Category Archives: US Foreign Policy

Iran, Israel, Media, U.S. Politics, US Foreign Policy

Washington Post Editors Join the Lobby to Derail a Nuclear Deal………

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“AS THE Obama administration pushes to complete a nuclear accord with Iran, numerous members of Congress, former secretaries of state and officials of allied governments are expressing concern about the contours of the emerging deal. Though we have long supported negotiations with Iran as well as the interim agreement the United States and its allies struck with Tehran, we share several of those concerns and believe they deserve more debate now — before negotiators present the world with a fait accompli…………….”
Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter

Arab Revolutions, Jihadis, Salafi, Syria, US Foreign Policy

Free Syrian Salafi Army: Under New Management Again?……..

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I use a telltale sign in avoiding restaurants and some other businesses. Whenever I see a large sign over a restaurant that promises: “Under New Management“, I know I should stay away. The larger the sign, the more certain I am. Ditto for other businesses.

Which brings me to the so-called Free Syrian Army (which I originally and presciently dubbed Free Syrian Salafi Army from the beginning in 2011). Of Course some senators and Arab oil princes have never stopped pushing the idea of this FSA, even as it was sinking deeper into irrelevance. They are still pushing for it, even as it has been “Under New Management” several times in the past four years.

Now they, the Arab princes and their Senate pals, want a yet newer iteration of the same old stale now-defunct Free Syrian Army. They want a no-fly zone which the United Nations will never agree to after the NATO deception in Libya. And they want boots on the ground from countries that created, fed, armed, and wed ISIS (ISIL, DAESH). And they want boots on the ground from countries that have no boots to put on the ground. Arab countries that need to rely on imported foreign mercenaries to keep their own peoples repressed.
Can you repeat the same mistakes and expect better results? Miracles do happen………
Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter

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Corruption, Jordan, Mecca, Money, U.S. Politics, US Foreign Policy

New Religion: American Leadership Courted by Israeli Money and Jordanian Bakhsheesh…….

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“Gov. Chris Christie likes to live large on other people’s dime, The New York Times reports. Christie let King Abdullah of Jordan pay for a family trip to the country, which included a stay at a hotel that cost around $30,000. In 2012, Christie flew to Israel on a luxurious private jet loaned to him by mogul Sheldon Adelson, who was also opposing legislation to legalize online gambling in New Jersey at the time. Christie later signed that bill into law………..”

The king of humorless Jordan could only pay for Governor Christie’s hotel and food and booze, Jordan not being nearly as rich as Sheldon Adelson of Las Vegas vice and the Likud. Mr. Adelson is famous for his genocidal suggestion, I believe in 2013 (google it), that the U.S. should drop nuclear bombs over parts of Iran. Republicans, like Democrats, are hungry for campaign money, any money. What else explains why I should suggest that the Washington Redskins be renamed, if anything else, the Washington Lobbyists?

It is possible the king of Jordan was just doing what Arabs traditionally do for guests, especially prominent guests; he was being hospitable, as only Arabs from tribal societies naturally are. The Governor, being a governor and a politician, could not refuse, not such a large amount of money: many people in his state earn much less every year.

The hunt for money is the only great bipartisan unifier in America now: even foreign policy and national security are divisive now. Money is almost a religion: it makes leaders of both parties bow down and pray, not only five times a day as we Muslims do, but full-time 24/7. And not toward Mecca or Jerusalem or Bethlehem. They pray toward where the money is: be it Las Vegas or Tel Aviv or the nearest Mujahideen Khalq offices in DC. The supremacy of this religion was edified and affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court ruling a few years ago (Citizens United vs. FEC).

The monarch of the Humorless Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan could only pay a paltry 20k or 30k for hotels and booze and food, just like a little bakhsheesh, a little royal tip. The King of Las Vegas and Tel Aviv (or is it Jerusalem) can buy these ‘American leaders’ wholesale. Just imagine what it would be like if some of the kleptocratic oil potentates of our Gulf could openly buy some of these leaders, just as Mr. Adelson buys them. Imagine the possibilities: the sky would be the limit……….
Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter

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China, Cuba, U.S. Senate, US Foreign Policy

The GOP Senators and Free China vs. Communist Cuba……..

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Have Yourself a Merry Little——-> Kenny G. Holiday 

Sunday morning saw Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) on one TV network interview blasting the new Obama policy towards Cuba. One of his main objections, one of them, was that Cuba is not ‘free’ and not democratic but communist.
The senator almost certainly was watching himself on a television set made in China at the time. After that he probably made some phone calls in an American iPhone or Android phone assembled in China. He probably went home and had cold drink, kept cool in a fridge made in China. All courtesy of dividends he received from American corporations that are in partnership with the rulers and the oligarchy of China. That is democratic non-communist China………

I forgot other democratic countries the senator and others do not object to the USA having close relations with. Like Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt, Burma, Zimbabwe, and many others. All free and democratic……
Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum                          Follow ArabiaDeserta on Twitter

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Economics, Finance, Globalization, Pacific, U.S. Politics, US Foreign Policy

Corporation Democrats and Globalization from Obama to Clinton: TP the TPP?……..

