English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For November 21/2020
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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Bible Quotations For today
A woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, ‘Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!’ But he said, ‘Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 11/27-32: “A woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, ‘Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!’But he said, ‘Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!’When the crowds were increasing, he began to say, ‘This generation is an evil generation; it asks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. For just as Jonah became a sign to the people of Nineveh, so the Son of Man will be to this generation. The queen of the South will rise at the judgement with the people of this generation and condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to listen to the wisdom of Solomon, and see, something greater than Solomon is here! The people of Nineveh will rise up at the judgement with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the proclamation of Jonah, and see, something greater than Jonah is here.

Question: "How can I know if I am one of the elect?"
What’s new on GotQuestions.org/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Answer: While there are numerous ideas of precisely what election means in regards to salvation, the fact that believers are elect is indisputable (Romans 8:29-30; Ephesians 1:4-5, 11; 1 Thessalonians 1:4). Simply put, the doctrine of election is that God chooses/determines/elects/predestines who will be saved. It is not within the scope of this article to determine how election works. Rather, the question is “How can I know if I am one of the elect?” The answer is exceedingly simple: believe! The Bible nowhere instructs us to be concerned regarding our status of elect vs. non-elect. Rather, God calls us to believe, to receive Jesus Christ as Savior, by grace through faith (John 3:16; Ephesians 2:8-9). If a person truly trusts in Jesus alone for salvation, that person is one of the elect. Whether belief secures election, or election causes belief – that is another debate. But what is sure is that belief is evidence of election. No one can receive Jesus as Savior unless God draws him or her (John 6:44). God calls/draws those whom He has predestined/elected (Romans 8:29-30). Saving faith is not possible without divine election. Therefore, saving faith is evidence of election. The idea of a person wanting to be saved but being unable to, due to not being one of the elect, is absolutely foreign to the Bible. No one seeks after God’s plan of salvation on his own accord (Romans 3:10-18). Those without Christ are blind to their need for salvation (2 Corinthians 4:4). This only changes when God begins drawing a person to Himself. It is God who opens eyes and enlightens minds to the need for Jesus Christ as Savior. A person cannot repent (change the mind about sin and the need for salvation) unless God grants repentance (Acts 11:18). Therefore, if you understand God’s plan of salvation, recognize your need for it, and feel compelled to receive Jesus Christ as your Savior, then believe, and you are saved. If you have received Jesus Christ as your Savior, trusting Him alone for salvation, believing that His sacrifice is the full payment for your sins – congratulations, you are one of the elect.

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on November 20-21/2020

Aoun receives written letter from Russian President, further Independence congratulatory cables from presidents and heads of states
Rahi Lashes Out again at Lebanese Leaders
Rahi: Politicians have destroyed the state instead of building it
Report: The U.S. ‘Postpones’ Sanctions on Senior Lebanese Officials
Army Chief Urges Military to Fend Off ‘Danger, Sedition’
Beirut Begins Clearance of Dangerous Port Containers
Pompeo Renews Support for Lebanon-Israel Sea Border Talks
ISG Deplores 'Lack of Progress' in Forming New Lebanese Govt.
Presidency Dismisses Israeli Remarks on Lebanon's Negotiations Stance
Lebanon Sets Starting Point for Sea Border Negotiations With Israel
Lebanese president urges Del Col to correct Blue Line
Israel accuses Lebanon of changing stance on maritime border
NY-Based Company Pulls Out of BDL's Forensic Audit
Lebanon Hires Firm to Clear Dangerous Material From Shattered Beirut Port
Lebanon Probes Turkish Paraglider Beach Landing
Bassil Denies Request for Slashing U.S. Sanctions
Fondation Diane, Ecoserv Launch Battery Recycling Initiative in Lebanon
Greek Musician Pays Tribute to Beirut: Pray, Lebanese Rebirth, In Memoriam
What’s in a Flag?/Olivia Shabb/Carnegie MEC/November 20/2020
A Hundred Days Later/Charles Elias Chartouni/November 20/2020
Wasta’ makes mockery of cronyism fair game for Lebanese/Rebecca Anne Proctor/Arab News/November 20/2020
L’indépendance nous a apporté beaucoup de malheurs et maintenant elle nous prépare à la disparition/Par Abdel Hamid El Ahdab, Avocat/Nocember 20/2020

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on November 20-21/2020

Numbers Don't Lie:' Walls Close in on Defiant Trump
U.N. Experts Decry Executions Wave in Iraq
Pompeo visits Abu Dhabi to build on momentum from Abraham Accords
Iran's Allies on High Alert in Trump's Final Weeks in Office
Israel Reveals Details on Iranian Positions in Syria
Emmanuel Macron issues ultimatum to French Muslims
Palestinian Authority Restores Ambassadors to UAE, Bahrain
Egypt Rejects French Interference in Its Internal Affairs
Turkey Sets Up New Military Base in Northern Raqqa
Establishment of Russian Base on Sudan's Red Sea Under Study

Titles For The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on November 20-21/2020

The Cancel Culture Moves Against Trump Lawyers/Chris Farrell/Gatestone Institute/November 20/2020
Towards a New Arab-American Era Based on Common Interests/Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al Awsat/November 20/2020
Caucasus: Clash of Imperial Dreams/Amir Taheri/Asharq Al Awsat/November 20/2020
Iran’s Optimism for a Return to Nuclear Deal Under Biden/Camelia Entekhabifard/Asharq Al Awsat/November 20/2020
Every American Should Be Tested for Covid-19 Once a Week/Faye Flam/Bloomberg/November 20/2020
No, It’s Not Surprising That Abu Muhammad al-Masri Was Living in Iran/Thomas Joscelyn/FDD/November 20/2020
Pompeo’s unusual visit and the dire state of Turkey-US relations/Sinem Cengiz/Arab News/November 20/2020
US allows Israeli spy to leave country after 30 years in jail/AFP/November 20/2020
Iran will be ‘sorry’ if it attacks or kills Americans, senior US official warns/Emily Judd and Omar Elkatouri, Al Arabiya English/November 20/2020
Biden must distance himself from far left if he is to unify US/Dalia Al-Aqidi/Arab News/November 20/2020

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on November 20-21/2020

Aoun receives written letter from Russian President, further Independence congratulatory cables from presidents and heads of states
NNA/Friday, 20 November, 2020 
Russian President Vladimir Putin affirmed "Russia's permanent commitment to support the sovereignty and unity of Lebanon and its welcome to efforts aimed at ensuring stability and national consensus”.
President Putin's position came in a written message received by President of the Republic, General Michel Aoun, this afternoon at Baabda Palace, from the Russian ambassador to Lebanon, Ambassador Alexander Rudakov, who discussed with President Aoun the Lebanese-Russian relations and means of developing them in all fields.The following is the text of President Putin's letter:
“Your Excellency the President,
I am pleased to offer you heartfelt congratulations on the occasion of the National Day of the Lebanese Republic - Independence Day. Relations between Russia and Lebanon are based on a tradition of friendship and mutual respect. I am assured that continuing constructive bilateral engagement is fully compatible with the interests of our two peoples and enhances peace and security in the Middle East. I would like to affirm Russia's permanent commitment to support the sovereignty and unity of Lebanon, and its welcome to efforts aimed at ensuring stability and national consensus in your country.
I wish Your Excellency good health and good luck to the citizens”.
Congratulatory telegrams:
In addition, President Aoun received more congratulatory telegrams from presidents and heads of states, on the occasion of the seventy-seventh anniversary of Lebanese independence. In this context, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas sent President Aoun congratulating President Aoun, a congratulation telegram: “In the name of the State of Palestine and its people, and on my own behalf, we are pleased to present to your Excellency, and through you, to the brotherly Lebanese people, our heartfelt congratulations on the occasion of your glorious Independence Day celebration, wishing to achieve all what you seek with goals and aspirations. I would also like to express, on this good occasion, our pride in the strong brotherly relations that unite our peoples and our countries, and our appreciation for your fraternal stances in support of our people and our just cause in order to achieve freedom, independence and sovereignty over our Palestinian land and its capital, Jerusalem, relying on continuing and strengthening your efforts to achieve this noble goal . Please accept our best wishes to your Excellency for good health, happiness and success, and for the Lebanese Republic and its brotherly people for prosperity”. Congratulation cables were also sent by Spanish Monarch Philip VI and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.-- Presidency Press Office
 

Rahi Lashes Out again at Lebanese Leaders
Naharnet/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Maronite Patriarch Beshara el-Rahi hit out again at Lebanon’s political leaders holding them responsible for the "destruction" of the State. “We blame the officials who seek to destroy the State instead of seeking to build it,” said Rahi during a meeting with a delegation of “sovereign groups,” from the October 17 uprising, said LBCI. Rahi indirectly hinted that officials in Lebanon are not masters of their own decisions. He asked: “Who enjoys freedom in Lebanon? Lebanese are known as merchants, can a merchant enjoy being free?” On his earlier calls to “neutralize” Lebanon from regional conflicts, the Patriarch said the Lebanese supported his call, “they found themselves in this proposal. Lebanon, a small country that is, does not wish to go into war, nor into alliances and international conflicts," stated the Patriarch.

Rahi: Politicians have destroyed the state instead of building it
NNA/Friday, 20 November, 2020  
Maronite Patriarch, Mar Bechara Boutros Rahi, on Friday said that the situation in Lebanon was unusual, pointing out that the outright proof “is the inability to form a new government, even a year after the events that have rocked the country, namely the revolution, the resignation of the government, and the coronavirus pandemic. “Politicians have destroyed the state instead of building it. We do not exclude anyone, everyone is responsible. Nobody has sacrificed anything,” the somber Patriarch said before his visitors today. Moreover, the Maronite Prelate received today MP Joseph Isaac, member of the "Strong Republic" parliamentary bloc, who announced in the wake of the meeting his support for the "national positions" of Patriarch Rahi.

Report: The U.S. ‘Postpones’ Sanctions on Senior Lebanese Officials
Naharnet/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Amid reports that the US is expected to impose a new batch of sanctions against some Lebanese officials, al-Joumhouria daily reported Friday that France was able to help postpone these sanctions. Western diplomatic sources told the daily that French President Emmanuel Macron was able to persuade US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to postpone sanctions on senior Lebanese politicians, in order to avoid further complications disrupting the efforts to form a Lebanese government, the daily reported. On condition of anonymity, the sources added that the US will, later, before the US President-elect Joe Biden takes office on January 20, impose sanctions on Lebanese officials if they insist on evading their responsibilities in forming a government of specialists, ending waste of public funds and corruption, and securing coverage and support for Hizbullah. Earlier this month, the U.S. Treasury imposed sanctions on the son-in-law of President Michel Aoun, ex-Foreign Minister and MP Jebran Bassil, saying he is “at the forefront of corruption” in Lebanon. Bassil said he will challenge the sanctions in American courts and demand financial and moral compensation. The US sanctions have hit a number of Hizbullah officials, and members in the Lebanese government and parliament.

Army Chief Urges Military to Fend Off ‘Danger, Sedition’
Naharnet/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Army chief Gen. Jospeh Aoun on Friday marked Lebanon’s 77th Independence Day urging troops to “fight off danger and discord.” In his order of the day, Aoun said everyone in Lebanon is counting on the military to face “danger and bury sedition,” vowing that any "attempt to tamper with security, stability and civil peace will not be tolerated.” “77 years of independence, and Lebanon is currently going through an unprecedented delicate and difficult phase on the political, economic and social levels. The port disaster added more pressure to the crisis accompanied with the coronavirus outbreak. But with unity and solidarity, we are confident that this too shall pass,” he said. Added Aoun: “We made one sacrifice after another, one martyr after another, which will only make us stronger and more determined to carry out our national duties.”Lebanon celebrates Independence Day on November 22. But the country has cancelled all forms of national festivities marking the occasion amid an outbreak of coronavirus pandemic.

Beirut Begins Clearance of Dangerous Port Containers
Agence France Presse/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Lebanon has signed a deal with a German company to dispose of 49 containers of flammable chemicals from Beirut's port, months after a deadly and devastating blast, officials said Thursday. Combi Lift, a German a heavy lift transport company that was already working in the port, started clearing the containers soon after the contract was signed on November 11, the prime minister's office told AFP. The containers, which include corrosive acids, have been stored in an open-air cargo zone for over a decade under the supervision of Lebanon's customs authority, a spokesperson said. Combi Lift will ship the chemicals in special containers as part of a $3.6 million deal, with the port authority reportedly to pay $2 million of that. Interim port chief Bassem al-Kaissi said that removing the chemicals was a necessary "preemptive step," warning that if they caught fire "Beirut will be wiped out". The containers sparked concern after the mammoth August 4 disaster -- Lebanon's worst in peace-time -- killed more than 200 people, injured at least 6,500 others and ruined swathes of the capital. Authorities say the blast was caused by a shipment of ammonium nitrate fertiliser that caught fire, years after it was impounded at the port.

Pompeo Renews Support for Lebanon-Israel Sea Border Talks
Naharnet/Friday, 20 November, 2020
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has reiterated Washington’s support for the ongoing negotiations between Lebanon and Israel over the demarcation of their maritime border. Speaking after talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, Pompeo said he conveyed to Israel’s premier his country’s “support for the decision by the Governments of Israel and Lebanon to begin discussions on the maritime boundary,” for which the U.S. is acting as a mediator and facilitator. “We hope that this long-standing dispute can be resolved. The negotiation has the potential to yield increased stability, security, and prosperity for both Israeli citizens and those in Lebanon as well,” he added. Separately, Pompeo commented on the role of the United Nations peacekeeping force in south Lebanon. “In August of this year, the U.S. supported the renewal of the UNIFIL mission, but we demanded some important conditions, and for good reason. For far too long, Hizbullah has enjoyed near-total freedom of movement through UNIFIL’s mandated areas of control, and with Iran’s support, has built up an arsenal of weapons, fired missiles into Israel, dug attack tunnels underneath the Lebanon-Israel border, and more,” Pompeo said. “The United States cannot abide by these actions against our trusted friend. The most recent renewal of the mandate included new reporting requirements on those attacks against peacekeepers and investigations of access denials,” he added. “We are hopeful that these important steps will ensure UNIFIL can be a multilateral mission that actually fulfills its mandate. If not, we’ll have to move in a different direction,” Pompeo went on to say.
 

