to practice religious beliefs."
Yet, to hear Ateek tell it:
Almost at every level of life, almost every level of life, the situation is getting bad. If we're looking at Israel, not the occupied Palestine, Israel itself, the question of the Christian schools – they are having a hard time now. Israel is cutting off the funding which the government gives to the private schools.
In fact, Israel recently began funding private Christian schools following a month-long strike. Public schools, regardless of religious affiliation, have always received full government funding.
Ateek then used one incident to paint a picture of widespread anti-Christian persecution:
They see some of these right-wing settlers or extremist Jews targeting Christians. For example, the church in Tiberias near the Sea of Galilee is burned because it is a Christian Church and Israel has not done much about it. They're now trying to pay for it, but in the beginning they said they were not going to pay for it, so things are worse than what people think. Israeli authorities indicted two Jewish suspects in connection with the June, 2015 arson attack on the Church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fishes in Tabgha, while Israel's Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein overruled the tax authority's denial of payment of damages. In addition to the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee donating funds to help rebuild the church, thousands of people attended a June 21 solidarity rally and church officials have reported an upsurge in support from Israelis of all faiths.
Undeterred by the facts, Ateek continued:
You're really dealing with people who are very extremist Jews who do not want to see Christians – that's it's a Jewish country and it's only for Jews. It's against democracy, which means everyone has a place, and I think that's becoming less and less back home.
From such statements, one would never know that "extremist Jews" make up a tiny portion of the population and that their acts have been condemned by both Israeli authorities and American Jewish groups. This is in marked contrast to the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, both of whom employ genocidal language, incite violence against Jews as a matter of course, and have never apologized for doing so.
Attempting to portray Christians and Muslims as victims of Jewish aggression, Ateek concluded, "They don't differentiate between a Christian and a Muslim. We are in the same boat together in this."Kuttab told the audience too much time and energy has been wasted trying to figure out if a one- or two-state solution would end the Arab-Israeli conflict: I personally have decided several years ago not to even engage in that debate. What we can address are specific issues. We can talk about human rights, we can talk about equality, we can talk about violence and non-violence, we can talk about sending less rather than more weapons to either party. Yet a one-state solution would guarantee the end of Israel as a Jewish state—a draconian outcome unacceptable to most Israelis and unaddressed by the panel. Jonathan Kuttab has given up on the two-state solution.
Ateek argued that Israel does not want peace, claiming it is comfortable controlling the Palestinian people. He maintained that the U.S. has "never" been able to take a "neutral or objective" position toward the situation and therefore the conflict remains unresolved.
The panel's lack of balance allowed such statements to go unchallenged, as for example by pointing out that the Arab states have repeatedly waged war in the hopes of destroying Israel, that the Oslo Accords—turned down by then-PLO chairman Yasser Arafat—would have given the Palestinians virtually everything they requested, and that Hamas, which the U.S. has designated a terrorist organization, launches frequent attacks against Israeli civilians. In presenting only one side of the conflict, ACMCU failed in its obligation to offer scholarly, rigorous, and balanced commentary on a complex and ongoing problem. Its bias reflects that of Middle East studies on the whole: a discipline in dire need of reform with less concern for genuine debate than with ensuring the domination of anti-Israel, anti-American views. Prince Alwaleed is getting precisely what he paid for.
**Cinnamon Stillwell is the West Coast Representative for Campus Watch, a project of the Middle East Forum.

Is America’s moment in the Middle East at an end?
Hisham Melhem/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
I ended last week’s article by saying that history may judge that President Obama, through his dithering and passivity, and his failure to deliver on his threats and his constant harping on the limits of American power, ‘has presided over the termination of America’s long and unique moment in the Middle East.’
The cover of the new issue of Foreign Affairs journal proclaims ‘The Post-American Middle East’, without a question mark. The editors and contributors were more charitable towards the President than my recent essays, and in fact the lead article spoke of the need for a ‘mature withdrawal’ from the Middle East, while advising the President on how to conduct a ‘constructive pullback’ from the region. There were more nuanced assessments of how the United States should pursue counterterrorism in a changing Middle East and how to keep the military sword dangling over Iran to ensure its implementation of the nuclear deal. There was also the ‘realist’ approach to ISIS, which bemoaned the use of military force, and proclaiming that containment of ISIS is more likely to succeed, especially if the United States is not in the lead. Political realism, in this context means that ‘it would be far better for U.S. policymakers to treat the group as a minor problem that deserves only modest attention’.
Ambivalence
The President’s supporters claim that the push for ‘retrenchment’ from the Middle East reflects the mood of most Americans, who are exhausted by the burden of unending wars, the protracted civil conflicts and atavistic sectarian strife they can never fathom. President Obama, by temperament and political philosophy – the belief that almost all conflicts can be mediated diplomatically, the skepticism of the utility of military force (except the safe use of drones), and the implicit conviction that America’s days of doing great deeds alone are behind her- put him too at that intersection. For almost seven years President Obama has been reinforcing this mood. The parochialism and small-mindedness of the Republicans and their ideological rigidity and refusal to cooperate with Obama on foreign policy challenges - such as their unwillingness to authorize the air campaign against ISIS - have given the president another reason not to be decisive.
