Category Archives: Arab Counterrevoltion

Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab League, Arab Politics, Corruption

Politics as a Joke: Arab Parliament, WTF Parliament, on Electing Dog-catchers……..

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I came across this headline today: “The ‘Arab Parliament ‘calls for freezing (or suspending) the membership of Syria and Yemen.” So I did some research about this and discovered the following items:
 
“Qatari Aisha Yusuf Al Mannai on Tuesday made history by becoming the first Gulf woman to be elected deputy speaker of the Arab Parliament.” Qatari? There must be a mistake: Qatar has no parliament, yet it has this lady as deputy head of an “Arab Parliament”.

Then I visited this site: “Welcome to arabparliaments.org This website provides user-friendly access to a host of parliamentary development resources, such as studies, policy guidance, translated documents, and links to networks and databases. It also serves to highlight UNDP-supported parliamentary development activities, mainly the Parliamentary Development Initiative in the Arab Region……………..”
Then I read this online: “At the Arab League Summit of 2001-Amman, the Arab states agreed to create an Arab Parliament, and came up with a resolution to give the Secretary General of the Arab League the power to start and create the Parliament. In 2004, in the ordinary Arab League Summit in Algiers was the official date where all Arab League Members agreed to send their representative to the temporary Parliament sessions that took place in the headquarters of the Arab League in Cairo, Egypt, with each member state sending four members, until the Parliament is reassigned permanently to its under-construction office in Damascus.”

Then I found one of my own old postings on this funny parliament: “They are trying to ape the European Union, with the false trappings of a “parliament”. They have chosen Damascus as the eventual permanent home of it. So, the absolute tribal monarchs, and the absolute despots who do not allow elections, and those who do would make sure who is elected, are serious about this travesty of democracy. There are about three Arab states that have elections where the rulers do not completely rig the voting. In one of these three states, Lebanon, foreign powers intervene, with help from their local surrogates, to try and determine who wins…….. I say scrape this body that was created to act as a fig leaf for lack of democracy. Saudi Arabia does not allow any elections for anything, not even for dogcatcher (one of my most favorite American terms), student government, or the PTA; yet it has representatives in this “Arab Parliament” appointed by the royalty. The same goes for some other states……”

So all the Arab countries have representatives in the Arab parliament: even Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, and the rest. Saudi Arabia? These countries don’t even have individual parliaments, but they have a joint appointed body that pretends to be a parliament, where the potentates select members. To be consistent, his Arab “Parliament” should freeze or suspend membership of about 19 of its 22 members, from Syria down through Saudi Arabia and Qatar and the UAE and on to Somalia (the last one being the southernmost Arab state). They should also change its name to the “WTF Parliament”.
Alles Klar???
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, France, Iraq, Libya, NATO, US Foreign Policy

A Tale of Two Arab Despots, a Tale of Two Invasions, a Tale of Two NATO Elections………

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“Obama Praises Libya’s Post-Qaddafi Leaders at U.N. President Obama on Tuesday extended to Libya’s transitional leader a diplomatic honor never offered his predecessor, meeting formally with Mustafa Abdel-Jalil at the United Nations and heralding the victory of Libyan rebels who brought an end to the 42-year reign of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi……..”

“Qaddafi Calls New Libya Government a Propped-Up ‘Charade’. As world leaders at the United Nations were embracing the rebels who overthrew him, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi broke nearly two weeks of silence on Tuesday, denouncing Libya’s new interim government and predicting its quick demise once NATO warplanes end their attacks on his forces…….”