ISG Deplores 'Lack of Progress' in Forming New Lebanese Govt.
Naharnet/Friday, 20 November, 2020
The International Support Group for Lebanon on Friday lamented the lack of progress in the negotiations to form a new Lebanese government. “Today’s International Support Group meeting in Beirut discussed with grave concerns the deepening complex crisis in #Lebanon, deplored lack of progress on the formation of a government, but also the absence of a more determined action of existing state and financial institutions,” U.N. Special Coordinator for Lebanon Jan Kubis said in a tweet. “Why it seems that foreigners are more concerned about the well-being and fate of #Lebanon and its people, more alarmed by lack of action and procrastination than the country’s political elites?” Kubis wondered. The International Support Group comprises representatives of the U.N. and the governments of China, France, Germany, Italy, Russia, the UK and the U.S., together with the European Union and the Arab League.  It was launched in September 2013 by the U.N. Secretary-General with former President Michel Suleiman to help mobilize support and assistance for Lebanon’s stability, sovereignty and state institutions and to specifically encourage assistance for the Lebanese Army, Syrian refugees in Lebanon and host communities and government programs and public services impacted by the Syrian crisis.

Presidency Dismisses Israeli Remarks on Lebanon's Negotiations Stance
Naharnet/Friday, 20 November, 2020
The Lebanese Presidency on Friday dismissed remarks by Israel’s energy minister about Lebanon’s stance in the negotiations over sea border demarcation. In a statement, the Presidency’s press office shrugged off as “baseless” Yuval Steinitz’s claim that Lebanon has changed its stance “seven times.” "Lebanon has changed its stance on its maritime border with Israel seven times," Steinitz tweeted late Thursday. "Its current position contradicts not only its previous one, but also Lebanon's stance on its maritime border with Syria, which takes into account Lebanese islands close to the border," Steinitz added. Earlier on Thursday, Aoun had set out Lebanon's position on the maritime border, which he said should be "based on the line that departs on land from the point of Ras Naqoura.” The demarcation should be "according to the general principle known as the median line, without taking into account any impact of the occupied Palestinian coastal islands," Aoun tweeted, referring to the Israeli coastline. Lebanon and Israel, which remain technically at war, opened negotiations on the border dispute under U.S. and U.N. auspices last month to clear the way for offshore oil and gas exploration. They have been negotiating based on a map registered with the United Nations in 2011, which shows an 860-square-kilometer (330-square-mile) patch of sea as being disputed. But Lebanon considers that map to have been based on wrong estimates. Aoun's tweet on Thursday confirms that Lebanon is now demanding an additional 1,430 square kilometers (552 square miles) of sea further south, which includes part of Israel's Karish gas field, said Lebanese energy expert Laury Haytayan.

Lebanon Sets Starting Point for Sea Border Negotiations With Israel
Asharq Al-Awsat/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Lebanese President Michel Aoun on Thursday specified the starting point for demarcating sea border with Israel under US-mediated talks. Israel and Lebanon launched the negotiations last month with delegations from both sides convening at a UN base to try to agree on the unresolved border that has held up hydrocarbon exploration in the potentially gas-rich area. A Presidency statement said Aoun instructed the Lebanese team that the demarcation line should start from the land point of Ras Naqoura as defined under a 1923 agreement and extend seaward in a trajectory that a security source said extends the disputed area to some 2,300 square km from around 860 square km, Reuters reported. Last month sources said the two sides presented contrasting maps for proposed borders. They said the Lebanese proposal extended farther south than the border Lebanon had years before presented to the United Nations and that of the Israeli team pushing the boundary farther north than Israel’s original position. The talks, the culmination of three years of diplomacy by Washington, are due to resume in December.

Lebanese president urges Del Col to correct Blue Line
The Daily Star/November 20/2020
Aoun stressed the necessity of correcting the line separating Lebanon and Israel so that it conforms to the internationally recognized land borders, local media reported
BEIRUT: President Michel Aoun urged the correction of the UN-demarcated Blue Line in a meeting with UNIFIL's head of mission Maj. Gen. Stefano Del Col Thursday. Aoun stressed the necessity of correcting the line separating Lebanon and Israel so that it conforms to the internationally recognized land borders, local media reported. Lebanon is currently in the middle of ongoing indirect negotiations with Israel to delineate the maritime border. Lebanon's mixed civilian-military delegation, headed by Navy Col. Mazen Basbous, has been directed by the Lebanese Army commander to push for an additional 1,430 square kilometers to be included in Lebanese territory. This is on top of the already disputed 860 square kilometer area that both sides say is in their respective Exclusive Economic Zone and brings what is now an Israeli gas field into disputed territory. Aoun in the meeting expressed his hope that the ongoing negotiations to demarcate the maritime borders would be fruitful and that Lebanon “will restore all its rights based on international law.” Aoun told Del Col that “the demarcation of the maritime border is based on the line that starts overland from the Ras Naqoura point in south Lebanon, according to the general principle known as the median line, without taking into account any impact on the occupied Palestinian coastal islands,” a presidency statement said. Israel and Lebanon completed the latest round of indirect negotiations, mediated by the US, in early November.
Del Col affirmed that “we are satisfied with the ongoing negotiations to demarcate the southern maritime borders," the statement said.

Israel accuses Lebanon of changing stance on maritime border
Jerusalem/AFP/November 20/2020
Israel has accused Lebanon of changing its position in talks on their disputed maritime border and warned it could lead to a "dead end" that would be damaging for the whole region. The two countries, which remain technically at war, opened negotiations on the border dispute under US and UN auspices last month to clear the way for offshore oil and gas exploration. "Lebanon has changed its stance on its maritime border with Israel seven times," Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz tweeted late Thursday. "Its current position contradicts not only its previous one, but also Lebanon's stance on its maritime border with Syria, which takes into account Lebanese islands close to the border," Steinitz said. Earlier on Thursday, Lebanese President Michel Aoun had set out his country's position on the maritime border, which he said should be "based on the line that departs on land from the point of Ras Naqoura". The demarcation should be "according to the general principle known as the median line, without taking into account any impact of the occupied Palestinian coastal islands," Aoun tweeted, referring to the Israeli coastline. Israel and Lebanon have been negotiating based on a map registered with the United Nations in 2011, which shows an 860-square-kilometre (330-square-mile) patch of sea as being disputed. But Lebanon considers that map to have been based on wrong estimates. Aoun's tweet confirms that Lebanon is now demanding an additional 1,430 square kilometres (552 square miles) of sea further south, which includes part of Israel's Karish gas field, said Lebanese energy expert Laury Haytayan.

NY-Based Company Pulls Out of BDL's Forensic Audit
Naharnet/Friday, 20 November, 2020
The announcement by Alvarez & Marsal deals a major blow to those hoping for accountability in a country mired in corruption and a crippling economic and financial crisis. It comes after Lebanon's central bank refused to provide the company with the needed documents, using the country's decades-old banking secrecy laws as a pretext. Caretaker Finance Minister Ghazi Wazni told The Associated Press that Alvarez & Marsal, which was contracted in July, says the information it received so far isn't enough and that it doesn't expect to get more.
Wazni added that the Lebanese government last week asked the company to stay for another three months in order for the state to provide it with all the information and documents needed.
"I was surprised when I received their statement today," Wazni said adding that Alvarez & Marsal agreed last week to give the Lebanese state three more months. "I find it odd. They should not have accepted the extension last week," he said. Wazni added that work has been underway to amend the banking secrecy law in order to facilitate the work of the New York-based company. He said legislators have started preparing draft laws and that the government was also working to amend the banking secrecy laws for Alvarez & Marsal.
The banking secrecy laws, once a mainstay of Lebanon's banking system, had attracted clients from around the Arab world who prized the anonymity its banks offered. The country's current economic and financial crisis, the worst in its modern history, is rooted in decades of corruption and mismanagement. The crisis deepened after nationwide anti-government protests broke out in October last year and the spread of the new coronavirus in 2020. A massive blast at Beirut's port on Aug. 4 that killed over 200 people and caused damage worth billions of dollars has worsened the situation. The outgoing government had been calling for a forensic audit into the central bank's accounts since March, after the country defaulted on paying back its massive debt for the first time earlier this year. President Michel Aoun has been a strong supporter of a forensic audit but other politicians were strongly opposed to such a move, which could

Lebanon Hires Firm to Clear Dangerous Material From Shattered Beirut Port
Asharq Al-Awsat/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Lebanon’s authorities signed a contract this month with a German company to clear dangerous material stored for more than a decade at Beirut port, the site of a seismic blast in August that killed about 200 people and wrecked swathes of the capital. Combi Lift, which signed the contract three months after a huge quantity of poorly stored chemicals erupted in a mushroom cloud, will remove “flammable and highly reactive” chemicals from 49 containers at the port, the caretaker prime minister’s office said in a statement sent to Reuters. At least some of the chemicals the German firm will remove had been in storage at the port since 2009, although the statement did not give precise details, Reuters reported. The fact that it took about three months since the blast to sign a deal to remove dangerous material still left at the shattered port, which lies in the heart of Beirut, will add to public frustration and a sense of political drift in a nation whose economy has imploded after years of mismanagement and corruption. Many Lebanese, particularly those who lost homes or who are still working on repairs since the Aug. 4 blast, are angry that results of an investigation have yet to be released. “One hundred days after the national tragedy of the Beirut port explosion, one hundred days of investigation engaging serious international expertise and still no clarity, no accountability, no justice,” UN special coordinator for Lebanon, Jan Kubis, tweeted on Nov. 13. He briefed the UN Security Council about Lebanon, citing a lack of clarity about the probe despite “numerous appeals and petitions of citizenry” for an impartial investigation. The cabinet quit after the blast but is still acting in a caretaker role, as Lebanon’s top politicians, many of whom have been in and out of power for decades under a sectarian power-sharing system, have yet to agree on forming a new government. The state news agency had said on Wednesday a contract with Combi Lift was signed. It did not give the details that were later provided to Reuters. The ammonium nitrate that exploded in August had been unloaded at the port in 2014. The authorities ignored several warnings by officials about the dangers of storing the material there. The authorities have detained 25 people, including port and customs officials, and say the probe is moving as fast as possible.

Lebanon Probes Turkish Paraglider Beach Landing
Agence France Presse/November 20/2020
Lebanese army intelligence questioned a Turkish paraglider who sparked a security alert Friday when he landed on a beach in the south of the country, the National News Agency reported. Videos posted on social media showed the paraglider landing in Adloun, a town halfway between the two main southern cities of Sidon and Tyre, less than 40 kilometers from the border with Israel. Turkish media reports said the man, identified as Mahmud Ertunc, and his powered paraglider were blown off course by strong winds.Lebanon's state news agency did not specify where the Turkish paraglider was believed to have taken off from.

Bassil Denies Request for Slashing U.S. Sanctions
Naharnet/November 20/2020 
Free Patriotic Movement chief MP Jebran Bassil denied reports on Friday claiming he asked the United States to stop sanctions imposed on him earlier this month. Bassil’s press office said in a statement the report was “unfounded,” and that Bassil has not yet taken any measure in that regard.
It added that discussions are underway between the FPM chief and a group of administrative, legal and political experts to study the means to uncover the truth behind the sanctions. Earlier this month, the U.S. Treasury imposed sanctions on the son-in-law of President Michel Aoun, Bassil, saying he is “at the forefront of corruption” in Lebanon. Bassil said he will challenge the sanctions in American courts and demand financial and moral compensation.

Fondation Diane, Ecoserv Launch Battery Recycling Initiative in Lebanon
Naharnet/November 20/2020 
Fondation Diane, a Lebanese NGO that works in favor of Civic Awareness and Eco-Sustainable Development, and Ecoserv, its leading partner in the Electronic Waste Recycling field, have launched a program in Lebanon that aims to collect and recycle batteries.
"With a growing population, the world's waste problems are only going to increase, so we, as citizens, need to find new innovative ways to deal with our waste: This includes recycling our batteries," Fondation Diane said.
“This alliance aims to expand the network of electronic waste collections, cover larger areas of Lebanon, and become the leading e-waste service provider. As of today, there are no proper recycling plans in Lebanon, and lots of Electronic Waste are misused,” Fondation Diane added.
The Fondation Diane-Ecoserv joint venture was launched at the beginning of the year 2020. “Fondation Diane is the pioneering NGO that started promoting Eco-sustainable Development and is working on changing the mindset and attitude of Lebanese people towards it,” a press release said.
“Today, Fondation Diane is collecting used batteries at the national level in cooperation with LibanPost and Energizer. Whereas Ecoserv is currently among those leading the Climate for Change in Lebanon by offering services towards green CSR, through e-waste solutions and social awareness,” the statement added. Through this partnership, Fondation Diane and Ecoserv are joining hands to optimize efforts and grow this endeavor to “encourage and be a major contributor to the circular economy in the country with the objective of establishing a highly sustainable recycling and refurbishing plant for obsolete electronics that will provide green job opportunities in Lebanon.” This partnership will allow Fondation Diane and Ecoserv to promote CSR compliant disposal methods of e-waste and “positively contribute to the ever increasing national environmental challenges concerning toxic waste disposal together, through effective environmental awareness and targeted sustainable actions.”

Greek Musician Pays Tribute to Beirut: Pray, Lebanese Rebirth, In Memoriam
Naharnet/November 20/2020 
Beirut’s devastating port explosion on August 4, 2020 that killed 200 people and flattened large parts of the capital, has reverberated through many parts of the world impacting many including artists, illustrators, directors, and writers who expressed their sorrow for Beirut in their work. Greek musician and composer, Panos Skouteris, was inspired by the catastrophe and the tragic days the Lebanese lived through. He featured Beirut, a city renowned for its love of art, life, and joy, after the blast in three short videos he dedicated to its people. He played for Beirut flashing passion, and showcased three musical pieces on YouTube and on his personal Instagram page. The first musical piece he named Pray for Beirut, has featured the view of the port of the city after the colossal explosion. The second musical piece Skouteris named the Lebanese Rebirth, through which he gave hope to the reconstruction of the city and its destroyed neighborhoods despite the loss it encountered. In Memoriam, his third piece. The musician was keen to salute through his music the souls of the victims who died in the explosion. The explosion, which also injured thousands, and left more than 300,000 people homeless was the latest blow to Lebanese already reeling from an economic crisis that sparked mass anti-government protests.