President Obama does not like to fly solo missions in foreign forays. He likes ‘partners’ as co-pilots and wingmen to protect his flank. The disengagement refrain goes like this; we have been fighting in Afghanistan for 14 years and we have yet to get a well-trained national Afghan force. The Taliban briefly occupied the city of Kunduz, al Qaeda is resurgent and ISIS is establishing itself in the country. And to add insult to injury, diplomats in the American embassy in Kabul are forced to use helicopters to and from the airport. And by the way, poppy production has decreased this year, but only because of natural causes and not because of our efforts. Iraq? We cannot leave Iraq, but we cannot stay there either. The political class in Baghdad is beyond redemption, and challenging Iran is impossible, because Iran has geography, history and Shiism on its side, and we have none of that. Libya? We got ourselves involved militarily, but we ignored the politics. Syria? Well, we always discuss Syria and reach the same conclusion, that there are no attractive options short of costly military intervention.
Indifference
The recent Benghazi hearing spectacle, in which former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was subjected to another tough inquisition by the Republicans in the House of Representatives about her role as Secretary of State in the tragic killing of four Americans in Benghazi three years ago, is a case in point. For eleven hours the aggressive questioning was partisan in the extreme and focused almost exclusively on damaging Clinton’s political viability as a candidate for the presidency, by trying to show that she had been derelict in her duty to provide enough security to the diplomatic mission in Benghazi.
However, Libya was invisible. No one bothered to ask even the pro forma questions about what’s going on in Libya today? Or what can we do to help reconciliation? It is as if the United States had no role whatsoever in the unraveling of the country. No one is interested in the inheritance of Libya. Three years ago Obama infamously led from behind, and as soon as Muammar Qaddafi was overthrown he said goodbye to Libya. To ease the burden of abandoning Libya that must have continued to haunt him, Obama engages periodically in contrition, admitting that ‘our coalition could have and should have done more to fill a vacuum left behind’.
And Nativism
The indifference and ambivalence expressed by many Americans towards the wars in Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen say a lot about the failure of President Obama and congressional leaders of both parties to adequately explain to the American people the threats of these conflicts not only on our friends and allies in the region and beyond, but also potentially on the American homeland.
This failure is especially disturbing now, given the rise of a new vein of nativism and xenophobia represented by the leading Republican candidate for the Presidency, Donald Trump and made doubly venomous by social media. Nativism, which is the cousin of chauvinism, is manifesting itself in the rise of flagrant anti-immigrant sentiments expressed not only by Trump, but also by some of the other Republican contenders. Trump’s trumped up claims that 200 thousand young strong Syrian men are on their way to America as refugees is breathtaking. ‘This could be the greatest Trojan horse. This could make the Trojan horse look like peanuts if these people turned out to be a lot of ISIS.’ Ted Cruz, the other unhinged Republican candidate said that accepting roughly 10,000 Syrian refugees is ‘nothing short of crazy’, because Jihadists could come along with them to ‘to murder innocent Americans.’ Such is the political and electoral discourse in America circa 2015.
Going home
President Obama does not like to fly solo missions in foreign forays. He likes ‘partners’ as co-pilots and wingmen to protect his flank. He would like to empower regional powers, say in the Middle East and Europe to share the burden and take things into their own hands. The problem with this approach is that the regional powers have their own competing agendas and may lack the leadership pull, and get themselves in conflicts they know how to start but not how to end. By what he does and does not do, President Obama - who seems to have lost intellectual curiosity about the Middle East and any previous emotional attachment to it - is gradually packing in preparation of (mostly) going home. The Russians are coming back, militarily and diplomatically to Syria, Iraq and Egypt, in part because of the vacuum America is leaving behind. Russian President Putin has managed to make himself more indispensable for a resolution of the conflict in Syria than ever before, and he is consolidating his position in Iraq and Egypt. President Obama is resigning to cooperating with Putin in Syria, and Putin knows it.
Assad in Moscow
There are those in the U.S. administration, as well as in some Arab quarters who would like to see Assad’s (apparently solo) visit to Moscow to meet President Putin, leading eventually to a political outcome without Assad. Some of those briefed about the reports of the Moscow meeting were told that one of Putin’s talking points in the briefings he provided to some of the regional leaders – who briefed in turn the Americans- is that one of the objectives of the higher Russian profile in Syria is to check the unbearable Iranian heavy handedness and influence in the country. It is too early to say with any certainty if Putin meant what he said. Or he is trying to tell people what they would like to hear. But for the U.S. and some of its Arab and regional allies, it is in the long term interest of Russia to have a unitary Syrian state governed from Damascus by a secular Arab leader. This is different from Iran’s vision of a weak Syria dominated by competing groups all beholding to Tehran.
