Category Archives: UAE

GCC, Saudi Arabia, Think Tanks, U.S. Foreign Policy, UAE

Oil Financed Lobbying Think Tanks of America………

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“Money is increasingly transforming the once-staid think-tank world into a muscular arm of foreign governments’ lobbying in Washington. Most of the money comes from Europe, the Middle East, and elsewhere in Asia, particularly the oil-producing nations of the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Norway, and takes many forms. The United Arab Emirates, a major supporter of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, quietly provided a donation of more than $1 million to help build the Center’s gleaming new glass and steel headquarters not far from the White House. Qatar, the small but wealthy Middle East nation, agreed last year to make $14.8 million, four-year donation to Brookings, which has helped finance a Brookings affiliate in Qatar and a project on United States relations with the Islamic world. Some scholars say the donations have led to implicit agreements that the research groups would refrain from criticizing the donor governments……….”

There is nothing implicit or subtle about it: tis the season now to exchange objectivity for some oil money. Did you ever believe that the princes and potentates of the Persian Gulf states would finance and host Western think-tanks because they love objective unbiased analysis?

When was the last time a Brookings paper publicly criticized the government of Qatar? Don’t we read Brookings-Doha ‘analysts’ peddling Qatari and Muslim Brotherhood policies every day in American and other Western media? Don’t we read almost every day Western ‘analysts’ attached to “think-tanks” in Abu Dhabi and Dubai peddle Saudi and UAE interests and regional policies and positions?

Petroleum money has been making deep inroads not only into the Western political classes, but also in some aspects and activities of academic and research institutions. The trend extends beyond think-tanks and opinion-makers.

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Arab Revolutions, Egypt, Islam and Elections, Libya, MENA, North Africa, UAE

UAE Pivoting: Brothers Karamazov to the Shores of Tripoli……..

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“From the Halls of Montezuma
To the shores of Tripoli
We fight our country’s battles
In the air, on land, and sea………” USMC Hymn

“Egypt and the United Arab Emirates were responsible for carrying out two series of air strikes in the past week on armed Islamist factions in Tripoli, Libya, US officials said on Monday. The officials said the two Arab countries used aircraft based in Egypt. Earlier the New York Times reported that the two US allies acted without consulting Washington………..”

If you have a choice between believing Egyptian (and UAE) officials and American officials, whom would you believe? I’d take my chances with U.S. officials, since they are subject to public and media scrutiny (er, ahem, not that they would lie even if they could get away with it). Besides, Egyptian officials are notorious serial liars, possibly the lying-est in the history of the Middle East.

But the United Arab Emirates flexing military muscle in the MENA region (with help from their little man in Egypt)? The private fiefdom of the Bin Zayed Al Nahayan brothers? As someone who is rude and crude (which I am not) would exclaim: the UnitedFuckingEmirates? The funny country that is 87% composed of imported temporary foreigner laborers and reportedly relies on a Blackwater-advised foreign mercenary force of Colombians and White South Africans and Australians and others to keep order? That is a shocker.

The Al Nahayan brothers are pivoting from the Persian Gulf toward North Africa now. They helped mess up Bahrain by joining the Al Saud invasion to crush the popular uprising and prevent the liberation of Bahrain in 2011. They joined up with French pop-philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy and John McCain and NATO bombers to help liberate Libya in the same year. They helped muddy the waters in Syria in 2011 and convert a popular uprising into a Wahhabi-financed and armed Jihadi terrorist campaign. There are some reports of a sisterly role for the brothers in the rise of ISIS and its Caliphate in Iraq and Syria and back to Iraq.
What Mr. Vladimir Putin should worry about now is if the brothers decide to pivot to the Ukraine and maybe seek to liberate the Crimea. Mr. Obama may have to worry about the brothers Al Nahayan pivoting toward the far east, thus complicating his own efforts at pivoting toward the arms of his Chinese business partners and Kim-Jong Un.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

Israel, MENA, Saudi Arabia, UAE

Will Netanyahu Visit Riyadh or Will the King do the Ghazwat Jerusalem?……….