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“President Barack Obama is ready to buck his liberal base in order to advance the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the pro-corporate international trade deal currently being negotiated in secret by the United States and 11 other Pacific Rim countries……..”

It is the corporations, stupid.
There was a time when it was true that what was good for corporate America was good for mainstreet America. Not so much anymore. Now what is good for corporate America is mainly good for the large shareholders and for the club of CEOs of America in this age of bonus-hunting by management. The real shareholders matter, not the average Jane with an IRA, as they try to tell us on the financial networks.

If you want to know what American corporations probably prefer the ideal state of American labor to be, look at China, India, and some Latin American countries. Well, a mild exaggeration to make the point perhaps, but not by much. A huge lower lower middle class enshrined in a permanent American class society the like of which has not been seen in more than a century.

Mr. Obama is in many ways like ALL other American presidents since Ronald Reagan. He is a corporation president, even though the U.S. Chamber of Commerce strongly campaigned for his Republican rivals (that was just a matter of comparative preference). His party aspires that he will be followed into the White House by the two most corporatist Democrats available in decades: Hillary and Bill Clinton.
Given the country’s well-financed shift to the right, those two might be the only Democrats who have a chance to keep the White House for their party two years from now.
Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

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Caliphate, Iran, Iraq, U.S. Foreign Policy, US Foreign Policy

Across Iraqi Skies: Tactical Partners, Strategic Rivals……….

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“The official said he could only confirm reports of the bombing on the condition of anonymity. While previous reports have said that Iran has provided weapons and equipment to the Iraqi government, the official’s comments represent the first confirmation that Iran’s own air force is involved in the fight in Iraq against the Islamic State. The fact that the U.S. is not challenging this level of Iranian involvement is the strongest evidence yet that the Obama administration sees the Iranian government as a tactical partner………….”

Imagine that: tactical allies. Even if they are strategic rivals to the point where one is trying hard to choke the other with an economic blockade. It is enough to give some of the jingoistic senators and assorted gunboat warhawks, think tank chickenhawks, and others of their ilk acute and permanent cases of erectile dysfunction. And well-deserved, too.

How can they be challenged across Iraqi skies unless the Iraqi government agrees to it? Since, technically, all these foreign warplanes and whatever boots are on the ground are presumably guests invited by Iraq. Technically, at least…………

Cheers

Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

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Arab Politics, Arab Revolutions, United Nations International Organizations, US Foreign Policy, Yemen

WTF? UN to Sanction Yemen Opposition Leaders, Charles and Hollande in Saada………

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“Lithuanian U.N. Ambassador Raimonda Murmokaite, chair of the council’s Yemen sanctions committee, said all 15 members had agreed to blacklist Saleh and Houthi rebel military leaders Abd al-Khaliq al-Huthi and Abdullah Yahya al Hakim. The three men are now subject to a global travel ban and asset freeze. Saleh has denied seeking to destabilize Yemen and his party warned after a meeting on Thursday that any sanctions on the former president or “even waving such a threat would have negative consequences on the political process.”…….. The United States submitted a formal request to the Yemen sanctions committee a week ago for Saleh and the Houthi leaders to be the first people designated…………”

Years ago some politicians in the United States often warned of “world government” encroaching on national sovereignty. They were usually conservative Republicans who were terrified of a UN-type world regime that would interfere in domestic US affairs. Some of them opined that it was part of an international conspiracy to dominate the world. They were considered ‘the crazies‘ in mainstream US media in those days. Now some of them run the asylum show.

Isn’t this exactly what the UN and the USA are doing now in places like Yemen? And can the UN really force various opposed Yemeni factions to follow international dictate on internal matters? And why does the UN and world powers not try to solve other ‘domestic’ problems with sanctions, as in Egypt and Bahrain? 

I have posted here before that sanctioning the Houthis is a meaningless  gesture. Unless it is a prelude to a more muscular intervention against them. As far as I know the Houthis don’t own properties in Europe or New York; they don’t shop in Paris and London, and they don’t spend their vacations in Nice or Geneva. They certainly don’t purchase their weapons from the West; otherwise Mr. Cameron and Prince Chuck Al Windsor and M. Hollande would be as regular visitors to Saada as they are to Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

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Caliphate, Iran, Iraq, US Foreign Policy

The Return of Qassem Suleimani: about Petraeus…………

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“When Islamic State militants retreated from the embattled town of Jurf al-Sakher last week, the Iraqi military was quick to flaunt a rare victory against the extremist group, with state television showing tanks and Humvees parading through the town and soldiers touring government buildings that had been occupied by the militants since August. However, photos soon emerged on independent Iraqi news websites revealing a more discreet presence — the powerful Iranian general Qassem Suleymani, whose name has become synonymous with the handful of victories attributed to Iraqi ground forces. Local commanders said Lebanon’s powerful Shiite Hezbollah group was also on the front lines. Shiite militias have played a key role in driving the Islamic State out of the so-called Baghdad Belt of Sunni villages ringing the capital…………..”

Qassem Suleimani has become like a mysterious military celebrity of the current Middle East wars. According to foreign media reports. He is hard to pin down, except for an occasional sneaked photograph and many rumors in Arab and Western media.