Qaddafi is just being Qaddafi: he couldn’t resist crashing the Obama party in New York. He still thinks he can prevail as soon as NATO gets tired and leaves. It is an interesting contrast between two Arab despots that were overthrown by Western forces. Saddam Hussein’s old Iraqi army deserted en masse in 2003, with hardly a bullet being fired against the “Coalition” forces. Saddam himself was found only months later in a hole. On the other hand the Iraqi people did not raise a hand either against or for the invasion.
In contrast the Libyans have had a short civil war which hopefully will not stretch and expand into a West African-style mess. The Qaddafi forces could not actually shoot at NATO forces, since the attacks came from the air, but they did shoot at somebody.
The Iraq invasion probably helped get Bush reelected one year later in 2004. He was reelected because one year was not enough for the American people to realize the costs of that war and the body bags had not started arriving in large numbers. Can the Libyan invasion help reelect Nicolas (Le Weasel) Sarkozy? Yes it can, unfortunately. In recent decades, the French voters have become notorious for talking a good talk and then turning around and electing the worst candidate available. They did that the last time. I suspect they will do so again in 2012.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab League, Arab Revolutions, Horn of Africa

The Arab World’s Second Somalia, or is it Sudan?………

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The Arab World has one completely failed state: Somalia, which is not even identifiable as a state anymore (or Arab for that matter). It has one nearly failed states: Sudan which has staved off Somalization by giving the Southerners their freedom (unlike Abraham Lincoln). Then there is Yemen. As for Yemen? I believe it will become an unidentifiable state, like Somalia, possibly with the South regaining the independence it foolishly gave away in 1990 to join the tribal North. Northern Yemen is truly in danger of falling completely apart, American drones and Saudi war planes notwithstanding.

No, Libya is not likely to become a failed state. It may try to become a failed state during the next few years, many African states that were ruled by long-term despots have headed that way. But Libya is a potentially rich country with a relatively high degree of national identity. Besides, it is too close to Europe to be allowed to fail as a state: who is going to stop all them boats?
Cheers
mhg


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Apartheid, Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, Corruption, ethnic cleansing, GCC, Human Right, Mercenaries

The Orwellian Glory of Bahrain? Khalifa and Winston Smith and O’Brien……………….

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                                           Glory of the nation? 
“Even amid the crackdown, officials insist that Bahrain remains a democratic country adhering to, in the words of Abdulla al-Buainain, a judge, the “rule of law.” (E-mails to the government information office and a public relations firm hired by Bahrain went unanswered.) But the frustration of Mr. Alderazi is evident across the kingdom. The most despised government figure for Shiites, Khalifa bin Salman al-Khalifa, the king’s 75-year-old uncle and the world’s longest-serving prime minister with four decades in office, has become the center of an attempt at a personality cult; his portraits adorn intersections. “Glory of the nation,” one describes him……… Most dangerous, though, is the exacerbation of sectarian hatred in a country that has never really reconciled the narratives of the Khalifa family’s long-ago conquest. No one claims that Sunnis and Shiites ever lived in harmony here. But the country stands as a singular example of the way venerable distinctions of ethnicity, sect and history can be manipulated in the Arab world, often cynically, in the pursuit of power. Programs on state-owned television like “The Observer” and “The Last Word” baited activists as traitors and encouraged citizens to inform on one another. ………………”

This over-ripe Shaikh Khalifa Bin Salman Al Khalifa has created a bipolar society on the island of Bahrain. For many years outsiders, especially Westerners, saw only what they were ‘directed’ to see. Or they saw what they wanted to see. They saw one Bahrain: cosmopolitan, open to foreign business, pro-Western, rulers and their elite retainers speak English, yadda, yadda, yadda….
They did not see “most” of Bahrain. The Apartheid system that kept a majority of the people oppressed. They did not see the kleptocracy that stripped the land the wealth of the small country. They did not see the imported foreign mercenaries from places like Pakistan and Jordan and Syria who helped repress and torture for a fee. Many preferred not to see, especially the British expatriates many of who openly sided with the despots this year, for a price.
I recall some Europeans get nearly teary eyed talking about the last Shaikh of Bahrain (before the son promoted himself to king), how he allowed Westerners free access to the beautiful beach at one of his palaces. Only Westerners, they emphasized: no Asians, no Arabs, no Bahrainis, not even Saudis! I recall that one German, only one European some years ago, who muttered that “you should go outside Manama and see the squalid Shi’a villages”.
Now they have created an Orwellian nation of native informers, just to help the foreign mercenaries keep things under control.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Jihadis, Libya, NATO

Of Libyan Islamist Factions and the American Tea Party………….