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“No, the surprising cooperation and doors that might open to which Netanyahu referred, seems an allusion to key Sunni countries in the region, particularly Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. Just a day before the prime minister’s comments, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah issued a statement read out on Saudi television about the situation in Gaza. Incredibly, Abdullah decried the “collective massacre” in Gaza, but did not pin it on Israel………… Abdullah’s words were real-time proof of what American political scientist Walter Russell Mead wrote last week, that “the battle between Sunni Arabs and Israelis is no longer the most important issue on the table for key Arab governments as well as for Israel……………”


The alliance, I called it a coalition, is in place. It has been forming for some time, it was awaiting the advent of Generalisimo Field Marshal Al Sisi to return Egypt to it. Now that the Egyptian Tahrir Uprising has totally failed: he is in place. The Al Saud and their Al Nahayn sidekicks had wanted Egypt back, which they have now bought back. They have also wanted Iraq back (demographically not possible) and Syria back (their chances were ruined by their Wahhabi militia allies) and Lebanon back (demographically not possible).
A coalition of convenience, between arguably the most democratic (it still is, even with the plight of the Palestinians under occupation) and most aggressively militarized country in the Middle East and two of the least democratic countries in the Middle East, possibly in the world (Saudi Arabia and the UAE).

Egypt is now another traditional Arab military oligarchy, its fate sealed with Al Sisi engineering a victory of 97% out of the few Egyptians who bothered to vote earlier this year. The goal: on the one hand aimed at maintaining the status quo of pre-2011, and on the other aimed at pushing back the eastward expansion of the mullahs away from the Mediterranean.
Don’t expect Netanyahu to land at Riyadh anytime soon: no such invitation is likely. If he did, he might bring along a bunch of lawyers with claims to Jewish property confiscated at Madinah and Khaybar some fifteen centuries ago. The Saudi king is unlikely to fly anywhere other than Morocco, or maybe to some medical facility in the West.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

Al-Qaeda, Baath Party, GCC, Iraq, UAE

A Rehabilitation of the Iraqi Baath Party? Good Cop, Bad Cop, Ugly Cop……

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This is not about Iraqis rehabilitating the Baath: most Iraqis would have nothing to do with the party. I mean the outsiders, the foreign Arabs, seeking to rehabilitate the Baath. Seeking to rehabilitate the Baathists as guardians of the ‘eastern gate’ of the Arab world. The good old days of Iran-Iraq War, Desert Storm, Iraqis suffering an international blockade, another long war, and the rest.

There are many former, actually current, Iraqi Baathists hanging around the capitals of absolute tribal Arab potentates and princes. From Manama to Abu Dhabi, they seem to have their uses, be it as mercenaries in the security forces or interrogators or small cogs in the regime sectarian media propaganda of these Persian Gulf potentates.

The Wahhabi crazies of ISIS, the Caliphate of pink Hello-Kitty and female genital mutilation and destroying churches and shrines and chopping heads, are making a lot of noise in the northwest of Iraq. They are definitely the ‘bad cop’ of the terrorist campaign in Iraq (but not necessarily in Syria, where there are too many such groups). So who can be the ‘good cop’ of the terrorist campaign in Iraq? Who else would the forgetful fools in the neighborhood select but the remnants of the Tikriti Baath Party? The logic might go like this: if the Mubarakist remnants, the feloul, maneuvered themselves into aborting the Egyptian revolution of 2011 and regaining power in Cairo in 2013, why not the Baathist remnants in Iraq?

I don’t mean the have-been softened Baathists like Iyad Allawi who are now acting as representatives of the Al Saud and other petroleum princes. No, I mean real true blue Baathists who have now gone temporarily religious for the convenience of it.