An offer they could refuse
President Obama was never serious about getting rid of Assad, and his calls on him to step down and not to cross the red line were meant as strong scolding not to be followed up with action if the Syrian President as many predicted was not in the mood to cooperate in his demise. According to informed sources, an Arab State offered to send a contingent of Special Forces to Syria to cooperate with U.S. forces and the Syrian opposition groups in hunting the helicopters bearing the barrel bombs that have been terrorizing the Syrian people. . The ruler behind the offer was shocked when told that there are no current plans that could accommodate his offer.
From Bosnia to Syria
There are many reasons for the failure of the U.S. in Afghanistan and Libya. They include Hubris, losing interest, and precipitous withdrawals. The U.S. left Afghanistan to the tender mercies of the thuggish warlords that were her allies during the struggle against Soviet occupation. There were no political follow up or economic investment. Shortly after the overthrow of the Taliban, the U.S. began to lose interest in Afghanistan and began the preparation for the invasion of Iraq, a decision that doomed America’s missions in both countries. Failure in Libya was not inevitable. We barely showed up before we bid them goodbye. In the 1990’s Muslim Bosnians and Kosovars were killed by Serb militias, sometime en mass because of their ethnic and religious background. It is crucial to remember that these were the first such killings on European soil since the Nazi Holocaust. To their eternal shame powerful European countries refused to intervene to stop the killing. It is as if the war on European Jewry did not occur only few decades earlier. In America many were outraged and demanded action; secularist liberals, Jewish, Christian and Muslim groups lobbied for an American intervention. Finally, former President Bill Clinton reluctantly had to act militarily. Moral outrage is what compelled the President of the United State to intervene militarily in a European war to stop the killing of civilians. What makes that intervention unique is that the U.S. had no discernable economic or strategic interests whatsoever in Bosnia and Kosovo.
It is estimated that In the course of the three year Bosnian War approximately 100,000 people were killed. By contrast, in Syria more than 250,000, the majority of them civilians, have been murdered. In Syria the primary killing machine belongs to a state. And yet we don’t see a similar and compelling moral outrage in America regarding the Syrian victims, similar to the outrage caused by the Bosnian massacres. It is infinitely painful to note that at the time the United States is slowly but surely disengaging from the Middle East, Syrians are still being killed en mass, and we are still asking where is the outrage?

Russia’s intervention in Syria: Is it all bad?
Abdullah Hamidaddin/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
Russia’s intervention in Syria is a game-changer in a volatile region. This alone is cause for great concern. What makes it worse is that it is an intervention to sustain a regime that has committed countless atrocities against the Syrian people. Saudi Arabia has been vocal in its opposition to the intervention, and government sources have said it will continue to support the Syrian rebels. But with its drawbacks, I believe there are some positive outcomes from Russia’s intervention, which we will see soon. First, the whole security architecture of the region has changed. While the U.S. role is diminishing, it is endorsing Iran as a regional player. The result is both an imbalance of power and a power vacuum.Second, the Saudis are aware of the impact of this, and have been actively developing their old alliances with great powers such as France and Britain. The recent arms deal with France should be seen in that light. However, the Saudis are also working on building new ties with Russia. The United States will be the main ally for the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) for the foreseeable future, but Washington now requires them to do more to protect themselves. In light of those two points, Russia’s intervention can have some benefit. The GCC cannot fill the power vacuum left by the United States, at least not in the medium term. Having a great power such as Russia in the region can help with that.This is conditioned on the GCC - particularly Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates - having stronger relations with it. If Russian-GCC interests are interlinked, one can hope that Russia will play a role in checking Iran’s expansionist ambitions.
We should continue to reject Assad, but also hope the Russian presence succeeds in bringing Syria peace.Already we have seen the impact of this on some of the smaller GCC countries. Qatar is moving closer toward Iran in its bid to enhance its security. With the U.S. role diminishing, Qatar had two options: fully bandwagon with the GCC and especially Saudi Arabia, or have a larger regional power as its ally. It opted – as expected - for the second, signing a security agreement with Iran. The Qatari move is of more concern for the GCC than Russia’s intervention in Syria.
Peace prospects
The intervention can expedite the Syrian peace process. The warring parties all agree that there is no military solution to the conflict, but the stalemate had encouraged the Syrian opposition to insist on a full victory. Russia’s intervention has made clear that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad will not fall. Letting go of that hope could be a recipe for peace. Most importantly, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and other terrorist groups have been growing relatively unchecked. There was hope that their growth would push Assad to breaking point. Now that his defeat is off the table, we may see a more serious campaign to purge Syria from such barbarous groups. The GCC, while not happy with Russia’s intervention, needs it to succeed. Failure will mean the mushrooming of ISIS, and the first targets will be us. We should continue to reject Assad, but also hope the Russian presence succeeds in bringing Syria peace. Moreover, we should cooperate with Moscow in its fight against terrorism because we are most at stake. Most importantly we must ensure that Russia plays a balancing role in the region, rather than supporting one power – namely Iran – at the expense of others.