What’s in a Flag?
Olivia Shabb/Carnegie MEC/November 20/2020
On Lebanon’s Independence Day, the question has meaning for a population whose leaders are masters of the meaningless.
November 20, 2020
Our daughter recently came home from daycare with a Lebanese flag drawn to the best of her two-year-old’s artistic ability. The red strips at the top and bottom consisted of glued-on shreds of papier-mâché, and the cedar in the middle was a broad stroke of green paint sprinkled with gold glitter.
I might have been endeared by this work of unwitting patriotism, had I not wondered what kind of allegiance my daughter was practicing, and on what grounds? What does it mean to teach love of country in a Lebanon that gives so little love to its own citizens, that offers closed horizons to those children rehearsing distorted versions of its national anthem in their preschools?
If November 22, Lebanese Independence Day, is tolerated annually thanks to a hefty dose of sarcasm, this year is different. This year, the hurt and disappointment are too fresh, too deep, too frequent, and too consequential to be neutralized with cursory defense mechanisms. If political and financial bankruptcy, intimidation and tear gas, unconstitutional kidnappings, threats of civil war, the mobilization of civilians against each other, and the impoverishment of the population are not violations enough of our right to life, then the explosion of August 4 sealed the deal. In times of so-called peace, we were living, working, bickering, baking, sending kids to school, making love, poring over projects atop thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate waiting to rip through us. And when they did, destroying the lives of those who died and survived alike, we received neither an apology nor an explanation from the authorities. Lebanon’s leaders preferred to rely on collective amnesia to wash away the disaster, as they did with memories of the country’s civil war between 1975 and 1990.
The picture has long been clear. We, the Lebanese, are in an abusive, life-threatening relationship with the so-called leaders of a certified failed state who are incapable of either governing or engaging in dialogue. So what does this make the Lebanese flag?
Is it a romanticized token of the strained relationship that exists between citizen and country? And might it draw some of its romance from this very tension, being something to hold onto as the country itself escapes our grip?
Is it a stubborn denial of the ways in which our tribalism bleeds into our patriotism, killing the possibility of a healthy nationalism, if such a thing can even be envisaged? Or is it an expression of hope that a healthy nationalism can one day be embodied by this symbol that flutters at some ill-defined finish line in the future? Is the flag a fig leaf that the ruling class uses to hide its moral vulgarity and justify its nepotism, corruption, opportunism, violence, lawlessness, and obstinate grasp on power, despite a flagrant lack of qualifications? Is it a familiar prop in the background of nearly every political speech or interview to gaslight the audience for feeling underserved, persecuted, insulted?
Or does the flag in fact belong to each and every one of us, an endless cloth on which to lay out our dreams like a picnic so that we can share and taste offerings of a brighter future—an inclusive future, a conscientious future, a future of political, humanitarian, and environmental accountability; a future of transparency and humility; of competent public systems and services; a future in which influence is earned rather than bought or inherited; a future of problem-solving and innovation, human protection and investment, dialogue and inclusivity; a future that resembles us and expands us. A future that honors life, and that cares for us and for our children.
Likely, a flag is all and none of the above. It is a symbol, like any other symbol, to be claimed and shared in the interests of building a broader culture. And in fact, since our last Independence Day, the uprising of the Lebanese that began on October 17, 2019, has done just that. With the flag as our only message, our only weapon, it has been a year of saying: This flag belongs to those who dare to dream of a country. And so it will be, regardless of whether one floats it from their balcony or sews it onto their broken, expatriated heart.
I put my daughter’s flag up on the refrigerator, and I urge her to love it. To love it in a way that honors her and everything she might dream of in herself and in her country, but also in a way that teaches her to hold love accountable rather than become its hostage. And I urge her to keep sprinkling glitter on her exploratory brushstrokes, because we will need that spirit when it comes time to build a country.
*Olivia Shabb is a clinical psychologist in Beirut.

A Hundred Days Later
Charles Elias Chartouni/November 20/2020
شارل الياس شرتوني: بعد مرور مئة سنة/فيديو لإنفجار مرفأ بيروت
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/92599/charles-elias-chartouni-a-hundred-days-later-%d8%b4%d8%a7%d8%b1%d9%84-%d8%a7%d9%84%d9%8a%d8%a7%d8%b3-%d8%b4%d8%b1%d8%aa%d9%88%d9%86%d9%8a-%d8%a8%d8%b9%d8%af-%d9%85%d8%b1%d9%88%d8%b1-%d9%85%d8%a6/

Terror in Beirut, Forensic Analysis of the Proto-Nuclear Explosion
Experts worldwide* started delivering their technical assessment of the explosion after reviewing videos, photographs and documents which helped them identify the chemical components ( 5 types of plumes which correspond to different combustibles, time frame ( 5.54 pm North East, 6.00 pm N.E as well, 6.07 pm North West, 6.08 Center, 14 minutes ), Combustible material( 2700 Tons of Ammonium Nitrate, 50 Tons of Ammonium Phospate, Rolls of Slow Burning Detonating Cord, 1000 Car Tyres, 5 Tons of Tea and Coffee ..., 755 meters height of detonation projections, total lack of storage security standards in terms of distancing, location at least 1570 meters away from urban areas, decayed packaging, lethal combination of combustible material, .... ). Experts consider that Ammonium Nitrate is very difficult to detonate by fire exclusively, nonetheless, when confined and contaminated it can trigger catastrophic explosions as demonstrated in the 4th of August Beirut explosion. After 3 and an a half months, the Lebanese government has not yet released any report ( forensic, administrative, legal, criminal ... ) which accounts for the circumstances that led to this criminal explosion that destroyed major parts of Eastern Beirut, and led to humanitarian, urban, social, economic, financial, educational and health infrastructures catastrophes, and are still unacknowledged and unaddressed by its different agencies ( 204 victims, 6500 with various degrees of injuries and invalidities, 20 disappeared, 300.000 homes destroyed and damaged homes, massive urban devastation in Gemmayzeh, Mar Mikhayel, overall Ashrafieh and vicinity, badly damaged and partially destroyed schools, universities, hospitals ....).
This deliberate oversight, far from being the expression of the commonplace delinquency of the reigning oligarchies, is an intentional terror act which displays the true nature of this criminal undertaking: it’s an act of total war initiated by Shiite fascists and their oligarchic accomplices, which aims at upending the political and urban dynamics, annihilate the strategic platforms of the Christian community, and enact the last stages of a domination strategy in motion. The release of various international forensic and intelligence reports is essential, if we were to understand the nature of the criminal indifference, moral and political apathy and total disregard for the reconstruction issues which succeeded the catastrophe, and account for the governmental and oligarchic smugness and cynicism.
This state of deliberate heedlessness has backlashed on international relief and reconstruction projects and swayed their alertness, tempo and readiness at a time when the international environment is fraught with vital crises. The caretaker government, its Hezbollah mentors and oligarchic accomplices have exhibited utter disregard for this tragedy, and the purported prime minister Saad al Hariri, in charge of cabinet formation, didn’t even mention it in his statements, while he rushed to defray the damages of a minor tragic fire on his power turf. The significant political incidence of this terrorist act should be reckoned with, since it’s a noteworthy gauge of the country’s viability, readiness for major reformist undertakings, and ability to evolve a moral compass which parallels the ugly realities of a proceeding decomposition.
*The 3D analysis was conducted by Forensic Architecture, a multi-disciplinary Research Group at the University of London, that uses architectural techniques and technologies to investigate State and Human Rights violations Worldwide ( https: //github.com/forensic-architecture/models ). To review the video, you should press on “ open in app “ on the bottom of the video and get the Vimeo application if you don’t have it.
 

Wasta’ makes mockery of cronyism fair game for Lebanese

Rebecca Anne Proctor/Arab News/November 20/2020
Elie Kesrouwany’s board game offers a satirical take on the country’s dysfunctional politics and nepotism. Inspired by the ‘thawra’ protests of Oct. 2019, the game features illustrations by cartoonist Bernard Hage
BEIRUT: In the Zero 4 shopping hub in Antelias, a small town just 5 kilometers outside Beirut, Elie Kesrouwany sits at a table sipping his morning coffee, surrounded by stacks of board games. With Lebanon’s economy on the rocks and the coronavirus outbreak forcing stores to close, Kesrouwany’s business, On Board, is one of the few here that remain open.
Lying sprawled across the table is a deck of comically illustrated cards from his latest creation: Wasta.
The board game, inspired by the anti-government protests that swept Lebanon in October 2019, is an exercise in witty seriousness and black humor. The illustrations, by popular cartoonist Bernard Hage, highlight what many Lebanese view as the bane of their lives: corruption, clientilism and nepotism.
Elements of this entrenched culture have also been held responsible for the Beirut port blast on Aug. 4, when nearly 3,000 tons of improperly stored ammonium nitrate exploded, killing more than 200 people and leaving 300,000 homeless.
“I wanted to criticize society, particularly present Lebanese society,” said Kesrouwany, who lost several friends in the blast. “We are in huge pain every day. My entire generation has been suffering from our present predicament and these warlords in the government have been there for years sucking the blood of this country.”
Wasta, which takes its name from an Arabic word for political and social influence or sway, is commonly used to denote an individual’s powerful connections used to rig opportunities in their favor.
The game was first released in June, two months before the port explosion, and sold out its first batch of 500 units in just two weeks.
It has been so popular, particularly among the Lebanese diaspora, that Kesrouwany is now creating an English-language version and an expanded second edition, with new illustrated characters to correspond with the country’s latest travails.
Kesrouwany, who worked as a librarian for 17 years before establishing his business, says he has long been a lover of these humble tabletop games — a vanishing pastime in the age of smartphones and gaming consoles.
“I began collecting board games in the trunk of my car and would go into coffee shops and offer games for people to play,” Kesrouwany told Arab News. “I then organized board game nights. It was a side gig at the time and one I was greatly passionate about.”
Kesrouwany was inspired to establish his own premises following a visit to London, where he encountered an avid community of board gamers. And so, on Dec. 22, 2019, at the height of Lebanon’s revolution — known in Arabic as the “thawra” — he opened On Board, a coffee shop for board-game lovers.
“It was my dream to create a game community in Lebanon open to all ethnicities and different religious affiliations under the umbrella of having fun,” he said. “It was an anti-sectarian space.”
It was during Lebanon’s coronavirus lockdown earlier this year that the inspiration for Wasta struck. Here was a creative and enjoyable way to speak out. “Having fun is a clever way to slip ideas into the minds of people that are hard to talk to,” Kesrouwany said.
Wasta players compete using points-weighted cards, each depicting a different facet of Lebanese society. Among the characters are the sectarian thug, the banker, the mother, the journalist, the soldier and the sheep (who blindly follow the government).
While the symbolism of each card offers a crash course in the different characters that make up Lebanese society, the genius of the game lies in the way the cards interact with one another when played.
IN NUMBERS
89% Lebanese who reported corruption in government as a big problem in 2019.
68% Lebanese who thought most or all government officials are involved in corruption.
28/100 Lebanon’s score in 2019 Corruption Perceptions Index, which measures public-sector corruption.
The starting player (obviously a Lebanese person) is the last person who managed to withdraw “fresh money” or US dollars from the banks. “This is a sardonic twist to the start, as recently the banks weren’t parting with US dollars anymore,” said Kesrouwany.
Since April of this year, Lebanese banks have forced customers with dollar accounts to withdraw Lebanese pounds at a fraction of the black-market rate. Now the Lebanese, ever creative in their response to sudden change and instability, must exchange their “fresh money,” when they have it, on the black market to get the best value, as the Lebanese pound continues to slide.
“The game is based on kicking other players out of the game and the objective is to either have the highest number or be the last man standing at the table. The most powerful card in the game is the Lebanese flag, which is number 8. So, if you have this card in your hand and the whole deck is done, then you win the game. “However, on the card there is a small sentence that reads that if you throw the Lebanese flag from your hand, then you lose your dignity and are out of the game.”
Cartoonist Bernard Hage in his studio. (Arab News photo by Firas Haidar)
Some aspects of the game mirror Lebanon’s system of political patronage. “The player who has the sheep picks his political leader (another player) and he follows him blindly. And if that leader wins the game, the player that played the sheep also wins a round and gains a tarboosh,” he said.
When players win a hand, they win a tarboosh — the iconic Middle Eastern felt hat. The first player to get three tarbooshes wins.
There is even an “external political influence” card — another echo of Lebanon’s entrenched clientelism, which allows you to swap cards between players. “Because both players then have information about each other’s cards, they are now pitted against each other,” he said.
If you get the “political immunity” card, then you become immune to the influence of other cards. “This is a reference to how Lebanese politicians are abusing power today to hide away from law and justice because of their political immunity,” Kesrouwany said.
And of course, there’s the “wasta” card. “Wasta can illegally copy a card that was already played on the field. It’s like a cheat card.”
Given the in-your-face style of Wasta, some amount of backlash was perhaps inevitable.
“Bernard (the cartoonist) has enough guts to do whatever is needed through his art and relay the right message,” said Kesrouwany, who has also caught some flak. “It was troublesome for some people. I got some calls too, but I didn’t answer.”
As with so many other things in Lebanon, Kesrouwany’s board game injects charm and humor into an otherwise bleak situation, but with a kernel of hope.
“In the expanded version (created after the Beirut explosion), I focused on the fact that the game should still be fun and that makes people forget a little bit of the pain that they went through,” he said. “At the same time, the game needs to raise awareness, but always with some positivity. This is why I made cards representing the Lebanese diaspora.”
The new version does not go into detail about the explosion, the deaths, the destruction and the broken homes. “It was too painful — we Lebanese already feel like we’ve been going through a funeral for the past month,” he said.
“Lebanon is in a very messy situation now, but we will get through it and will overcome it with time by the sheer will to live.”

