Monthly Archives: August 2011

Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Arabian Peninsula, Saudi Arabia

Saudi Fear and Loathing…….

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      BFF
“THE SAUDI royal family is afraid. Very, very afraid. A crisis of leadership is brewing. The king is ailing and his successor, Crown Prince Sultan, is in even worse health. Their hard-line brother, Prince Nayef bin Abdel Aziz, is set to take the throne. One of the last absolute monarchies, the Saudi family seems to represent all that the Arab Spring is fighting against: closed societies with unequal wealth distribution; repressed minorities living within manufactured boundaries; strong Islamist sympathies across its lands; a latent Sunni-Shia power struggle embedded in the country’s fabric—not to mention a string of surrounding states struggling to stave off revolutions that could easily have a contagion effect.
We should be careful not to count the al-Sauds out. They are among the world’s most proven survivors………………”
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Revolutions, Hezbollah, Iran, Syria

Is Iran Hedging on Syria? Saving Assad from his Party…………….

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“Iran, Syria’s closest ally, called on the government in Damascus to recognize its people’s “legitimate” demands on Saturday, in the first such remarks to come from the Persian country since the five-month-old uprising against President Bashar al-Assad started. Although the remarks, by Iran’s foreign minister, Ali Akbar Salehi, did not advocate any specific changes, they were the first public sign of growing unease with the crisis in Syria — even as Iran has maintained an unyielding crackdown on its own dissenters. Other governments in the region are increasingly worried that the crisis could spill beyond Syria’s borders…………….”

A little late, but not too late: maybe they see something new. This is a serious development for Syria. Iran is the last ally left, other than Hezbollah. The Iranians see the writing on the wall, but the Syrian regime does not. The Iranians worry about a “Libyan” solution for Syria whereby Nato forces (Turks and others) would interfere, with the help and alibi provided by a couple of Gulf states like UAE and/or Qatar (other Arab countries are smarter than intervening in a bloody civil strife). Now if one day Hezbollah surprises everyone and comes out and calls on the Syrians to respect the rights of their people………
Cheers
mhg


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Economics, Human Right, Middle East Women, Saudi Arabia, WTF

Ill-Timed Honorary Degree, 23 Women Awaiting Execution……..

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      BFF

“University of Indonesia (UI) has come under a storm of protests for awarding an honorary doctorate to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, a leader whose commitment to human rights has been seriously questioned by labor activists. The award came just two months after the beheading of Ruyati binti Satubi, an Indonesian maid who was convicted for murdering her employer — a crime she allegedly committed in response to repeated torture. For years, international human rights organizations have criticized Saudi Arabia for its treatment of migrant workers. A 2011 Human Rights Watch report notes that domestic workers from Indonesia “frequently endure forced confinement, food deprivation and severe psychological, physical and sexual abuse”. There are an estimated 1.5 million Indonesian maids currently working in the kingdom, with 23 on death row……………”

Bad timing. An honorary degree just after one Indonesian housemaid was beheaded, and as 23 others are on death row waiting to be beheaded. Sounds quite inappropriate. Some of these institutions bestow honorary, and real, degrees easily on the potentates.

Saudi relations with exporting countries of Asia (countries that ‘export’ housemaids) have been rocky in recent years. No other country in the whole wide world puts so much effort (including diplomatic) in securing cheap foreign housemaids for its citizens homes. Government officials delegations often travel to Indonesia and the Philippines to renegotiate terms of employment of housemaids. Saudi officials often protest laws passed by ‘exporting’ countries that seek to raise wages or generally improve living conditions for their citizens who are housemaids in the kingdom. I believe the official government economic and social policy can be summarized as a Hooverian: “two Asian housemaids in every house, a car in every garage (to be driven only by men)“.
When leaders of these two countries visit Saudi Arabia, the main topic of discussion is……housemaids! (They probably also discuss ‘certain’ security issues with Indonesian officials, given that Salafi religious Madrassas have created a large and influential Salafi fundamentalist community in Indonesia).
Economics, Finance, Gulf states, Iran, Iraq, OPEC, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela

Petroleum Rivalries Turning OPEC Upside Down……….

