Monthly Archives: May 2011

Al-Qaeda, Iran, Salafi

Incomplete Iranian View of Bin Laden and his Genesis…………

     
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“The death of Osama bin Laden brought closure to many people around the world, especially those who lost loved ones in the September 11 attacks or other terrorist acts that were conducted or inspired by Bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda network. Bin Laden is associated with murder and terror. Bin Laden claimed that his war was against those he called “infidels” but the victims of his shadowy Al-Qaeda network were mostly Muslims, and thus he and his death machine did the greatest injustice and harm to Islam and Muslims. Thousands of children have been orphaned in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan just because Al-Qaeda decided to use these countries as battlefields for taking revenge against the United States. Despotic Arab rulers and Western countries, especially the United States, are responsible for the emergence of people like Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri. Bin Laden and his Arab comrades were supported by the United States and certain European and Arab countries in the war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. To counter the Soviets in Afghanistan, the CIA provoked the people’s religious sentiments and used religious fanaticism as the strongest tool against forces that the CIA and other intelligence agencies called kafirs (unbelievers), and thus planted the seeds of extremism in the region…….” Mehr News (Iran)

On the face of it, nothing seems new here: it is the usual Western view of the emergence of the Salafi terrorist group under Bin Laden. Yet oddly this Iranian view completely ignores the deeper genesis of Bin Ladenism and the al-Qaeda: the Salafi educational system and the Wahhabi religious teachings in Saudi Arabia. This Salafi teaching of the exclusion and hatred of the “other” has spread to other places, especially in poverty-stricken regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan and Indonesia through Saudi schools and clerics. I know firsthand that it has also spread to some GCC Gulf states through Saudi-trained Salafi clerics and activists.
An interesting reluctance on the part of the Iranians; even as senior state-sponsored Saudi clerics wage a vicious media and mosque and fatwa war against “other” Islamic sects, unjustly tying them to the Iranian mullahs.
Cheers
mhg

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Apartheid, Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain

The Thrilla of Apartheid in Manama……

     
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“MANAMA, Bahrain — Hassan Mohamed ran his finger over bumps of birdshot beneath his skin. He is nearly blind in his left eye, but is scared to go to the emergency room. The wounds would betray him as a protester. His sister arranged to sneak him into a hospital to visit a doctor she trusts. Mohamed was worried. “The police are watching,” he said. “I don’t want them to take me.” Helicopters hover over this island kingdom as doctors are rounded up, university students expelled, teachers fired, houses bombed, mosques destroyed and political opponents silenced. What began as a crackdown on a Shiite Muslim population that rose in protest against the Sunni royal family two months ago has become something more pervasive and sinister….. Much of the strategy is driven by Bahrain’s dominant ally, Saudi Arabia, which fears pro-democracy movements will upset the balance of power in the Persian Gulf……….. “It’s apartheid,” said Mansoor Jamri, who was forced to resign as editor of the independent Al Wasat newspaper. “They’ve made a decision that half the population is not wanted and they want to instill fear in this population and dehumanize them.”………..”

These al-Khalifa are acting like a band of thugs rather than the ruling family of a state. That is the image I get, and I believe it is the right image. What they are doing is an organized state-executed pogrom against most of the people of Bahrain, with the goal of enforcing acceptance of their Apartheid policy. Today the Washington Post wrote an editorial urging US military action to “take out” Gaddafi. Maybe Obama ought to send the Navy Seals to get that despotic thrilla of Manama, aka Khalifa al-Khalifa.
Cheers
mhg

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Culture, UAE

Only in Dubai: an Impotent Polygamist Womanizer………

     
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“Dubai: An Emirati man is being sued for Dh45 million in compensation for failing to sexually perform. The defendant’s ex-wife, told the court that she suffered from her husband’s erectile dysfunction while they were married. In her civil compensation claim, the ex-wife alleged that the accused suffered from sexual impotency that resulted in failing to fulfil her needs and forced her to have what she termed as “inhumane sex”. The case is being heard before the Dubai Courts…… She said her husband did not sleep with her in the first four months of their marriage. “When he did for the first time, he treated me inhumanly and inappropriately,” she told the court. “I discovered later on that he suffered erectile dysfunction. He was exactly the opposite of what he claimed to me before we signed the marriage contract……….”He was a sweet talker and after we got married, I discovered that he is a womanizer who married more than 12 times. Although he was a former public figure, but that didn’t prevent him from allegedly manipulating decent girls and spend weeks of pleasure with them before ditching them…….”

