LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
August 08/2019
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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Bible Quotations For today
So have no fear of them; for nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 10/21-26:”Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death; and you will be hated by all because of my name. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next; for truly I tell you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes. ‘A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the master; it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the slave like the master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household! ‘So have no fear of them; for nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known.”

’Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News published on August 07-08/2019
 Aoun: He who refuses justice refuses a society that cannot live in chaos
US demands fair and transparent review of Qabrshamoun incident
Bassil: Militias Always Resort to Intelligence Agencies and Embassies
Lebanon: PSP Wages Unprecedented Attack on Aoun, Holds Him Responsible for Bassil’s Behavior
President Aoun Says Lebanon Enjoys Security Stability
Rampling Meets Berri, Urges All to 'Focus on Improving Economic Situation'
Parliament Files 'Libel' Complaint against Nabil Karam
Berri: I will never allow any division in the country
Berri Urges Feuding Parties to Show 'Wisdom', Warns over Financial Situation
Dib Slams U.S. Embassy Statement as 'Interference in Judicial Affair'
MP Khalil: New Electoral Law Proposal Pushes for Single Constituency
Hamadeh Says Presidential 'Term Taking Lebanon to Era of Syrian Hegemony'
Chidiac chairs meeting of national team in charge of 'Conference of States Parties to UN Convention against Corruption' activities
Foreign Ministry announces release of detained Hussein Yassine in Uganda
Maronite Bishops: Qabr Shmoun Incident Should be Resolved Away from Political Meddling
Father Najjar shot dead

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on August 07-08/2019
Israel’s Amos 17 satellite successfully launched by SpaceX
Hamas activists arrested in Cairo in probe of bomb blast that killed 20
France Denies Report That Macron Invited Rouhani to G7 Summit
Qatar, Iran Hold Joint Coast Guard Meeting to Boost Field Cooperation
Iran Increases Hamas’ Monthly Payments
Syrian Troops Take Village, Push toward Key Rebel-Held Town
Turkey Says Drill Ships Continue Work in Eastern Med, Another en Route
Turkey’s Inflation Rises
Turkey says drill ships continue work in eastern Med, another en route
Turkey says meeting with US on Syria ‘positive’
Pakistan expels Indian envoy, suspends trade over Kashmir
Taliban claim bomb attack on Afghan police; 14 killed, 145 hurt
Double suicide attack kills 3 in northeast Nigeria: Officials
Sisi Urges All Egyptians to Back Push Against Militants
Egypt’s President Calls for Expanding Cooperation with African States
Jordan's King Abdullah and Boris Johnson hold talks amid Iran tension

Titles For The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on August 07-08/2019
 Aoun: He who refuses justice refuses a society that cannot live in chaos/NNA/August 20/2019
Israel’s Amos 17 satellite successfully launched by SpaceX/DEBKAfile/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
Hamas activists arrested in Cairo in probe of bomb blast that killed 20/DEBKAfile/August 07/2019
Qatar’s Isolation... The Best Is Yet to Come/Salman Al-dossary/Asharq Al Awsat/August 07/2019
Between Two Wars: Yemen and Afghanistan/Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat/August 07/2019
Forty Years of Iranian Intolerance/Denis MacEoin/Gatestone Institute/August 07/2019
Pakistan: Abduction, Forced Conversion of Non-Muslim Girls/Uzay Bulut/Gatestone Institute/August 07/2019
At Historical Sites Around Israel, No Sign of Arabic/Moshe Gilad/Haaretz/August 07/2019
Freedom on the march in Moscow, Hong Kong/Cornelia Meyer/Arab News/August 07/2019
Is anyone in the West paying attention to what is happening in Idlib?/Dr. Azeem Ibrahim/Arab News/August 07/2019

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News published on August 07-08/2019
 Aoun: He who refuses justice refuses a society that cannot live in chaos
NNA/August 20/2019
President of the Republic, General Michel Aoun, on Wednesday confirmed that “the path of reform and counter-corruption has no end and it has indeed started. The Lebanese live today in the arms of freedom, sovereignty and independence despite all the wars and pressures. We speak in the name of Lebanon in regional and international forums for the benefit of everyone, without having someone dictating us or influencing us, but rather being, ourselves, the dictators and influencers.”“Many files have been transferred to judicial authorities, for corruption runs in the veins of several institutions, but we will eradicate it and eradicate any chance of it rooting out again,” President Aoun added, stressing that the message he had addressed to the youth was educational, yet education alone is not enough to face certain incidents like that of Mount Lebanon, which entails the intervention of the judicial authorities that enjoy the right to implement punishments according to laws in force. President Aoun declared these positions at Baabda Palace during his reception of a Lebanese delegation coming from European and American countries to spend their summer in Lebanon. President Aoun welcomed the delegation and praised the importance of the visits of the Lebanese youth abroad to Lebanon, indicating that they represent the pulse of the Lebanese abroad, carrying Lebanon in their hearts wherever they go. President Aoun emphasized the “importance of maintaining loyalty to the countries that embraced our people, without that standing in the way of attachment to one’s homeland and to one’s roots. We share values with these countries and cooperate with the United Nations, despite the existence of some political conflicts, which will eventually fade, so that only truth prevails.
“We turn to the United Nations each year to defend essential matters. This time, a big event will enter the history of Lebanon, for the UN will vote on September the 13th on a project we’ve proposed that is of utter importance to Lebanon and to the world, and it contributes to establishing peace. It is the founding of ‘The Human Academy for Convergence and Dialogue’. Formerly, peace was only on paper, and that is why it was always fragile and defeated. The peace that we call for is a peace stemming from the heart, based on knowing and understanding others no matter their nationality, sect, or ideology. Peace education must therefore prevail, and that will be possible by graduating students from this academy. As such, Lebanon remains loyal to his ancient history and diverse components. You can help us through promulgating this concept and this academy. You can also teach there at a later stage,” he said.
Concerning Lebanon spreading peace education at a time where some parties still don’t believe in peace and tend to cut roads and prevent ministers visiting Lebanese regions, the President of the Republic said that “the aim of the message I’ve addressed to our youth a while ago is teaching those who lack this education, and if they had acted upon its essence, there would not have been in any kind of problem. Certainly, no one needs a “special permission” to roam his own country, and he who refuses justice, refuses a society that cannot live in chaos. Hence, the messages we send from time to time are educational, but that which happened has judicial consequences and it has gone down as such because teaching alone is not enough, and judicial authorities are needed because they have the prerogative of punishment according to the laws in force. So, do not fear, for the situation is being controlled. Violations shall be punished at occurrence, for even in the developed societies, austerity is used in handling violations.”
He also mentioned that “it also requires raising many generations on a new hierarchy of values based on loyalty to one’s country and working for its sake, not on stealing needs. Thus, it is an obligation to raise people towards sound thinking in the society and moral immunity, and I hope that the young generations carry on what we have started.”
Following that, Baabda Palace witnessed a series of political and social meetings, the focus of which was the recent developments and how to tackle them. Within this framework, President Aoun received head of National Dialogue Party, Member of Parliament Fouad Makhzoumi and had a developments-related round of talks with him, which included the current issues. After the meeting, MP Makhzoumi said,” We reconfirmed the necessity of setting an economic plan and vision for the coming years, especially that the International Bank and international economic bodies are waiting on us for a lot, let alone the promises of the donor countries in CEDRE to achieve real structural reforms in the economy.” He also called for the “approval of the 2020 budget at the specified date and with the required reforms.”President Aoun also addressed political developments with former Minister Naji Boustani who said after the meeting, “The situation is critical and requires everyone taking responsibility. His Excellency the President, entrusted over the stability that holds together the rule of law and institutions, and dedicated to the country with all its components, co-existence, and civic peace, has spared no effort to handle the situation while keeping these invariables untouched.”

US demands fair and transparent review of Qabrshamoun incident
Georgi Azar/Annahar/ August 08/2019
On June 30, Progressive Socialist Party loyalists clashed with the convoy of Lebanese Democratic Party Minister Salah al Gharib, killing two of his bodyguards.
BEIRUT: The U.S called for a "fair and transparent judicial review" of the deadly Qabrshamoun incident "free of political interference," as the crisis continues to mire internal Lebanese politics. "The United States supports fair and transparent judicial review without any political interference," a statement by the embassy said, adding that "any attempt to use the tragic June 30 event in Qabr el-Shamoun to advance political objectives should be rejected."
On June 30, Progressive Socialist Party loyalists clashed with the convoy of Lebanese Democratic Party Minister Salah al Gharib, killing two of his bodyguards. The case has been referred to the Military Tribunal, which is now tasked with handing down punishment. The PSP has accused the Free Patriotic Movement, which is allied with the LDP, of piling pressure on the judges presiding over the case. "The US has conveyed in clear terms to Lebanese authorities our expectation that they will handle this matter in a way that achieves justice without politically motivated inflammation of sectarian or communal tensions," the statement concluded.

Bassil: Militias Always Resort to Intelligence Agencies and Embassies
Naharnet/August 07/2019
Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil on Wednesday launched a vitriolic attack on political rivals, describing them as anti-state “militias.”“They built their castles with extortion money and the state's money and from selling arms and drugs and yet they're accusing us of corruption,” Bassil said during an FPM ceremony. “Militias are always linked to foreign forces, they gather and ally against the state and they always resort to intelligence agencies and embassies,” Bassil added, in an apparent jab at the Progressive Socialist Party and the U.S. embassy in Lebanon. The U.S. embassy had earlier in the day issued a statement in which it stressed that “any attempt to use the tragic June 30 event in (Qabrshmoun) to advance political objectives should be rejected.”“We will not allow a Druze-Christian problem in Mt. Lebanon and we are working steadily for partnership and we won’t back down no matter how much lies they spread,” Bassil added. Referring to the Qabrshmoun incident, Bassil said “the road was blocked and an attack occurred against ministers and MPs visiting their regions and people.”“The facts are clear and any military, judicial or criminal judiciary will not be able to evade them,” he added. “We will not take permission from anyone to enter into our houses in Mount Lebanon and we will not tolerate the presence of feudal fiefdoms,” Bassil went on to say. “Today you are witnessing the approach of the militia versus the approach of the state,” he added.