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“Saudi Arabia’s government spending, flat since the last oil boom in the 1970s, is now rising at 10 percent or more annually. And it will rise faster still: The House of Saud’s survival instinct in the wake of the initial Arab revolutions led King Abdullah to announce $130 billion of largesse in February and March. The resulting increases in government employment and salaries can be cut only at the cost of more discontent. And that’s only what the kingdom is spending on its “counterrevolution” at home. Saudi Arabia will pay the lion’s share of the pledged $25 billion of Gulf Cooperation Council aid to Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, and Oman. With Iraq, Syria, and Yemen likely flashpoints yet to come, the bill will only increase. Already, nearly a third of the Saudi budget goes toward defense, a proportion that could rise in the face of a perceived Iranian threat. Meanwhile, fast-growing domestic demand poses a serious threat to oil-export revenues. The kingdom is one of the world’s least energy-efficient economies: With prices fixed at $3 per barrel for power generation and $0.60 per gallon of gasoline, Saudi Arabia needs 10 times more energy than the global average to generate a dollar of output. Subsidized natural gas, too, is in short supply, undermining an economic diversification drive focused on petrochemicals. As much as 1.2 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil are burned for electricity to meet summer air-conditioning demand, yet Jeddah, Saudi Arabia’s second-largest city, still suffers frequent power cuts………This combination of higher spending and lower exports shortens Saudi Arabia’s time horizon. Usually considered, on shaky evidence, to be a “price moderate” within OPEC, the kingdom now requires $85 per barrel to balance its budget. That figure will rise to $320 by 2030………”

The problem for the Saudis is that long before the year 2030, both Iran and Iraq would have resumed full control of their oil fields. Iraqi and Iranian outputs have been disrupted by thirty years of war and revolution and Western sanctions, but that era of instability will end soon. Both countries threaten to overtake Saudi Arabia as OPEC’s main producer and possibly as ‘swing’ producers. Both have huge untapped resources and unconfirmed reserves (thirty years of instability takes its toll). Then there is Venezuela, which OPEC recently declared now has the largest oil reserves, surpassing Saudi Arabia. It is almost certain that within a decade from now the heavy weights in OPEC will be three ‘ornery’ republics in addition to the Kingdom without Magic.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Iran, Israel, Libya, nuclear Iran

Kim Jong Qaddafi, Kim Jong Iraq, Kim Jong Iran………

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      BFF

“Such sweet deals are no longer to be had in a world where all worker bees, even those wearing medals and epaulettes, with secret police at their disposal, get discarded like used tissue paper after their cost-benefit balance tips to the former. Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega languished in an American prison on trumped-up drug charges for 20 years before being extradited to France; Saddam got dropped down a trap door to the howling jeers of his rivals. One can easily imagine a call from North Korean tyrant Kim Jung-Il to Libya’s Colonel Gadhafi a few years back: “Don’t disarm, Muammar. Just you wait! The second you give up your nukes the Americans will take you out. Saddam disarmed in 1991; now he’s in a tacky grave in Tikrit. What did Milosevic get for attending the Dayton peace conference? A war crimes trial. Look at me. I don’t cooperate. I don’t give in. Sure, they hate me. But I’m holding tight. Living large. Cooperation with the Americans is a mug’s game!“…………..”

Raises a good point, n’est-ce pas. Saddam gave up his weapons of WMD, and where is he now? So did Qaddafi, and he is gone somewhere. Meanwhile Kim Jong-Il, Pakistan, Israel, India, etc have nuclear weapons and nobody is touching them. Is there a message in here somewhere for the Iranians?
(Okay, Israel doesn’t count here, since Israel is a “white” power).
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, Israel, Libya, Palestine, Qatar

Abrams Pissed at Qatar, When in Rome and Carthage………

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“Qatar has acquired a reputation for sharp, quick responses to crises in the Arab world and for modern and unorthodox thinking. It is undeserved. Qatari diplomatic activity is designed to advance the interests of the tiny country and of its ruling family. Its adoption of the Libyan opposition, for example, is not based on any principle (such as liberty, democracy, or free elections), for the Qatari government and its TV station, Al Jazeera, have been notably silent about the crisis in Bahrain. There, they have backed the royal family and the Saudi-led GCC armed presence………Backing the royal family in Bahrain, supporting Hamas but then giving some money to the PA, and financing the rebels in Libya shows Qatari flexibility, but not courageous leadership. What does Qatar seek, beyond influence? Influence for what? ……………..”