He treads in places where David Petraeus and his various men used to tread, some of them still do. Petraeus was more ‘official’ in his task and in his travels. Suleimani is not: he has been reported in various Middle East cities, from Baghdad to Damascus to Cairo and Beirut. If all that is true, then no doubt he has also been to a few other cities as well, (possibly incognito?). Excluding Jerusalem and Tel Aviv and maybe Riyadh, of course.

Petraeus was the man of the last decade. Suleimani seems like the man of both the last and current decades. Petraeus had to fly thousands of miles in order to be able to tread on those unstable sands. He had to fly all the miles back to DC and Langley to get away from the field (which he did not really). Suleimani and his mullahs live in the neighborhood: he can, and probably does, walk across borders to retrace the footsteps of Petraeus. Much shorter and easier than a march from Hanoi to Saigon.
Does that tell us something? I sure hope so, now more than ever, given the U.S. election results. More on that later………..

Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

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Al-Qaeda, Jihadis, Syria, US Foreign Policy

David Drugeon of Khorasan Group: a Mission Accomplished?……..

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These days we hear of some “top” terror groups and their experts only after they are bombed, possibly killed, in the field.
A few weeks ago the media reported, based on official leaks, that a leader of the Khorasan Group (they are terrorists, not a contracting or industrial company) was killed in a precision bombing in Syria. I tweeted that if he were killed, it will become acknowledged quickly. We Muslims usually don’t deny death: there are certain rites and services that will be observed publicly. As it turned out, there was no acknowledgement of his death back home, which means that he was most likely not killed at that time. So we were told that maybe another leader was hit.

Now there are reports that another leading Khorasan member, converted Frenchman David Drugeon, has been bombed to death in Idlib, Syria. This one is more difficult to ascertain: his family are French, presumably Catholic.

Was he a ‘key bombmaker’ as the officials now claim? Was it leaked so soon in the spirit of the current American popular need for “instant gratification” and the need for a “mission accomplished“? Time will tell, not anonymous ‘officials’.
Cheers
Mohammed Haider Ghuloum

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Arab Revolutions, Death Penalty, GCC, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Shi'as, US Foreign Policy

A Kingdom of Beheading and Crucifixion: Wahhabi ‘Justice’ Rides a Tiger in Qatif………

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“A well-known Shiite cleric was sentenced to death Wednesday by a court in Saudi Arabia, sparking fears of renewed unrest from his supporters in the kingdom and neighboring Bahrain……….. Al-Nimr had faced charges that include disobeying the ruler, firing on security forces, sowing discord, undermining national unity and interfering in the affairs of a sisterly nation. A statement by the cleric’s family described the verdict as discretionary, saying the judge had the option of ordering a lighter sentence. The family said the verdict sets a “dangerous precedent for decades to come. Prosecutors asked for execution followed by crucifixion…………”

Mr. Obama famously claimed last month that he was “proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with allies in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, etc, etc……….” That is what we can politely call doublespeak: I doubt that privately he is really proud of it: no American can or should be.

So, maybe he will get an invitation to attend this execution of Al Nimr, this beheading and crucifixion, in a public square. It is, after all, a moderate Arab execution, carried on by a tolerant freedom-loving, democracy-seeking family oligarchy that is trying hard to liberate Syria (and probably Iraq) for the joys of Wahhabism. And, more important in this case, it is tinged with the aroma of petroleum and lucrative weapons deals and not an insubstantial dose of the odor of corruption.

Al-Nimr was arrested under suspicious and almost certainly phony pretexts, a common practice of Saudi internal security services. His will be only the latest of many executions by beheading and crucifixion in the Kingdom Without Magic. Yet his case sets a terrible precedent: he is an activist cleric who avoided violence and is very popular with the native Shi’as of the Eastern Province. I have heard and watched him in action: he may be the best and most-stirring Arab orator of recent times. Perhaps that dangerous charisma, so different from the distinctly un-charismatic and uninspiring Al Saud, is what made him such a target of their malevolence. No doubt his harsh sentence also somehow fits into the power struggle raging between Saudi princelings over who will inherit the throne and the peoples of the Arabian Peninsula from the current elderly rulers.

Al Nimr‘s name means Tiger in Arabic. It could be an omen: the princes could be riding a wilder tiger than they think.

(FYI: Death by beheading is the method used in the Wahhabi kingdom. This year so far more than 50 people have been reported beheaded by the sword. Sometimes the convict is also crucified, depending on the crime. So the regime must be truly angry with cleric Al-Nimr. The biggest one-day ‘batch’ of Saudi executions by beheading that I know of occurred in September of 1989. That was when 16 young Kuwaiti Shi’as were executed by beheading in the kingdom. Probably all in one day. It was done North Korean style: there was no prior media report of a trial or an appeal. They were accused of plotting bombings in Mecca, a strange and blasphemous thing for any Muslim to plot. Nobody knows what happened to them after that. To this day the Saudis insist on keeping their remains. They refuse to send the bodies, the remains, back home to their families. The dead remain in forced exile among their executioners).

Cheers
MHG

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