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“Those who keep denouncing the Libyan Revolution as somehow not indigenous (?) because it got Western help should remember that behind the scenes the revolutionary governments of Egypt and Tunisia were very much working against Qaddafi, who, if he had remained in power, would have attempted to undermine their experiments in democratic governance. That is, regional and Muslim forces also supported the Libyan revolution. Meanwhile, military commander of Tripoli Abdul Hakim Belhadj gave an interview in al-Sharq al-Awsat that has been translated by the USG Open Source Center. He denied that faction-fighting is going on in Tripoli, said security is fairly good there, and played down alleged conflicts between Muslim fundamentalist and more secular forces…………..”

As I opined earlier here, Libya is going Islamist, much more Islamist. I don’t know yet how much more. The same will go for Egypt, and for Syria when (or if) Assad’s Baath regime falls.
Yes, Abdul Hakim Belhadj denied that there is factional infighting in Tripoli. At the same time, the American (beer drinking) Tea Party denied it was trying to derail the Obama policies. Rep John Boehner, Head, or rather captive, of the Tea Party categorically denied that any rift exists in Washington. One of the Koch brother, allegedly the billionaire masterminds of the Tea Party, responded to a query: ”We ain’t no fucking Libyans….”
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Britain, France, Libya, NATO, North Africa

NATO and the Arab World: Are Happy Days Here Again? When Potentates are Divine and Groveling is Hip…….

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“NATO planes are still in the air and bombing targets over Libya, and Moammar Gadhafi is still on the loose. Nonetheless, NATO is taking something of a victory lap in the wake of an operation that broke new ground for the military alliance……….. Throughout the conflict, NATO has insisted that its actions are limited to supporting the U.N. resolution that calls for protecting civilians and enforcing an arms embargo. But NATO certainly pushed the boundaries, and critics say NATO ended up providing close air support for anti-Gadhafi rebels. To most observers, NATO was clearly taking the rebel side in a civil war and backing efforts to oust Gadhafi. Those critics worry that NATO risks becoming an armed service provider for the U.N. and other allies. That job description is a long way from what NATO still insists is its core, founding mission: to protect its members’ territory and population…….”

A few decades after the last European imperialists departed the Arab world, militarily speaking, they are back. The major, the only imperialist powers that ruled the Arabs for decades are back to their old turf. That would be the British and the French. Interesting that the British leader (a minority leader) comes from the Conservative (Tory) Party of Winston Churchill but he is hardly Churchill-esqu, and the French president du jour comes from the conservative ranks as well, but he is hardly de Gaulle-esque. But they are here in Libya and looking speculatively toward Syria (while completely ignoring Yemen and Bahrain).
 
Mr. Cameron is doing an Allenby, or is it a Kitchener? While the strutting Sarkozy is more ambitious, if more delusional, and is apparently going for a Bonaparte. Maybe Berlusconi is also dreaming of the old Roman Province of Africa but he is a bit late. Now we can say that NATO, or various parts of it, control the skies and the seas and the land of almost the whole Arab World, save for a sliver in Gaza and a very iffy Syria that is also teetering, and parts of Lebanon. Now NATO also controls all of the Middle East, save for these mentioned parts and theocratic Iran (remember that Turkey is part of NATO and Israel is practically an honorary member).