The Middle East facing the unknown
Eyad Abu Shakra/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
There is no agreement yet among those following the Syrian situation as regards what Washington thinks of Russia’s direct involvement in combat. Most comments and analyses seem closer to smart guesswork than reliable information. Three different opinions on Washington’s Russia policy. Some analysts see nothing new in Washington’s virtual silent consent, pointing to its policy towards Syria for more than four years. These include those who suggest that this silence may be partly attributed to some sort of tacit agreement that gives Russia a free hand in Syria in return for Moscow’s acceptance of a Washington-run Iraq. Others give the Obama administration the benefit of the doubt; believing that Washington is actually pulling Russia into a terrible quagmire which would damage its standing, while relieving itself of its traditional enemy. A third group of analysts reckon that in order that Iran’s strident regional ambitions are checked, and the fears of what remains of Middle Eastern Christians and sectarian and ethnic minorities are put to rest, Washington would be happy to commission Moscow to secure Bashar al-Assad an honorable exit while keeping in place the infrastructure of the Syrian state.
All these guesses deserve to be taken seriously, and why not? At least, they make sense, although they are unethical and have got nothing to do with human rights and the right of self-determination.
What are Russia and Iran really doing in Syria? However, what worries many as far as the Russian airstrikes are concerned – and contrary to Moscow’s announcements – is that they are not targeting the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), but rather 9 out 10 strikes are targeting the areas controlled by moderate opposition groups, which are supposed to be the international community’s future partners in the expected Syrian political settlement. What Russia’s warplanes are doing so far, in addition to aiding and providing air cover to the regime’s land assault, has been to weaken and defeat the acceptable alternative not ISIS, which is exactly what Assad and Iran want. This reality proves false all Russia’s claims about its intentions in Syria; the last of such claims were made by the Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, who, while denying “helping Assad,” said that he still recognized him as Syria’s “legitimate president.”
In the absence of honest dealing, the Middle East is indeed moving towards the unknown. On the other hand, Russia is not the only active combatant in Syria. There is also Iran, which is rumored to be preparing a massive land offensive aimed at enabling the weak regime to retake the districts of northwestern Syria, lost to the opposition in the provinces of Homs, Hama, Idlib and Aleppo. Interesting to note here, in fact, was how Russian air strikes – particularly in Aleppo province – were taking place against opposition areas at the same time these same areas were coming under recurrent attacks by none other than ISIS! Furthermore, Russian heavy bombardment of Al-Ghab Plains (south of Idlib province and northwest of Hama province), Jabal Al-Akrad (in northeast Lattakia province) has nothing to do with fighting ISIS, but rather protecting the eastern borders of Lattakia province, Assad’s stronghold. The same applies to the southern fronts, where Moscow and Tehran are doing their utmost to defend the regime’s headquarters and security facilities in the capital, Damascus, and its environs.
Evidently, no one would like to see a political and security vacuum in Syria similar to that of the post-Saddam Iraq, leading to endless disasters; and sure enough, even the real opposition – not the regime’s fabricated opposition of Qadri Jameel and Ali Haydar – has a vested interest in maintaining a bare minimum of the state’s institutions, reassuring minorities and preventing extremist forces from becoming part of the new decision-making future authority. But it is also true that the international community is neither talking to the Syrians in one voice, nor seriously subduing the regime’s killing machine and confronting Iran’s blatantly sectarian and militaristic regional project.
Iran is now behaving in both Syria and Lebanon exactly as it has been behaving in Iraq, where it is now a de facto mandatory power and sponsor of an armed demographic and sectarian subjugation intended not only to be perpetuated, but also politically and constitutionally legitimized. It is now exploiting the nuclear deal reached with the US and the West, the lifting of international sanctions, and Turkey’s preoccupation with its parliamentary elections and Kurdish Problem, to cement its aforementioned mandate.
Middle Eastern geopolitics is changing
This highly unclear picture carries with it grave dangers throughout the Middle East; and as the Obama administration enters its last 12 months in office, one may claim that the Middle East Barack Obama first knew, as president, seven years ago has become a totally different place. And as it would be foolish to expect any changes in Washington’s policies during the next few months, what were – for a long time – regarded as “unshakeable constants” in regional politics are diminishing by the day. In all honesty, the roles of Egypt and Turkey may change; and some regional groupings may in the near future lose their cohesion due to diverging outlooks and differing short-term interests. As for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it is now gradually moving away from the safety of mutual deterrence. It is now impossible to guarantee anything there, as people are being stabbed and shot in the streets, against the background of horrendous collusion by a Benjamin Netanyahu government hell-bent on collective punishment and provocative shoot-to-kill executions. In the absence of honest dealing, the Middle East is indeed moving towards the unknown. Thus, if Washington does not revise, and fast, its assessment of the regional situation in the aftermath of the Iran-Russia deal under the pretext of “fighting terrorism” through the so-called “Baghdad information center”, the repercussions will be catastrophic.