Abrams sounds truly pissed at the Qatari oligarchy, but he is right overall about the hypocrisy. I have to agree with him on this one, although it is the Palestinian statehood thing that riles him up the most.
Abrams asks: “Influence for what?” He forgets all about Rome. Long ago, in this galaxy, a small farming community around the upstart town of Rome gained influence and power gradually as it beat regional rivals. Within a couple of centuries, the Roman upstarts defeated Carthage in three (Punic) wars and became undisputed masters of the Mediterranean and half the known world (from Spain to the Euphrates River). Is it possible the Qatari dynasty is seeking to take over the (Persian-American) Gulf? Or maybe they just want to merge with Bahrain (minus al-Khalifa and the Saudi occupation forces, of course). Is it possible they want to conquer the known world? Ich weiss nicht.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab League, Arab Revolutions, Libya, North Africa

Return to Tobruk: Liberated Libya, Lucrative Libya………….

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“The German government made a Transall military transport plane available for the journey, and the mission was headed up by Hans-Joachim Otto, a state secretary in the German Economics Ministry. In Benghazi, where the rebel movement is headquartered, the group handed over aid goods and medical supplies to the city’s hospitals. But the trip was far from just a humanitarian one. The Germans also met with representatives of the Libyan transitional council and of the country’s central bank in an effort to pursue economic interests in the country. The war in Libya, of course, has not yet come to an end, and autocrat Moammar Gadhafi remains at large, likely hiding in a bunker somewhere in Tripoli. But companies from around the world, including several based in Germany, have already begun preparing for peacetime. Once reconstruction begins, business opportunities, they hope, will be plentiful — and lucrative…….. The Italian oil concern Eni, for example, is doing what it can to defend its status as the largest foreign oil producer in the country. Even before the rebels stormed the Gadhafi residence in Tripoli this week, Eni technicians had begun preparing to restart the flow of oil. And Eni has the full support of the government in Rome. Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is meeting with rebel leader Mahmoud Jibril on Thursday. It is France, though, that could have the pole position when it comes to doing business with the new Libya…………….”

The Europeans lining up to get their “fair share” of the Libyan war booty. This time, not only are the Italians back, but the French as well, and the Germans, and others. Seventy years after World War II, European landmines are still killing Arabs (and Berbers) in North Africa. Now their forces are back, some of them disguised as Qataris and foreign residents of the UAE.

The fact that Libya needs “reconstruction” after only a few months of “low level” fighting indicates the dismal state of Qaddafi’s Great Libyan Socialist Jamahiriya. With huge oil reserves and revenues, and only about 5 million people, the dictator could not do even a mediocre job on the economy.
The carnage also indicates something else: the amount of destruction NATO forces have unleashed on Libya.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, Corruption, GCC, Human Right

On My Gulf: The King Giveth and the King Taketh Away……….

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“The national dialogue did express support for a “fairer” electoral system but there are no plans to change constituency boundaries or other mechanisms that preserve Sunni control: one Shia constituency has 15 times as many voters as a small Sunni one – classic gerrymandering. No wonder critics were quick to dismiss the dialogue as a sham. “An exercise in make-believe,” is the blunt conclusion of a new report by the International Crisis Group. And the king, it seems likely, will continue to appoint the prime minister and rely on an unelected upper chamber of parliament to keep MPs in check and his own power untrammelled. And there is no sign that the government will halt its controversial policy of “political naturalisation” of non-Bahraini Sunnis – imported from Syria, Jordan, Yemen and even Pakistan – to fill the ranks of the security forces (from which Shias are largely excluded) – to tip the demographic balance………..”

