A Tea Party in Iran During Ramadan: Religious Repression and Waning Piety………

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Even in the heart of the Islamic republic, fully observant Muslims may not be in the majority. Iran’s police chief estimates that as many as half of Tehran’s citizens eschewed fasting during the holy month of Ramadan, the most recent of which ended in late August, the Iranian media reported Monday. Speaking to journalists at the International Press Fair in Tehran, Brig. Gen. Esmael Ahmadi-Moghaddam said that 20% to 50% of the capital’s population failed to fast during the holy period of contemplation and prayer. Should law enforcement intervene? Not a good idea, said Iran’s top cop. “Police would interfere only when it happens in the public,” he was quoted as saying. Police officers, he said, cannot compensate for society’s failure to imbue proper Muslim practices in much of the population……………

I imagine many people, especially young Iranian people, may have been turned off Islamic piety by so many clerics running their lives. It can easily happen when ruled by dogmatic repressive clergy who take away many freedoms: young people (probably wrongly) tend to equate the repression with Islam. Of course that is as wrong as equating some unique American version of “Christianity” with the Republican (Tea) Party or equating Judaism with the Israeli social Salafis and the Likudniks.
Maybe what they need in Iran is a dedicated intrusive religious police, something like the Saudi Commission for the Propagation of Vice. Then they can crash into people’s homes to catch them eating and drinking, and possibly fornicating, during Ramadan.

Cheers
mhg



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Kim Jong-Qaddafi on the Gulf…………..

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Worried they might return with provocative tales of a populist uprising that just toppled another Middle East dictator, strongman Kim Jong Il has issued a decree to North Koreans in Libya –- don’t bother coming home. The ban was an effort to prevent word of the often-violent Arab uprisings from reaching the isolated regime, illustrating Kim’s concern about potential social unrest at home inspired by the Arab Spring revolutions, according to stories published in the South Korean press. The move has left an estimated 200 North Koreans stranded as country-less orphans. They include doctors, nurses and construction workers sent to Libya to bring hard currency back to their impoverished country, which many say is experiencing food shortages..……..



This odd story is just a reminder that even the worst of Arab despots (there are about 20 of them) are mild pussycats compared to the Kims of the People’s Republic of Korea.

Maybe some of our Gulf regimes can use these stranded North Koreans. The UAE now has a mercenary force led by Blackwater veterans and composed of Colombians, Australians, White South Africans and others. They can always add some Asian flavor to the mix. The regime in Bahrain has been in the foreign mercenary business even longer, they can now add a few dazed North Koreans to their current mirthless mix of Pakistanis and Jordanians.

Cheers
mhg



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Libyan Jamahiriya and the West: Democracy, WMD, and Virginity………

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Back in May 2006, when the West (USA) and the Great Libyan Socialist Jamahiriya were becoming fast friends. Americans were asked a question:
“Libya says it will work with the United States to spread democracy. What do you think?…..”

The answers were “interesting” if not necessarily brilliant:


  • “If we really want Libya to help spread democracy, we’d better give them their (WMD) weapons back.


  • Libya might seem like an unlikely partner, but, given our current international standing, every partner is an unlikely partner.

  • A favorite: “The same thing happened with my boyfriend and me, sort of. As soon as I agreed to give up my virginity, he agreed to remove me from his personal list of state-sponsors of terrorism.