L’indépendance nous a apporté beaucoup de malheurs et maintenant elle nous prépare à la disparition
Par Abdel Hamid El Ahdab, Avocat/Nocember 20/2020
Chaque année,nous célébronsle 22 novembre la fête nationale de l’Indépendance du Liban ! Mais l’indépendance n’a plus l’éclat et le sens qu’elle avait autrefois ! Alors que le Liban est au bord du gouffre comme l’a prévenu le Ministre français des affaires étrangères en disant que le Liban court le risque de disparaître si les réformes ne sont pas adoptées, nous nous demandons en ces temps difficiles, tout en voyant la classe politique gouvernante qui est tout à fait déconnectée de la réalité nous guider vers le gouffre, si l’indépendance nous était une bénédiction ou une malédiction. Si le Liban était toujours sous le mandat français, y-aurait-il eu une fraude électorale sous le règne de Cheikh Béchara ? La révolution de 1958 aurait-elle éclaté ? L’Accord du Caire aurait-il était signé ? La guerre civile aurait-elle éclaté laissant des milliers de morts et des milliers de blessés ?
Le Liban était sous le mandat français quand il fut fondé il y a 100 ans ! Des universités, des écoles et des hôpitaux furent ouverts,des rues furent percées, l’administration et la magistrature indépendante mixtefurent réglementées, la justice fut rendue, et l’économie etles financesfurent réglementées, etc. et ce jusqu’à l’indépendance en 1943. Ceci fut suivi par une fraude électorale en 1947, une révolution en 1958, une période de grâce sous la présidence de Fouad Chéhablors de laquelle il y eu une tentative de fonder un État neutre parmi les États arabes, tout en notant que les chrétiens accusèrent le régime deChéhab de suivre le modèle égyptien (celui d’Abdel Nasser), et enfin « Mizyara » qui détruisit l’État de Fouad Chéhab et prépara le chemin pour la guerre civile.
Le Liban n’est pas composé d’un seul peuple, mais de plusieurs peuples représentés par les différentes confessions ! Ceci se manifeste dans chaque crise ! Comment alors donner à un Etat formé de plusieurs peuples uneindépendance non adaptée à ses différentes confessions tout en s’attendant à ne pas avoir des conflits entre ces peuples et confessions ? De 1920à 1943, le Liban vivait en paix, la sécurité régnait, la dignité de l’être humain était respectée et le pays était prospère. Après vint la fraude électorale, la révolution, l’armistice, le chaos qui a détruit la tentative de fonder un État, la guerre civile, l’occupation syrienne, le régime de Ghazi Kanaan puis de Rostom Ghazali et JamehJameh et enfin le régime iranien qui, ces jours-ci, contrôle le pays et le peuple à travers les mullahs iraniens !
L’indépendance était-elle une bonne idée ?
C’était Émile Eddé qui désigna le premier Premier ministre Khaireddine Al Ahdabet c’était lui qui a fait les préparatifs de l’élection de Cheikh Mohammad El Jisr pour la présidence de la république, d’où la dissolution du Parlement par le Haut-commissaire français.Émile Eddé croyait en l’indépendance, mais non « l’indépendance de 1943 ». Il croyait en une indépendance taillée sur mesure qui prend en considération les différents peuples et confessions de ce petit pays, une indépendance où la France reste un allié auquel le Liban recourt pour régler les conflits qui naissent entre lesdits peuples et confessions ! Ainsi, il n’y aurait aucune fraude électorale, aucune révolution, aucune guerre civile, aucun règne par les services secrets syriens et les mullahs iraniens et le Liban serait un État qui se respecte et qui respecte les lois. L’indépendance de laquelle nous nous sommes réjouis a déclaré licite ce qui est illicite et a déclaré illicite ce qui est licite : la crainte et l’indépendance de la magistrature ont disparu, la corruption est devenue chose courante et les leaders qui émergent sont devenus des dieux qui s’approprient les fonds publics, qui disséminent le chaos et la corruption et qui vident les fonds de l’État dans leurs poches sans aucun contrôle !
Tout mandat se caractérise par son propre enfant gâté qui dissémine la corruption et le chaos : Cheikh Béchara avait Sultan Salim l’ombre du président, SleimanFrangieh avait Tony BeykFrangieh l’ombre du président, et Michel Aoun a son gendre Gibran Bassil,l’ombre du président, qui s’est plongétellement dans la corruption et le chaos que le plus grand Etat au monde a dû le mettre sur sa liste noire !
C’est le résultat de l’indépendance, un phénomène qui se manifeste dans les pays du tiers monde qui sont ivres en raison de beaux mots lancés à leurs oreilles mais qui soudainement deviennent sobres une fois la réalité les frappe de plein fouet, plus particulièrement les pays du tiers monde ayant une pluralité de peuples et de confessions. Ils aiment les apparences, l’apparence d’une liberté et l’apparence d’uneindépendance, alors que ce qui règne après l’indépendance est la corruption, la pauvreté, l’ignorance, le chaos,la tyrannie et l’absence de l’indépendance de la magistrature !
Émile Eddé voulait l’indépendance, mais une indépendance taillée sur mesure qui prend en considération ces différents peuples et confessions, une indépendance oùnouspouvonsrecourir à un État avec lequel nous nous allions pour régler les conflits qui naissent entre lesditspeuples et confessions, ne les laissant pas ainsi comme des orphelins sur les banquets des hommes vils.
Il est peut-être temps, après cent ans, de réfléchir sur lesleçons sans se distraire avec les beaux mots qui sont vides de sens. L’indépendance. Que veut dire l’indépendance et comment l’indépendance fut un malheur pour nous, un pays qui comprend des peuples et des confessions qui se disputent ?
L’indépendance n’est pas une quelconque indépendance mais une indépendance taillée sur mesure qui prend en considération les différents peuples et confessions. C’est l’indépendance à laquelle Émile Éddé visait, non l’indépendance de Béchara El-Khoury en 1943 où tout était permis.
La Suisse est composée de peuples et de confessions qui ont choisi la neutralité et le fédéralisme pour instituer l’indépendance.
Ceci n’est pas un jeu d’enfants. 1943 était la plus grande erreur dans l’histoire des peuples et confessions au Liban. Il aurait peut-être fallu une phase transitoire avec la France en tant qu’alliée et en tant qu’autorité à laquelle le Liban pourrait recourir pour régler ses conflits. C’est à quoi pensait Émile Éddéqui a été transformé en un traître et dont le fils, surnommé la « conscience du Liban »et qui, avec Fouad Chéhab, avait fondu un État moderne où régnait l’opulence, la liberté et la prospérité, a étéforcé de quitter le Liban pour après être remplacé par Ghazi Kanaan, Rostom Ghazali et les mullahs d’Iran. C’est l’indépendance de 1943.
Nous avions de même Edmond Naim que l’indépendanceremplaça par Riad Salameh et ainsi de suite.
Il est temps d’instituer une indépendance qui prend en compte la situation des peuples et des confessions de ce pays, en commençant par la neutralité et en passant par le fédéralisme, moyennant des personnes honnêtes et intègres comme Raymond Éddé et Fouad Chéhab.
Il est temps d’avoir recours à la raison non aux instincts et à l’ignorance pour pouvoir instituer une indépendance qui prend en compte la composition de ces peuples et confessions en conflit, moyennant des hommes honnêtes et patriotiques qui visent à fonder un État où les citoyens jouiront d’une vie respectable et ne vivront pas en enfer comme l’a dit Michel Aoun !
La forme de l’indépendance ne peut pas attendre les peuples et confessions du Liban mille années-lumière pour qu’ils soient en harmonie avec elle ! Nul ne peut savoir si on trouvera, vingt mille années plus tard, une forme d’indépendance qui sera en harmonie avec tous ces peuples et confessions, une forme d’indépendance appropriée, une forme de neutralité et de fédéralisme où nous cherchons tous à devenir des libanais.
Les suisses n’étaient pas nés suisses. Ils se sont fait la guerre bien avant qu’ils aient institué une forme d’indépendance qui les convient. Ce fut alors le paradis ; ils sont enfin sortis de l’enfer.
Tout au long des années qui suivirent l’indépendance, nous cherchâmes l’Homme libanais et nous le trouvâmes enterré parmi les poèmes de la Jahiliyyaet attendant à l’entrée des villes libanaises pleurant et affamé.
L’indépendance est le contraire du malheur. Mais quelle forme d’indépendance pour tous ces peuples et confessions ? L’indépendance est un système dont le rôle principal est de protéger contre l’horreur, l’injustice et le malheur ! et ce n’est pas elle qui cause l’injustice, le malheur et l’horreur.
Le système de l’indépendance ne peut être ni illogique ni immoral, et ne peut pas prendre ni le parti du tueur contre la victime, ni le parti de l’oppresseur contre l’opprimé et ni le parti du poignard contre la chair humaine comme nous avons vécu depuis 1943.
Il est temps de mettre fin au long congépris par le cerveau libanais, ce congé qu’il a passé en mangeant, en buvant, en dormant et en chassant des gazelles. Il est temps de mettre fin à la période d’inactivité passé à la cafétéria en jouant aux cartes, en buvant un café amer et en composant des panégyriques.
Si la politique libanaise est celle dessinée et appliquée par Machiavel visant à bâtir une cité idéale, ce but sera impossible. Mais si la politique reflète la vertu et les bonnes mœurs, bâtir une cité idéale deviendra alors très facilement réalisable.
La raison pour laquelle le peuple libanais souffre intellectuellement, nationalement, politiquement et démocratiquement, c’est parce que tous ceux qui le gouvernent sont des machiavélistes.
Aucun manuel n’existe qui apprend comment conduire une voiture. De même, aucun manuel n’existe qui apprend comment bâtir une nation. S’il existait un, toutes les femmes et tous les hommes seraient des titulaires de doctorats en l’art de bâtir des nations libres et indépendantes.
Le système de l’indépendance est un système autodidacte. Il est similaire à un oiseau qui vole sans avoir besoin de s’inscrire dans une école d’aviation et à un poisson qui nage sans avoir besoin de joindre les forces navales.
Le 22 novembre 1943 fut un malheur pour nous et le début de tous les massacres, maux et famines auxquels nous étions témoins. La forme d’indépendance du Liban qui est composé de plusieurs peuples et confessions ne peut pas être basée sur les livres relatifs à ce sujet mais sur la conscience, l’expérience et la pensée vivante.
 

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on November 20-21/2020

Numbers Don't Lie:' Walls Close in on Defiant Trump
Agence France Presse/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Donald Trump faced growing pushback from fellow Republicans Friday for resisting Joe Biden's election victory, as the increasingly isolated president pursued his crusade against defeat in an angry stream of tweets.
Insisting against all odds that a path to victory remains viable, Trump was meeting Friday with Michigan lawmakers in a bid to pressure districts in key states to overturn the voters' will. But logic dictates that his days in the White House are numbered, with battleground states that sealed President-elect Biden's November 3 win rapidly approaching deadlines to certify their election results. "Numbers don't lie," said Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state in Georgia -- which was poised Friday to certify Biden's win. "I believe that the numbers that we have presented today are correct," he added, saying: "The numbers reflect the verdict of the people."Senator Lamar Alexander became the latest Republican to nudge Trump, saying Biden "has a very good chance" of becoming the next president and should be provided "all transition materials, resources and meetings necessary to ensure a smooth transition."The outgoing president though has bunkered down in the mansion, and for nearly two weeks has done something unimaginable one month ago: shunned the media. He has maintained his busy tweeting schedule however. "A Rigged Election!" Trump fumed on Twitter Friday morning, calling the vote a "HOAX" and retweeting conservative personalities arguing that Biden's victory was fraudulent, and that Republican senators who accept the Democrat's win should be challenged in their next elections. He notably retweeted a message about stopping the electoral "fraud and abuse" posted by Georgia Republican congresswoman-elect Marjorie Taylor Greene, who supports the QAnon conspiracy theory.
'Irresponsible' -
While Biden's team plows ahead preparing for taking over on January 20 -- his team announced new White House senior staff Friday -- Trump appears in denial. He takes the unprecedented step Friday of hosting at the White House two legislative leaders from Michigan, where Trump's team seeks to block the state from certifying the vote. Biden won Michigan by 155,000 votes, a margin more than 10 times higher than Trump's state victory in 2016. Biden, who turned 78 on Friday, slammed Trump as "irresponsible" for the move which also alarmed some Republicans. Senator Mitt Romney accused Trump of trying to "subvert the will of the people and overturn the election" by pressuring local officials. "It is difficult to imagine a worse, more undemocratic action by a sitting American president," Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, said in a statement late Thursday.Trump's legal team fights on, however.  Rudy Giuliani and other lawyers hosted a conspiracy-laden press conference Thursday peddling unsupported allegations that Democratic "crooks" committed widespread fraud to deny Trump reelection. The event fueled Trump's last-ditch effort to throw out ballots in counties that voted heavily Democratic, force recounts and otherwise delay the process enough so that an insufficient number of states will have finalized their results before the Electoral College votes on December 14.
- 'Outrageous' -
Republican Senator Ben Sasse slammed the tactics as undemocratic. "Wild press conferences erode public trust. So no, obviously Rudy and his buddies should not pressure electors to ignore their certification obligations under the statute," Sasse said. Another Senate Republican, Iowa's Joni Ernst, said it was "absolutely outrageous" for Trump lawyers to declare that Democrats and Republicans might have rigged the election. In a further blow to Trump's long-shot hopes of overturning results, Georgia officials on Friday were to formally certify Biden's victory there, the first time a Democratic presidential candidate has carried the southern state since 1992. Georgia conducted a hand recount of some five million ballots, reaffirming that Biden won by more than 12,000 votes. Trump's campaign will likely demand yet another recount. While a growing number of Republicans are calling for Trump's administration to recognize Biden as president-elect, the party's leaders on Capitol Hill have attempted to humor the president -- while some conservatives are doubling down in his support. Republican Jim Jordan wrote the House Judiciary Committee calling for an investigation into the election's integrity "amid troubling reports of irregularities and improprieties." But more than two weeks after the election, a Pew Research poll shows Americans approve of Biden's conduct far more than Trump's. Sixty-two percent said Biden's conduct since November 3 has been excellent or good, compared to just 31 percent who said the same of Trump.

U.N. Experts Decry Executions Wave in Iraq
Agence France Presse/Friday, 20 November, 2020
U.N. human rights experts on Friday voiced alarm at reports that a further 50 terror convicts were facing execution in Iraq on Monday, as they urged Baghdad to halt all "mass executions." Some 4,000 prisoners, most of them charged with terror-related offences, are reportedly on death row in Iraq, said a trio of experts who do not speak for the United Nations but report their findings to it. Hundreds of deaths are imminent after the signing of execution orders, according to the UN special rapporteurs Nils Melzer (torture and other cruel punishment), Fionnuala Ni Aolain (protecting human rights while countering terrorism) and Agnes Callamard (extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions). Iraq executed 21 men convicted of "terrorism" last Monday at the notorious Nasiriyah prison in the country's south, medical and police sources said. They had all been convicted under a 2005 anti-terrorism law, which carries the death penalty. Since declaring the Islamic State group defeated in late 2017, Iraq has condemned hundreds of its own citizens to death for membership of the jihadist faction. The U.N. experts said in a joint statement that they had "serious concerns about the conduct of the trials and the extraction of confessions under torture." "We strongly urge the Iraqi government to respect its international legal obligations and to immediately halt further plans to execute prisoners," said the special rapporteurs. "When carried out on a widespread and systematic basis, arbitrary executions may well amount to crimes against humanity and may entail universal criminal responsibility for any official involved in such acts."