He was an impotent husband who was a serial womanizer and had married 12 women. Twelvefuckingwomen! No wonder he was impotent. Contrary to legend, “excessive” polygamy can lead to ED, sort of like taking steroids.
I don’t assume anyone knows if his name was Whatishisface al-Nahayan.
I list this under “culture”.
Cheers
mhg

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

Gulf Niemöller: Protesters, Reporters, Teachers, Doctors, and Jews………….

     
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“First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.” Pastor Martin Niemöller

“Up to 50 doctors and nurses who treated anti-government protesters injured during the recent demonstrations in Bahrain were charged yesterday with acts against the state. In an escalation of the government crackdown on the protests, the medical staff were accused of “promoting efforts to bring down the government” and “harming the public by spreading false news” Some were also accused of causing the deaths of two demonstrators by “inflicting additional wounds” on them or of giving them “unneeded treatments.” In all 23 doctors and 24 nurses were charged and will be tried in a military court, the Justice Minister Khaled bin Ali Al Khalifa said. “The medical profession was strongly abused during this period,” he said. Medical organisations expressed outrage at the legal assault on the profession with health staff seized from their homes and hospitals taken over by the military. Under the Geneva convention people wounded in conflict are guaranteed the right to medical care, regardless of which side they are on…….”

“Bahrain’s justice minister has said 47 medical workers will be charged with acting against the state during the recent unrest in the Gulf kingdom. The 23 doctors and 24 nurses had promoted efforts to bring down the Sunni monarchy and spread false news, Khaled Bin Ali Al Khalifa alleged. Activists say medics are being punished for treating pro-democracy protesters hurt in clashes with security forces. On Monday, two ex-MPs from main Shia opposition group Wifaq were arrested. Matar Matar and Jawad Fairuz were taken from their homes in the evening and had not been heard of since, members of Wifaq said……” BBC News

The al-Khalifa al-Saud pogrom is in full swing in Bahrain. But that is okay, they may get all these Bahrainis mentioned above in the title, but they’ll never get what counts the most: oil and weapons deals. Western democracy will be safe on my Gulf, under the protection of the princes of al-Saud and the shaikhs of al-Khalifa.
Cheers
mhg

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Arab Revolutions, Culture, Gulf states, UAE

My Gulf: Two Views of Dubai and Kabul……..

     
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A cynical foreign view: “This is a good question! Everyone knows that Dubai is the most useless city in the world, filled with entitled, arrogant, rude, mindlessly materialistic Emiratis and the shopping malls that sustain them. If Dubai receded into the sand that surrounds it or if its man-made palm shaped islands were drowned by rising sea levels, we would not feel bad for more than one minute. This is all true and not subject to debate. There is absolutely no reason to go to Dubai. Unless, of course, you are arriving from one of the neighboring shitholes (Kabul, Baghdad, Kandahar). In that case, Dubai is absolutely indispensable. It is the only place for you. Dubai must exist because Kabul does, just a short two-hour flight away. Kabul is filthy, violent, medieval and necklaced with razor wire. Thirty percent of the dust in the air is fecal matter. The blue sacks sitting in the mud (30% of which, it stands to reason, is also fecal matter) in intersections are not bags of potatoes; they are women in burqas begging. Donkey carts, armored SUVs and military convoys jam its unpaved streets. Dubai is none of these things (it’s pretty much what happens what medieval warlords do when they come into lot of money, but that’s a different post)………”

A native brown-noser view:
“But why did one succeed while the other failed? Why did ‘Death to America’ not resonate? I suppose, in the end, nobody wants to live in Tora Bora — not even Bin Laden apparently — but, rather Dubai. People rose because they wanted to live well. It must have been hard for Egyptians and Tunisians to understand how a city-state like Dubai, and the UAE in general, could develop with none of the resources of their countries, let alone their political and social institutions. It was no longer about being like London or Paris but rather like Dubai……..”