Warning: people in certain places in our region may find this posting offensive. In fact they may not find it even humorous. This includes people in: Jordan, Palestinian Territories, Central Saudi Arabia, and Abu Dhabi, among other places.
Cheers
mhg



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Defining an Arab Kleptocracy: “Sultan’s Fortune is Estimated at $270 Billion”………

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Sultan’s fortune is estimated at $270 billion, which he distributed between his sons prior to his death in order to shore up their political position in the competitive princely arena. The reality is that every senior prince has placed his favorite sons in important positions in the Kingdom .…….. The Al Saud resembles a family business, established in 1932. Ibn Saud managed to conquer and unite the vast territory of the Arabian Peninsula, give it his family name, and alienate, divide, and control his cousins and brothers in order to establish a clear and undisputed line of succession through his sons. After Ibn Saud’s death, his sons, though never entirely united, maintained enough coherence to keep the store running. That is no longer true of the thousands of princes that they produced. As the older generation dies off, the new generation has fallen to fighting in front of the customers. Indeed, with the ratio of royals to commoners now at one to a thousand (compared to one to five million in the United Kingdom), the challenge of managing princely privileges, salaries, and demand for jobs has never been more intense. Royal perks include lifetime sinecures and domination of the civil service, which enable the princes to award contracts and receive commissions on top of their salaries. So the Saudi regime is divided, its legitimacy is questioned …….….

This lady knows her country, but she won’t travel home anytime soon.

The amount mentioned is staggering, nay mind boggling. No wonder the Saudi semi-official media (alarabiya, Asharq Alawsat) call him Sultan of Plenty. If true, he had to earn, loot, and steal plenty to get to the $ 270 billion. Yet million of people of the Arabian Peninsula struggle to find jobs, housing, and the basic necessities of life. The unemployment rate is in double digits (over 30% for young people), millions are out of work and more live under poverty than we’ll ever read about in Saudi media or Western media like the Washington Post. He does not appear on the annual Forbes list of richest people; that covers only normal mortals not princes and shaikhs. His nephew al-Waleed Bin Talal is listed, along with the information claiming that his fortune is ‘self-made’. The folks at Forbes editorial must think al-Waleed started flipping burgers at the Dairy Queen in Riyadh and moved up from there. Just like Steve Forbes. It can’t be stupidity, can it?

Cheers
mhg



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Ahamadinejad Opines on the Buried Secrets of Qaddafi and NATO………..

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Al-Quds al-Arabi from London quotes Iranian president Ahmadinejad that Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi was killed in order to keep many secrets he could have exposed, secret. He said among the secrets were the amounts of money Qaddafi paid to European leaders especially for their election campaigns. He also said the Western powers seek to appoint their own ‘friends’ in power inn Libya.
Now, I am not usually a believer in conspiracies, and I am not sure I buy the idea that NATO somehow got the GCC and other Arabs to ask it for intervention. But when I saw Qaddafi wounded but quite alive and then I saw him dead, I suspected something. Qaddafi, like every leader, carries many secrets. Some of them are secrets about Western leaders. I would have loved to hear of the role of the British government, British businesses, and American banks and Tony Blair, in the release of al-Migrahi (Clinton now claims she wants him re-arrested). His take on the “non raunchy” photos of Condi Rice would have been interesting. I would also be interested in what he had to say about some leaders of the National Transitional Council (NTC). Many of them were his minions. Mustafa AbdulJalil was his minister of “justice”. Some of them are as responsible for the excesses of the regime as Qaddafi’s sons were.

It would have been a positive point for the “new” Libya if he had been tried, with lawyers, just as Saddam was tried for three years. Before being hanged. Then maybe some of these hypocritical Arab media would have slammed his executioners, just as they did the executioners of Saddam.
Cheers
mhg



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Saudi Media Mourn Prince Sultan: Prince of Plenty………..

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Writers
in Saudi media have gone over the top in accolades to the late Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz al-Saud:
 
Sultan of Generosity and Plenty has departed…. Chief Editor of Asharq Alawsat (Prince Salman)

An Arab knight has dismounted. ALL Saudis called his Sultan of Generosity and Plenty…. Mamoun Fandy (Egyptian). No doubt his sons called him that, especially Prince Bandar who got “plenty” in bribes from BAE Systems.