Lebanon: PSP Wages Unprecedented Attack on Aoun, Holds Him Responsible for Bassil’s Behavior
Beirut - Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
The Progressive Socialist Party (PSP) accused a team affiliated with Lebanese President Michel Aoun, in addition to ministers and judges close to him, of attempting to fabricate and falsify a judicial file against the party, related to the armed dispute that took place in Aley on June 30.
The dispute broke out as PSP supporters were protesting against Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil’s visit to the Aley district of Mount Lebanon. Protesters blocked the passage of State Minister for the Displaced Saleh al-Gharib’s motorcade and the two sides exchanged fire, which led to the killing of two of the minister’s companions. The Cabinet has been paralyzed since then. Bassil is Aoun’s son-in-law and head of the Free Patriotic Movement that was founded by the president. In a news conference on Tuesday, Industry Minister Wael Abou Faour, who is a member of the PSP, held Bassil fully responsible for the deadly shootout. He added that had it not been for Bassil’s visit to Aley on that day and his “provocative speech,” the clashes between PSP supporters and bodyguards in the convoy of Gharib would not have happened. Gharib belongs to the PSP’s rival Druze party, the Lebanese Democratic Party, headed by MP Talal Arslan. PSP leader Walid Jumblatt tweeted: “We, in the party, together with a lot of friends, will persevere against the systematic terror practiced by some of those pretending to be ruling.”They “live in the dark past, which is based on the approach of elimination wars,” he added. Addressing Aoun, Abou Faour said: “Do you realize the magnitude of the risks facing Lebanon and its civil and political stability in the wake of your political heir’s destructive and fanatical discourse?”He added: “We frankly hold the president [of the FPM] Minister Jebran Bassil morally, politically and legally accountable for the incident from A to Z.”

President Aoun Says Lebanon Enjoys Security Stability
Beirut - Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
President Michel Aoun has stressed that the Lebanese are always capable of rising after setbacks. "History has shown that we are always able to rise after regression," the president said Tuesday. "Our country may be going through a difficult time, but this is also the case in many other countries," he indicated. Lebanon “enjoys security stability,” Aoun said. Aoun made these remarks during his meeting at Baabda presidential palace with a delegation from the Maronite Diaspora Foundation. Meanwhile, Lebanese army commander General Joseph Aoun said Tuesday that the military was carrying out its role in protecting the country and maintaining security on the border despite challenges. The general praised the role of the army in the Fajr al-Joroud offensive against ISIS militants on the Lebanese-Syrian border in August 2017. His remarks came during the inauguration of the Lebanese army square and martyrs of terrorism road in northeastern Lebanon’s border town of al-Qaa.

Rampling Meets Berri, Urges All to 'Focus on Improving Economic Situation'
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 07/2019
British Ambassador to Lebanon Chris Rampling held talks Wednesday with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri after which he called on all Lebanese parties to “focus on improving the economic situation.”“We discussed political and economic developments of recent weeks, which concerned us both. Lebanon’s stability is a priority for us and I hope that all will now focus on improving the economic situation,” said Rampling after the meeting. “The ratification by Parliament of the government’s 2019 budget was an important first step, but there is much to be done,” the ambassador added.

Parliament Files 'Libel' Complaint against Nabil Karam
Naharnet/August 07/2019
Lebanon's parliament has filed a libel complaint against Nabil Karam, the owner of a downtown Beirut building sold in a controversial deal to the 'touch' mobile network operator, accusing him of making insulting remarks against lawmakers during a TV appearance, the National News Agency reported on Wednesday. MP Jamil al-Sayyed had also filed a complaint against Karam for “making insulting remarks against deputies” during the interview on al-Jadeed TV station. Sayyed said Karam was defending a "suspicious" deal under which 'touch' purchased the building to turn it into its new headquarters in the capital.

Berri: I will never allow any division in the country
NNA -Wed 07 Aug 2019
House Speaker, Nabih Berri, said on Wednesday that political, security and financial stability is the responsibility of all parties, stressing that he will never allow any division or disintegration in the country. Visiting deputies within the weekly "Wednesday Gathering" relayed Speaker Berri's emphasis on the need for having a comprehensive and inclusive reconciliation in the context of the Aley's Qabr Shmoun incident, in preparation for holding the cabinet meetings. As per the Speaker, the ongoing tension and escalation did not serve the interests of the country, calling on all parties concerned to be aware of the delicate situation in the country, notably that he has ceased his political initiative to contain the fallout from the Qabr Shmoun incident. On the other hand, Berri met with former MP Imad El Hout, with talks reportedly touching on the general situation. Berri also met with British Ambassador to Lebanon, Chris Rampling, with talks touching on the recent political and economic developments in the country. On emerging, Ambassador Rampling said "We discussed political and economic developments of recent weeks, which concerned us both," adding "Lebanon's stability is a priority for us and I hope that all will now focus on improving the economic situation.""The ratification by Parliament of the government's 2019 budget was an important first step, but there is much to be done," Rampling said.

Berri Urges Feuding Parties to Show 'Wisdom', Warns over Financial Situation
Naharnet/August 07/2019
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri on Wednesday called on political parties bickering over the Qabrshmoun incident to show “awareness and wisdom,” as he issued a warning over the country’s financial situation.
Speaking to lawmakers during the weekly Ain el-Tineh meeting, Berri said he “will not allow anything that might divide the Lebanese or tear up the country.”“Everyone must seek political, security and financial stability, especially that the global financial institutions are monitoring the situation in Lebanon with some sort of cautiousness and concern,” Berri added.Turning to the Qabrshmoun crisis, the Speaker called for a “full and comprehensive reconciliation,” reassuring that “there is no need for the current panic in the country, which would dissipate once the cabinet convenes.”Suggesting that the Cabinet should not discuss the Qabrshmoun incident without a prior agreement among the parties, Berri said “any initiative requires the consensus of all parties concerned.”The Speaker also told the MPs that his latest initiative had made major progress and that all parties had expressed acceptance before it ran into a deadlock due to some stances.Confirming that he has decided to suspend his initiative, Berri urged the political parties to show “more awareness and wisdom towards the worrisome situations that the country is going through.”

Dib Slams U.S. Embassy Statement as 'Interference in Judicial Affair'
Naharnet/August 07/2019
MP Hikmat Dib of the Strong Lebanon bloc on Wednesday criticized a statement issued by the U.S. embassy in Beirut regarding the political spat over the Qabrshmoun incident. “The U.S. embassy’s interference regarding the Qabrshmoun incident is aimed at protecting a certain side,” Dib said in a phone interview with al-Mayadeen television, apparently referring to the Progressive Socialist Party. “The U.S. embassy statement is deplorable, especially that it is interfering in a judicial affair,” Dib added. “We believe that the picture became clearer after the U.S. embassy interfered in favor of a certain party,” the MP went on to say. He also stressed that the statement will not affect the judiciary’s investigations into the incident. The embassy statement said that the United States “supports fair and transparent judicial review without any political interference.” “Any attempt to use the tragic June 30 event in Qabr el-Shamoun to advance political objectives should be rejected. The U.S. has conveyed in clear terms to Lebanese authorities our expectation that they will handle this matter in a way that achieves justice without politically motivated inflammation of sectarian or communal tensions,” the statement added.

MP Khalil: New Electoral Law Proposal Pushes for Single Constituency
Naharnet/August 07/2019
MP Anwar al-Khalil said on Wednesday that a new parliamentary election law proposed by the Development and Liberation bloc makes Lebanon one electoral constituency. “The new law proposal would achieve validity and credibility of representation away from the mishaps of the previous law because it is non-sectarian and guarantees broad national representation,” said Khalil. He said “presenting it two years in advance before the next parliamentary elections gives everyone enough time to discuss and weigh it better.” Speaker Nabih Berri had tasked a mini-panel of the Development and Liberation bloc composed of MPs Khalil, Hani Qobeisi and Ibrahim Azar to register a new electoral law proposal in the General Secretariat of the Parliament to take its legal course. “The new law suggests making Lebanon a single electoral district not 15 constituencies as in the previous law, distributes seats equally between Christians and Muslims in accordance with the Constitution, adopts proportional system abolishing the preferential vote, raises the number of deputies to 134 by increasing 6 seats for expatriates and setting a mandatory quota for women deputies, reducing the voting age to 18 years,” said Khalil. In 2018, Lebanon held its legislative elections based on a new electoral law adopted in 2017 that provides a proportional representation system for the first time in the history of the country.

Hamadeh Says Presidential 'Term Taking Lebanon to Era of Syrian Hegemony'
Naharnet/August 07/2019
Progressive Socialist Party MP Marwan Hamadeh said on Wednesday that the presidential term of President Michel Aoun “takes Lebanon back to the time of the Syrian hegemony," the Saudi Asharq al-Awsat daily reported on Wednesday. Hamadeh said it was “unfortunate how the (presidential) term has placed Lebanon on the brink of political and economic bankruptcy. This term takes us back to the Syrian hegemony over Lebanon,” he said in an interview with the daily. Hamadeh said there was “coordination” between Syria, the Free Patriotic Movement and Hizbullah in order to implement Hizbullah’s agenda in Lebanon. “There is a line that runs between al-Muhajireen Palace (in Damascus), to Mirna al-Shalouhi (FPM headquarters) to Haret Hreik (Hizbullah’s bastion) where everyone abides by Hizbullah’s agenda,” said Hamadeh. “What do they want? What are they doing to this country? Do they want to wage a cancellation war against (ex-MP and Druze leader) Walid Jumblat, the Druze community and the Mountain Reconciliation?” he asked, stressing that the Mountain Reconciliation was “firm and reinforced.”

Chidiac chairs meeting of national team in charge of 'Conference of States Parties to UN Convention against Corruption' activities
NNA - Wed 07 Aug 2019
Minister of State for Administrative Development Affairs, Dr May Chidiac, on Tuesday chaired the first meeting of the national team in charge of the activities of the Conference of the States Parties to the United Nations Convention against Corruption. The meeting was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Justice, the Ministry of Interior and Municipalities, Bank of Lebanon, Special Investigation Commission and the Ministry of Administrative Development. The meeting aimed to discuss means to empower the national team to enable it to carry out its tasks in a way that serves Lebanon's obligations under the UN Convention and the anti-corruption agenda. Discussions also reportedly touched on the available means and tools that would enhance coordination and preparation of Lebanon's participation in relevant international conferences. Minister Chidiac said that they agreed on specific points which would help attain the desired goals.

Foreign Ministry announces release of detained Hussein Yassine in Uganda
NNA -Wed 07 Aug 2019
Foreign and Emigrants Ministry on Wednesday announced that its efforts yielded success in releasing the Lebanese Hussein Mahmoud Yassin, who was detained with his brother-in-law Ali Hussein Yassin in Uganda.  Yassin will arrive in Beirut on Thursday morning, while Ali is to be released shortly.

Maronite Bishops: Qabr Shmoun Incident Should be Resolved Away from Political Meddling
Kataeb.org/August 07/2019
The Council of Maronite Bishops on Wednesday called on the government to resolve the Qabr Shmoun incident with the competent judiciary without any political meddling. During their monthly meeting, the Council prompted co-existence incited by the historical Christian-Druze reconciliation.
“We hope that the Parliament rectifies the flaws and economic and financial gaps when taking up the budget following the political approach,” the statement noted. “The government should reconcile to solve this current crisis in order for the adoption of the audit of previous years' financial accounts and to jump-start the productive economy,” it added.

Father Najjar shot dead
NNA -Wed 07 Aug 2019
Father Elie Najjar (of the Antonine Maronite Order), president of the municipality of Mar Chaaya-Mzakkeh Broumana, was found dead in his room at the monastery, with a visible gun wound to his head, according to the NNA correspondent. Security services rushed to the scene and opened an investigation into the incident.