Young Arabs need skills, not just university degrees
Yara al-Wazir/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
Young university graduates in the Middle East are up to three times more likely to be unemployed than their uneducated counterparts, a recent report by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) has revealed. In simple terms it sounds as though Arabs are too good for the jobs on offer in the region - they are simply over-skilled. Yet the issue of employment, or lack thereof, of young people in the Middle East and North Africa is deeper.The Middle East and North African region is notorious for its high level of youth unemployment. With young people making up over 40% of the population, the unemployment rate sits at a whopping 28.2% for the Middle East, and 30.5% for North Africa –well above the global average. What is perhaps more worrying is that the ILO does not predict the numbers will improve. The forecast for female unemployment is to remain relatively stable for the Middle East, and increase in North Africa.
The forecast shows that the graduate job market is going to remain difficult to break into. This is largely because university enrolment is growing faster than demand for graduates in the workplace. Young Arabs need to look at the needs of the market and act accordingly, rather than expect the market to react to their needs. The Middle East is still developing – it doesn’t need millions of engineering graduates, because relative to the population in the region, there are too few manufacturing businesses. The Gulf boom in the early 2000’s saw skyscrapers growing at an unsustainable rate. Although these towers may have inspired young people to go to university, they did not promise them jobs.
In order to break into the workforce, young Arabs need to look at the needs of the market and act accordingly, rather than expect the market to react to their needs, expectations, and idealistic lifestyle wishes. In the Middle East, there is a stigma around low-skilled jobs. The ILO figures show us that there is a need now more than ever to get over this stigma. People get jobs because they have the right skills, not simply because they have a degree. If it’s a question of university followed by unemployment, or the equivalent time spent ‘skilling up’ but then getting hired, the answer is simple. Skills need to be developed from a young age – these include going out of your comfort zone, becoming more adaptable to change, and building experiences. Often, young graduates find themselves in a ‘catch-22’– they can’t get a job until they have the experience, and they can’t gain experience because no company is offering them a job. Therefore development and work experience must begin early – starting in your 20s is too late. In an increasingly competitive workplace, you can’t afford to be left behind.

Iran’s corruption and human rights overlooked
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Al Arabiya/October 24/15
While Iran’s nuclear deal continues to hold the spotlight, two other critical issues demand much more attention than they are receiving. Despite President Hassan Rowhani’s pledges to the contrary, corruption and human rights continue to pose a huge challenge. According to Transparency International, Iran ranks 136 out of 175 countries. The scale of corruption has not changed significantly when comparing Rowhani’s presidency with that of his predecessor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. A considerable part of the economy and financial systems are owned and controlled by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the office of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Since they enjoy the final say in decision-making, Rowhani and his cabinet do not have the power to tackle corruption. Corruption in Iran is ingrained in the political and financial institutions that are the country’s backbone. However, often figures across the political spectrum, including members of the president’s office, engage in corruption for their political and financial benefit. Corruption in Iran is ingrained in the political and financial institutions that are the country’s backbone. Embezzlement and money-laundering within the banking system are prime examples of corruption. In addition, corruption takes place by granting loans, financial benefits and fellowships to relatives of senior officials or those who show their loyalty.
Facade
From time to time, the judiciary might bring a political or business figure to court on charges of corruption. Most recently, billionaire Babak Zanjani has been put on trial, accused of embezzling $2.7 billion from the government-owned petroleum company. The rare occasions when cases are brought to court are not part of a concerted effort to fight corruption. Instead, they appear to be a facade put on to alleviate people’s frustration over the economic difficulties they face, which are exacerbated by corruption. Normally such cases are closed, or the sentences are kept secret after months of trial with no legal explanation. These cases can also be due to political disagreement between factions of the system and the defendant, thereby used as a tool to warn or punish. If the government really wanted to fight corruption, the first step would be to properly enforce article 142 of the constitution, which states: “The assets of the Leader, the President, the deputies to the President, and ministers, as well as those of their spouses and offspring, are to be examined before and after their term of office by the head of the judicial power, in order to ensure they have not increased in a fashion contrary to law.” The government claims to be working to improve Iran’s human rights records, but many have observed that Rowhani’s promises have not even begun to be fulfilled.
Human rights
The government claims to be working to improve Iran’s human rights records, but many have observed that Rowhani’s promises have not even begun to be fulfilled. His office appears to have chosen not to challenge the three major institutions that set the boundaries for human rights, civil liberties and social justice: the IRGC, Iran’s intelligence (Etela’at) and the judiciary. The judiciary recently executed a juvenile convicted for the death of her husband. According to a recent release by the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Iran, Ahmed Shaheed: “These executions are disturbing examples of surging execution rates and questionable fair trial standards.” Iran “must comply with its international law obligations and put an end to the execution of juvenile offenders once and for all.”

What the return of the Arab strongman means for the Middle East
By MOHAMAD BAZZI, REUTERS /10/24/2015
On Oct. 18, Egypt began the first phase of parliamentary elections, but many voters shunned the balloting and turnout is estimated at a measly 15 percent. Most Egyptians seem to have decided that the election results are a foregone conclusion, with a new parliament that will kowtow to President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s iron-fisted regime in the absence of any meaningful opposition.