Sultan the Insan (Sultan the Human)…… M. al-Rumaihi

When Iraq occupied Kuwait, Saudi Arabia confronted Iraq initially (alone) and later formed an alliance with 33 other countries….. Sameer Atallah (Lebanese): of course this man lies. Saudi media did not even mention that Iraq had occupied Kuwait until days later. The princes were literally shitting in their thobes until US Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney got there.

I hear tell that Saudi television networks, offshore and onshore, are extensively covering the funeral, not a common thing among Salafi Wahhabis.
They are all princes of “plenty”. They have all looted “plenty” of the resources of the people of the Arabian Peninsula. They all have plenty of progeny who continue to take and loot plenty.
Still, may he rest in peace.
Cheers
mhg



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Condi Rice: a Shower for a Lebanese President, Raunchy Photos with Qaddafi………

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The book recounts her signature diplomatic ventures, including a landmark nuclear accord with India salvaged in a last-minute negotiation and a Middle East peace initiative that came achingly close to bringing Israelis and Palestinians together. She also bluntly assesses foreign leaders. Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, “looked as though he was on drugs.” After shaking hands with President Émile Lahoud of Lebanon, she writes, she felt as if she needed a shower. President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt rejected reform, saying, “Egyptians need a strong hand, and they don’t like foreign interference.” As for Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya, who was killed Thursday after a revolution, Ms. Rice adds details about his well-known “eerie fascination with me.” She writes that he made a video showing pictures of her while a song called “Black Flower in the White House” played. “It was weird,” she writes, “but at least it wasn’t raunchy.”……….”

“Raunchy” is like beauty, it is in the eye of the beholder. Old Colonel Qaddafi was quite a raunchy old man. What innocent poor Condoleezza Rice
was not aware of is that what is not “raunchy” in America is most
likely very raunchy in Libya. It’ll get even raunchier when the Islamists dominate the new “free” Libya. Also, Condi shook hands with the Lebanese
president and apparently he gave her the creeps: she had to rake a
shower afterwards. Maybe he came across as some kind of sleaze bag. I wonder if she ever shook hands with the prime
minister of Bahrain or the President of Yemen or….. . She would need a cocktail of “Raid” and “Clorox”
afterwards.


Cheers
mhg



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Irony of Smug Western Arrogance: Iranian Navy a Danger to the “Persian” Gulf………………….

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While much of the world’s attention focuses on Iran’s nuclear program, Tehran has made considerable progress on another security front in recent years — steadily increasing the reach and lethality of its naval forces. The goal by 2025, if all goes as the country has planned, is to have a navy that can deploy anywhere within a strategic triangle from the Strait of Hormuz to the Red Sea to the Strait of Malacca. Should such plans materialize — and Iran is making steady progress — Tehran would redraw the strategic calculus of an already volatile region. The Persian Gulf is home to some of the world’s most valuable supply lines, routes that are vital to the global energy supply. In the last few years, Iran has invested heavily in a domestic defense industry that now has the ability to produce large-scale warships, submarines, and missiles. Since the end of the Iran-Iraq War in 1988, Iran has largely pursued a strategy of deterrence……………”

The title of this piece in Foreign Affairs is an example of true Western smug arrogance: “Iran’s Navy Threatens the Security of the Persian Gulf”. Something is not kosher about this analysis. The Iranian navy in the “Persian” Gulf, in its own backyard, is considered a danger to peace. Foreign Western navies cluttering my Gulf, thousands of miles (or kilometers) from their home territory, are considered normal, elements to stability. Yet all the major wars of our region in the past four decades were either started or instigated by the West and its regional allies. The Iran-Iraq War (1980-88) was started by Saddam’s invasion of his neighbor, and encouraged by the West and some Arab potentates on the Persian-American Gulf. The Persian Gulf War (1990-91) was started by Saddam of Iraq, armed to the teeth by the West and his Arab allies (his former Arab allies and suppliers whom he turned against). The invasion of Iraq (2003) was engineered by Saddam’s former Western allies and supported by his former Arab allies.
If the Iranian navy is a danger to the Persian Gulf, is the U.S. navy a danger to the Gulf of Mexico? Is the French navy a danger to the Mediterranean?