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on August 07-08/2019
Israel’s Amos 17 satellite successfully launched by SpaceX
DEBKAfile/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
The Amos 17 communications satellite was boosted by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida, early Wednesday. The successful launch into orbit over the Africa continent came three years after Amos 6 was destroyed by an explosion on the Falcon launch pad. This time, SpaceX was extra careful and delayed the launch of Amos 17 for three days over a suspected malfunction in the rocket engines. DEBKAfile: This communications satellite will supply Israel’s intelligence services with data on Iran after a three-year gap during which they made do with makeshift technical devices.The $250m satellite built by Boeing is now operating autonomously and due to reach a point 36,000km above the earth’s surface in 11 days.

Hamas activists arrested in Cairo in probe of bomb blast that killed 20
موقع دبيكا/القضاء المصري يحقق مع نشطاء من حركة حماس في ملف التفجير الأخير الذي أوقع 20 قتيلاً في القاهرة
DEBKAfile/August 07/2019
Egypt’s General intelligence director Gen. Abbas Kamel is leading the investigation into suspicions that Hamas undercover agents were involved in setting up the Aug. 4 blast on a Cairo road that left 20 people dead and 47 injured. A vehicle packed with explosives crashed into three cars and exploded outside the National Cancer Institute, which along with other buildings was badly damaged by the blast. The Egyptian government declared the major incident a terrorist attack, attributing it at first to the Hasm underground of the Muslim Brotherhood. When the horrific scale of the explosion came to light, Hamas issued a hasty statement disowning responsibility for planning or executing the crime. However, DEBKAfile can report exclusively from its intelligence sources that on Wednesday, Aug. 8, the Egyptian inquiry took a new turn. Suspicion fell on Hamas intelligence agents operating in Cairo of involvement in the attack – or at least maintaining close ties with the perpetrators. Security officers thereupon began rounding up Hamas agents, including the high-ranking Sami Saleh. If the Palestinian terrorist Hamas organization that rules the Gaza Strip is proved to have been implicated in the Cairo bombing, there will be broad repercussions. The El-Sisi regime’s attitude towards Hamas will be affected and it may lose its standing in one of the few Arab capitals willing to truck with the Palestinian extremists. This will bear on the Israel-Hamas ratio in view of Egypt’s proactive efforts as a go-between for achieving a truce in Gaza.
The timing of the Cairo atrocity may be significant. It occurred a few days after a senior Hamas delegation headed by its deputy chief Saleh Al-Arouri returned from Tehran after being received with full honors by high IRGC officials. Arouri has a permanent office in Beirut, from which he pulls the strings of the organization’s terrorist operations in the region, including Israel. President Abdel-Fatteh El-Sisi delivered an unusual speech to the nation on Wednesday night in which he stressed that it is the duty of every Egyptian to back the government in its efforts to defeat the terrorists.

France Denies Report That Macron Invited Rouhani to G7 Summit
Paris- Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
French President Emmanuel Macron has not invited Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to the G7 summit to be held in Biarritz later this month, a French diplomatic source said on Wednesday. The official was responding to a report that Macron had invited Rouhani to the G7 meeting in Biarritz at the end of August to meet US President Donald Trump. Rouhani rejected the proposal, according to the report. Rouhani said last week that Iran was ready for the worst in an uphill struggle to salvage its nuclear deal struck with world powers such as France but which has been abandoned by the United States.

Qatar, Iran Hold Joint Coast Guard Meeting to Boost Field Cooperation
Dammam - Asharq Al-Awsat/Monday, 5 August, 2019
The 15th joint coast guard meeting between Iran and Qatar was held Sunday in Tehran to develop field cooperation and boost bilateral good-neighborly relations, according to Iranian media. The Iranian side was headed by Border Guard Commander Brigadier General Ghasem Rezaei and the Qatari delegation was headed by Lieutenant Colonel Abdulaziz Ali al-Mohannadi, assistant director-general of the country’s Coasts and Borders Security, according to IRNA. Ties between Iran and Qatar have been bolstered since the GCC decided to boycott Doha in June 2017 after accusing it of supporting terrorism. Last week, Tehran also received UAE Coast Guard Commander Brigadier General Mohammed Ali Musleh al-Ahbabi to discuss means of enhancing border security between the two countries. The two sides signed on Thursday a maritime border cooperation deal and agreed to hold meetings to discuss border cooperation every six months. Qatar-funded media has launched a propaganda campaign against UAE's effort to hold border cooperation talks with Iran. It exploited UAE's move to disrupt the Gulf alliance despite the official announcement by Abu Dhabi that its talks with Iran were routine and didn’t reflect any shift in regional policy.

Iran Increases Hamas’ Monthly Payments
Ramallah- Kifah Zboun/Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
Iran has agreed to increase Hamas’ monthly payments in exchange for “information about Israel’s missile capabilities,” an Israeli report said on Tuesday. The Israeli Channel 12 said that Iranian leader Ali Khamenei, during a recent meeting in Tehran with nine Hamas officials, expressed his readiness to raise the movement’s monthly allocated financial support to $30 million. Iran has long provided financial support to Hamas, but has decreased it sharply in recent years because of differences over the Syrian crisis. The new Iranian support is a powerful boost to Hamas, which is suffering a severe financial crisis in the Gaza Strip and elsewhere in the West Bank and abroad. Over the past few years, Hamas and Iran have rebuilt their ties through Hezbollah’s interventions in Lebanon. Tehran resumed limited support for the group before deciding to increase it, following a visit by a Hamas delegation to Tehran two weeks ago.
The Israeli Channel 12 said that during these meetings, Tehran asked Hamas to provide intelligence information about the locations of Israel’s missile stocks. Hamas members said they would deliver the request to their leaders in Gaza. The movement has also reportedly asked Iran to launch a mediation with the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, after their relations deteriorated during the Syrian crisis. According to a Haaretz report last week, Israeli intelligence officials believe Hamas and Iran have agreed to open a front against Israel from the Gaza Strip in the event of war with Iran’s allies on the northern border. Hamas and Islamic Jihad would try to force Israel to divert forces and air defense systems to the south from the northern front, a senior Israeli defense official was quoted by Haaretz as saying.

Syrian Troops Take Village, Push toward Key Rebel-Held Town
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/August 07/2019
Syrian state-run media say government forces have captured a northwestern village and are getting closer to the town of Kfar Zeita, which has been held by insurgents since 2012. The government-controlled Syrian Central Military Media said on Wednesday that troops captured Arbaeen the night before, following intense clashes with al-Qaida-linked militants. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, confirmed that Arbaeen was taken, adding that "regime forces are at the gates" of Kfar Zeita. Kfar Zeita is one of the largest towns in the northern parts of Hama province. It lies on the edge of Idlib, the last remaining major rebel stronghold in the country. On Monday, the Syrian army announced it's resuming an offensive on the rebel-held northwest, accusing insurgents of violating the latest truce there.

Turkey Says Drill Ships Continue Work in Eastern Med, Another en Route
Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
Two Turkish drill ships are continuing operations in the eastern Mediterranean and another ship will join them this month, Energy Minister Fatih Donmez said, as a dispute over natural resources there fuels tensions between Turkey and Cyprus.EU member Cyprus and Turkey have argued for years regarding the ownership of fossil fuels in the eastern Mediterranean, where Ankara says Turkish Cypriots are entitled to a share of the resources. Turkey rejects agreements the internationally recognized Cypriot government has reached with other Mediterranean states on maritime economic zones. Turkey has sent two drilling ships, Fatih and Yavuz, as well as an exploration vessel, to operate in waters off the divided island of Cyprus, prompting accusations from Greece that it is undermining security in the region. Aboard the Yavuz drill ship, off the northeastern coast of Cyprus, Donmez told reporters that a second exploration vessel would begin work in the area by the end of August. A Turkish frigate and patrol boat accompanied the Yavuz. "Fatih is continuing to drill in the Finike-1 borehole in the areas licensed to Turkey. Yavuz is continuing its operations in the Karpaz-1 borehole," he said in comments made on Tuesday but embargoed until Wednesday. "The Oruc Reis seismic exploration ship will join this work as of the end of August," he said. Turkey's operations in the region have drawn a reaction from its Western allies, including the European Union and the United States. "We support a peaceful, stable region and we discourage provocative actions by any players," US Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources Francis Fannon said on Tuesday, when asked about Turkey's moves in the region. EU foreign ministers last month suspended negotiations on a comprehensive air transport agreement and decided not to hold further EU-Turkey high-level dialogue for the time being. Cyprus was divided in 1974 after a Turkish invasion triggered by a brief, Greek-inspired coup. Several peacemaking efforts have failed and the discovery of offshore resources in the eastern Mediterranean has complicated the negotiations. On Friday, Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci will discuss a way out of an impasse in peace talks, which have been stalled for two years. Akinci said the Greek Cypriot side was making unilateral attempts to explore for natural gas in the eastern Mediterranean despite repeated Turkish Cypriot proposals to resolve the issue. "This doesn't leave the Cypriot Turkish side and Turkey with any choice other than what we are doing right now," Akinci told Reuters TV in an interview. Speaking to Turkish ambassadors in Ankara on Tuesday, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey would continue to protect the rights of Turkish Cypriots. "We cannot remain indifferent to the attempts at theft and sabotage that are being carried out under the name of drilling," he said.

Turkey’s Inflation Rises
Ankara - Saeed Abdelrazek/Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
Turkey saw a 16.65 percent annual hike in consumer prices last month compared to 15.72 percent in June, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) reported this week. On a monthly basis, the consumer prices went up 1.36 percent in July, it said. Turkey’s central bank sharply cut its key interest rate by a more than expected 425 basis points to 19.75 percent end of July to spur a recession-hit economy, its first step away from the emergency stance it adopted during last year’s currency crisis. The bank lowered its benchmark one-week repo rate from 24 percent, where it had remained since September, when a collapse in the Turkish lira pushed inflation to a 15-year high above 25 percent, prompting aggressive rate hikes. The lira was volatile earlier this year after weakening by nearly 30 percent against the dollar in 2018. It has steadied in recent weeks, even though Turkey faces the threat of US sanctions over its purchase of Russian missile systems. Meanwhile, Turkish Trade Ruhsar Pekcan said that she has held a fruitful phone conversation with her US counterpart, Wilbur Ross. A US delegation led by the commerce secretary will visit Turkey in September, she said.

