Lebanon

Lebanon’s Hariri Chooses Paris over Riyadh………….

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      BFF
“One week after Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati announced his new Hizbullah-dominated cabinet, Lebanon’s opposition is already feeling menaced by the country’s new leadership and its Syrian ally. Saad Hariri, the previous prime minister and leader of the pro-West March 14 Alliance, fled the country nearly two months ago following an attempted car bomb assassination on him, the French daily Libération reported on Monday. Hariri has been hiding in Paris after being informed by American and Saudi intelligence agencies that his life was in real danger in Lebanon, the daily claimed…….”

So the prime minister of Lebanon, at the time, escaped to live in Paris for a couple of months, leaving the country to its own devices. Never heard of ahead of government fleeing the country he runs for fear of assassination (his father was out of office when he was assassinated). If he feared for his life, why not resign in protest? Why not move to Riyadh where he has homes as well, and is always welcome and is certainly better protected? I have some doubt about this Jerusalem Post report. No doubt even if the Syrian side entertained any idea of assassinating this Hariri, they would be afraid of international retribution. That would have been the last straw, and it would give the West a casus belli to restructure Lebanese politics by force, as they are doing in Libya and probably wish to do in Syria.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, Iran, Middle East Nuclear

Joke of the Day: Tony Blair Preaches on Morality………….

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“Iran must not be allowed to develop its nuclear program, Quartet envoy Tony Blair said Tuesday during a panel discussion as part of the three-day Israeli Presidential Conference in Jerusalem. “If we allow Iran to develop nuclear capabilities, there will be consequence, therefore we must not let that happen,” Blair said.…… During the panel discussion entitled, “Nation, Interests and Ethics in the Journey Toward Tomorrow,” Blair said he sees Israel as a model for the region. “Through it’s (sic) belief in the creativity and endeavor of the human spirit, Israel can be seen for what it is as a country of hope and human values,” he said. Commenting on moral decisions that leaders must take, Blair said “If we fail to intervene where people are being killed, that is a decision that has consequences,” and gave Sierra Leone as an example. “…….”

Regardless of the Iran issue, Blair hardly has any claim to morality. During the Egyptian uprising in January-February, Tony (the Poodle) Blair famously said something like “we should try and manage the Egyptian uprising”. Now his petroleum princes are trying to take his advice and manage the Egyptian and other revolutions (Libya, Syria, Yemen). They are also trying to kill other Arab uprisings (Bahrain, Jordan). Speaking of “morality: it has not been Tony Blair’s strong suit for many years now.
Cheers
mhg


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Apartheid, Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, ethnic cleansing, Human Right

Bahrain Kangaroo Court Passes Saudi Sentences on the Opposition………

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“Bahrain sentenced 10 Shi’ite prominent activists and opposition leaders to life in prison on Wednesday on charges of plotting a coup during protests that rocked the Sunni-ruled Gulf island kingdom earlier this year. The sentencing could inflame already simmering tensions in the tiny Gulf Arab state, where small protests have erupted daily since emergency law was lifted on June 1 and may threaten a national dialogue planned to start next month. Among those who received life sentences were Shi’ite dissident Hassan Mushaimaa, leader of hardline opposition group Haq. His group joined two others in calling for the overthrow of Bahrain’s monarchy during mass protests in February and March. Ibrahim Sharif, the Sunni leader of the secular leftist Waad party, was sentenced to five years in prison. Waad and Bahrain’s largest Shi’ite opposition group Wefaq had called for a reform of the kingdom’s monarchy. The defendants were defiant after the verdict, vowing to continue “peaceful” opposition to the royal family……….”

First they arrested them en masse, looting their homes in the process, then they tortured them, then they sentenced some to death. Now the al-Khalifa military Kangaroo court has passed its life sentences against opposition leaders. It is as if they, and their al-Saud masters, want to completely destroy the opposition.
Cheers
mhg


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Death Penalty, Human Right, Saudi Arabia, Slavery

Another Asian Housemaid Beheaded, about Stoning……….