As for me: I have been to Dubai, both before and after, and I have been to some of those other places. I think the truth lies somewhere in between, between the cynical foreigner and the native writer who never seems to want to displease the ruling masters. My gut feeling, which does not always agree with my economist’s judgment (I have gone sour on economics these past three years), is that the cynical foreigner is closer to the truth. The native writer al-Gergawi always seems eager to please the powers that be, the rulers; but I have read only two or three of his postings. The foreign cynic Carpetblogger clearly doesn’t give a rat’s ass about pleasing anyone, and that is a good sign. Besides, I have never cottoned up to brown-nosers, even when I got so close to being one myself some years ago. Close, but never made it.
Cheers
mhg



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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain

Field Marshal Shaikh Buffoon of Bahrain……….

     
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“If you have no shame, then do what you want” Good Arab Saying

“Bahrain Defence Force (BDF) Commander-in-Chief Marshal Shaikh Khalifa bin Ahmed Al Khalifa confirmed in an interview published today in the Kuwaiti newspaper “Al Rai”, that the BDF, Ministry of Interior (MOI), and the National Guard system was able to restore safety and security in the Kingdom through stopping those who attempted to overthrow the regime and establish a state within the clerical rule of Iran that follows Welyat Al Faqeeh ” ’ the mandate of the jurist’. Marshal Khalifa bin Ahmed refused labeling the groups involved in the recent events as reform callers, describing them as traitors an saboteurs that led Bahrain into chaos and disorder. Pointing out that the Seven Associations were carrying out the guidance lines from Iran that drew the acts of sabotage and barbarism in the Kingdom. The Commander in Chief explained that upon declaring a state of national safety a number of involved heads in the killing and agitation were arrested, along with the group of terrorists who threatened the civil peace and attacked public and private property to undertake the legal necessary procedures…….”

Field Marshal (no less) Shaikh Khalifa Bin Ahmad Al Khalifa of Bahrain. This Field Marshal, the Rommel of Bahrain, had to call in Saudi forces in order to put down a demonstration or two. Or maybe the invaders just came in on their own. If I were in his place, I would be ashamed. If I were in his place, I would keep away from the media for a while, having to import foreign occupation forces to subdue my people. Before that they had imported foreign mercenaries to subdue the people, bypassing the Field Marshal.
The title of Field Marshal is normally given, in normal countries, only to generals who have fought and won battles. Like Bernard Montgomery of Britain and Erwin Rommel of Germany. Normal countries don’t bestow such honors on buffoons like Shaikh Khalifa Al Khalifa, just for being born.
Cheers
mhg

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GCC, Persian-American Gulf, UAE, Weapons deals

Shaikhs and Bins: the Rapidly Evolving UAE Police State……..

     
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The United Arab Emirates has been cracking down on any whiff of dissent. This week, the regime took over the Teachers Union and appointed its own agents on the board because they had advocated for democracy. They have not yet been charged of being Iranian agents but stay tuned. A week or two earlier they dissolved the independent human rights organization for the same reason. Several advocates of free speech and democracy have been arrested and are still in prison. Some of the latter have been charged with insulting the ruler of Abu Dhabi (president of UAE) Shaikh Khalifa bin Zayed al-Nahayan and his crown prince Shaikh Mohammed Bin Zayed al-Nahayan and the ruler of Dubai Shaikh Mohammed Bin Rashid al-Maktoum. I am not sure how they insulted these tribal absolute shaikhs, maybe they stuck their tongues out at their ubiquitous pictures.
The al-Nahayan, rulers of Abu Dhabi who run the whole UAE (the other shaikhs are just for show), are apparently worried about unrest. This is odd for two reasons:

Why are they worried I: The overwhelming majority of the UAE are temporary imported foreign workers and housemaids who are rotated every few years and have no interest in the internal politics of the country. They probably form around 85% of the population. Maybe the al-Nahayan can imiose masters of Apartheid the al-Khalifa in Bahrain and naturalize these millions of Asians to offset the politically demanding natives.