Turkey says drill ships continue work in eastern Med, another en route
Reuters, Eastern Mediterranean/Wednesday, 7 August 2019
Two Turkish drill ships are continuing operations in the eastern Mediterranean and another ship will join them this month, Energy Minister Fatih Donmez said, as a dispute over natural resources there fuels tensions between Turkey and Cyprus. EU member Cyprus and Turkey have argued for years regarding the ownership of fossil fuels in the eastern Mediterranean, where Ankara says Turkish Cypriots are entitled to a share of the resources. Turkey rejects agreements the internationally recognized Cypriot government has reached with other Mediterranean states on maritime economic zones. Turkey has sent two drilling ships, Fatih and Yavuz, as well as an exploration vessel, to operate in waters off the divided island of Cyprus, prompting accusations from Greece that it is undermining security in the region. Aboard the Yavuz drill ship, off the northeastern coast of Cyprus, Donmez told reporters that a second exploration vessel would begin work in the area by the end of August. A Turkish frigate and patrol boat accompanied the Yavuz. “Fatih is continuing to drill in the Finike-1 borehole in the areas licensed to Turkey. Yavuz is continuing its operations in the Karpaz-1 borehole,” he said in comments made on Tuesday but embargoed until Wednesday. “The Oruc Reis seismic exploration ship will join this work as of the end of August,” he said. Turkey’s operations in the region have drawn a reaction from its Western allies, including the European Union and the United States. “We support a peaceful, stable region and we discourage provocative actions by any players,” US Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources Francis Fannon said on Tuesday, when asked about Turkey’s moves in the region. EU foreign ministers last month suspended negotiations on a comprehensive air transport agreement and decided not to hold further EU-Turkey high-level dialogue for the time being. Cyprus was divided in 1974 after a Turkish invasion triggered by a brief, Greek-inspired coup. Several peacemaking efforts have failed and the discovery of offshore resources in the eastern Mediterranean has complicated the negotiations. On Friday, Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci will discuss a way out of an impasse in peace talks, which have been stalled for two years. Akinci said the Greek Cypriot side was making unilateral attempts to explore for natural gas in the eastern Mediterranean despite repeated Turkish Cypriot proposals to resolve the issue. “This doesn’t leave the Cypriot Turkish side and Turkey with any choice other than what we are doing right now,” Akinci told Reuters TV in an interview. Speaking to Turkish ambassadors in Ankara on Tuesday, President Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey would continue to protect the rights of Turkish Cypriots. “We cannot remain indifferent to the attempts at theft and sabotage that are being carried out under the name of drilling,” he said.

Turkey says meeting with US on Syria ‘positive’
AFP, Istanbul/Wednesday, 7 August 2019
Turkey’s Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said Wednesday that talks with the US aimed at averting the need for a Turkish military intervention into northern Syria had been “positive”, according to state news agency Anadolu. “We witnessed with satisfaction that our partners grew closer to our position. The meetings were positive and quite constructive,” Akar was quoted as saying as the talks in Ankara entered a third day. Turkey has repeatedly warned that it is preparing an offensive into Syria against the Kurdish YPG militia, which it sees as a terrorist offshoot of the PKK which has fought a bloody insurgency inside Turkey for the past 35 years.The US has supported the YPG as the main fighting force against ISIS, and its defense officials have been meeting their Turkish counterparts in Ankara since Monday in a bid to prevent an intervention. “We would prefer to act together with our American ally. If that isn’t possible we have said multiple times that we will do what is necessary,” Akar told Anadolu. All sides agree that a “safe zone” needs to be created in northern Syria to keep the YPG away from Turkey’s borders. But Turkey, the US and the YPG differ on how large the neutral zone should be, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned in recent days that patience is running out. “Turkey has the right to eliminate all threats against its national security,” he said in a televised speech on Tuesday. “God willing, we will carry the process started with (previous offensives into Syria) to the next stage very soon.” US Defence Secretary Mark Esper countered that any unilateral action by Turkey would be “unacceptable.”Turkey and the US are NATO allies but have grown increasingly estranged over a number of issues, including American support for the Kurds and Turkey’s decision to buy a Russian S-400 missile defence system. Turkish media outlets have often shown images in recent weeks of military convoys heading for the border area, carrying equipment and fighting units. Turkey has twice carried out unilateral offensives into northern Syria against ISIS and YPG, in 2016 and 2018 respectively.

Pakistan expels Indian envoy, suspends trade over Kashmir
AFP, Islamabad/Wednesday, 7 August 2019
Pakistan downgraded its diplomatic ties with nuclear-armed rival India on Wednesday, announcing that it will expel the Indian envoy and suspend trade in a deepening row over New Delhi’s move to tighten its grip on disputed Kashmir. New Delhi stripped the Himalayan region of its seven-decade-long semi-autonomous status on Monday through a contentious presidential decree, just hours after it imposed a crippling curfew on the valley. Experts have predicted the move will trigger conflict with Pakistan, which has a competing claim to the Muslim-majority valley, and reignite an insurgency that has already cost tens of thousands of lives. Delhi has insisted that the move is an internal matter. But Islamabad has called for the international community to intervene and vowed to take the matter to the United Nations Security Council. “We will call back our ambassador from Delhi and send back their envoy,” foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi announced in televised comments on Wednesday. He spoke as the government released a statement declaring that Pakistan will suspend trade with India and review its bilateral ties with Delhi. “Prime Minister Imran Khan today chaired meeting of the National Security Committee” to discuss the “unilateral and illegal actions by the Indian government” in Kashmir, the statement said. “The Committee decided to take following actions: - 1. Downgrading of diplomatic relations with India. 2. Suspension of bilateral trade with India. 3. Review of bilateral arrangements. 4. Matter to be taken to the United Nations, including the Security Council,” it continued. Khan “directed that all diplomatic channels be activated to expose brutal Indian racist regime, design and human rights violations,” the statement added. He also called on the military to continue its “vigilance.”
Kashmir has been divided between Pakistan and India since independence in 1947. They have contesting claims on the Himalayan region, and have fought two of their three wars over it. Earlier this year they came to the brink of war once more, after a deadly attack in Indian-held Kashmir was claimed by a militant group based in Pakistan, prompting tit-for-tat airstrikes over the mountainous region. The Pakistani military said Tuesday that it “firmly stands” with Kashmiris. An armed rebellion against Indian rule has raged in the valley since 1989, claiming more than 70,000 lives, mostly civilians. Long a semi-autonomous state where only local residents could buy land or take government jobs, Kashmir’s new status is as a territory directly ruled by New Delhi. Its summer capital Srinagar appeared a ghost town on Wednesday as the security lockdown took hold, with armed soldiers on corners and in front of barbed wire barricades among the few people to be seen in the streets.

Taliban claim bomb attack on Afghan police; 14 killed, 145 hurt
Reuters, Kabul/Wednesday, 7 August 2019
The Taliban claimed responsibility for a suicide car-bomb attack on a police station in the Afghan capital, Kabul, on Wednesday which the government said killed 14 people and wounded 145. There has been no let-up in violence in Afghanistan even though the Taliban and the United States appear close to a historic pact for US troops to withdraw in exchange for a Taliban promise the country would not be used as a base from which to plot attacks by extremists. The blast, in the west of the city during the morning rush hour, sent a huge cloud of grey smoke billowing into the sky. The Taliban said a “recruitment center” had been attacked by one of their suicide bombers. “A large number of soldiers and police were killed or wounded,” the Taliban said in a statement. Deputy Interior Minister Khoshal Sadat later told a news conference 14 people had been killed and 145 wounded. Four of the dead were policemen and the rest civilians, while 92 of the wounded were civilians, he said. The bomb went off when the vehicle carrying the device was stopped at a checkpoint outside the police station, said interior ministry spokesman Nasrat Rahimi. Women and children were among the casualties, the health ministry said.
Pictures from the scene showed extensive damage with facades blown off buildings and a jumble of rubble and vehicles strewn through the area. “Again a Taliban suicide attack in Kabul targets a civilian area that resulted in harming of so many innocents,” Sediq Sediqqi, a spokesman for President Ashraf Ghani, said on Twitter. “Continued Taliban attacks indicate that they have no commitment to peace,” Sediqqi later told the news conference. The blast came a day after the Taliban called for a boycott of a September 28 presidential election and threatened to attack election rallies. Separately, security forces conducted raids on two ISIS hideouts in Kabul overnight and killed two militants and seized a large quantity of explosives and bomb-making equipment, the National Directorate of Security (NDS) said. Three members of the security forces were also killed, an agency spokesman said.
Both the US peace envoy leading talks with the Taliban, and the Taliban reported significant progress this week in their talks in Qatar aimed at ending America's longest war. The militants control more territory than at any point since the United States bombed them out of power in 2001 and many government officials fear their war with the Taliban will not end if US troops leave. About 20,000 foreign troops, most of them American, are in Afghanistan as part of a US-led NATO mission to train, assist and advise Afghan forces. Some US forces carry out counter-terrorism operations. President Donald Trump has announced his aim to end the war.

Double suicide attack kills 3 in northeast Nigeria: Officials
AFP, Kano/Wednesday, 7 August 2019
Two female suicide bombers killed three civilians and wounded eight in a suspected Boko Haram attack in northeast Nigeria, emergency services said Wednesday. The twin blasts tore through a crowd late Tuesday in the town of Mafa, some 50 kilometers from regional capital Maiduguri.
“The female bombers killed three people and wounded eight others,” Bello Danbatta, head of security for the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) in Borno state, told AFP. The assailants entered the town among a group of local women who had gone to fetch firewood for cooking, Danbatta said.
Local district spokesman Adamu Mohammed, who gave the same toll, said the bombers waited until around 8:30pm (1930 GMT) before launching their attack. Boko Haram has been waging a 10-year insurgency in northeast Nigeria that has seen it repeatedly use female suicide bombers to attack soft targets such as mosques, markets and bus stations. Many of the bombers are young women and girls. The last suicide attack was in June when a triple bombing outside a hall where football fans were watching a match killed at least 30 people. Also on Tuesday, fighters burnt 11 houses and looted food in an attack on the village of Kotori, 12 kilometers outside Maiduguri, Danbatta said, adding that no one was hurt in that incident. Boko Haram’s decade-long campaign of violence has left some 27,000 people dead, displaced over two million across the region and spilt over into neighboring countries. The extremists have splintered into two major factions, after fighters loyal to ISIS broke away from long-time leader Abubakar Shekau in 2016. Shekau’s Boko Haram group has tended to attack civilian targets, while ISIS West Africa Province (ISWAP) faction has ratcheted up assaults on the military since July 2018. On Monday ISWAP fighters made an incursion into the garrison town of Monguno, 135 kilometers from Maiduguri, military and local militia sources said. Three civilians were killed as the extremists exchanged fire with troops, the sources said.

Sisi Urges All Egyptians to Back Push Against Militants
Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi called Wednesday on the nation to back his government's efforts to defeat militants, saying it's the mission of every Egyptian. His appeal came after a car packed with explosives was detonated earlier this week outside Egypt's main cancer hospital in Cairo, killing at least 20 people. The attack was the deadliest in the Egyptian capital in over two years. Sisi said in a televised speech that it's "not only the mission of the state to defeat (militants), but also, we as a society have to make our sons understand, enlighten and protect them against this" extremist ideology, the Associated Press reported. The government has accused a militant group known as Hasm, linked to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, for Sunday's attack, saying it was moving the car to carry out an attack elsewhere.