When Sisi and the Egyptian military ousted the country’s first democratically elected president two years ago, they promised a quick return to democracy and civilian rule. But like much else in Egypt’s modern history, those promises did not materialize. Instead, Sisi has turned into a strongman. And like the strongmen of an earlier generation in the Middle East, Sisi has dangled the promise of reform while finding new ways to consolidate his power.
With most opposition banned or imprisoned, the new legislature will be stacked with Sisi loyalists after the second round of voting ends in late November. The elections underscore how fully Sisi has transitioned into the role of strongman, and how far the Middle East has moved from the early promise of the 2011 Arab uprisings, which toppled then-Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and other dictators. Sisi is the latest in a line of military strongmen to rule Egypt, since the charismatic Gamal Adel Nasser overthrew the British-backed monarchy in 1952.
Egypt spiraled into a cycle of state-sanctioned violence, repression and vengeance soon after the military removed Mohamed Morsi, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood and Egypt’s first democratically elected president, from power in July 2013. The new military-backed government launched an aggressive campaign to suppress all political opponents, hunt down leaders of the Brotherhood who fled after the coup, and undo many of the gains made during the 2011 revolution. Human rights groups estimate that the Egyptian regime is holding more than 40,000 political prisoners, many of them supporters of the Brotherhood.
Egypt has avoided the large scale post-revolutionary bloodshed in Syria, Libya and Yemen. But after Morsi’s ouster, Islamic militants intensified an insurgency centered in the North Sinai, killing hundreds of Egyptian soldiers and policemen. Many of the militants later declared their allegiance to the Islamic State and its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
Sisi, who was Morsi’s defense minister and the coup’s main instigator, was elected president in May 2014 with nearly 97 percent of the vote - he faced a single, obscure opponent. Since then, Sisi has restored many elements of military rule, returned officials from Mubarak’s former regime to power and issued laws by fiat since Egypt has not had a parliament for three years. (In June 2012, an Egyptian court dissolved the new parliament, which had been elected in late 2011 and was dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood.)
For a short while, it seemed that the era of rule by strongmen in the Middle East was coming to an end. In October 2011, the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi was captured hiding in a drainage pipe near his hometown of Sirte, and he was beaten and shot dead by rebels, bringing his 42 years in power to an ignoble end. His contemporaries were the likes of Saddam Hussein and Hafez al-Assad, military men from poor families and hardscrabble towns who fought their way to the top, riding the wave of revolutionary sentiment that swept the Arab world in the 1960s and ’70s.
Their inspiration was Egypt’s Nasser and his Free Officers Movement, who pledged to rid the Arab world of the vestiges of colonial rule. Nasser’s rousing speeches, heard across the region via the newly invented transistor radio, kindled visions of Arab unity. It was a time of upheaval, in which the merchant and feudal elites - the allies of the old European colonial powers - were losing their grip. At first, Hussein, Gaddafi and Assad appeared to embody a promising new era of reform. But these leaders and others quickly suppressed any opposition, executed their critics and squandered national resources.
By 2011, one by one, the strongmen began to teeter and fall. A new generation of revolutionaries had fostered a revitalized sense of pan-Arab identity united around demands for broad political and social rights. As the protests that began in Tunisia at the end of 2010 spread to Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain and Syria, each uprising was inspired by the others. A vanguard of civilian leaders emerged from the revolts, and although they drew on some of the old Arab nationalist doctrine - anti-colonial rhetoric and resistance to Israel - they were well aware of the failures of the strongmen and their generation.
The protesters no longer accepted a social contract in which they effectively made peace with government repression, arbitrary laws, state-run media and censorship, and single-party rule, in exchange for security and stability. Instead, they demanded justice, freedom, and dignity. “The people should not fear their government,” read a popular placard in Cairo’s Tahrir Square during the 2011 revolution. “Governments should fear their people.”
In mid-June, an Egyptian court upheld the death penalty against Morsi, the first Muslim Brotherhood leader to assume the presidency of an Arab country. He was initially sentenced to death in May, along with more than 100 co-defendants, for taking part in an alleged prison break. It was the latest in a series of sham trials and mass death sentences decreed by the judiciary since the coup. The Brotherhood’s recent experience in Egypt shows that authoritarian and secular forces, which often fare poorly at the ballot box, will mobilize to undermine the Islamists before they have had a chance to rule fully.
When it deposed Morsi, the military insisted it was acting on the will of the Egyptian people, who had grown disenchanted with his clumsy rule and disastrous economic policies. But the army didn’t stop there: It arrested Morsi along with thousands of other Brotherhood leaders and activists, shut down media outlets sympathetic to the Islamists, and banned the movement from Egyptian political life entirely.
Then, in August 2013, the army and security forces opened fire on thousands of Morsi’s supporters who were engaged in a peaceful sit-in at Rabaa al-Adawiya square, killing at least 1,000 people. In a report one year later, Human Rights Watch called the massacre “one of the world’s largest killings of demonstrators in a single day in recent history.”