Why are they worried II: The UAE is the second biggest importer of weapons in the whole wide wonderful world. They are a bigger importer than Israel and Saudi Arabia. They are buying weapons faster than they can rust in their desert warehouses: they are clearly striving to become the first biggest importer of weapons in the whole wide world. Since they obviously have no intention of invading either Saudi Arabia or Iran, and they seem to think they can always buy Oman, the only reason for these weapons is to keep their people under control. I mean their native people since the Asian housemaids who form a majority of the people are not likely to start a revolution. So with all these weapons in the desert warehouses, what is there to worry about?

I still think their best bet is to find an Iranian connection, create one if they must. If the hapless al-Khalifa could do it in Bahrain and sell it to Robert Gates and Hillary Clinton, the al-Nahayan should be able to do even better if only because they have more money. Or maybe they can blame it on the devil.
More on this later.
Cheers
mhg

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Al-Qaeda, Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Arabian Peninsula, Persian-American Gulf, Saudi Arabia

Post Bin Laden: Will al-Qaeda Come in From the Cold?………….

     
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“Bin Laden’s radical politics continued to hold sway with some Saudi youth as Al Qaeda carried out attacks in the desert kingdom mainly in 2003. With an internal crackdown against Al Qaeda, Saudi fighters headed to Iraq to battle the US military and Iraq’s Shiite-led government through 2007. Only after concerted pressure from the Americans, did the Saudi royal family make a serious effort to try to stop the migration of young Saudi radicals to Iraq..…….”

Will al-Qaeda mutate again now that Bin Laden is dead? Will it come in from the cold?
I have never believed that al-Qaeda terrorists, good Salafi sons of the Wahhabi nest, had ever completely cut the cord with the mother. There were a couple of publicized operations inside the Arabian Peninsula, many arrests, trials, re-education camps. Yet the emphasis has always been on ‘misguided’ sons who will return to the bosom. Re-education programs were set up exclusively for these Salafi ‘misguided ones’: by contrast, a ‘misguided’ Shi’a would probably have his head chopped off. Then there was the important money angle: that may explain the reluctance of the terrorists to perform significant operations in the Saudi kingdom. Why blow up decent Wahhabi folks in the ‘mother country’ when there is ample supply of Shi’a heretics next door in Iraq? Why kill the cash cow (or cash she-camel naqah)?

There is no doubt that al-Qaeda will undergo some more changes now that its leader, its main link to the moneyed part of the Arab world, is dead. We may be about to find out how far these changes will go before this year is over. Despite the public ‘animosity’ between al-Qaeda and the al-Saud dynasty, the Saudi regime has kept close and warm relations with the regional supporters of Bin Laden, the Salafis and their various organizations (e.g. Islamic Heritage Societies). Some of them act as outright Saudi agents in the Gulf states, pushing for yet closer ties with Riyadh, pushing for Saudi hegemony. This is partly tribal, but largely political and ideological and, dare I say it, financial.
The Salafi Wahhabis were spawned in Saudi Arabia and have never really strayed too far from their roots. The Saudis know they have a reliably fierce potential ally in their intensifying struggle not only against the ‘rival’ theocracy in Iran but also against the inevitable winds of Arab change and revolution. Al-Qaeda recruits have shown their ferocity in the terrorist campaigns inside Iraq, almost certainly financed by Saudis and other patrons in the Persian-American Gulf. For some years the Saudis tried to tie Iran to al-Qaeda, especially in Iraq, the same way as Dick Cheney tried to tie Iraq (under Saddam Hussein) to al-Qaeda. This was largely based on the proximity of Iran to Afghanistan and that some Bin Laden family members fled after 2001 to Iran. Saudis tried, improbably, to tie the Iranian mullahs to the terrorist acts committed in Iraq against the Shi’as by Saudis and other foreign Salafi Arabs. But that was then, a spin tailored to the Iraqi and American markets of that time.