Egypt’s President Calls for Expanding Cooperation with African States
Cairo - Asharq Al-Awsat/Wednesday, 7 August, 2019
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has chaired a meeting aimed at discussing ways to expand cooperation with countries in the African continent. The meeting brought together Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly and several ministers, including the ministers of electricity and renewable energy, finance, health and housing, trade and industry, agricultural and land reclamation, in addition to the head of General Intelligence. Spokesman for the Egyptian Presidency Bassam Rady said Sisi “gave instructions to expand the scope of cooperation with African countries and build bridges of communication with them."
He also advised to work hard in drafting and improving the mechanisms for joint African action. The meeting addressed the steps taken to implement Egypt's plan of action for taking over the African Union presidency, especially with regard to achieving economic integration after the enforcement of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) in May and the official launch of the African Continental Free Trade Area during the latest exceptional AU summit in Niamey, Niger, said Rady. It also tackled Egypt's efforts to support infrastructure projects in Africa, such as the Cairo-Cape Town Highway as well as power and railway interconnection projects, which seek to boost continental integration, the spokesman added. In a related development, several Egyptian and African lawmakers stressed during a meeting hosted at the Egyptian parliament the importance of issuing joint legislation and exchanging expertise. They also shed light on the necessity of improving the investment climate, mainly in agriculture.

Jordan's King Abdullah and Boris Johnson hold talks amid Iran tensions
Arab News/07 August/2019
LONDON: King Abdullah II of Jordan met the new British prime minister on Wednesday as the UK seeks to shore up relations with one of its strongest Arab allies amid heightened tensions with Iran. The meeting with Boris Johnson in London also came as the UK nears a crunch Brexit deadline with a withdrawal from the European Union without a deal increasingly likely. London is looking to secure and boost trade ties with markets away from Europe to soften the blow and Jordan is seen as a reliable, if small, trade partner. The king was greeted warmly by Johnson outside 10 Downing Street ahead of the talks and a working lunch. “The leaders reflected on the close bilateral relationship and longstanding friendship between our countries,” a Downing Street spokesperson said. “The Prime Minister welcomed the King’s progress in delivering economic reforms and urged continued momentum.”
The king and Johnson also discussed Jordan’s role in “maintaining regional stability” and the kingdom’s hosting of Syrian refugees.The Jordanian state news agency said the meeting would cover “the deep-rooted, strategic relations between Jordan and the UK, and current regional developments.”
Jordan also hopes to secure further investment for its fragile economy, which is going though tough austerity measures as part of an International Monetary Fund program. In February, London hosted a conference attended by the king to boost investment in his country. During the event the UK increased its aid and support for Jordan. But the escalating tensions with Iran in the Gulf, including the seizure of a British oil tanker last month, were expected to dominate discussions. Yossi Mekelberg, professor of international relations at Regent’s University London and an associate fellow at Chatham House, said the situation with Iran was a high priority for both sides but that Jordan was often cautious and pragmatic when there is a major crisis. “They (Jordan) wouldn’t like to see a deterioration in relations and a war in the Gulf, on the other hand, they are recognizing now that there is a real danger of this happening, there is danger of Iran developing nuclear weapons. “I think Hezbollah and the Iranian forces on its doorsteps in Syria is another issue that doesn’t make Jordan very happy, it’s a cause of worry for Jordan to.”The two nations were also expected to discuss the conflict between Israel and Palestine and a US peace plan, which has angered Palestinians and drawn consternation from Jordan. “The king will probably point out to the prime minister that the current impasse is dangerous and it’s not going to last and this might affect the stability of the Hashemite Kingdom,” Mekelberg said. The UK and Jordan have historic ties and the royal family is closely connected to the UK. The King’s mother was British and he studied at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.

The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on August 07-08/2019
Qatar’s Isolation... The Best Is Yet to Come
Salman Al-dossary/Asharq Al Awsat/August 07/2019
In just about a month: the media revealed the famous conversation of a Qatari ambassador, in which he admitted his country’s support for terrorist acts in Somalia, and then documents were published proving Doha’s involvement in violating FIFA rules. Then, several cases followed, exposing Qatar’s corrupted money in French sports. And finally, a report by the London Times on Tuesday announced that Doha was financing extremism through a British bank.
Those issues combined put a heavyweight on any country in the world. What if it was a very small country, in size, population and status, where every month, a new scandal emerges: the support for terrorism, the attempt to buy everything with dirty money and the persistence of its political downfall by forbidding its citizens, for example, to perform the holy Hajj, for the third consecutive year.
This is happening while the state is isolated and boycotted by its neighbors. How would it be then if it was allowed to maintain its role as a deceitful state, as it has done for more than two decades?
When the four countries announced in June 2017 to boycott Qatar, some questioned the decision, others sympathized, and a third group was surprised. No one expected that the last solution would be burning the ties with a brotherly country. Intra-Gulf relations were not used to this type of complete boycott.
However, in the first months that followed the decision, all of them reviewed their positions, and admitted – even to themselves – that this decision was not only right, but belated.
Today, more than two years after the boycott, I don’t think that there are those who want the return of Qatar, even if it complied with a thousand conditions.
The danger of any rapprochement with it is much higher than boycotting it. Isolating it away from its neighbors locks doors of evil, which will reopen with any possible return.
After governments were insisting on rejecting any form of reconciliation, all wise citizens became more radical than their leaders. A system, such as the Qatari regime, could never return to its senses. There are no half-way solutions with it other than boycotting and isolating it.
The London Times said that Qatar should choose between being the West’s ally or foe, and that if it chooses the latter, it should be isolated. This claim came too late, while Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the UAE, and Bahrain sensed the Qatari danger before everyone else.
In the end, countries are patient. They wait and see; but they never accept to be touched by an
evil that comes from a state that claims to be good. Certainly, it is not necessary that this isolation be as open and public as the four countries have done. However, a mere conviction of this very dangerous, silky state, proves that Qatar still hides more threats to all those who engage with it.
Every day there is a growing conviction that the best resolution taken in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), after the late King Fahd’s 1990 decision to liberate Kuwait, is to boycott Qatar and stop the harm coming from it. So the longer the boycott, the greater the benefits. The isolation of Qatar carries real and tremendous gains, and the best is yet to come.

Between Two Wars: Yemen and Afghanistan
Abdulrahman Al-Rashed/Asharq Al Awsat/August 07/2019
There are no beautiful wars in the world; all are ugly. But there are wars of necessity, and the war in Yemen is one of them, both for Yemenis and Saudis. The war there is not one of choice. Militants on the Saudi border, armed with ballistic missiles, are capable of reaching the Kingdom’s main cities and beyond the capital Riyadh.
But why the comparison between Yemen and Afghanistan? Well, the two wars, though different in historical roots and political motives, are similar in geography, circumstances and ongoing challenges.
Has the war in Yemen been going on for too long? Yes, but wars do not have a specific duration. The US entered Afghanistan in 2001 and has been fighting there ever since. Saudi Arabia has been in Yemen since 2015. Taliban militants in Afghanistan are like the Houthis of Yemen. The Taliban are Sunni extremists and the Houthis are Shiite extremists. Both have a political agenda with an extremist religious discourse.
The battlefields in both countries are also similar, given their rugged mountainous terrain, and the tough lives and poverty of their peoples.
The alternative options for both wars are very limited too. A withdrawal from Afghanistan will lead to the seizure of the entire country by the Taliban and other armed groups. This is why Washington fears that if it withdraws, the situation in Afghanistan will go back to how it was before American troops arrived.
These troops were deployed in the course of the US war against Al-Qaeda and its ally the Taliban after the Sept. 11 attacks. Still, the US — as a superpower in the western hemisphere, 11,000 km from Afghanistan — is capable of waging war on its enemy in Afghanistan from afar.
But for Saudi Arabia, withdrawal is dangerous because Yemen may become a satellite state loyal to Iran on the Kingdom’s southern border, which would pose a direct threat. A Saudi withdrawal may also lead to the destruction of what remains of Yemen, and drive the country into a wider tribal civil war, causing greater hardships for the Yemeni people.
US forces leading the coalition in Afghanistan have 16,000 troops, twice the number of Saudi forces in Yemen. The cost of the war in Afghanistan is $45 billion, four times that of the conflict in Yemen. The war in Afghanistan has been ongoing for 18 years, compared to four years in Yemen.
The US has conducted rounds of direct and indirect talks with the Taliban, but has failed to find acceptable solutions. Attempts to resolve the conflict in Yemen have not fared much better, although the door was and remains open to the Houthis to participate in a national government and have seats in Parliament.
But the Houthis are in a more difficult position than the Taliban because the former are an Iran-affiliated extremist militant group, similar to the Lebanese Hezbollah, and Tehran is the real decision-maker.
The war in Yemen is not an exceptional case. Like all conflicts, its dynamics may change for internal or external reasons.