Pompeo visits Abu Dhabi to build on momentum from Abraham Accords
Arab News/November 20/2020
LONDON: US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo arrived in Abu Dhabi on Friday as part of a tour of the Middle East. The Secretary of State said he looked forward to building on the “positive momentum” made from the Abraham Accords. “We have made significant progress in advancing peace and security in the Middle East,” Pompeo tweeted. The UAE agreed to normalize relations with Israel in a historic agreement in August. Bahrain and Sudan followed suit soon afterwards. Previous to the agreement, Egypt and Jordan were the only two Arab countries that had formal diplomatic relations with Israel. Pompeo on Thursday became the first top American diplomat to visit a West Bank Jewish settlement and the disputed Golan Heights. His visit was condemned by the Palestinians and the Syrian government.

Iran's Allies on High Alert in Trump's Final Weeks in Office
Associated Press/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Iran has instructed allies across the Middle East to be on high alert and avoid provoking tensions with the U.S. that could give an outgoing Trump administration cause to launch attacks in the U.S. president's final weeks in office, Iraqi officials have said.
The request -- delivered by a senior Iranian general to allies in Baghdad this week -- reflects the growing regional anxiety over President Donald Trump's unpredictable behavior and the uncertainty in the chaotic transition period until President-elect Joe Biden takes over in two months.
Iran's allies have collectively welcomed Trump's election defeat. Under his presidency, tensions with Iran escalated, reaching fever pitch at the beginning of the year with the U.S. airstrike that killed Iran's top general, Qassim Soleimani, at the Baghdad airport. Iran launched a ballistic missile attack in response to the fatal drone strike, targeting U.S. soldiers in Iraq and wounding dozens. Trump also unilaterally withdrew America in 2018 from Iran's nuclear deal with world powers, meant to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons, and re-imposed punishing sanctions on Iran, crippling its economy.
Iran has since abandoned all limits on its uranium enrichment program, even as the deal's other international partners have tried unsuccessfully to salvage it. The incoming Biden administration has stated plans to rejoin or renegotiate the 2015 nuclear accord.
But there is growing concern over what Trump, who is refusing to concede the election, might do in the last days of his presidency -- including a potential strike on America's enemies abroad. On Thursday, an adviser to Iran's supreme leader warned in an interview with The Associated Press that any American attack on Iran could set off a "full-fledged war" in the region.
"We don't welcome war. We are not after starting a war," said Hossein Dehghan, who served in Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard before becoming a defense minister under President Hassan Rouhani. The concern does not appear to be rooted in anything concrete -- Trump has, in fact, ordered a drawdown in U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan to be completed by mid-January -- but rather in general nervousness about the unpredictability of Trump's actions. His firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper two days after the election triggered a flurry of speculation about whether it was related to a broader plan to strike abroad. Iraq, where the U.S.-Iran rivalry has chiefly played out, is seen as a potential arena. Frequent attacks against the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad in recent months led a frustrated Trump administration to threaten to close the mission, a move that sparked a diplomatic crisis and diplomatic back channel messaging that led to an informal truce a few weeks ahead of the U.S. election. With two months to go until a Biden administration takes over, Iranian Gen. Esmail Ghaani, head of the Guard's expeditionary Quds Force, delivered Tehran's request during a meeting with Iranian-backed Iraqi militia factions and Shiite politicians in Baghdad this week, according to two senior Iraqi Shiite politicians who attended the meetings in Baghdad.
The message: Stand down to avoid giving Trump the opportunity to initiate a fresh tit-for-tat round of violence. And to the Iraqi Shiite paramilitaries: Be calm and cease attacks for now against American presence in Iraq. However, if there was a U.S. aggression by the Trump administration, Iran's response would "be in line with the type of strike," one of the Iraqi politicians cited Ghaani as saying. An Iraqi government official also confirmed Ghaani's meetings with Iranian-backed factions in Iraq this week. All Iraqi officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private meetings.
Meanwhile, in Lebanon, the leader of Iran-backed Hizbullah, Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah, warned followers and allies to be vigilant during Trump's remaining weeks in office. "All of us ... should be on high alert in these next two months so that it passes peacefully," Nasrallah said in televised remarks earlier this month even as he urged followers to "be prepared to face any danger, aggression or harm" and to respond in kind "if the U.S. or Israel's follies go that far."But only hours after Ghaani delivered Iran's message in Baghdad -- and while he was still in Iraq -- a barrage of Katyusha rockets were fired at the Iraqi capital's heavily fortified Green Zone, landing a few hundred meters from the U.S. Embassy. A few of the rockets that landed just outside the Green Zone killed a child and wounded five civilians. The attack -- contrary to instructions to avoid escalation -- could indicate potential disagreement within militia ranks, or a deliberate plan by the factions to offer mixed messages and keep their intentions ambiguous. A little-known militia group, Ashab al-Kahf, believed to have links with the powerful Kataib Hezbollah, claimed responsibility for the rocket attack. For its part, Kataib Hezbollah denied it had carried out the barrage, and claimed the truce initiated in October was still in place. That claim was countered by Qais al-Khazali, the head of the powerful Iran-aligned Asaib Ahl al-Haq militia group, who said in a televised interview on Thursday that the truce had ended.

Israel Reveals Details on Iranian Positions in Syria
Tel Aviv - Asharq Al-Awsat/Friday, 20 November, 2020
The Israeli army spokesman revealed on Thursday secrets of the Iranian positions in Syria, saying Tehran reduced its presence but increased the activity of its militias. The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps is personally supervising this activity, through its “Unit 840,” he added. According to the spokesman, the unit, which is the foreign arm of the IRGC Quds Force, is responsible for managing and directing Iranian militias, along with the Lebanese “Hezbollah.” It is a relatively secretive operational unit that carries out bombing operations against Western targets and assassinations against Iranian opposition figures.
A new mission seems to have been added to the Unit, which is to turn the Golan into a war front run by Iranian militias against Israel, he noted. The spokesman affirmed that the unit managed to infiltrate through selected militia fighters into southern Syria and recruited Syrian citizens in exchange for money. It trained them to plant mines and improvised explosive devices and to establish an infrastructure for military activity against Israel. He also issued a press statement, including pictures, videos and explanatory maps that gave new details on Iranian activities and the strikes launched by Israel in its recent raids on Wednesday morning.

Emmanuel Macron issues ultimatum to French Muslims
Arutz Sheva/November 20/2020
French president issues 'republican values ultimatum' to Muslim leaders, demanding they sign charter denying Islam is a political movement. French President Emmanuel Macron has issued an ultimatum to French Muslim leaders, as part of his bid to clamp down on radical Islam following a string of terrorist attacks. On Wednesday, Macron issued a “charter of republican values”, giving the French Council of the Muslim Faith 15 days to sign on to the document. The charter establishes a national council of imams, which would be empowered to accredit religious Muslim leaders, or, conversely to strip leaders of accreditation. In addition, the charter defines Islam in France as a religion and not a political movement, and bars “foreign interference” in Muslim groups. Macron has promoted French secularism, following a string of terrorist attacks by Islamists in France, including the beheading of a teacher over cartoons of Muhammad shown to a class last month. In addition to the charter on Islam, Macron proposed a number of policy changes Wednesday aimed at curbing religious radicalization. Among the new steps are tightened restrictions on home-schooling and stricter enforcement of anti-truancy regulations. Under the plan, children would be given a unique identification number to help schools ensure their attendance, with parents being subject to up to six months in jail for their children’s truancy.

Palestinian Authority Restores Ambassadors to UAE, Bahrain
Ramallah- Kifah Zboun/Asharq Al-Awsat/Friday, 20 November, 2020
The Palestinian Authority is planning to resend its ambassadors back to the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, in a second major step after restoring all relations with Israel since Joe Biden's win in the US presidential elections.
On August 13 and Sep. 11, the PA recalled its ambassadors from the UAE and Bahrain, respectively, in protest at the Gulf countries’ US-brokered deals establishing ties with Israel. It described these ties as “betrayal to Jerusalem, Al-Aqsa Mosque, and the Palestinian cause and a declaration of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.”The decision to resend the ambassadors hasn’t come into effect yet, a Palestinian informed source told Asharq Al-Awsat, noting that it is part of the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’s tendency to alter policies and prepare the atmosphere for the new US administration to start a new political path. Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki received on Thursday Ambassador to the UAE Essam Masalha in the ministry’s headquarters. They discussed the embassy’s affairs in Abu Dhabi and the consulate general in Dubai, as well as the conditions of the community and the consular facilities provided to it during the pandemic, a statement read. They also discussed the general political situation and the leadership’s efforts to achieve reconciliation and consensus on the elections, as well as Israel’s recent approval of the reference to the agreements signed with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). The statement affirmed that another meeting will be held next week between the two officials to complete the talks. The PA seems to be preparing to officially announce the return of its ambassadors to avoid immediate popular criticism.
This development came shortly after the PA announced it will renew its security and civil coordination with Israel, which was severed six months ago over Israel’s plans to apply sovereignty over parts of the West Bank and the Jordan Valley, which have been put on hold since the signing of the normalization pacts. The Palestinians have had a difficult relationship with US President Donald Trump, who cut aid to the West Bank and Gaza, expelled the Palestinian envoy in Washington, and presented a peace plan that the Palestinians believed granted too many concessions to Israel.
The PA has boycotted Trump’s administration since 2017 when he announced that he would move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Biden, for his part, has opposed parts of Trump’s peace plan and pledged to undo some of the Trump-era policies most rejected by the Palestinians.

Egypt Rejects French Interference in Its Internal Affairs
Cairo - Asharq Al-Awsat/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Egypt's Foreign Ministry rejected a statement released by the French Foreign Ministry on the arrest of the administrative manager of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights group (EIPR). The Ministry said the French statement entails interference in an Egyptian internal affair. EIPR group said that security forces arrested its administrative manager Mohamed Bashir on charges of joining a terrorist group, spreading false information and funding terrorism. It also arrested Karim Ennarah, the group's criminal justice unit director. The arrests come after senior diplomats visited EIPR for a briefing on the human rights situation on Nov. 3.On Wednesday, France expressed "deep concern" over the arrest of Bashir. Egyptian Foreign Ministry’s spokesperson Ahmed Hafez rejected France’s statement, calling it an attempt to interfere in Egypt’s internal affairs and influence investigations of the country’s Public Prosecution and reminding France that the case in question is between an Egyptian citizen and Egyptian courts. Hafez also stressed that the Egyptian state respects the principles of the rule of law and equality, adding that work in any field must be regulated by the applicable laws and no person is above these laws.

Turkey Sets Up New Military Base in Northern Raqqa
Deir Ezzor - Kamal Sheikho/Asharq Al-Awsat/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Military sources from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) confirmed Thursday that the Turkish army and Syrian factions had set up a military base in the village of Sayda, north of Ain Issa. The Kurdish news agency, Hawar, published recorded videos showing the expansion of the military site, hundreds of meters from the M4 international highway. According to residents, the Turkish forces have reinforced their military positions along the conflict lines in the vicinity of Ain Issa in Raqqa and Tal Tamar, Zarkan and Abu Rassin in their military operational areas, northeast of Syria. They also said that the Turkish forces equipped those positions with radars and tracking devices, in addition to the presence of hundreds of soldiers, vehicles and heavy weapons. This comes amid escalation of attacks by Turkish forces and their proxies on Ain Issa town and countryside. On Thursday, hundreds of residents in Ain Issa gathered in front of the Russian forces base in the vicinity of al-Sawameh area, denouncing the attacks launched by Turkish forces. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported the injury of three civilians in rocket attacks by Turkish forces and their proxy factions in the area. The residents urged the Russian forces not to remain silent over Turkish violations against them. SOHR activists also reported rocket attacks by Turkish forces on Thursday afternoon, targeting the SDF-controlled village of Sayda in the northern countryside of Ain Issa in northern Raqqa. Also, several Turkish rockets pounded the entrances of Ain Issa district, but no casualties have been reported.

Establishment of Russian Base on Sudan's Red Sea Under Study
Khartoum - Ahmad Youness/Asharq Al-Awsat/Friday, 20 November, 2020
Sudanese deputy Chief of Staff Mohamed Othman al-Hussein has affirmed that his country has not yet concluded any deal with Russia to establish a naval base on its Red Sea coast, however, he pointed out that the deal is under study. Hussein’s remarks were the first by a senior Sudanese official following Russia’s statements on establishing a naval base in the region. “The military bilateral cooperation is ongoing,” he stressed, adding that Russia and some eastern countries were providing Sudan with weapons during the embargo imposed by the US and the West. He told Al-Arabiya TV channel that Sudan will not compromise its sovereignty, and the agreement with Russia is being studied. Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his defense ministry on Monday to establish a logistical support center for Russia's navy in Sudan. According to Russian reports, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said the facility “meets the goals of maintaining peace and stability in the region and is defensive and not aimed against other countries.”Putin’s order, which was posted on Russia's Official Internet Portal of Legal Information, is dated Nov. 16, 2020. Mishustin had approved a draft agreement regarding the base on Nov. 6. The base facilities will reportedly be constructed near the Sudanese Navy's main base at Flamingo Bay, which is situated just north of Port Sudan, the country’s main port city on the Red Sea. The draft agreement between Russia and Sudan on the naval logistics facility was submitted by Russia’s Defense Ministry, approved by the Foreign Ministry, the Supreme Court, the Prosecutor General’s Office and the Investigative Committee of Russia. Ousted President Omar al-Bachir had asked Putin to provide him with protection in the face of US threats and to establish a military base on the Sudanese Red Sea coast during a visit to Russia.