All that because the corrupt Arab system, and not just the League of Arab States, has failed the Arab peoples for decades. There was a time, decades ago, when Arabs were hopeful and had expectations of something better. Maybe they were delusional, but they had optimism and hope. In recent years, they have been reduced to bowing to potentates and absolute monarchs and dictators. It is now cool, nay it is hip, in much of the Arab world to bow and grovel to the potentates. One, or perhaps two, of these potentates are increasingly assuming the air of something beyond statesmanship, more like quasi-divinity, egged on by their all pervasive vast dynastic media that control the Arab skies and waves and the squads of thugs and mercenaries.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, Libya, North Africa

The Right Wing Arab Spring: will Libya Join the New Humorous GCC?………

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“The head of Libya’s National Transitional Council on Monday night delivered his first public speech in central Tripoli. Speaking to thousands of supporters in Martyrs’ Square, Mustafa Abdul-Jalil said Libya would adopt sharia law. But, as the New York Times reports, Jalil insisted that Libya would never again fall into the hands of extremists. We will not accept any extremist ideology, on the right or the left. We are a Muslim people, for a moderate Islam, and will stay on this road. We strive for a state of the law, for a state of prosperity, for a state that will have Islamic sharia law the basis of legislation. Meanwhile Amnesty International has accused fighters of Libya’s National Transitional Council of committing war crimes in their battle to overthrow leader Muammar Gaddafi……….”

This man, Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, has decided that Libya will adopt the Shari’a. He has not asked the Libyan people, he has not ‘offered’ to allow them to vote on the issue. My, and others’, suspicions about these Libyan rebels are coming true. Many of the leaders were minions of Qaddafi until recently. The rest were Salafi and Muslim Brother fundamentalists who were either in exile or in Qaddafi’s prisons. A few among the exiles were pro-democracy. Qaddafi himself espoused some cocktail of Islamism-Arab nationalism-Qaddafiism-Africanism; but like all Arab despots, he was foremost for himself, his family, and his tribe. As they say, the fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree.
The next Libyan regime will be fundamentalist, but not anti-western (nor fiercely independent) as the regimes in Iran and Gaza. It will be more like the Saudi regime, a theocracy that is acceptable to the West. I can almost see the Qatari, Emirati and others dancing a jig of celebration. That is what it will be for a while, until the ruling group breaks up into its warring factions, unless they find a formula to share the pie.
Speaking of all this: the new Libya may become another Saudi candidate for membership of the Gulf GCC. (I know, I know: Libyans probably have about as much humor as Jordanians, which is next to nil, but try telling that to the Gulf potentates).
Then there is Papa Sarkozy and Mama Cameron, or is it the other way around…………
Cheers
mhg


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Apartheid, Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, Bahrain, Egypt, ethnic cleansing, Gulf states, Humor, Occupied Bahrain, Persian-American Gulf

Bahrain Opposition, Jordanian Fondlers, About Moroccan Humor, GCC Potentates, etc………….

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“And they’ve given me a name
The call me the fondler, yeah the fondler
I feel around around around around around…..” The Fondler (Bob Rivers)

Bahrain’s main opposition al-Wefaq “Society” issued a statement saluting Jordanians who protested against their government sending troops and security agents and torturers to help repress the people of Bahrain. Jordan is a major source of “interrogators”, also affectionately and fondly called “fondlers” by some extremely non-affectionate potentates, to certain regimes of the Persian-American Gulf. Jordan is the second source of mercenaries into Bahrain, after Pakistan (and not counting Saudi occupation troops and the foreign mercenaries that the UAE potentates have sent). I am not sure this is a major reason for the Saudi idea of Jordan joining the GCC, but it must have helped. Al-Wefaq notes that imported mercenaries also include Syrians (most likely anti-regime) and Yemenis and Baluchis. (Bahrain’s potentates prefer Sunni mercenaries and they prefer them third-world hungry, unlike the Abu Dhabi potentates who prefer white Blackwater types, and Colombians, and Australians and White South Africans, etc).
I still stick by my “extremely educated” prediction that Jordan will never be a full member of the GCC. It ain’t gonna happen, even if the peoples of the GCC and Jordan are never allowed to vote on this issue (nobody i going to vote on this issue, not even the Moroccan people who are probably more ‘with it’ politically). Besides, my Gulf region needs humor more than anything else these days of grim Salafi ascendancy, and Jordanians are not exactly known for their sense of humor (if any), as I have been at pain to point out here. I don’t know much about Moroccan humor, I assume it is better than Algerian humor (probably no contest here). Both countries may become toothless meaningless “associate members”, just a way to save face for the Saudi potentates from the embarrassment of their desperate invitation.
From a point of humor, Egypt would be the best candidate. Egyptians are almost the only Arab people, nay the only Middle East people, with some sense of humor. Even the 30 years of Mubarak could not completely get rid of it, even decades of the growth of Salafi Wahhabism could not do it.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, Human Right, Libya, North Africa