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“An Indonesian woman was beheaded by the sword on Saturday after being convicted of murdering a Saudi woman, the interior ministry said. The woman named Roiaiti Beth Sabotti Sarona, according to a transliteration from Arabic, was found guilty of killing Saudi Khairiya bint Hamid Mijlid by striking her repeatedly on the head with a meat chopper and stabbing her in the neck, the ministry said in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency. The ministry did not elaborate on the motives of the crime, nor it did disclose the relation between the two women. But Indonesian officials say that around 70 percent of the 1.2 million Indonesians working in Saudi Arabia are domestic staff…….”

It is not as painful as stoning, at least it is a faster death. It is quicker, unless the swordsman misses and does not decapitate the first time. Then there will have to be a second time.
Equality under the law: a few months ago a Saudi housewife was convicted of torturing and killing her Asian housemaid. The housewife paid about $10,000 blood money to some Sri Lankan relative and was free.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, GCC, Mercenaries, Occupied Bahrain, Persian-American Gulf

A Gulf of Mercenaries: Arab Potentates Discover the Joys of Hired Foreign Guns……….

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      BFF
“Mercenaries from Indonesia, Malaysia and Pakistan are being recruited by officials in Bahrain to help restore security to the country, a Saudi scholar claimed. Bahrain is under increasing scrutiny for the response by the Sunni minority leadership to a Shiite uprising in the country. Doctors without Borders claimed that Bahraini security officials were using hospitals as torture chambers as part of a crackdown. Ali al-Ahmad, director of the Institute for Gulf Affairs, told Radio Australia’s Contact Asia program that the royal family was recruiting mercenaries from Asia to help with its crackdown. Ahmad said there were no Shiites in the national security forces. Given the fact that Sunnis are in the minority, he said, the country has a “need to import mercenaries” from other places. He claimed “the majority of them” are coming from Pakistan, though he said he’s seen reports of some from countries such as Somalia, Malaysia and Indonesia……..” U P I News

The hired guns and killers are pouring into the Gulf region: it is a gold rush for the dogs of war, mangy or otherwise. Bahrain has been hiring foreign mercenaries for some years: Pakistani newspapers often have advertisements for interviews with Bahrain National Guard officials (some al-Khalifa or another). The ruling Bahraini clan is now expanding the field of mercenary recruitment. They used to focus on Pakistan and a few Arab countries. Now they are expanding it to Indonesia and Malaysia, more impoverished Islamic countries that already have expressed some support for the Saudi role in Bahrain in exchange for a consideration (truly a coalition of the hired and the paid). The United Arab Emirates is already forming a large mercenary force of foreigners from as far away as Colombia, South Africa, and Australia, among other places, to keep its people from thinking rebellion. All under the leadership of Blackwater veterans. I once recommended that the ruling al-Nahayan clan of Abu Dhabi ought o consider hiring their killers and thugs from among the extremely ruthless Mexican drug cartels. I was not kidding: once you have no morals, why pretend to have limits? A hired killer is a hired killer, as the al-Khalifa of Bahrain have discovered. Meanwhile, Western media report that the al-Saud are arranging for Pakistani, Malaysian, and possibly Indonesian forces to help the regime in case of a serious uprising. If this continue I may change the name of my Gulf: from the Persian-American Gulf to the Gulf of Mercenaries and Hired Thugs.
Okay, these potentates should be ashamed of themselves for hiring foreign mercenaries to suppress their people, but they are not. Especially those in occupied Bahrain who use foreign money to buy foreign protection.
Cheers
mhg


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Al-Qaeda, Salafi, Terrorism, Women 100, WTF