Forty Years of Iranian Intolerance
Denis MacEoin/Gatestone Institute/August 07/2019
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14633/iranian-intolerance
What, one has to ask, does Iran's Islamic regime have to fear from the country's Christians, Baha'is, Zoroastrians, Sufis, Sunni Muslims, or Jews? Yet its treatment of these minorities is so repressive that it seems not unreasonable to ask if the clerics might be afraid of what they consider challenges to their fantasy of pure Islamic identity.
So why this persecution? Because they represent a challenge to the radical shari'a law doctrines of the clergy, who impose Ayatollah Khomeini's religio-politico system of Velayat-e Faqih (rule by the theocratic Islamic government).
"If they [Muslims] had gotten rid of the punishment for apostasy, Islam would not exist today." – Islamic leader Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi.
The Iranian people who have been fighting for their freedom all these years deserve our immediate help.
What does Iran's Islamic regime have to fear from the country's Christians, Baha'is, Zoroastrians, Sufis, Sunni Muslims, or Jews? Yet its treatment of these minorities is so repressive that it seems not unreasonable to ask if the clerics might be afraid of what they consider challenges to their fantasy of pure Islamic identity. Pictured: The destruction of a historic Baha'i cemetery in Shiraz, Iran, by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp.
The regime that currently rules Iran was set up after a revolution in early 1979, and after forty years remains in power. It will have escaped no one's attention that relations between Iran and the West, notably the United States, have never been healthy and in recent months have deteriorated further.
The United States has placed increasingly harsh sanctions on its clerical foe, including some on Iran's hard-line Supreme Leader (Rahbar-e A'zam), the ageing but still powerful Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. These sanctions are justified on several grounds: Iran's massive involvement in Middle East conflicts beyond its borders (For example, in Syria Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon, Venezuela and the Gaza Strip); its financial, moral, and physical support for major terrorist bodies such as Hizbullah, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad; its funding and arming of its own Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), now designated as a terrorist entity by the US; its carrying out of executions of dissidents, homosexuals, religious minorities, among others, making it responsible for over half of all recorded executions worldwide; its enforcement of strict codes of modesty on women, who can be arrested merely for wearing a hijab badly or not at all – a policy that was reinforced in 2016 and 2019 through the recruitment of thousands of morality police; its mass arrests, imprisonments and murders of dissidents, human rights activists, religious minorities, and others, with little or no evidence and without access to defence, and its rejection of diplomatic efforts to secure the release of the innocent British-Iranian woman Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe because its government refuses to recognize the international standard of dual citizenship.
There is also the matter of Iran's unremitting hatred for Israel, a country with which it does not even share a border, and expressed in regular chants of marg bar Isra'il, "Death to Israel" during demonstrations or after mosque sermons, and in aspirations to "wipe Israel from the map." Along with all that is also its deep antisemitism; its illegal arms smuggling to terrorists and its current attacks on shipping in the Gulf.
Even a few of so many violations at home and abroad would be more than enough to condemn any country as a pariah state. The clerical rulers of Iran and their many acolytes, however, are actually proud of their longstanding refusal to join the secular democratic states of the West. That was, after all, the purpose of their revolution. The Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and other leading revolutionaries were strongly influenced by the writer, ethnographer, and cultural commentator, Jalal Al-e Ahmad (d. 1969).
Al-e Ahmad's best-known work in Persian is Gharbazadegi, variously translated as "West-struckness", Westoxification", or "Occidentosis". In it, the author argued, not without justification, that the importation of Western ideas and cultural pursuits -- dress, music, cinema, education and more -- was corrupting the values of a highly elevated civilization. Iranian culture had a long history: from its Ishraqi philosophy to its Sufi-influenced poetry (with world-standard poets such as Hafez, Saadi, and Rumi) to its breathtaking calligraphy; exquisite music; Shi'ite spirituality; gardens (which were the first in any country and which gave us the word "paradise", the Greek pronunciation of ferdows), to its architecture in palaces and mosques. Al-e Ahmad was apparently convinced that Western ways threatened that culture, notoriously under the Westernizing ambitions of the first Pahlavi king, Reza Shah, and his son, the ruling (and last) occupant of the Peacock Throne, Mohammad Reza Shah (deposed in 1979).
Al-e Ahmad, the son of a cleric, was widely read in foreign culture and started life as a Marxist, but he came to see Shi'ism as a path to rejecting the intrusive West, and when the Ayatollah Khomeini came to power in January 1979, he too was convinced that all Iranians must be persuaded or coerced in a religion-based alternative to the ways of the West.
It is this deep conviction of the distance that must be preserved between Shi'ite Iran and the Western world -- perceived as a foe at all levels of personal and national life -- that keeps the regime on its unwavering path of anti-Western preaching and activity.
In the list above of the many things in which the Islamic Republic achieves a negative distinction, religious minorities were also mentioned. In June 2019, The US Department of State published its massive 2018 report on international religious freedom. Like its predecessors, this well-researched compendium covers every country. The section on Iran is one of the longest, not least because the Islamic Republic presents an almost total lack of religious freedom. Examining this aspect of Iranian practice is immensely revealing: it shows not just a high degree of intolerance but also extraordinary pettiness. What, one has to ask, does the Islamic regime have to fear from the country's Christians, Baha'is, Zoroastrians, Sufis, Sunni Muslims, or Jews? Yet its treatment of these minorities is so repressive that it seems not unreasonable to ask if the clerics might be afraid of what they consider challenges to their fantasy of pure Islamic identity.
The "Freedom of Religion" report on Iran is much too long to summarize in any detail. However, it will be of value to cite it and précis it here. Its executive summary begins with an explanation of overall governmental and legal positions on religious rights (and the lack of many of them):
The constitution defines the country as an Islamic republic, and specifies Twelver Ja'afari Shia Islam as the official state religion. It states all laws and regulations must be based on "Islamic criteria" and an official interpretation of sharia. The constitution states citizens shall enjoy human, political, economic, and other rights, "in conformity with Islamic criteria." The penal code specifies the death sentence for proselytizing and attempts by non-Muslims to convert Muslims, as well as for moharebeh ("enmity against God") and sabb al-nabi ("insulting the Prophet"). According to the penal code, the application of the death penalty varies depending on the religion of both the perpetrator and the victim. The law prohibits Muslim citizens from changing or renouncing their religious beliefs. The constitution also stipulates five non-Ja'afari Islamic schools [the four Sunni schools and the Shi'ite Zaydi school] shall be "accorded full respect" and official status in matters of religious education and certain personal affairs. The constitution states Zoroastrians, Jews, and Christians (excluding converts from Islam) are the only recognized religious minorities permitted to worship and to form religious societies "within the limits of the law."
Further, the report notes that
Since 1999, Iran has been designated as a "Country of Particular Concern" (CPC) under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 for having engaged in or tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom. On November 28, the Secretary of State redesignated Iran as a CPC.
Gonabadis are Shi'ites who follow the spiritual path of Sufism. They number between two and five million, which may be an exaggeration, and they have been persecuted for many years. According to Tara Sepehri Far of Human Rights Watch: "Sufism is very deeply rooted in the Iranian culture. They're not that different from the way that Iranians pursued Islam in its early years". And they are Shi'ite Sufis, not Sunni Sufis. So why this persecution? Because they represent a challenge to the radical shari'a law doctrines of the clergy who impose Ayatollah Khomeini's religio-politico system of Velayat-e Faqih (rule by the theocratic Islamic government).
In 2006, a Sufi shrine in Qom was demolished after Ayatollah Hossein Noori-Hamedani, called the religious order a "danger to Islam". Saeid Golkar, a senior fellow on Iran policy at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs clarified this "danger":
Usually the Dervish aren't politically involved. Their only political act is participating in elections and voting for reformists.
There are millions of Sufi followers in Iran, and they follow their leader. These millions of people can impact any election.
Regarding Christians, notes the report: According to World Christian Database statistics, there are approximately 547,000 Christians [in Iran], although some estimates suggest there may be many more Christians than actually reported. While the government Statistical Center of Iran reports there are 117,700 Christians, Elam Ministries, a Christian organization, estimates that there could be between 300,000 and one million Christians.
Although in theory Christians are a recognized and protected community under shari'a, many in Iran suffer persecution, particularly those who have converted from Islam, thereby making them apostates. Under Islamic law, apostates may be executed. While this is not common in Iran, it sometimes occurs. The chief factor in pressing for punishment is the idea that renouncing Islam is treason for the state or the community -- something wholly relevant to political Islam. As one of the foremost leaders of Sunni Islam, Sheikh Yusuf al- Qaradawi, explained on television in 2013:
"If they [Muslims] had gotten rid of the punishment for apostasy, Islam would not exist today."
In Iran, Christian rights are limited: Authorities may close a church and arrest its leaders if churchgoers fail to register or unregistered individuals attend services. Individuals who convert to Christianity are not recognized as Christian under the law. They may not register and are not entitled to the same rights as recognized members of Christian communities.
Hard as life can be for Christians in Iran, for many decades the plight of its indigenous Baha'i community has been one of the worst examples of religious persecution in the modern world. The Baha'is (who emerged in Iran in the 19th century) are non-political believers in world peace, the brotherhood of man, the abolition of prejudice, the equality of the sexes, and the oneness of religions. They do not represent any sort of threat. But they are relentlessly harried by the regime, today as much as forty years ago.
After the revolution in 1979, one by one all the holy sites of the religion were systematically demolished. Their cemeteries (designed as gardens) have almost all been bulldozed and corpses disinterred. One of those cemeteries, in Shiraz, held the bodies of nine Baha'i women and a seventeen-year-old girl, all hanged in 1983 for teaching morality lessons to children, and all of whom refused to disavow their faith. More than 950 bodies were dug up and dumped.
Businesses have been closed without compensation; young Baha'is are banned from entering or remaining in institutes of higher education; "benefits in the pension system" have been denied to older believers ; hundreds have been imprisoned purely on account of their faith; many have been murdered; Baha'i properties have suffered arson attacks, and since 2013, this persecution has increased, not diminished. According to a report by Baha'i International Community:
The situation facing Baha'is has not changed since the coming to power of President Hassan Rouhani in August 2013, despite his promises to end religious discrimination. Since his inauguration, at least 283 Baha'is have been arrested, thousands have been blocked from access to higher education, and there have been at least 645 incidents of economic oppression, ranging from intimidation and threats against Baha'i-owned businesses to their closure by authorities. More than 26,000 pieces of anti-Baha'i propaganda have been disseminated in the Iranian media during President Rouhani's administration.
Because the Baha'is have their World Center in Haifa and outside Acco in Israel, the country most hated by the regime, this alone serves to condemn believers as agents of anti-Iranian espionage and interference.
For forty years, the UN, governments including the US and the European Union, the European Parliament, and NGOs such as Human Rights Watch, and Amnesty International, as well as the international community have issued repeated condemnations of the Iranian government for its persecution of the country's Baha'is, yet not once has the regime shifted in its determination to strangle this peaceful community. Protests have, in fact, sometimes provoked an intensification of the persecution.
All this religious discrimination and persecution that resists even the protests from the world's highest bodies is a yet stronger indication of Iran's determination to defy the West and its values, and its appeals for human rights as mere tokens of the weakness of the democracies and the corruptions of gharbzadegi (West-struckness). It is time for that bias to end -- not through war, but through support for the Iranian people who desperately want their own freedom. A regime that can dismiss the norms of religious freedom so viciously is not worthy of respect. The Iranian people who have been fighting for their freedom all these years deserve our immediate help.
*Denis MacEoin PhD has an MA and PhD from Edinburgh and Cambridge universities in Persian and Persian/Iranian Studies. He is an international authority on the Baha'i religion and a Distinguished Senior Fellow at New York's Gatestone Institute.
© 2019 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