In the decades leading up to the Arab uprisings of 2011, Islamist parties across the region renounced violence and committed to participating in electoral politics. But now, Islamists view the Egyptian military’s coup and subsequent crackdown as a signal that election results will not be respected. The process can spiral out of control, as it did in Algeria in 1992, when the Islamic Salvation Front was on the verge of winning parliamentary elections, and the military intervened to cancel the second round of voting. That coup set off an eight-year war civil war that killed more than 100,000 people.
Many in the Arab world and the West have failed to grasp this danger: While authoritarian rule appears to provide stability over the short term, it breeds discontent and affirms the idea that violence is the only way to be heard. It also sets up a dichotomy favored by Sisi, Assad and the strongmen of an earlier generation, where Arabs are stuck between only two choices: authoritarian and nominally secular rule, or life under Islamist extremists like al-Qaida or the Islamic State.
Rulers who demonize all Islamists and other opponents as terrorists who must be suppressed nurture a self-fulfilling prophecy, allowing them to repeat the pattern of repression that leads to more radicalization. For the strongman to keep power, there can be no other choice.
**Mohamad Bazzi is a journalism professor at New York University and former Middle East bureau chief at Newsday. A former fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, he is writing a book on the proxy wars between Saudi Arabia and Iran. He tweets @BazziNY

Dennis Ross: Israel-US crisis will be resolved
Yitzhak Benhorin/Ynetnews/Published:10.24.15
The veteran diplomat, who has spent more hours with American and Israeli leaders than any other person, talks to Ynet about his new book, which offers an intimate look at US-Israel ties in the past few decades. While Obama and Netanyahu don’t trust each other, he says, the unique relationship between the two countries is 'doomed to succeed.'
WASHINGTON - Dennis Ross has spent more hours with American presidents and Israeli prime ministers than any other person. He doesn’t think the relationship between Barack Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu is the worst that has ever been between a US president and an Israeli prime minister. The veteran diplomat refuses to say that they loath each other.
They don't trust each other, Ross asserts in an interview to Ynet, but the worst relationship in his opinion belonged to President George H. W. Bush, who thought that Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir had deceived him, and that was a definite rift. Israel-US relations didn’t reach a low over the Iranian nuclear deal, he says, but over the siege on Beirut and the Sabra and Shatila massacre.
Ross served in Republican and Democratic administrations since the days of President Ronald Reagan, when he served as his Middle East advisor. In the Bush Sr. administration, he was director of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff, which worked on the US policy towards the former Soviet Union, the reunification of Germany, the arms control talks and forming the coalition for the 1991 Gulf War. Bill Clinton put him in charge of the peace team, and Obama used his services as a special advisor on the Middle East and mainly on Iran.
His service has provided him with an intimate outlook on Israel-US relations since the days of President Harry S. Truman to Obama. The result is his new book "Doomed to Succeed," which was published Tuesday. As far as Ross is concerned, there is no other option for the special relationship between the two countries other than success.
Can one president and one prime minister destroy the relations?
Absolutely not, Ross says. After all the affairs, the relations improved. But the key, he believes is that the relations must not be taken for granted. They have to maintained, and both sides are responsible to work on that.
In the administrations Ross has served in, he witnessed battles around the presidents between those who see Israel as a partner and those who see it as a burden. Incumbent National Security Advisor Susan Rice sees Netanyahu as an obstacle to the nuclear agreement and ordered Secretary of State John Kerry not to get him involved in the interim agreement reached with Iran two years ago.
"When people read the book, it's a very straightforward description. Susan in many ways embody the mindset that exists in any administration. The book highlight the fact that if you go from Truman to Obama Administration, there are always those in the national security apparatus that look at Israel in lens of more as a competitor and less as a partner.
"Susan's instincts put her in this camp. At the UN, whenever I asked her she played the right role and that was important, but if you look at the way she operated as a national security advisor v the way Tom Donilon operated as national security advisor, her instincts has been to view the Israelis in more competitive terms and less cooperative terms."
Ross points in his book to misunderstandings and crises which could have been minimized with a different approach, like a calming phone call. "Donilon was very close to President Obama. They both have been. In the administration there are competing instincts and orientations among people. I know it because I saw it, I felt it and I lived it."
He explains that the Reagan administration was the first in which there were people in the American national security's bureaucracy (not individuals like Henry Kissinger during the Nixon and Ford era) who saw Israel as a partner and others who saw it as a burden.
"The supporters see Israel as facing the same threats as us. They see Israel as having capabilities that can add to ours. They see the benefits of intelligence cooperation, military to military cooperation."
Reagan's first two years in office were very difficult. He was the first president to suspend military aid as a penalty, following the bombing of Iraq's Osirak nuclear reactor and after the Israeli law was applied in the Golan Heights in December 1981.
"Since that time you had two competing views. If you go back to Reagan, Secretaries of State Haig and Shultz viewed Israel in more favorable light and Secretary of Defense Weinberger who viewed in a very negative light and during the siege of Beirut wanted us to break relations." According to Ross, that illustrates how radical the views were.