Of course they will do what it takes. The rulers and their elite retainers and minions have a good thing going: they have their goose that lays the golden egg, at the expense of most of the people. The neighbors, the Al-Saud and Al-Nahayn of Abu Dhabi will not stand for anything resembling democracy in Bahrain. Not now that they have their armed forces in the place.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Human Right, Iraq, Syria

Syria Divided: Arab Spring, Arab Toothpaste………….

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“On one of the city’s main streets, families have still gathered every night on the sidewalks and in the medians for nighttime picnics. Vendors crowd around selling hookahs, popcorn, sandwiches and coffee. Traffic moves slowly as people park cars by the sidewalk and open doors and windows to let music stream out to entertain the crowds……. But Aleppo’s reluctance to join the revolution goes beyond any alleged cowardice. As a financially stable city, Aleppo was already less likely to revolt, and since the nationwide unrest erupted in mid-March, residents have by turns been made complacent by government enticements and scared by the overwhelming presence of security agents and spies. Whereas Damascus is the capital and administrative hub of Syria, Aleppo is the economic center where much of the money flows, said Ammar Abdulhamid, a Syrian opposition activist and dissident in the United States. Many of the country’s factories, textile plants and pharmaceutical companies are in the city………….”

The regime in Syria, just like those in Libya and Yemen, just like all Arab regimes whether dictatorships or monarchies, clings to power. As a Ba’ath Party regime, it is more willing to kill its own people than say, even the Mubarak regime in Egypt. The Ba’ath Party has had a specially dark and bloody history, in both Iraq and Syria. It started as an imitator of Europe’s Fascist “Nationalist” parties, but later acquired socialists pretensions after the expansion of Soviet power. Yet it soon descended, especially in Iraq, to a basically tribal power center (tribal in the literal sense and in the broader sense of a clan or a sect). In that, the Ba’ath rule became no different from any dictatorship or absolute monarchy; only it was bloodier than both other cases because of the mutual mistrust with the people. Neither Nasser nor Sadat or Mubarak in Egypt were ever nearly as repressive as the Ba’ath, nor were most Arab monarchies with one exception (some would say two exceptions).
No doubt the Syrian toothpaste is out of the tube. Yet the shape of the future is unknown. Arab despots are very creative in bargaining with their people and clinging to their power under different, new, guises. And the outside world (especially the West) does not like any change not of its own making. That is why the overall verdict on the so-called Arab Spring is undecided, yet.
Cheers
mhg


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Arabian Peninsula, Human Right, religious police, Saudi Arabia, Terrorism

Saudi Anti-Terror Law subject to Revision? About U.S. Bible Belt Worries………..

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“Saudi Arabia has revised an anti-terrorism law and made it less severe than a leaked version that was heavily criticized by human rights groups, a Shura Council spokesman said on Saturday. “The draft that was published is not the final one,” said Mohammed Almohanna, spokesman for the advisory parliament. “It was discussed in a Shura Council session. It was a draft and some changes were made to it to ensure that the law is compatible with Sharia (Islamic law) and does not violate citizens’ rights or the country’s existing laws,” he said. He said the Shura would amend the draft further when its summer recess ends in mid-September before sending it to the king for approval. Amnesty International, which published a draft of the Penal Law for Terrorism Crimes and Financing Terrorism on its website, said on July 22 that the authorities could use the law to stifle dissent…………”

This spokesman for the Shura Council talks as if it has any power. The Shura is an appointed advisory council, just like the cabinet, and takes its orders from the ruling family. They basically rubber-stamp whatever is sent over by the princes, which usually is not much. It doesn’t matter what they have on the law books, provided there are any: they do what it takes not just to stifle dissent, but to crush it.
On the bright side, they don’t chop the heads of dissidents anymore. They arrest them and throw them in prison for long periods of time, some without charges or trial.
(Also these guys should not mention the Shari’a Law to the Western press. The folks in places like Oklahoma and Tennessee and Texas get panicky and start voting to ban “Sharia Law”, wtf that be in their own Bible Belt context).
Cheers
mhg


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