The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on November 20-21/2020

The Cancel Culture Moves Against Trump Lawyers
Chris Farrell/Gatestone Institute/November 20/2020
Now, the Never-Trumper "Republicans" of the Lincoln Project... have dreamed up a way to self-righteously interfere with legal due process.
Reminder: our system of justice guarantees citizens the presumption of innocence and the ability to access the courts to address torts and grievances.
The larger point to consider is that should a Biden presidency come about, these sorts of tactics -- and the general, national shift to centralized government control -- will increasingly be compulsory. It is a philosophical thing. Big Government, Big Media, Big Tech, Big Medicine, Big Solutions -- all at the expense of the individual: Individual rights, individual property, personal wealth, personal privacy, individual responsibility, personal conscience. Those will all have to be compromised supposedly for the greater good -- especially if you supported Trump.
According to civil rights attorney Harmeet Dhillon (pictured), lawyers representing Republicans have received death threats and been "doxxed" by people opposing the Trump-Pence campaign's ability to lawfully challenge contentious election results. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
Thanks to The Lincoln Project, attorneys at Jones Day and Porter, Wright, Morris & Arthur LLP are on "the List." What list? The List of people to be identified, catalogued, written about and punished for cooperating with Republican election campaigns. Bloomberg News reported it a week ago and we have The Lincoln Project's own Twitter feed explaining their thinking.
In their tweet announcing their project against the law firms, The Lincoln Project stated: "Whatever you think of the Administration's legal arguments, targeting the sanctity of our elections is immoral & ineffective." One wonders if they apply the same election integrity standards to themselves.
Attorneys with these two law firms (among others) are representing the election interests of President Trump and Vice President Pence. Legal representation, according to The Lincoln Project, must be suppressed and intimidated. People who help Trump-Pence must be put on The List. This was precisely the sort of list maintained by the Ministerium für Staatssicherheit in the not-so-distant past.
Just when you had deciphered and comprehended the consequences of today's practical application of the Frankfurt School's critical theory -- how "deconstructing" people is the Cancel Culture -- many (and here I include The Lincoln Project crew) take things to whole new low.
You are familiar with the tactics of the Cancel Culture: Target a person who says things (usually very effectively) they do not like; then manufacture some outrage over a supposed offense (real or imagined); whip things up exponentially, to a hysterical pitch via social media; maximize the controversy with additional murky claims and/or threats to anyone who may support the person or be within their "blast radius" (also known as "isolation"); issue non-negotiable demands for the person's silencing, firing, removal, banning, etc. Viola! Cancelled.
There was a time when these tactics were reserved for persons in politics, media, entertainment, and sports. Every once in a while, some ordinary mortal would be elevated from obscurity, thrust into the spotlight, destroyed, and their remains cast adrift and burned in Viking funeral fashion.
There is a generation of Americans (those addicted to social media) for whom this Cancel Culture is all great sport, and who spend the greater part of each day hunched over a device, awaiting the next status update or posting. Welcome to COVID-locked America 2020.
Now, the Never-Trumper "Republicans" of the Lincoln Project -- you remember, the people who worked with John Podesta to "war game" post-election street violence against persons and property -- have dreamed up a way to self-righteously interfere with legal due process.
Reminder: our system of justice guarantees citizens the presumption of innocence and the ability to access the courts to address grievances and torts.
Do the folks who would, it appears, dismiss these guarantees subscribe to the Trump Accountability Project's goal of cataloguing all persons who cooperated with or supported the Trump administration? If Trump had just given each of the Lincoln Project "leaders" minor sinecures at Agriculture, HUD or the Small Business Administration, would they have groveled appreciatively and never organized to oppose his administration? Is The Lincoln Project "protecting democracy" by seeking to undermine the rule of law? The irony would appear lost on them.
In America, serial killers and drug dealers get legal counsel. This clumsy political war against lawyers representing a president may be unprecedented in our nation's history. It is not only petty and disingenuous -- but -- it is also dangerous. It is an attack on our fundamental constitutional rights. Members of The Lincoln Project are seeking to intimidate law firms and attorneys in order to deprive individuals and organizations of their legal protection. Could there also be the hope that enough character assassination might stick so that the targeted person will be permanently taken out?
Civil rights attorney Harmeet Dhillon claims attorneys representing Republicans have received death threats and been "doxxed" by some of the Never-Trumpers and other persons opposing the Trump-Pence campaign's ability to lawfully challenge contentious election results.
Here is an interesting point to consider: Normally, Republicans are not well-suited to devise political techniques like this effort to pressure legal representation. Many rank-and-file Republicans are comfortable remaining in the minority. Notably, the Lincoln Project crowd has not accomplished very much since Trump took office, other than occasional appearances on CNN. This legal pressure campaign is quite novel.
The larger point to consider is that should a Biden presidency come about, these sorts of tactics -- and the general, national shift to centralized government control -- will increasingly be compulsory. It is a philosophical thing. Big Government, Big Media, Big Tech, Big Medicine, Big Solutions -- all at the expense of the individual: Individual rights, individual property, personal wealth, personal privacy, individual responsibility, personal conscience. Those will all have to be compromised supposedly for the greater good -- especially if you supported Trump. The legal profession has made it onto The List. Will the new Big Brother be coming soon for you?
*Chris Farrell is a former counterintelligence case officer. For the past 20 years, he has served as the Director of Investigations & Research for Judicial Watch. The views expressed are the author's alone, and not necessarily those of Judicial Watch.
© 2020 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.

Towards a New Arab-American Era Based on Common Interests
Eyad Abu Shakra/Asharq Al Awsat/November 20/2020
International relations are based on interests, not liking or disliking one another; with stability very much a top political priority. Subsequently, the more stable an influential superpower is, the easier it is to carry out dialogue or manage differences. This issue also applies to regional equations and conflicts, as well as internal crises. Thus, there is nothing worse than chaos. Any country finds it easier to acclimatize with others’ clear policies - even when not being perfect - than it can when there is vacuum or confusion that never produce results to help governments adopt meaningful approaches.
Given the above, and regardless of what one thinks of the USA as a superpower, or its government and its institutions, its stability is in the best interest of the international community. On the other hand, I dare to say, that despite the acute political division reflected in the November 3rd elections, the USA has enough mechanisms, laws, rules, and networks of vested interests capable of arresting current divisive tendencies.
A proof of this has been how the world community, especially the major Western democracies, rushed to congratulate the President-elect before the official declaration of the result. This confirms both the fairness of the elections and their confidence in the American system. Even China, America’s leading competitor on the world stage decided not to wait too long before sending its letter of congratulation; leaving only Russia behind.
There is no need to recall the 2016 Presidential elections, after which Moscow was accused of interference and hacking; which led to setting up a Special Investigation Commission (2017-2019) led by Robert Mueller.
The Mueller Commission eventually came up with a technically detailed report saying that it did not find “sufficient evidence” that the (Trump) campaign “coordinated or conspired with the Russian government in its election-interference activities”.
We have also been aware that many Democratic politicians in Washington, as well as several European politicians, have since accused the Russian leadership of trying to influence internal politics and general elections in many European countries. Moscow’s alleged attempts mainly aimed at supporting marginal ultra-nationalist and extreme isolationist groups within these countries; in order to sow the seeds of chaos through actions and reactions from extremist rightwing and leftwing groups.
Thanks to the retreat of its Western competitors and their internal problems, Moscow’s attempts have been successful, as it scored significant tactical global victories despite its acute economic problems. Among the aforementioned internal problems are the crises of immigration, racism, terrorism, Brexit, inter-European tensions, as well as Washington’s shifting its traditional ‘animosity’ from Russia to China, and adopting protectionist and isolationist policies that have strained its relations across the Atlantic.
Soon enough, the Covid-19 pandemic hit America in early in 2020, and confirmed Washington’s isolationist attitude. President Trump began calling the virus the “Chinese Virus” since it emerged from the Chinese city of Wuhan, and because Beijing “kept quiet” about it.
Later on, Trump capitalized on the World Health Organisation’s confusion and indecisiveness in the face of the worsening pandemic, to go further in a fight against the UN agencies, including WHO, which he boycotted after accusing it with ‘failures’ and ‘collusion with China’.
All this pertains to the US-Russian ‘accounts’ inside the US, and whether Moscow intentionally embarked on spreading chaos and fomenting instability within American society and undermining its unity and political institution. However, as far as Moscow’s national interests are concerned, they obviously depended on Washington’s retreat or even withdrawal from particular strategic regions, among which are the Middle East and North Africa.
The Arabs, evidently, know better than most how Barack Obama’s administration dealt with the Middle East’s affairs. They are well aware that had it not been for the disastrous way it handled the Iranian file, the Arab world would not have reached the horrible situation it is in today.
Just as a reminder, the Obama administration adopted three fatal approaches prior to the ‘Arab Spring’ early in 2011:
1- Tacit, then open OK, and then active support, to bringing down pro-Washington and ‘anti-Political Islam’ regimes, without insuring an alternative that Washington was truly willing to accept. In fact, Obama’s Washington, itself, used the extremist groups coming out of the cloak of traditional ‘Political Islam’ as excuse to justify its alliance with the Iran leadership. Noting that Obama candidly said that Iran’s brand of ‘Political (Shi’ite) Islam’ was “not suicidal”!
2- During the ‘Arab Spring’, the Obama administration worked to marginalize its closest Arab allies when it kept them in the dark about its negotiations with Iran. This happened despite Washington being aware that Iranian expansionist ambitions concern them, and threaten their people.
3- Those negotiations were focused on the technical side of Iran’s nuclear file, with total disregard to its geopolitical dimensions. Thus, the negotiations became nothing more than an ‘understanding’ that allows Iran to fulfill its regional political ambitions through its ‘classic’ arsenal without the need for nuclear muscles. In fact, since then Iranian boasts about “controlling four Arab capitals” became familiar.
These three approaches have created the Syrian tragedy and speeded up Iranian control of Lebanon, Yemen, and most of Iraq. Consequently, they were the main reasons why a large percentage of Arab public opinion sided with Donald Trump in 2016. Thanks to his withdrawal from the nuclear deal, many in the Arab world continued to support Trump this November, despite his whole-hearted backing of the Likud policies in Israel.
Well, now after the US elections, we are facing a different scenario that requires wise endeavors. Four full years have passed, and the political landscape of the Arab Middle East looks really different. Still, some of the names being suggested as future administration members under President-elect Joe Biden do not reassure many Arabs, as they have strong and old links to the ‘Tehran lobby’ in Washington. But having said this, lines of political and diplomatic communications are there and must be used and invested in. Furthermore, it is important to conduct dialogue with Democratic leaders who are less dogmatic than Obama, and more willing to realize the dangerous strategic consequences of betting on a theocratic-militaristic regime that incites all kinds of sectarian violence.
Dialogue is always needed; and in Washington’s case necessary; more so, after it has discovered who benefited most from its regional retreat.

Caucasus: Clash of Imperial Dreams
Amir Taheri/Asharq Al Awsat/November 20/2020
As the dust settles after the latest fighting in Transcaucasia we may be witnessing the shaping of a bigger disaster involving more parts of the Western Asian arch of instability spanning from the Caspian Basin to the Mediterranean.
Let’s briefly recall what happened.
Sometime in 2018 Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan offered to help his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliev to reconquer the High Qarabagh enclave captured by neighboring Armenia in the early 1990s, soon after the disintegration of the Soviet Empire. A crash program of training and arming the newly created Azeri army was launched by Ankara financed by Azerbaijan’s spiraling oil revenues. The fact that the so-called Minsk Trio, the United States, France and Russia who guaranteed the status quo had lost interest in the whole thing enabled Erdogan to put the new and as yet fragile Azeri republic on a war footing with the help of over 100 Turkish advisers and some 300 Syrian Jihadis forming part of a Turkish Foreign Legion.
Meanwhile, successive Armenian governments, thinking that Russia will always be here to protect Armenia as it had done since the 18th century, had neglected the new nation’s defense needs. Just over a month of fighting drove the Armenians onto the defensive and then defeat on various fronts. But when the Azeris and Turkish allies were swooning for the kill, Russia intervened by calling the leaders of Baku and Yerevan to Moscow to agree to a confused ceasefire that, while stopping the fighting, left the deep causes of the conflict untouched. In typical fashion of opportunist powers, Russia used the occasion to extend its military presence, already significant in Armenia, to Azerbaijan as well. Under the Moscow accord, a Russian “peacekeeping” force will seize control of the ceasefire line plus the borders of Azerbaijan and Armenia with Iran. On balance, the Azeris didn’t gain much. Most of the disputed enclave, notably its capital Stepanakert (Khan Kandi in Azeri) remains beyond their control while a good chunk of their own territory, notably the land route between Azerbaijan proper and its “ autonomous” enclave of Nakhichevan fall under Russian control.
Armenia loses six settlements while at least half of High Qarabagh’s ethnic Armenian population has chosen to flee, often burning their villages. Worse still, Yerevan will now have to consult, read obey, Moscow before attempting any revenge in the future. The message is clear: Transcaucasia was a Russian protectorate for two centuries and is again becoming a Russian glacis.
All this may recall what Putin has done in some other so-called “near neighbors” of Russia. He has annexed the Crimean Peninsula and carved out a fiefdom in Donetsk in eastern Ukraine. He has annexed the Georgian enclave of South Ossetia and created another fiefdom in Abkhazia. He has a similar fiefdom in eastern Moldova, under Russian protection and is breathing down Latvia’s neck with a military build-up.
And, yet, Putin may turn out to be one of the losers in this deadly game.
To start with the mini-victory he has won against Armenia may have whetted Erdogan’s appetite for further conquests. Pro-Erdogan papers in Turkey are beating the drums about “victory in the Caucasus” as the first time, since the end of the Ottoman Empire that Turks have managed to “liberate” a chunk of Islamdom from “infidel” rule. Forty-eight hours after the ceasefire, Erdogan asked the Turkish Parliament to let him send an expeditionary force to Azerbaijan. A Turkish military presence in Transcaucasia could entail the risk of direct confrontation between Moscow and Ankara which are already in conflict in a number of other places notably Syria, Libya and Kosovo.
Worse still for Putin, Erdogan has already indicated he wants to involve his Foreign Legion of Jihadis in protecting “Muslim lands”. The Moscow daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta quotes Russian military experts who warn that Erdogan may have his eyes on stirring trouble among Crimean Tatar already unhappy with Russian annexation. A recent visit by a gentleman who claims to be heir to the throne of Crimea on behalf of the Develt Giray Tatar dynasty who ruled in Baghche-Sarai in medieval times was given top billing in Ankara. ( Crimean Tatars were transported to Siberia en masse by Stalin but allowed to return under Khrushchev in the 1950s.)
The region is full of Muslim lands to be “liberated “from Russian “Infidel” control notably Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia and Charkes-Qarachai, not to mention the more populated autonomous republics of Tatarstan a Bashkortostan.
More immediately, Erdogan’s ambitions may threaten Armenia’s very existence. Turks blame Armenians for having stabbed the Ottoman Empire in the back in the First World War by siding with Russia. It is no accident that Ankara has revived the memory of the so-called Iravan (Yerevan in Armenian) Khanate, a mini-state under a self-styled Turkic khan that enjoyed a brief existence during the period of Iranian decline under the Qajars.
Several Moscow papers claim that Erdogan’s swelling ambition is dangerous for both Russia and Armenia.
By mixing his Muslim Brotherhood Jihadism with pan-Turkic themes that recall Enver Pasha, Erdogan hopes to replace the Ataturk narrative with a new narrative of religious nationalism. It is no accident that he is also sharpening his anti-West rhetoric and tightening ties with the Grey Wolves, a pan-Turkish outfit banned by the European Union as a “terrorist organization.” The “Grey Wolves” dream of a Turkic empire stretching from the Balkans to Central Asia. In their most cherished book “The White Lilies” they even claim that Finns and Hungarians are also Turks and would become part of the empire.
The mess created by Putin and Erdogan in Transcaucasia may also revive Armenian militancy. There are some 12 million Armenians across the globe, more than 3 million in Russia alone. In recent days we have heard noises about “volunteers” from various parts of Europe and North America who might go to the region to fight against the “Turkish enemy.”
Two decades ago we witnessed a similar trend as Serb and Croats in diaspora returned to the Balkans to fight for their respective patch of land. For almost three decades, until the fall of the Soviet Empire, the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA) was a thorn in the side of both Turkey and Russia. Ah, and what about Iran? It has lost its border with Armenia, and once again has Russia as a land neighbor. The latest episode revealed the Islamic Republic as a country without a proper government in the normal sense of the term, and thus as an irrelevant spectator as the “big beasts “ fight it out.