The Bush Sr. administration was often critical of Israel, Ross says, because the president believed Prime Minister Shamir had deceived him on the settlements in their first meeting and he couldn't go over it. The interesting thing is that the Bush Sr. administration got 44 countries to establish or restore relations with Israel, opened the Soviet Union's gates to the Jews and helped with the immigration of Jews from Ethiopia and even Syria, which was an issue Secretary of State James Baker raised in his meeting with Syrian President Hafez al-Assad.
A significant change, Ross notes, took place in the Clinton administration, which was inclined to see Israel as a partner. Clinton thought it would be a mistake to present any dispute with Israel in public. He saw the US as Israel's only real friend in the world and was clearly in favor of improving the relations and cooperating.
President George W. Bush didn’t treat Israel favorably at the beginning of his term, Ross clarifies, but following the September 11 attacks, he began seeing Israel and the US in the same boat in the war on terror.
According to Ross, all presidents tried to avoid dealing with Israel and the Middle East at the beginning of their terms, but the Middle East drew them in. Obama's instinct at the beginning of his term was to stay away from the Israeli issue like the five administrations before him. He felt he has inherited problems with the Arab and Muslim world from Bush Jr. because of the invasion of Iraq, and worked to strengthen the relations. That's why he visited Cairo and the Middle East at first, but not Israel.
Ross writes in his book that the Eisenhower administration did the same and didn’t gain a thing. Richard Nixon, in his first years (until September 1970), consistently tried to get closer to the Arabs, especially to Gamal Abdel Nasser's Egypt. He suspended the supply of Phantom jets to Israel while Russia was building the air defense system and sending military people outside the Eastern bloc for the first time.
Ross notes that Nixon sent Joseph Sisco to Cairo, but that President Nasser couldn’t care less. Nixon, he says, believed that the Six-Day War was American defeat, as it created an opportunity for the Russians in the Middle East.
'Obama saw Israel as the strong side'
And now it's Barack Obama's turn. Ross writes in this book that Obama strengthened Israel's security and didn’t seek to harm it. He saw Israel as the strong side which must be advanced and the Palestinians as the weak side.
As a result, Obama relied in the security issue on those who supported Israel. That particularly applies to the Iranian issue, especially in the first term. He wanted Israel to see that the Americans are taking the threat seriously and operated in a way that would not require the US to launch a military operation, by building pressure which had a chance of working.
Ross clarifies that in all the decades he served in Democratic and Republican administrations, he didn't see a major difference between them in the attitude towards Israel. The first administration to take tough steps against the settlements was the Republican Ford administration after Nixon, followed by the Democratic Carter administration, who approached the settlements from a legal aspect. Reagan turned the settlements from a legal issue to a diplomatic issue. Since then, Ross says, all the administrations have been consistent on the settlement issue.
Obama and Netanyahu. The relationship between the countries is more important than the relationship between the leaders (Photo: Reuters)
Obama and Netanyahu. The relationship between the countries is more important than the relationship between the leaders (Photo: Reuters)
Seven months after Netanyahu's Congress speech behind Obama's back, the two are about to meet for the first time at the White House on November 9. Ross believes that the important thing is not the relationship between the two, but the relationship between the countries, and that he two leaders will try to repair the relations.
According to Ross, while Obama has failed to create contact with the Israeli public, he sees Israel as a country which shares US values and is threatened by the same forces threatening America. Sometimes he sees Israel doing things which he thinks are hurting Israel itself, and he feels compelled to say so.
Ross believes a serious effort will be made during the Obama-Netanyahu meeting to overcome the crisis. He says both sides have an interest to put the differences behind them.
As for the Republican invitation to Netanyahu to address Congress, Ross believes that those who consider themselves as true friends of Israel should not turn it into a political issue. What works today, he explains, won't work tomorrow, as the US is in the midst of a demographic change in which the majority will turn into a minority within 25 to 30 years, following the rise in Asian and Hispanic power.
In light of all the developments, he believes, Israel must maintain is democracy values. In light of the de-legitimization movement, it is particularly important that Israel's policy will match the two-state solution - in other words, building in the settlement blocs and not beyond.
If Dennis Ross were in a position of power in the administration today, he would have suggested in talks with the Israelis to do several things after the current wave of terror were suppressed.
The moment a calm is reached, he says, it's important to ease the conditions on the ground by opening Areas C for Palestinian economic activity. The next stage would be to bring Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf states to the negotiating table with Israel.
Considering the Palestinians' weakness, he says, the Arab states must indicate what they are willing to give Israel in order to get the Palestinians back to the negotiations - public security coordination against shared threats, normal diplomatic and economic relations. They can't do that before Israel makes progress on the Palestinian issue, Ross believes, but the Arabs will have to compromise for the Palestinians, who are incapable of compromising because they feel they are the victim.
Ross says there should be no Netanyahu-Abbas meeting at the moment, as a meeting which is not properly prepared is doomed to fail. He sees no negotiations in the horizon right now, not just because off the atmosphere but because different circumstances have to be created. It can begin, he believes, with an effort to calm the situation down.

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