So the ISIS and its presumptuous Caliphate is the “bad cop” which is supposed to make the Baathists the “good cop”. Then there are the “ugly cop” in the neighborhood, those potentates who aid and abet it all.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

NASA, Outer Space, Science, UAE

United Emirates of Disneyland: the Potentates Buy a Space Program and Emigrate to Mars……

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February 2014: “”Gravity” is just a film. Imagine a similar real-life scenario: Would there be any chance of survival? That’s a concern for the General Authority of Islamic Affairs & Endowments, or GAIAE, the United Arab Emirates’ religious watchdog, for anyone who wishes to travel to Mars. The GAIAE has issued a fatwa, or an official Islamic ruling, to warn Muslims against a Mars mission…………”

July 2014: “To date, there have been 41 past missions to the red planet, many of them from established space agencies, and only 16 have been a total success. To ensure that the UAE’s mission achieves its goal, the country’s newly established space agency will have to draw upon the lessons of previous attempts, as well as coordinate closely with international parties to ensure there is no room for failure. “The majority of things we’ve sent to Mars have failed,” said commander Chris Hadfield, the Canadian astronaut who was in the Emirates last week to meet officials from the country’s nascent space agency…………….”

Why not? There are rumors that the Bin Zayed Al-Nahayn Brothers who own Abu Dhabi and rule the UAE are planning a vacation getaway for the family on the Red Planet. Just rumors. Some people I know claim, rather hopefully, that the brothers may be planning to emigrate to Mars. Some would have preferred for them to opt for one of the Jovian planets like Jupiter or Uranus. Oh well……

So what have we here? A United Arab Emirates of Disneyland. A continuation into outer space of a trend toward phony culture and science (and politics). Fake Sorbonne. Fake New York University. Fake MIT. All the curricula ‘adjusted’ and watered down to account for ‘local culture’: you figure out what that means. Fake Louvre. Fake Vatican and Fake Kaaba (stay tuned)? Fake Army (imported veteran mercenaries). Fake population (7 million temporary foreigners out of a total population of 8 million). But not all of it is entertaining.
And now? The ultimate in scientific fakery: a fake Mission to Mars. No research and no technological advancement needed, all bought and paid for. It is like when you buy a Boeing airplane: you own the airplane, but you do not acquire the technology (well, you learn how to fly the jet and flush the toilet).

Now what is there they can get that NASA (and maybe others) have not got? Unless they plan to rename a mountain or a famous waterway on Mars after the UAE rulers.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

Al-Azhar, Arab Revolutions, Egypt, History, Islam, Islamic History, UAE, Uncategorized, Wahhabi

Grand Ayatollah of Al Azhar Gets His Just Reward on the Gulf………

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Qatari daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi reports that His Excellency the ‘Great Imam’ shaikh of Al-Azhar went to Dubai last week by private plane. He was to receive the Dubai Holy Quran International Prize (WTF that be). He is reported to have received the award as “Islamic Personality of the Year” as a reward for his efforts in the service of Islam (WTF they be). It does not say if he is rewarded for siding with the military coup that overthrew the elected Muslim Brotherhood presidency of Mohammed Morsi in July 2013, nor if he was awarded for siding with Hosni Mubarak during the uprising of 2011. As I noted in a recent post here, he was bound to win the prize.

This is news to most people, the fact that now Shaikh Dr. Al Tayeb calls himself the “Great Imam”, or is it the “Grand Imam”? Apparently the Al Azhar bureaucracy and its hierarchy are now copying some of the Shi’a (Shi’ite if you prefer) titles like Grand Ayatollah, etc. It is now not too fat-fetched that Dr. Shaikh Al Tayeb will pop out some day with the title “Grand Ayatollah” of Al Azhar, possibly earned from one of them ubiquitous online for-profit theology colleges.