Al-Shamikha of Al-Qaeda: Salafi Women Discover Victoria’s Secret………

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“The 31-page glossy, Al-Shamikha, which translates loosely as “The Majestic Woman”, features a niqab-clad woman posing with a sub-machine gun on its cover. Much like Elle or Cosmopolitan, it includes advice on finding the right man (“marrying a mujahideen”), how to achieve a perfect complexion (stay inside with your face covered), and provides tips on first aid and etiquette. Alongside sisterly advice such as “not [to] go out except when necessary” and to always wear a niqab for protection from the sun, the magazine runs interviews with martyr’s wives and praises those who give their lives in the name of the editors’ interpretation of Islam. “From martyrdom, the believer will gain security, safety and happiness,” it says. For those readers not quite ready for such a drastic step, it argues the pros and cons of honey facemasks and lobbies against “towelling too forcibly”.……”

Don’t knock it. Women are women (just as men are men). They probably have everything that others do, under that black Salafi tent. Victoria’s Secret included. (No, I probably draw the line at things like leather and S & M and bondage). I liked the part about “not [to] go out except when necessary”, I thought it means “go out” as in “going out”, a.k.a “dating”. For a moment there I thought I had missed a Salafi fatwa allowing “going out on dates” when necessary. I thought of all the poor saps al-Qaeda that were sent to certain death and mayhem with a promise of all those delayed pleasures in Paradise, how these frustrated young men went partly because they could not see all the beauty around them, all the Victoria’s Secrets hidden under the dark attire. The least the master terrorists could have done was send them out to do “God’s work” in couples, couples with matching “belts”. That would have been an explosive date, the date of a lifetime, going with a bang, the puns intended.
Dommage….
(al-Shamikha also means dignified or proud, which apparently applies only to Salafi women who cater to Salafi men).
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Revolutions, Economics, Finance, France, U.S. Politics, WTF

World Revolution Redux? a Wal-Mart World, PIGS of Europe, Arab Spring, Che Guevara……….

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“S. Robson “Rob” Walton, Walmart chairman, has a net worth of about $19.7 billion. And he’s only number 9 on the list of 2010’s top 20 richest Americans. Walmart workers, meanwhile, make around $8.75 an hour—about $18,000 a year. They’d have to work over a million years to approach what the chairman of Walmart Stores is sitting on. Alice and Jim Walton each have about $20 billion, and Christy Walton has $24 billion. Last year Jonathan Turley noted that the CEO of Walmart, Michael Duke, makes his average employee’s yearly salary every hour………..”

This is not just an American phenomenon anymore, although the gap tends to be wider in America and the third world (including the Middle East where the gap may possibly be the widest now) than in Europe or Japan. From Russia to Ireland, and south to the Middle East, income gaps are widening among working people and their corporate and government leaders. The middle classes, usually the pillars of stability wherever they exist, are being truly squeezed, forcing a very few of them upward, pushing the vast majority of them down the ladder. That is when revolutions erupt: when the middle class, if it exists, is threatened, when very few are at the top and most are at the bottom. Think France 1789, Russia 1917, China 1949, Iran 1979. The now-aborted Arab Spring was at least partly a bread and butter issue, about depots taking away both freedom and a chance at decent living.
Just when we thought Europe was irrevocably in its post-revolutionary stage, we are getting the ‘uprisings’ in Greece and Spain, not to mention the perennial French issue-oriented little ‘uprisings’. Advice to many older Europeans, especially in the PIGS countries: don’t throw away your Che Guevara posters and caps yet.
Okay, I may be exaggerating a bit, barely, so don’t sell the farm yet…..
Cheers
mhg


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Afghanistan, Arab Revolutions, Libya

Has NATO Found its Libyan Karzai?…………

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I am beginning to get a funny feeling about the leading figure of the Libyan opposition in Benghazi, Mustafa Abdul-Jalil. I am beginning to get that odd déjà vu (all over again) feeling; that I have seen this film, or just another version of it, before. Look at the picture: His hat is red not green, and his attire is more red and grey than green. Yet, I am getting this persistent feeling that this western border of the Middle East is looking so much like that other eastern border of the Middle East. The difference is that this one is Arab (and Amazigh) and has a lot of petroleum that the West needs. That other border, the one on the other side is mostly Pashtun, Hazara, Uzbek, etc, and instead of petroleum it has something else many in the West want: opium. Many in the West also apparently want this product as well, and as badly.