I hate to repeat the mantra of the Iranian theocrats, but this type of “analysis” reeks of Western arrogance, of  a smug sense of entitlement to enter others’ backyards and own them.
Cheers
mhg



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Irony of Smug Western Arrogance: Iranian Navy a Danger to the “Persian” Gulf………………….

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While much of the world’s attention focuses on Iran’s nuclear program, Tehran has made considerable progress on another security front in recent years — steadily increasing the reach and lethality of its naval forces. The goal by 2025, if all goes as the country has planned, is to have a navy that can deploy anywhere within a strategic triangle from the Strait of Hormuz to the Red Sea to the Strait of Malacca. Should such plans materialize — and Iran is making steady progress — Tehran would redraw the strategic calculus of an already volatile region. The Persian Gulf is home to some of the world’s most valuable supply lines, routes that are vital to the global energy supply. In the last few years, Iran has invested heavily in a domestic defense industry that now has the ability to produce large-scale warships, submarines, and missiles. Since the end of the Iran-Iraq War in 1988, Iran has largely pursued a strategy of deterrence……………”

The title of this piece in Foreign Affairs is an example of true Western smug arrogance: “Iran’s Navy Threatens the Security of the Persian Gulf”. Something is not kosher about this analysis. The Iranian navy in the “Persian” Gulf, in its own backyard, is considered a danger to peace. Foreign Western navies cluttering my Gulf, thousands of miles (or kilometers) from their home territory, are considered normal, elements to stability. Yet all the major wars of our region in the past four decades were either started or instigated by the West and its regional allies. The Iran-Iraq War (1980-88) was started by Saddam’s invasion of his neighbor, and encouraged by the West and some Arab potentates on the Persian-American Gulf. The Persian Gulf War (1990-91) was started by Saddam of Iraq, armed to the teeth by the West and his Arab allies (his former Arab allies and suppliers whom he turned against). The invasion of Iraq (2003) was engineered by Saddam’s former Western allies and supported by his former Arab allies.
If the Iranian navy is a danger to the Persian Gulf, is the U.S. navy a danger to the Gulf of Mexico? Is the French navy a danger to the Mediterranean?

I hate to repeat the mantra of the Iranian theocrats, but this type of “analysis” reeks of Western arrogance, of  a smug sense of entitlement to enter others’ backyards and own them
Cheers
mhg



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Libya and MI6, the Rendition of Tony Blair to Pyongyang………….

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The papers, discovered in the British ambassador’s abandoned residence in Tripoli, raise new and damaging questions over Britain’s role in the seizure and torture of key opponents of Muammar Gaddafi’s regime. Britain is already facing legal actions over its involvement in the plot to seize Abdul Hakim Belhaj, leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) who is now the military commander in Tripoli, and his deputy, Sami al-Saadi. Both men say they were tortured and jailed after being handed over to Gaddafi………. The cache of confidential documents – which included private letters to Gaddafi from Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and key Downing Street aides – was abandoned when the three-story residence was attacked by Gaddafi loyalists in April. ……… London only designated the LIFG a terrorist organisation after Libya said it was abandoning its weapons of mass destruction programme in 2003. The move is understood to have been agreed as part of the negotiations with Gaddafi’s regime that paved the way to the controversial Blair deal……….

I have no doubt now: Tony Blair has been behind some of the most corrupt deals made by, for, or, in Britain in the past fifteen years. I think he ought t be renditioned somewhere, I am not sure where. Maybe North Korea, where hopefully we will never hear from him or of him again. But then again, he may cut a deal with Kin Jong-Il to become some kind of PR consultant or lobbyist.

Cheers
mhg



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Multidisciplinary: Middle East, North Africa, Gulf, GCC, World, Cosmos…..