Now what would their Wahhabi allies and financiers in Riyadh think of all this? A Grand Ayatollah leading Al Azhar, just as its original creators of the Fatimid Dynasty had intended? Thus undoing the military coup of Salah El Din Al Ayyoubi (Saladin) who overthrew his Fatimids bosses and benefactors long before Al Sisi overthrew his Morsi boss and benefactor. Saladin did atone for it later by liberating Jerusalem from the European barbarians. No wonder there are complaints, warnings, and fears about the spread of Shi’ism in Egypt. No wonder the military regime and its Salafi and Wahhabi-Liberal allies ban Bahrain activists and Iranian tourists from coming to Egypt. It can be risky. Look, even the recently Wahhabi-ized Al Azhar shaikhs are adopting Shi’a titles now. Soon they might start allowing Shi’a mosques and Husseiniyyas all over Cairo. Who knows, some day we might see Al Sisi playing Shimr, or maybe even Al-Hurr, in a re-enactment a Shi’a passion play about the Battle of Karbala.

And our princes and pals on the Persian-American Gulf had thought their man Al Sisi had come to power and was generously rewarded in order to stop all that.

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

Asinus Asinum Fricat, Culture, GCC, Saudi Arabia, Solar System, UAE, United Arab Emirates

The Arab King and the Functionary: Cultural Personalities of the Solar System including Uranus……..

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“King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has been chosen as the cultural personality of the year by the Sheikh Zayed Book Award team. Dr Ali bin Tamim, secretary general of the awards, said the decision to choose King Abdullah came as a result of his many cultural achievements…………..”

“Last year, Dr Sheikh Ahmad Al Tayyeb, the Grand Imam of Al Azhar mosque in Egypt, was recognised as the cultural personality of the year. An academic and researcher, he was praised for his role in adopting the moderate path and encouraging a culture of tolerance, dialogue and protection of the civil society. Dr Al Tayyeb…………”

Honorable Dr. King Custodian of the Two Holy Shrines has been chosen by Shaikhs Bin Al-Nahayan as the Cultural Personality of the year 2014. It doesn’t say if he is the cultural personality of Abu Dhabi only or of the whole United Arab Emirates (plus Saudi Arabia of course). Or maybe the cultural personality of the Gulf GCC. I suspect he was chosen as cultural personality not only of the Arab World, but of the whole wide wonderful world. To wit, the cultural personality of our planet (that would include our moon as well). Could be the cultural personality of our solar system, unless someone discovers intelligent life on one of our neighbors, possibly Uranus and preferably NOT pronounced the two syllable American way.

As for last year’s winner, Dr. Shaikh Ahmad Al Tayeb of the once venerable Al-Azhar, he was bound to win the prize, given his services to Hosni Mubarak as a functionary of his National Party. And given his political sectarian services to the petroleum princes and potentates in the past two years.

Fasten your seat belts, folks. The fun has just begun. Next year’s almost certain winner will be El Presidente Generalisimo Field Marshal Al Sisi. Surely he has earned it in both Abu Dhabi and Riyadh………..

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

[email protected]

Arab Counterrevoltion, Arab Elections, Arab Politics, Egypt, GCC, UAE

The GCC Livestock Exchange: Cattle from the UAE, Votes from Egypt………

      

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Egyptian media report that 20 thousand heads of cattle have arrived by ship at the port of Alexandria. They are the first payment of a 100 thousand head of cattle grant from the government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to Egypt.
The political heads of cattle arrived suspiciously just after Generalisimo Field Marshal Al Sisi was declared the winner of the election by 97% of the vote. But the timing could be a coincidence, or maybe not. Yet, in the brotherly and sisterly world of official inter-Arab relations, a free lunch is an illusion. After all, the potentates and princes did not give a fig about the Egyptian people when Morsi was president.
On the other hands millions of heads of cattle voters voted for Al Sisi in the election, which gave him a modest 97% of the vote. That is modest by the standards of Yemen, where president general Hadi Al Zombie won by 99.8% a couple of years ago (and it is not true that only GCC rulers and Saudi princes voted in his election). In comparison, it is expected that Bashar Al Assad will win the Syrian election by a relatively modest margin, as he is unlikely to win more than 85% (my prediction).
The Saudi king woke up from his sleep long enough to announce that the election of Sisi heralds a new Arab awakening (he was in a rare mood to flaunt fancy words). Overall the Egyptian deal is not so bad for the potentates: 100 thousand heads of cattle in exchange for millions of heads of…………..