Iran’s Optimism for a Return to Nuclear Deal Under Biden
Camelia Entekhabifard/Asharq Al Awsat/November 20/2020
In nearly 60 days from now, Joe Biden will inaugurate as the new President of the United States (that is, should Mr. Trump eventually concede), and in nearly six months’ time, Iran will have its presidential election (June 2021).
Today, FM Zarif and President Rouhani who foresee the return to the White House of the Democrats they had been acquainted with, find the opportunity – in the short run - to brush aside rival groups in the Iranian political arena.
Mr. Biden has already signaled the possibility of returning to the nuclear agreement, but contrary to Iran’s wish, he has shown no indication for removing the sanctions that are already in place.
Mr. Zarif is pinning his hopes on his friendship with former US officials in Barak Obama’s administration to undo the current paralyzing situation in Iran. It was the time when the media referred to the US and Iranian foreign ministers by their first names, “Jack” and “Javad”; the time Joe Biden was the vice president. The world in which the nuclear accord or ‘JCPOA’ was signed with Iran in 2015, was a very different world from today. Now, looking at regional to international developments, Iran and the United States, along with Iran’s neighbors are in totally different positions compared to those under Barak Obama’s presidency. Hassan Rouhani had managed to conclude the nuclear agreement with the West at the end of the very first round of his presidency.
The popularity President Rouhani and his team including FM Zarif and his deputy, Abbas Araqchi enjoyed, both inside Iran and internationally, raised the hope at the time that with the formal signing of the JCPOA and the reduction in tensions, Iran would go back to the bosom of the international community, and that Iranians would at last be able to enjoy peace and prosperity after thirty years of the Islamic Revolution.
However, political and social developments that followed the JCPOA in Iran removed all the affinity reformists had with the system and its affiliates, Rouhani and Zarif included.
Violent suppression of the uprising by residents of the city of Mashhad in December 2017 turned into nationwide protests. The position the President took against people who complained about the soaring prices and the reduction in their purchasing power, created such a gap between the people and the government that even Trump’s paralyzing sanctions and his maximum pressure were dwarfed as a cause to forge people’s solidarity with the government and the governing system as a whole.
The killing of hundreds of people in November last year who demonstrated against the rise in the price of petrol and Hassan Rouhani’s approach to their protests, equally disgruntled Iranians with the rulers of the country. Today, Rouhani’s government in its last six months, has neither the prestige and the popularity it gained in 2015 among Iranians and the international community nor the credibility and legitimacy on the basis of which it attempts to open negotiations with the US.
On the other hand, the more the US exerted its maximum pressure on Iran, the more the Islamic Republic compensated for it by attacking its neighbors. Iran’s threats and attacks against tankers in the Persian Gulf and missile attacks by its proxy Houthis against Saudi Aramco oil facilities, that according to UN experts had Iranian origins, not only added to the existing tensions but intensified the distrust and frustration of Iran’s neighboring countries.
Today, the countries of the region have extended their hand of friendship to Israel. Whether Mr. Trump stays in the White House or not, there will no longer be any obstacles on the way of such regional friendships, and Mr. Biden will support peace in the Middle East and friendship between Israel and Arabs.
Far from Iran’s interest in opening negotiations with the US over the nuclear agreement, for the President-elect, there are more pressing matters to attend than the fate of the JCPOA. Mr. Biden should, at the commencement of his office, concentrate on the two most important national issues for Americans: the coronavirus pandemic and the US economy.
Therefore, in the six months left of Rouhani’s government, neither the United States has the time to negotiate with Iran nor such negotiations could hurriedly be organized for Zarif and Rouhani’s government.
Equally, Mr. Biden is well aware of the shortcomings within the nuclear agreement’s body; shortcomings that have led to its failure and ultimately necessitated a new round of negotiations with Iran and the Western partners to include other issues of concern.
Any such negotiation will include Iran’s interference in regional affairs, with its missile program added to the agenda of the current agreement.
Iran’s aim is to succeed - however trivial - in removing some of the sanctions in order to alleviate – however short-term – the huge wave of people’s dissatisfaction and prevent the possibility of an uprising by people whose patience are exhausted by soaring prices, unemployment and disease.
Apart from economic sanctions, there are similar sanctions over the question of human rights and terrorism, the removal of which requires not only presidential order but also the vote of the Congress.
The fact of the matter is that the Islamic Republic would be too optimistic to believe that in his first six months of presidency, Mr. Biden would return to the nuclear agreement or create the same favorable situation for Iran that Barak Obama did. Realities have dramatically changed at each and every level in the United States, Iran, the Middle East and the world over the past five years. The prevailing situation requires different negotiations and different perspectives.

Every American Should Be Tested for Covid-19 Once a Week
Faye Flam/Bloomberg/November 20/2020
Americans are still doing Covid-19 testing wrong. The kind of testing and contact tracing that scientists advocated in the spring to combat the virus isn’t working in the US. And it won’t be improved by the new $50 at-home test made by startup Lucira Health Inc., which was just given emergency authorization this week by the Food and Drug Administration.
That’s because a biological quirk of this disease means the current testing system misses the bulk of the cases in their most contagious period. But a different strategy would catch them. And we already have the technology to do it. Once it’s in your body, Covid-19 lies low for several days before suddenly accelerating. It’s well-known that the virus has an incubation period of around five days, and possibly as long as 14, before symptoms appear. What’s not so well-known is that during most of its “quiet” phase, the virus is invisible to most tests. People are at the most risk of transmitting the disease a couple of days before symptoms start and a few days afterwards. That’s the stage a test needs to capture.
To combat the pandemic with testing, then, we need to test people once a week or more. That means we need a test that’s fast, easy, cheap and possible to distribute all over the country. The Lucira Health test is not that test, says Harvard epidemiologist Michael Mina. It’s too expensive, won’t scale up for massive, regular use, and requires a doctor’s prescription.
We could use the cheap antigen tests scientists have already developed. They’re as easy as a pregnancy test to administer and sensitive enough to show a positive result when a person is near peak infectiousness but has no symptoms. They could provide the kind of frequent testing that would end the pandemic.
A technology that looks even more promising is the use of wearable devices, which have been shown to pick up heartbeat changes that signal an infection before symptoms start. They can even signal an asymptomatic infection. I wrote about this in June, and this week more good results came out in the journal Nature Immunology. The inventor of the system, Stanford’s Michael Snyder, told me last spring that the devices can be made for just a few dollars and can continue to work for months — making them even cheaper than antigen tests.
What we have instead is a terrible system that confuses and misleads. This week, people are waiting for hours in long lines hoping to get a test they think will clear them to meet loved ones, some of them elderly and vulnerable, for Thanksgiving.
“Getting a PCR test today isn’t going to make you any safer for Thanksgiving,” Harvard’s Mina said at a media event eight days before the holiday.
Anyone early in the incubation phase is at risk of getting a false negative. Some people will have cleared an infection and no longer be able to transmit it; for them, the test will yield a false positive. Even people who are contagious now and test positive this week are unlikely to still be infectious next week, says Mina.
Mina says the New York Times wrongly asserts that existing scalable, cheap tests have only 30% sensitivity. The reporter used the wrong denominator, he says. The tests are missing people who are past their infectious period — not people who are still shedding virus and need to isolate.
Critics also say the tests haven’t been tested extensively in asymptomatic people, which is true. But there is convincing evidence out there that frequent use of cheap tests can catch enough infectious people to contain the virus.
That’s what officials are doing in Slovakia, where a program of mass weekly testing has already reversed an exponential spread of the virus. The program is more mandatory than might be acceptable in the US, but here, Mina says, we could create hundreds of millions of cheap tests and distribute them, 20 at a time, to US households. College campuses in many places have also seen success with regular twice-weekly screening tests of students.
One key point: Testing can reduce overall transmission, but it’s not precise enough to give individuals a free pass to socialize right away. People would still want to wear masks to the grocery store and avoid the sort of germ-spreading mingling seen at September’s infamous White House event. You’d still want to wear a mask when you visited your 88-year-old mom, or hold off seeing her for a little longer.
But catching and isolating a major fraction of infected people would curtail the pandemic so we could all go back to a more normal life within a few weeks.
Instead, the US is doubling down on strategies that aren’t working, says Mina. What we need is a strategy that is workable — “that won’t make people sit in line for two hours or stay home for 14 days because someone they walked by in the street was infected.”
It’s not just convenience at stake, says Muge Cevik, an infectious-disease doctor in the UK. She’s examined dozens of contact-tracing studies to show who’s the most at risk — poor people, people with public-facing jobs, people with multiple jobs, and people in crowded housing. The majority of them can’t afford to self-isolate at a contact tracer’s request.
Frequent testing would pick up new cases much faster than contact tracing could, and it would cut down on unnecessary quarantines of contacts who were not infected, but it would have to be combined with a system of financial relief so those who were infected could isolate without facing financial ruin.
“I get frustrated when I see people demanding the same things over and over … when we’re seeing that it’s not working,” says Harvard’s Mina. All you have to do is look at Massachusetts, where people are following the rules, the governor has enacted a strict indoor and outdoor mask mandate, and the state has assembled the country’s top contact-tracing program. “We still have exponential growth here and massive numbers of cases,” he says.
It’s time to admit the current approach isn’t working. The rollout of a $50 prescription home test isn’t going to fix it. In the months before vaccines become widely distributed, cheap wearables and tests given on a massive scale might just turn the tide, along with financial assistance to help infected people stay home. That’s actually following the science.

No, It’s Not Surprising That Abu Muhammad al-Masri Was Living in Iran
The Islamic Republic and al-Qaeda have a long history of cooperation.
Thomas Joscelyn/FDD/November 20/2020
On August 7, Israeli operatives, acting at the behest of American officials, gunned down the deputy emir of al-Qaeda in a well-to-do suburb of Tehran, Iran. The al-Qaeda leader, a veteran jihadist known as Abu Muhammad al-Masri, had been wanted by the U.S. government for more than two decades.
Masri (also known as Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah) was implicated in the August 7, 1998, U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. The date of those twin attacks, which left 224 people dead, was quite obviously on the minds of those who planned the highly secretive assassination behind enemy lines. Gunmen working on behalf of America’s ally finally caught up with Masri 22 years later to the day.
The clandestine hit was first reported by an al-Qaeda linked social media account, which accurately relayed that both Masri and his daughter, Miriam, had been killed in Iran. That version of events was translated and published by MEMRI on October 20. Three weeks later, anonymous intelligence officials confirmed to the New York Times and then other press outlets that the operation had taken place. The Israeli media has reported additional, provocative allegations, including that father and daughter were planning attacks on Israeli and U.S. interests at the time of their demise.
In addition to being the daughter of al-Qaeda’s second-in-command, Miriam was the widow of Hamza bin Laden, Osama’s heir. The U.S. previously killed Hamza somewhere in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region but has provided few details concerning exactly where and when he was hunted down. Hamza married Miriam during his own sojourn in Iran. After 9/11, much of Osama bin Laden’s immediate family relocated to Iran. Eventually, their stay in Iran became contentious, as the Iranians wouldn’t allow them to leave. But their stay wasn’t always so restrictive. Around 2005, Hamza married Miriam in a union that was intended to bolster the next generation of al-Qaeda.
Footage from the wedding was found during the May 2011 raid on Osama bin Laden’s Abbottabad, Pakistan, compound. In 2017, the CIA released the video, along with thousands of additional documents and files that had been kept under lock and key. Judging by the footage, the wedding was a festive affair, with Abu Muhammad al-Masri personally attending alongside other al-Qaeda leaders who had sought refuge inside Iran. Masri can be seen sitting to Hamza’s right in the screenshot from the video above. It is the most recent publicly available image of him. In fact, al-Qaeda commentators on social media are using a cropped head shot from that same image in their eulogies for him.
To be sure, the Iranians and al-Qaeda have been at odds in various ways. They are on opposite sides of the wars in Syria and Yemen. And Iran reportedly did place senior al-Qaeda leaders such as Abu Muhammad al-Masri in a form of detention at some point. In 2015, the Iranians freed Masri and four others in exchange for an Iranian diplomat. Al-Qaeda had kidnapped Tehran’s representative in order to free Masri and the others.
But Masri and his longtime comrade, another veteran al-Qaeda leader known as Saif al-Adel, had been operating inside Iran since then. In the summer of 2018, the State Department increased the reward for information concerning each of them from $5 million to $10 million. Concurrently, a team of experts working for the U.N. Security Council reported that Masri and Adel were managing al-Qaeda’s global affairs from inside Iran. Separately, another al-Qaeda operative confirmed that the two were no longer imprisoned but instead living their “natural lives” inside Iran.
In short, it was well-known that Abu Muhammad al-Masri was a free man inside Iran—free enough to do al-Qaeda’s business—when Israel’s assassins caught up with him and his daughter.
None of this should be revelatory. But in confirming Masri’s death, the New York Timesclaimed it was “surprising” to learn that he lived in Iran, because the Iranians and al-Qaeda are “bitter enemies.” The Times did not stop to reconsider its one-dimensional assessment even though its own sources explained that Masri “had been living freely in the Pasdaran district of Tehran, an upscale suburb, since at least 2015”—that is, for the past five years.
It is a myth that the Shiite Iranian regime and Sunni al-Qaeda are incapable of collusion. It is true that they are at odds in various ways, but duplicity is a fundamental characteristic of human behavior. There is a wealth of evidence, stretching back to the early 1990s, showing that the two have repeatedly cooperated. The 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings are a good example.
The 9/11 Commission found Iran and its chief terrorist proxy, Hezbollah, gave al-Qaeda the “tactical expertise” necessary for those near-simultaneous attacks. Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants were impressed with how Iranian-backed terrorists forced America’s retreat from Lebanon in the 1980s. And al-Qaeda wanted to replicate that success. While living in Sudan in the early 1990s, Osama bin Laden reached out to Iran’s master terrorist and Hezbollah’s chieftain, Imad Mughniyah. As a result of their encounter, as well as other meetings, al-Qaeda sent personnel to Iran and Hezbollah’s stronghold in the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon. Al-Qaeda’s men were shown how to build the bombs necessary to conduct an operation such as Hezbollah’s 1983 bombings on the American and French military barracks in Lebanon. Thus, Iran’s 1983 barracks bombings served as a template for al-Qaeda’s 1998 embassy bombings.
There is no material dispute over these facts. In addition to the 9/11 Commission’s final report (see, for example, pages 61 and 68), this story has been recounted by firsthand al-Qaeda witnesses in U.S. district courts, as well as in assessments compiled by the U.S. intelligence community. In more recent years, the U.S. Treasury and State Departments have repeatedly exposed the details of a formerly “secret deal” between Iran and al-Qaeda. Under that agreement, the Iranians allow al-Qaeda to maintain its “core facilitation pipeline” on their soil. Osama bin Laden himself referred to this Iranian hub as the “main artery” for his global network.
As readers of my work know, there is a constellation of data points about the Iranian regime’s cooperation with al-Qaeda. And this evidence has been the basis of multiple official U.S. government assessments, including during the Obama administration, which sought a version of détente with the Iranians. “By exposing Iran’s secret deal with al-Qaeda allowing it to funnel funds and operatives through its territory, we are illuminating yet another aspect of Iran’s unmatched support for terrorism,” David S. Cohen, who was then the Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence at the Treasury Department, said in July 2011. Abu Muhammad al-Masri knew better. That’s why he decided to live inside Iran for the past five years. And Iran was his safe haven—until Israel’s assassins proved otherwise.
*Thomas Joscelyn is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Senior Editor for FDD’s Long War Journal. Follow Tom on Twitter @thomasjoscelyn. FDD is a nonpartisan think tank focused on foreign policy and national security issues.
 