Pakistan: Abduction, Forced Conversion of Non-Muslim Girls
أوزي بولوت/معهد كايتستون: في باكستان تتم عمليات خطف  لغير المسلمات واجبارهن على الأسلمة
Uzay Bulut/Gatestone Institute/August 07/2019
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/77337/%d8%a3%d9%88%d8%b2%d9%8a-%d8%a8%d9%88%d9%84%d9%88%d8%aa-%d9%85%d8%b9%d9%87%d8%af-%d9%83%d8%a7%d9%8a%d8%aa%d8%b3%d8%aa%d9%88%d9%86-%d9%81%d9%8a-%d8%a8%d8%a7%d9%83%d8%b3%d8%aa%d8%a7%d9%86-%d8%aa%d8%aa/
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14574/pakistan-forced-conversion
"The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan reports that the police often turn a blind eye to reports of abduction and forced conversions thereby creating impunity for perpetrators. The police will often either refuse to record a First Information Report or falsify the information, thereby denying families the chance to take their case any further." — Report conducted in 2018 by the University of Birmingham's Commonwealth Initiative for Freedom of Religion or Belief, United Kingdom, 2018.
"Local police and political leaders... are often accused of being complicit in forced marriage and conversion cases by failing to properly investigate them. If such cases are investigated or adjudicated, the young woman is reportedly questioned in front of the man she was forced to marry, which creates pressure on her to deny any coercion." — Annual Report of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, 2019.
"The most important reason for this [abduction and conversion] is the desire to increase Pakistan's Muslim population, which stems from the Islamic teaching that that a person who converts one non-Muslim to Islam will be granted a place in paradise." — Sardar Mushtaq Gill, Pakistani human rights lawyer and head of the Legal Evangelical Association Development (LEAD-Pakistan).
"The judiciary are often subject to fear of reprisal from extremist elements, in other cases the judicial officers' personal beliefs influence them into accepting the claims made that the woman/girl converted on her own free will." — Report conducted in 2018 by the University of Birmingham's Commonwealth Initiative for Freedom of Religion or Belief, United Kingdom, 2018.
"Higher authorities also have done little to nothing to pass legislation specifically criminalizing this issue....International pressure on Pakistan is an important element of seeking to end this abuse. Without motivation coming from outside the country, it is very unlikely the Pakistani government will listen to minority leaders and civil society to pass laws combating this issue." — William Stark, South Asia regional manager at the International Christian Concern.
On July 12, Hindus and Sikhs gathered in Pakistan's Sindh province to protest the kidnapping of young girls, their forced conversion to Islam and subsequent marriage to their abductors. Pictured: Karachi, capital of Sindh province, Pakistan.
On July 12, Hindus and Sikhs gathered in the Sindh province of Pakistan to protest the kidnapping of young girls, their forced conversion to Islam and subsequent marriage to their abductors. Demonstrators at the rally also railed against the government of Prime Minister Imran Khan for not safeguarding minority rights in the Muslim-majority country.
According a report conducted in 2018 by the University of Birmingham's Commonwealth Initiative for Freedom of Religion or Belief:
"Evidence provided by numerous NGOs, journalists and academics have shown that abductions and forced conversions are one of the most serious problems facing Hindu and Christian women and girls.
"Minorities often do not receive the protection required from state institutions and lack access to justice.
"The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan reports that the police often turn a blind eye to reports of abduction and forced conversions thereby creating impunity for perpetrators. The police will often either refuse to record a First Information Report or falsify the information, thereby denying families the chance to take their case any further. Both the lower and higher courts of Pakistan have failed to follow proper procedures in cases that involve accusations of forced marriage and forced conversions. The judiciary are often subject to fear of reprisal from extremist elements, in other cases the judicial officers' personal beliefs influence them into accepting the claims made that the woman/girl converted on her own free will. There is often no investigation into the circumstances under which the conversion takes place and the age of the girl is often ignored. The girl/woman involved is largely left in the custody of her kidnapper throughout the trial process where she is subject to further threats to force her into denying her abduction and rape and claiming that the conversion was willing.
"Many religious institutions, local mosques and seminaries fail to investigate the nature of the conversion or the age of the bride and mostly simply accept the word of the abductor. Some organisations, like Minhaj-ul-quran, routinely and as a matter of official policy, encourage the practice of converting members of minority communities by offering rewards for successful conversions. They say that it is the equivalent of Haj-e-Akbari, or the greatest religious duty to Muslims."
The 2019 Annual Report of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom concurs, stating:
"Forced conversion of Hindu and Christian young women into Islam and marriage, often through bonded labor, remains a systemic problem... Local police and political leaders, particularly in Punjab and Sindh provinces, are often accused of being complicit in forced marriage and conversion cases by failing to properly investigate them. If such cases are investigated or adjudicated, the young woman is reportedly questioned in front of the man she was forced to marry, which creates pressure on her to deny any coercion."
Maheen Pracha, Publications and Social Media Manager of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), told Gatestone that some 1,000 cases of forced conversion occurred last year in the province of Sindh alone."
HRCP member Zohra Yusuf told Gatestone that the statistics "are difficult to compile and verify, but forced conversions in Punjab appear to be higher among Christian girls than Hindus."
"Though believed to be a widespread practice," Yusuf added, "it only receives coverage in the media when families hold a protest or appeal to the courts."
With what Yusuf calls the "increased emphasis on Islamic identity in Pakistan," non-Muslims -- particularly women, a weak sector of Pakistani society anyway -- "are particularly vulnerable to exploitation and abuse."
Yusuf does not believe that the Pakistani government has done enough to improve the security of such women:
"A bill against forced conversions has been pending in the federal parliament. In 2016, the Sindh provincial assembly passed a law against forced conversions, but had to back down after religious parties protested. However, if the law raising the age of marriage to 18 is enacted and enforced properly, it should alleviate the situation somewhat."
Sardar Mushtaq Gill, a Pakistani human rights lawyer and head of the Legal Evangelical Association Development (LEAD-Pakistan), told Gatestone that, according to data collected by his organization:
"In the first six months of 2019, there were more than 60 abductions and conversions of Christian and Hindu girls – particularly easy targets because of their poor socioeconomic status. The most important reason for this is the desire to increase Pakistan's Muslim population, which stems from the Islamic teaching that that a person who converts one non-Muslim to Islam will be granted a place in paradise."
William Stark, South Asia regional manager at the International Christian Concern, also pointed to the role of Islam in the persecution of non-Muslim girls. He told Gatestone:
"The religious reasons behind these abductions are important to note. In Pakistan, there are extremists teaching ideologies that say the kidnapping and forced conversion of religious minorities is actually a good thing. These ideologies teach that the perpetrator can and will receive blessings for what they have done because they have done it to spread Islam.
"Another reason behind this issue is the widespread religious discrimination that exists in Pakistan. In Pakistan, religious minorities are viewed as lower than Muslims because they do not adhere to Islam. Essentially, because Pakistan is an Islamic Republic, non-Muslims are seen as second-class citizens and their faiths are considered less holy. This lessening of the importance of non-Muslims helps create a religious hierarchy that justifies the abuse.
"Based on accounts of the victims I have talked to in Pakistan, the Pakistani government has not done enough to combat the problem. Many have expressed frustration with local authorities and police for siding with the perpetrators of abductions and forced conversions.
"Higher authorities also have done little to nothing to pass legislation specifically criminalizing this issue.
"International pressure on Pakistan is an important element of seeking to end this abuse. Without motivation coming from outside the country, it is very unlikely the Pakistani government will listen to minority leaders and civil society to pass laws combating this issue.
"Advocating for the establishment of a specially trained task force, which includes representatives from religious minorities, to deal with the issue. Perhaps then we would start to see perpetrators investigated and brought to justice."
*Uzay Bulut, a Turkish journalist, is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Gatestone Institute.
© 2019 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

At Historical Sites Around Israel, No Sign of Arabic
Moshe Gilad/Haaretz/August 07/2019
Hebrew and English speakers receive detailed explanations, but Arabic-speaking visitors get only warnings
You are above the Crusader port. From here you can see other port cities from the Crusader era: Jaffa to the south and Caesarea to the north.” The nice explanatory sign, made to resemble the shield of a Roman soldier, with a silvery metallic background, is located at the Apollonia National Park (Tel Arsuf) overlooking the Mediterranean Sea at the northern end of Herzilya.
The sign is written in two languages: Hebrew and English. The same goes for all the other explanatory signs at the site. Warning signs – those telling you not to leave the paths, not to step on the antiquities or to avoid, if possible, falling off the cliff – are written in Hebrew, English and Arabic.
The managers of the national parks and nature sites seem to think that Arabic speakers are more interested in safety warnings that in content. According to the signage, it seems that history is less interesting than words of caution.
An hour and a half drive north of Apollonia is Gan Hashlosha (Sahne) National Park – one of the most popular attractions in Israel – which has dozens of signs. All the warning signs, especially those that requesting visitors not to jump into the water and not to drown, appear in the three languages: Hebrew, English and Arabic. The ones that provide explanations, like about the ancient flour mill alongside the natural pool where thousands of visitors swim every day, are written only in Hebrew. The sign tells us, in Hebrew only, that the mill is the only one of its kind in Israel – but non-Hebrew speakers would never know it.
Gan Hashlosha also has an interesting archeological museum, which boasts at the entrance – in three languages – that it is officially recognized by Education and Sport and Culture ministries. But inside the museum itself, almost all of the signs are only in Hebrew and English.
Many similar examples can be found at other historical sites and recreation spots – some of which are national parks and others forest and nature sites established and run by the Jewish National Fund (Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael). If we had expanded our investigation to municipal parks, too, the results would have been even more bleak.
One instance that stands out among the many is Horvat Tinshemet (Barn Owl Ruins) in Shoham Forest Park. Fascinating archeological finds, including a large mosaic and remnants of a Byzantine-era church, have been uncovered there. The site is wonderfully signposted – with attractive illustrations and clear explanations– but all of them are only in Hebrew. A few of the signs have an English text alongside the Hebrew. Arabic is not a very useful language here.
Next to the large mosaic is an audio station where visitors can press a button and listen to experts talk about the history of the site. The choice is between Hebrew, easy Hebrew and English. Arabic speakers are unable to receive an educated explanation.
Not far from there stands the impressive Mazor Mausoleum, a beautiful 2,000-year-old Roman building. Next to it are two signs. The Israel Nature and Parks Authority sign has explanations in three languages. The other sign, which was put up by the Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel and explains that the site is on the Israel National Trail, is only in Hebrew.
Just a little farther north, near the Baptist Village, the JNF has put up a number of signs along the Yarkon River. Here things are truly confusing. A few of the signs have explanations in Arabic, Hebrew and English. Others are only in Hebrew. The warning signs – No fishing, for example – also have Russian along with the other three languages.
Government responsibility
Hanan Marjieh is a lawyer who conducted a survey into the use of Arabic on national park signage for the Shared Public Space project of Sikkuy – The Association for the Advancement of Civic Equality. “We examined the situation of the signposting and directions in 13 large and important national parks. We examined the level of presence of the Arabic language,” Marjieh told Haaretz. “The clear conclusion was that the situation was not consistent and not good. All the warning signs appear in the two languages, Hebrew and Arabic, but the signs with information almost always appear only in Hebrew.”
Marjieh says that the Nature and Parks Authority has been making efforts lately to make national parks accessible to the Arab community and has even launched a new website to invite Arabs to visit the national parks. “It’s a good thing but it’s not enough to market the sites to Arabs,” she says.
“We, Arabic speakers, come to the parks and in the end discover that a great deal of the information is not accessible to us,” she says. “After all, the target audience is the children, and regretfully they are not fluent enough in Hebrew. The same goes for the elderly audience. When they see informational signs only in Hebrew they feel a sense of foreignness and a lack of belonging. The regrettable result is that they will not come to these parks again. As a girl, I grew up and was educated in the Galilee. I visited Tzipori with my class – an important and interesting national park. I remember quite well the frustration that there were no signs in Arabic there.”
Today, too, there are still no informational signs in Arabic at Tzipori National Park.
The number of Arabs who visit national parks has increased significantly in recent years, and this rise calls for a way to allow Arabic speakers to understand the historical and archeological background at these sites, says Marjieh. This would send the Arab community a message of inclusion. Another aspect she raises concerns Hebrew speakers: The more Arabic is present in the public space, the more it will become, in the eyes of Hebrew speakers, an integral part of the public space.
“Our main claim is that in addition to a lack of accessibility, it is the right of visitors from the Arab community to receive information in their native language, the native language of 20 percent of the population of Israel,” says Marjieh.
She adds that the signs at national parks should be replaced, and Arabic should be added wherever it’s missing. She believes that such a step could send an inviting message: “A visit to the national parks is part of an educational experience and not just entertainment. It is a right of Arab society and the obligation of the state in which every fifth citizen is an Arab.”
Sikkuy’s survey found two national parks that excelled in providing information in Arabic: The En Afek Nature Reserve and Mount Carmel National Park and Nature Reserve. Other sites were much more problematic and the signs there were a mixed bag. In addition, many sites have park maps and guides available at the entrance, but most of them do not have Arabic versions.
Multilingual confusion
Marjieh does not want to comment at all on JNF sites. The survey focused on national parks, which are funded by the government. “We have nothing to do with the JNF,” she says. A random sampling of a few JNF sites found that most have no signs in Arabic at all – but mostly that there is no consistency.
At the entrance of Tel Hadid, near Ben Shemen Forest, there is a sign with safety instructions in three languages. The site itself has a sign in Hebrew only which explains that the ancient city of Hadid was identified as the Arab village of al-Haditha. Hadid became important during the wars of the Maccabees in the second century B.C.E. for controlling a strategic crossroads for the cities of Judea and Jerusalem. An Arab family was picnicking next to the sign. From the top of the hill one could see the Tel Aviv metropolitan area below. Everyone was having a great time, smiling and relaxing. The sign was the least of their concerns.
The Nature and Parks Authority said that for years, their policy has been to display signs in three languages: Hebrew, English and Arabic.
Anat Gold, the director of the JNF’s planning division, admits that the organization does not have a definitive policy concerning signage. The management is now working on developing a unified method of signposting that will include content, format and location of the signs. This is a long process that will take a number of years, says Gold. “We need to examine who is the audience. In a broad organization such as the JNF it is complex, and patience is necessary.”
Out of the dozens of signs in Shoham Forest Park, one is in Arabic. The eastern section of the Yarkon has quite a number of informational signs in three languages, but a few are in Hebrew only. It’s needless to attribute this to any orders from above. There is no way to understand why the restored winding stream deserves an explanation in Arabic, while a sign with the history of the so-called Concrete House nearby appears only in Hebrew and English.
An attempt to understand whether the signage policy has political and national motives finds no answer. The feeling is that it is more of a big mess than a targeted policy with clear goals. Lack of consideration and disrespect for the Arabic-speaking community sounds like a much more reasonable explanation. No one would have forgotten to place an explanation in Hebrew there, and English inspires us with a feeling of international respect. Arabic, it turns out, is not critical.