I can be wrong, I have my moments: this Libyan man looks older and somehow less manipulative than that other Pashtun guy with the green robe (the one I once imprudently called the grasshopper). Yet back in 2002 Mr. Karzai also looked benign and harmless and incorruptible. I hope my odd feelings are wrong, but i sure would like to know how many relatives does he have waiting in the wings to take advantage.



Cheers
mhg


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Iran, Terrorism, US Foreign Policy

Tehran Holds Counter-Terrorism Conference: United States Unlikely to Attend……..

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“High-ranking officials from more than 60 countries, including several heads of state, have accepted Iran’s invitation to attend the Global Campaign against Terrorism Conference, conference secretary general Bahman Taherian-Mobarakeh stated at a press conference in Tehran on Monday. The conference is scheduled to be held in the Iranian capital from June 25 to 26. Taherian-Mobarakeh stated that the United Nations, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the Asia Cooperation Dialogue, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Economic Cooperation Organization, and Interpol are among the international and regional organizations which have been officially invited to send representatives to the conference. He said that the list of officials who plan to participate in the conference will be released later. However, Taherian-Mobarakeh did not name the countries which have decided to send representatives to the conference. It is expected that more countries will announce their interest in attending the event ………” Mehr News

Shouldn’t they know by now who or what and from where is attending ?
This whole thing is mysterious: nobody knows who will attend from where. I know one thing: the United States government will not be represented at this meeting. I also know at least one other country that will not be represented. But then it all depends on one’s definition of ‘terrorism’: the countries that claim to be the most concerned with ‘terrorism’ will not be attending. Most likely al-Qaeda will not attend, nor will George W. Bush or Dick Cheney.
I also suspect that most terrorists will not attend.
Cheers
mhg


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Iraq, US Foreign Policy

Mystery of the Missing Iraq Money: do I hear 6, do I Hear 18……..

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“In 2004, the Bush administration flew twenty billion dollars of shrink-wrapped cash into Iraq on pallets. Now the bulk of that money has disappeared. The funds flown into the war zone were made up of surplus from the UN’s oil-for-food program, as well as money from sales of Iraqi oil and seized Iraqi assets. Recent estimates had the amount of missing money at about $6.6 billion, but according to Al Jazeera, Iraqi Parliament Speaker Osama al-Nujaifi says the figure is closer to three times that amount. Officials were supposed to distribute the money to Iraqi government ministries and U.S. contractors tasked with the reconstruction of Iraq, but it now appears that the bulk of the cash was stolen in what may be one of the largest heists in history. The Iraqi government argues that U.S. forces were supposed to safeguard the cash under a 2004 agreement, making Washington responsible for the money’s disappearance. Pentagon officials claim that given time to track down the records they can account for all of the money, but the U.S. has already audited the money three times and no trace of what happened to it can be found……….”

I would rather accept the US$ 6 billion figure and forget the US $ 18 billion. I wouldn’t take the word of Osama al-Nujaifi. Exaggeration as an ‘art’ was probably invented in the Middle East, most likely in Iraq, especially in Mosul which Mr. al-Nujaifi controls with his clan. Still, $ 6 billion is a lot of money. As to who took it all, I would say all of the above: Iraqis and Americans, possibly contractors from other countries as well. Many American officials and contractors probably got a good education in the Middle eastern ways of lining the pocket, some of them got very rich in the process.
Cheers
mhg


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Multidisciplinary: Middle East, North Africa, Gulf, GCC, World, Cosmos…..