Pompeo’s unusual visit and the dire state of Turkey-US relations
Sinem Cengiz/Arab News/November 20/2020
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was in Turkey this week as part of his seven-nation tour of Europe and the Middle East. The nature of the visit and his remarks ahead of it had caused intense debate. Throughout his regional tour, Pompeo has met with top officials, but Turkey, a NATO ally, has been the only exception. No meeting took place between Pompeo and any Turkish official during his visit to the country.
This was not the first time Pompeo had skipped Turkey while on a visit to the region. In September, Pompeo visited Cyprus on the heels of the US lifting its arms embargo on the Greek Cypriot administration. He then visited Greece two weeks later. On both trips, Turkey was not included on his itinerary. Top US diplomats have traditionally visited Turkey and Greece on the same tour, but Pompeo abandoned this balanced policy with his recent trip. So this week’s stopover in Turkey with no official meetings was unprecedented in Turkish-American diplomatic history.
In Istanbul, Pompeo met with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, the leader of roughly 300 million Orthodox Christians, who he said in a tweet was “a key partner” in efforts “to champion religious freedom around the globe.” He also met with the apostolic nuncio to Turkey, Archbishop Paul Russell. Interestingly, religious freedom was the only issue on his agenda despite the simmering disputes between Ankara and Washington on several issues, ranging from Syria to the eastern Mediterranean.
The US side stated that Pompeo’s tight travel itinerary prevented him from meeting Turkish state officials in Ankara, but he “was open to seeing any Turkish officials” in Istanbul. From the Turkish side, according to diplomatic customs, Pompeo had to make an official visit to Ankara for bilateral talks to take place. It is quite unusual in Turkish diplomatic culture for a top official to receive a foreign guest in any other way. In his book “Suits and Uniforms,” author Philip Robins described Turkey’s bureaucratic-diplomatic traditions. He wrote: “The bureaucracy has historically been the object of awe and deference in Turkey. Since the Ottoman bureaucracy, the Foreign Ministry was an elite within the elite. The ethos of the Foreign Ministry as a center of bureaucratic excellence persists in contemporary Turkey.” The Ministry of Foreign Affairs — the center of Turkey’s foreign policymaking — follows a protocol-based approach in international affairs. However, this does not mean that there have not been exceptions in bypassing the protocol for some foreign guests. On such occasions in the past, Turkish officials were criticized by the media and opposition for not receiving some foreign heads of state according to diplomatic customs. Normally, all foreign dignitaries are received in the presidential palace and any deals are signed there. However, there have been occasions when the Turkish president has met a foreign guest at a hotel. At such times, Turkish officials have explained the breach of protocol as being down to Turkey’s desire to improve dialogue with the visiting leader.
In this instance, from the Turkish officials’ cold shoulder to Pompeo after he allegedly refused to travel to the capital, it can be clearly understood that there was no will from the Turkish side to have any dialogue with him.
In fact, it would not be wrong to consider Pompeo’s failure to meet with any Turkish official during his trip as a loss in Turkey-US relations. Given the deep differences of opinion between the two countries on almost any issue, it would be unrealistic to expect a positive outcome from any possible meeting. And it seems the Turkish side did not want to waste a minute with an outgoing American official known for his anti-Turkey rhetoric. Relations between Ankara and Washington have hit rock-bottom and the next US administration is going to inherit this legacy.
On the other side, Pompeo also did not shy away from making clear his stance toward Turkey’s role in the region. His thoughts on Turkey came out ahead of his visit. In Paris, which has also been at odds with Ankara in recent months, Pompeo called on Europe to work jointly with the US against Turkey’s actions in the region. “France's President Emmanuel Macron and I agree that Turkey’s recent actions have been very aggressive,” he told French daily newspaper Le Figaro. This statement raised eyebrows in Ankara, which is aware of Pompeo’s alleged dislike of Turkey and its leadership.
Therefore, if we keep aside the US side’s “tight travel itinerary” explanation and the Turkish side’s “diplomatic customs” expectation, experts have read Pompeo’s visit to Istanbul as an act aimed at making domestic political gains, amid rumors he is considering a Senate run in Kansas. It would not be wrong to liken Pompeo’s last Turkey visit as secretary of state to the final state of overall Turkish-American relations during Donald Trump’s White House tenure. What we understand from Pompeo’s unusual visit, his meetings, and Ankara’s snub is that relations between the two NATO allies have hit rock-bottom and the next US administration is going to inherit this legacy.
*Sinem Cengiz is a Turkish political analyst who specializes in Turkey's relations with the Middle East. Twitter: @SinemCngz

US allows Israeli spy to leave country after 30 years in jail
AFP/November 20/2020
An American imprisoned in 1985 for spying for Israel was released from strict parole conditions Friday, allowing his return to Israel, the US Justice Department said. Jonathan Pollard served 30 years for giving away classified US documents and had been confined by parole terms to the United States since his release in 2015, despite Israeli pressure to allow him to leave. “After a review of Mr. Pollard’s case, the US Parole Commission has found that there is no evidence to conclude that he is likely to violate the law,” the Justice Department said.

Iran will be ‘sorry’ if it attacks or kills Americans, senior US official warns
Emily Judd and Omar Elkatouri, Al Arabiya English/November 20/2020
The United States will not stand idle if Iran or any of its terrorist activities kill American citizens, a senior US diplomat told Al Arabiya English, warning Tehran not to test Washington’s resolve. “If Iran and its proxies engage in military activities and terrorist activities that kill Americans, they’re going to be sorry,” Special Representative to Iran Elliot Abrams said. Abrams was speaking after a trip to Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates for talks on Iran and its destabilizing behavior in the region. Although Abrams said the US was not seeking conflict with any country, the US diplomat warned that any attack on Americans would result in a “very strong US reaction.”Any US reaction will be “entirely dependent on the conduct of the Islamic Republic,” he said. The Trump administration's maximum pressure campaign will continue in the final weeks and months of the US president’s term in the White House.
“The sanctions program will generally speaking continue. We never announce sanctions in advance, but this is the maximum pressure campaign … There will be more sanctions coming in November and December, so you can expect that, yes,” Abrams said. As for a new Iran nuclear deal, Abrams warned against losing momentum built up as leverage by the Trump administration, which withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal signed by Iran and the P5+1. “If you try to go back to the [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action] and simply throw away all that leverage, the outcome would be really, very unfortunate for the United States and for all of our friends and partners in the region and all of Iran’s neighbors.”Abrams was referring to US President-elect Joe Biden’s previous comments that he intended to rejoin the Iran nuclear deal. “So, our view is that the leverage is there, and the United States should use it to get a much better agreement than the JCPOA,” Abrams said.
Ties between Iran and al-Qaeda
Following a New York Times article that cited intelligence officials revealing an operation to kill al-Qaeda’s deputy leader in Iran last August, Abrams said Tehran had an interest in working with the terrorist group. He said he was not surprised that there were ties between Iran and al-Qaeda.
“I remember years ago in the Bush administration, a lot of people saying, ‘Oh, that’s impossible. It’s impossible because al-Qaeda is Sunni and the Islamic Republic is obviously Shia so they can’t possibly have any relationship.’”But Iran has an interest in working with al-Qaeda, Abrams said. “Iran seems to want to make sure that al-Qaeda does not disappear because some of the countries and people that al-Qaeda attacks are people that Iran likes to see attacked.”

Biden must distance himself from far left if he is to unify US
Dalia Al-Aqidi/Arab News/November 20/2020
Following the declaration by US media organizations of Joe Biden’s victory against Donald Trump in this month’s presidential election, the president-elect told his supporters in Wilmington, Delaware: “I pledge to be a president who does not seek to divide, but unify, who doesn’t see red states or blue states, who only sees the United States.”
This was an appropriate speech for a leader who wants to extricate his country from its state of division, conflict, discrepancy, and intolerance that spread broadly following a series of riots in multiple Democratic-ruled cities.
His message was widely welcomed by several leaders, such as former President George W. Bush, who “extended his warm congratulations and thanked Biden for the patriotic message he delivered,” according to a statement issued by the Republican former president, in which he also said: “Now is the time when we must come together for the sake of our families and neighbors, and for our nation and its future.”
For Biden to achieve this worthy ambition of unifying Americans, he needs his party’s blessing and the consent of his colleagues in Congress, in addition to his leftist followers. Unfortunately, the reactions of the far left and sections of the mainstream media, which played a vital role in attacking not only Trump but every Republican who supported the president, say otherwise and draw a very dark picture of what to expect after inauguration day on Jan. 20. The progressive politicians, who took the Democratic Party hostage, believe that this goal can only be achieved by implementing some form of castigation to punish those who disagree with their socialist agenda.
The rising calls for a purge of Trump supporters take us back to the US during the 1950s, when Sen. Joe McCarthy created his infamous blacklist for Communist Party members in the country to be chastised and extracted from the general public.
The New York socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez inquired on Twitter about a similar list, asking if anyone was keeping a record of what she called “Trump sycophants” to remind them should they try to downplay or deny their complicity in the future.
AOC’s fellow “Squad” member, Somali-born Rep. Ilhan Omar, who ran her two congressional campaigns based on identity politics and victimization, did not hesitate to describe Trump’s national campaign events as “(Ku Klux) Klan rallies.” Her statement basically implied that the 73 million Americans who voted to give Trump four more years are all members of a major white supremacist hate group.
Meanwhile, former Democratic National Committee Press Secretary Hari Sevugan warned against hiring Trump’s White House staff, threatening employers who might consider them for a job with unspecified “consequences.”
Washington Post opinion writer Jennifer Rubin went further, suggesting during a panel discussion on MSNBC that the Republican Party should be killed off. “We have to collectively, in essence, burn down the Republican Party. We have to level them because, if there are survivors, if there are people who weather this storm, they will do it again. It is our job to hold them accountable for the rest of their lives,” she proudly told the audience.
Such narratives of hatred and vendetta were reflected on the streets of Washington last Saturday, when thousands of American citizens who had chosen to express their support for their president were attacked by Antifa and Black Lives Matter counterprotesters before our eyes.
Is this the fate of democracy in the US? Is this the fate of the leader of the free world?
We are facing the “dark winter” Biden warned us about. If Biden is serious about unifying America, and there are no doubts about that, he needs to heal the Democratic Party first and distance his administration’s strategy from the progressive ideas and propositions that, according to the election results, do not match the aspirations of the average American citizen. Democratic Party moderates need to reject the radical socialist agenda that would create deeper divisions and increase intolerance.
Democratic Party moderates need to reject the radical socialist agenda that would create deeper divisions and increase intolerance.
The far-left Democrats are expecting Biden to lean toward their agenda once elected, but they are in for a big surprise. Unless pressured by his running mate Kamala Harris, it would not be wise for Biden to adopt dead-end policies that will, eventually, disappoint the centrists who voted for him.
But Biden’s bumpy road does not end there; his most difficult task will be reaching out to the 73 million voters who do not want him inside the White House. Regardless of what he does, it is unreasonable to expect him to win the hearts and minds of these millions, but he could ease the tension by reaching out to his long-time Republican colleagues. He needs to assure the Trump supporters that no secret police will hunt them down, destroy their livelihoods, and delete their identities.
He also needs to give more power to the states to govern themselves without interference from the federal government. And, just as he has been chasing Trump to condemn extreme-right movements and white supremacist groups, Biden needs to clearly condemn all the violent acts committed by the two main radical-left groups, Black Lives Matter and Antifa. Failing to do so would steer the country toward greater chaos and frustration.
Dalia Al-Aqidi is Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Policy. Twitter: @DaliaAlAqidi