Freedom on the march in Moscow, Hong Kong
Cornelia Meyer/Arab News/August 07/2019
When authoritarian regimes come up against grassroots protesters, both find themselves in an uncomfortable place. Last weekend proved this once more.
In Hong Kong, demonstrations started nine weeks ago in opposition to an extradition law that pro-democracy forces claimed would undermine the Basic Law, the constitutional agreement reached in 1982 between then UK Prime Minister Margret Thatcher and her Chinese counterpart Zhao Ziyang.
The Basic Law underlines Hong Kong’s special relationship with China, commonly referred to as “one country, two systems,” and its signing was central to the UK’s handover of the territory in 1997.
The last mass protests in Hong Kong took place in 2014 with the so-called umbrella movement. Then it was students and young people demanding more democracy. Now, support for the protests has been broader with business leaders also opposing the extradition treaty amid warnings that it could lead to tighter control from Beijing — a move that would damage Hong Kong’s economy.
Despite the permanent suspension of the extradition law and an offer by Carrie Lam, the city’s chief executive, to resign, Hong Kong’s protests have become increasingly agitated, turning violent at times. The Chinese government watched as Hong Kong's Parliament was invaded and business district immobilized.
A general strike on Monday, which again crippled the business district and forced the cancelation of hundreds of flights, did not help. The Chinese government, the foreign ministry and Lam have warned that this situation cannot continue. It seems only a matter of time before Beijing is forced to intervene. This has not happened so far only because “one country, two systems” offers economic benefits to China. If economic activity declines and that benefit evaporates, Hong Kong will lose its usefulness to Beijing.
Meanwhile, Moscow has also seen mass protests. Demonstrations have taken place with increased frequency throughout Russia since 2017 in anger at corruption in government and a rise in the retirement age.
Over the past two weeks protests in the capital have voiced anger at lack of access to the city's municipal elections. These are more akin to the 2012 demonstrations opposing Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency because of the threat it represented to civil rights. Opposition leader Alexander Navalny was arrested for 30 days.
In the longer term, recent protest movements have shown that many want to break free from excessive state control.
Last weekend’s demonstrations in Moscow were met with force, with more than 1,000 people arrested and taken into custody. Sergey Sobaynin, the city’s mayor and a confidant of the Russian leader, is now considering bringing charges for mass unrest against selected demonstrators that could result in their imprisonment for up to 15 years. The UN has condemned the excessive use of force against the protesters.
What do these demonstrations in two of the world’s greatest cities have in common? In both cases, grassroots demonstrators oppose what they see as a repressive regime. In Moscow, they oppose the status quo. In Hong Kong, they act out of fear of losing civil liberties and a de facto takeover by what they see as a repressive regime. In both cases, NGOs, such as Human Rights Watch, support the demonstrators and the Western media show sympathy for their plight. The Russian and Chinese governments also condemn the protests and accuse foreign institutions, particularly the US government, of stirring things up. The “foreign forces” vehemently deny any involvement.
The demonstrators will have the NGOs behind them, but should not expect much more. Both China and Russia are members of the UN Security Council, which gives them the power to veto any potential resolution if the situation spins further out of control. The US, too, will not support them vociferously. Unlike his predecessors George W. Bush (who had wide-ranging democracy programs) and Barack Obama, President Donald Trump does not have a single pro-democracy gene in his body. Indeed, he seems to admire autocrats such as Putin or North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. The business at hand with China concerns trade disputes and, with Russia, the withdrawal from the INF arms control treaty. This leaves no room for considering the plight of demonstrators or lofty ideals of democracy.
The British should have an interest in what happens to Hong Kong’s Basic Law, but, alas, there is Brexit, which is dominating the British political agenda. Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s vow to leave the EU on Oct. 31 puts him under pressure to sign trade agreements with countries like China. Hong Kong’s Basic Law is the least of his concerns.
Where does this leave us? In the short term, the strong arm of the state will prevail. In the longer term, recent protest movements have shown that many of their citizens want to break free from excessive state control. This desire for greater freedom cannot be suppressed over time. The human spirit is resilient. We shouldn’t forget that even the Berlin Wall crumbled after four decades of oppression.
There will be costs associated with these struggles. Let us hope that Hong Kong and its indomitable spirit of entrepreneurship survives. Moscow is much less fragile. It survived the czarist empire, Stalin’s great terror, communist regimes and two world wars. If there has ever been a survivor, it is Moscow with its beauty and splendor.
• Cornelia Meyer is a business consultant, macro-economist and energy expert. Twitter: @MeyerResources

Is anyone in the West paying attention to what is happening in Idlib?
Dr. Azeem Ibrahim/Arab News/August 07/2019
The last major rebel holdout in Syria is in the northern province of Idlib. Since April, 800 civilians have been killed there, 200 of whom were children.
Right now, a large-scale campaign is being waged against the entire population of 3 million in Idlib. As many as 330,000 people have already been forced to flee north to Turkey. As before, this campaign, led by the Assad regime and its Russian allies, focuses on bombing civilian targets such as schools, hospitals and residential areas, but also crop fields, in keeping with already established starvation-siege tactics that the regime has employed elsewhere (including Madaya and Ghouta).
As there has been so many times before, there is also talk of a ceasefire, conditional on the rebels withdrawing 20 kilometers to allow the establishment a demilitarized buffer zone. The rebels are happy to observe the ceasefire but refuse to withdraw 20km — and with good reason. The government’s army and its Russian allies have never observed such ceasefires in good faith, and the request for a buffer zone is just a transparent land-grab attempt for a territory that, at the moment, they are unable to take by force.
And this is where things are getting interesting. The reason why the government forces are even entertaining this ceasefire idea, instead of just highhandedly marauding all over the province, is that they are unable at this moment in time to make any further territorial progress. The reason for this is that Iran is sitting out the Idlib offensive.
Why is this? It seems that Assad and, especially, Putin have not shown sufficient appreciation for the crucial role the Iranian militias have played in other provinces, most notably Aleppo. So Iran is demonstrating just how necessary it is to the Damascus front by showing up the impotence of the government forces when Iranian support is absent from the fighting.
The government effort still has clear aerial dominion, courtesy of the Russian air force, but it is being held back on the ground. So it is reduced to doing the only thing it can do in such a situation: bomb targets from the air and hope the other side surrenders — out of sheer terror or out of hunger.
If Turkey’s welcome wears thin and the country cannot absorb the newcomers, we will be looking at another massive wave spilling over into Europe.
This tactic is not going to persuade the rebels on the ground to surrender. Given how the government has behaved in the other areas it took over (continuing to crush the local populations into submission), they would be crazy to do so. But the ongoing destruction of crops and hospitals is taking its toll. We will be seeing an increasing number of civilian refugees forced to flee Idlib and head for Turkey, if only in the search for food for their children.
What is worse, this is coming at a time when anti-refugee sentiment is hardening in Turkey. For all the ways in which Turkey and its president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, are problematic, it must be conceded that the way the country has handled the refugee influx from Syria over the past eight years has been much more generous and effective than anything any country in the West has managed. Germany, for example, the wealthiest and most generous western country took in fewer than 800,000 Syrians; Turkey took in more than 3.6 million. And, at least in some areas, it has integrated them much better, too.
However, the political environment in Turkey is taking a turn for the worse, just as a new wave of refugees looks set to emerge from Idlib. If Turkey’s welcome wears thin and the country cannot absorb the newcomers, we will be looking at another massive wave spilling over into Europe.
Now are you paying attention to what is happening in Idlib? The West is facing the same question it has since the very beginning of the crisis in Syria: will we intervene to uphold human rights in the country or will we accept the refugees that our lack of interest produces?
We continue to try to defy the reality of the situation by refusing to do either, but the reality of the civil war in Syria has caught up with us before and it will catch up with us again and again, until we find the moral courage to stand by our commitments to universal human rights.
*Dr. Azeem Ibrahim is a director at the Center for Global Policy and author of “The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Genocide” (Hurst, 2017). Twitter: @AzeemIbrahim​