Now there may be a new twist: a new, yet old, al-Qaeda that is truly allied with the Saudi regime, this time openly. The prodigal Wahhabis returning to the bosom of the mother: the absolute tribal monarchy from which they never strayed too far. They can be used in the coming battle: to intensify terrorist acts in Iraq (and possibly Iran), and they can be used against Hezbollah and Amal in Lebanon (something already started by the Saudi-financed Hariri group). It is an alliance that fits this new sectarian Sunni-Shi’a cold/hot war provoked by the al-Saud in order to divide our unstable region and help keep their shaky throne. This closer alliance is an idea that has no doubt crossed the minds of the al-Saud princes in the past, and they may be putting it to work now. They already have strong ties and alliances to al-Qaeda affiliates and sympathizers like the Salafis of the Islamic Heritage Societies and other groups in the Gulf. They have kept somewhat warm relations with the Taliban (Saudis and the UAE were the only Arab regimes that recognized their rule in Afghanistan before 9/11). Is it a coincidence that his year alone the Saudis have reportedly released hundreds, maybe thousands, of former al-Qaeda terrorists? Are they setting things up for a new alliance, post-Bin Laden? That would be a smart move for them to make, especially now that the more reactionary Prince Nayef is gaining ascendancy.
Cheers
mhg



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Al-Qaeda, Religion

A Bin Laden Doomsday Tape, Renewable Chicks of Paradise………

     
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“When doomsday rears her ugly head again
And even though you voted that awful man
i’ll never refuse your hand
on any given doomsday or the one and only doomsday
Not in all my wildest dreams it never once was seen
that doomsday might fall anywhere near a Tuesday……” Elvis Perkins

“A doomsday tape made by Osama Bin Laden was poised to be released Monday by his Al Qaeda disciples. U.S. officials feared the recording would be akin to a voice from the grave calling for a do-or-die jihad against the West, a final order of a terrorist madman. Just a day after U.S. Navy SEALs raided Bin Laden’s luxury hideout in Pakistan and snuffed him out, media outlets were weighing whether to air a tape that could boost his legacy as a martyr. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer said he was getting bombarded with Twitter messages from viewers pleading with the network not to air Bin Laden’s propaganda. Blitzer’s colleague Anderson Cooper said he sided with those who had no desire to hear from a hater. “Bin Laden a mass murderer who should never be heard from again,” Cooper said Monday……….”

The media is doing its best to fuck up the aftermath of Bin Laden’s death. All this nonsense about a ‘doomsday’ tape that will somehow set the world aflame is pure horse apples. Al-Qaeda terrorists have wanted to set the world aflame for a couple of decades and have mostly failed. What makes these press pundits think that one more tape will inspire the terrorist Salafis to make that one extra push toward the rivers of wine and renewable chicks of paradise? I say release the tape, if it exists, for it will come out anyway sooner rather than later. Unless it has a shot of Osama and Ayman belting out Auld Lang Syne.
Cheers
mhg

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censorship, Middle East

Arab Press Freedom: Same Old, Same Old……….

     
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Freedom of the Press rankings (Freedom House):
I have my doubts about some of these rankings: for example I think Lebanon (109) has more press freedom than several countries that are listed above it. I am also not sure why the US (22) and UK (29) are ranked lower than some European countries. France is ranked 42. Bahrain (159) has no independent press anymore, and should now be at a lower level than Saudi Arabia (178) or Iran (188), closer to Libya. Saudi Arabia (178) should be lower after now because they just passed decrees and regulations that make a mockery of any concept of press freedom:

Finland (1)- Norway(2)-Sweden(3)……
Israel (62)
Lebanon (109)- Turkey (113)- Kuwait (127)- Algeria (138)
Jordan (142)- Egypt (147)- Qatar (148) – Iraq (151)
As for the rest of the Arab states? The less said the better.

Frankly, I am not sure wtf these rankings mean. In many Arab states the press knows a red line when it sees one and would not cross it. It is called censorship by silent intimidation. How do these rankings account for that?
Cheers
mhg

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