Cheers
mhg

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GCC, Persian-American Gulf, Salafi, UAE

UAE: Suspicious New Emirates Opposition go Deeply Wahhabi and Sectarian……

        

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A “suspicious” new UAE opposition group now calls itself Emirates Freedom Movement (its Twitter ID is @Emirate_Freedom). In Arabic the group are: حركة احرار الامارات . It is not clear how large it is, since locals will be wary (actually fearful) to follow it on the Internet. Most likely it is a small group for now since Wahhabi Salafism has not been popular in the UAE.

It has just issued its manifesto, which is NOT fully very freedom loving or reforming. On the contrary it is extreme Wahhabi Salafi. Some good early goals listed by this group include: release all “reformist” political prisoners, justice, distribution of oil wealth equally….. 

Then the true character of this “opposition” group shows up as they seek to repress and ban “others” with the following demands: 

  • Expulsion of all “enemies of Islam” from UAE. Probably meaning here expelling non-Muslims (Christians, Hindus, Budhists, etc) who are a large majority of UAE residents. The term “enemies of Islam” here seems to mean “enemies of Salafism”. It goes beyond that to take an extreme Wahhabi meaning with their next demand:
  • End all Safawi (Safavi) practices in UAE. Safawi is a favorite Wahhabi Salafi derogatory term for Shi’as (and it is often used by some Muslim Brotherhood types as well). Even the clownish Chief of Dubai Police (Dhahi Khalfan) has used this term in his personal tweets in the past. This means that like all Salafis, and like many Wahhabi liberals from the Persian-American Gulf to North Africa, they are demanding that Shi’a religion practices be banned.
P.S.: Could this group be a plant by the rulers to confuse matters and taint the ‘opposition’? It could, it could.

Cheers
mhg 

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GCC, Oman, UAE

Sahel Oman: Coast of Oman and Rewriting History in the Gulf of Mercenaries…….

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Rewriting history and faking history has become a habit in our native region, especially in the Gulf GCC states. But it is a good thing that ‘facts’ are stubborn, mostly. This week’s political noise about an Al-Jazeera documentary film on the Coast of Oman is a good example.

When we were children growing up on the hot shores of the Gulf (Gulf of Mercenaries? Persian-American Gulf?) we knew about Sahel Oman (ساحل عمان) from readings and from family members. We called the whole coast south of Bahrain and Qatar by one name: Sahel Oman (Coast of Oman). We had student colleagues and friends from what is now the UAE and we called them ‘Omani students’: they did not seem to object. Dubai existed as Dubai, a commercial center, as did Al Sharjah and maybe Ras Al Khaimah. Abu Dhabi existed, but barely. We never heard or read about Abu Dhabi or some of the other emirates. Maybe we were ignorant, but we called the region: Sahel Oman. As did the other Arab media whenever they paid attention to the Arab side of the Gulf beyond Bahrain and Kuwait. In those days Bahrain was were the political action and political news were: even then the people were in constant rebellion against the absolute Al Khalifa clan and their British advisers (how some things never change!). Not much has changed in Bahrain: except for the unwelcome intrusion of Saudi troops and other imported foreign mercenaries shoring up the regime.
Now this recent recent documentary film on Al-Jazeera about Sahel Oman has riled up the UAE (mainly Abu Dhabi), and some of their Saudi allies are also making the right supportive noises. Saudi mouthpiece Asharq Alawsat (owned by Crown Prince Salman) had its obedient chief editor blast the film as a Qatari insult to the United Arab Emirates. The film is reportedly non-political, although the Qataris must have suspected that it would upset up the ruling potentates of the UAE who fancy themselves the heirs of the Greek-Persian-Roman-Babylonian-Umayyad-Abbasid empires (now they can add ancient Egypt through their share of the Gulf investment in Generalisimo Field Marshal Al Sisi). 

 

Cheers

mhg[email protected]