OFMQ: Old Friends of Mu’ammar al-Qaddafi…………

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“Khalid Saad worked for years as a loyal cog in Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s propaganda machine, arranging transportation to ferry foreign journalists to staged rallies, ensuring that they never left their hotels without official escorts and raising his own voice to cheer the Libyan leader. The day that rebels took Tripoli, Mr. Saad immediately switched sides. Now he works for the rebels’ provisional government, coordinating transportation for its officials and insisting that his previous support for Colonel Qaddafi was just business. “My uncle and my son were soldiers for the revolution,” he said in an interview. “Everyone will be happy now. Everything is changed now. Everyone is free.” As the curtain falls on Colonel Qaddafi’s Tripoli, many of its supporting actors are rushing to pick up new roles with the rebels……….”

Old friends of Ma’ammar Qaddafi (OFMQ) are braying for his blood, as are old foes. His former best pal Silvio Berlusconi, former admirer Nicolas Sarkozy, law-bending-for-money British politicians, assorted Europeans, Hillary Clinton, etc, etc. Only some of the Latins and some Africans seem to have not jumped off his Libyan ship. Interesting how the most murderous dictators and despots are tolerated and accepted by the “international community”, meaning Western governments, while in power, but are quickly set upon by their friends when they topple. As long as they play by the rules of the “international community”, they can continue their murderous rule, provided they can keep it quiet. From Batista to Papa Doc to Noriega to Saddam Hussein to Qaddafi and the absolute monarchies: play by the rules as set by the “international community” and you can do wtf you please inside your domain, as long as you keep a lid on things.
Cheers
mhg


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Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Revolutions, France, Libya, NATO, North Africa

Sarkozy and his Celebrity Philosopher Have a Good War, Hit the Shores of Tripoli………

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“NICOLAS SARKOZY has had a good war. The armed campaign in Libya was the French president’s biggest gamble, the moment he put his reputation, judgment and leadership on the line. France, along with Britain, carried out the bulk of the air strikes. Unlike President Barack Obama, Mr Sarkozy enjoyed cross-party support for the campaign and popular backing at home. The fall of Colonel Muammar Qaddafi ought therefore to yield some domestic reward. Yet Mr Sarkozy’s poll numbers remain grim, and, little more than six months before France’s presidential vote, his chances of re-election do not, on paper, look good. The Libyan air strikes were not Mr Sarkozy’s first armed campaign. He sent French soldiers into hostile territory in the name of democracy in both Afghanistan and Côte d’Ivoire. But his investment in the Libyan campaign was the most intensely personal. Before anybody else, and unbeknown at the time even to his foreign minister, he stuck his neck out and gave diplomatic recognition to the Libyan rebels, whose leaders he met at the Elysée palace at the urging of Bernard-Henri Lévy, a celebrity philosopher…………..”

Now Sarkozy has his own favorite American-Style “celebrity” philosopher. Bernard-Henri Lévy as a Gallic Dr. Phil, or Deepak Chopra, or Jerry Springer, or Howard Stern, et al. I would advise Sarko not to strut in front of a “Mission Accomplished” banner yet. Wait for the dust in the Libyan desert to settle, wait for the Sahara dust to settle. Remember: your old pal Rommel thought he was heading to Alexandria (then Cairo) when in fact he didn’t get beyond El-Alamein.

The French
 are notorious for being skeptic about their leaders, at least they think they are, yet they keep electing snake-oil vendors who almost always have to be investigated for corruption as soon as they leave office. De Gaulle excepted. Maybe they do that so they can quickly get back to their “French” norm and be skeptic about them.
Cheers
mhg


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