English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For April 26/2020
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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Bible Quotations For today

Then Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.’When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 05/01-11/:”Once while Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.’Simon answered, ‘Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.’When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. So they signalled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!’For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken; and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.’When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on April 25-26/2021

Health Ministry: 1524 new Corona cases, 24 deaths
Al-Rahi Voices Shock over Judge Aoun's Controversial Raids
Judge Ghada Aoun Denies Attacking al-Rahi
UAE says it supports Saudi Arabia’s ban on fruit, vegetable imports from
Lebanon Farmers Union Urges KSA to Repeal Produce Ban
Berri Urges End to 'Political Absurdity, Narrow Interests'
Lebanon Thwarts Attempt to Smuggle 69 Syrians to Cyprus
Lebanon’s private and public sectors cooperate on COVID-19 vaccination campaign
Lebanon Launches First Electric Car despite Crisis

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on April 25-26/2021

Fire Kills 82 at Iraqi Covid Hospital, Health Minister Suspended
Iran says US must lift sanctions from 1,500 Iranians to fix nuclear deal
Armenia PM Resigns to Enable Snap Polls
Iran, Syria say 'attack' on tanker never happened
Syria Says Iran Tanker Attacked by Drone Flying over Lebanon Waters
Turkish restrained anger at Biden’s recognition of Armenian genocide
Turkey’s genocide blackmail: Threats to work closer with Iran and Russia
Analyst: Rocket engine test likely caused blast in Israel
Netanyahu Calls for 'Calm' in Jerusalem amid Fresh Violence
Jerusalem escalation could be how Israel's next war starts - analysis
Paris terror attack could influence French elections
Protests in France over No Trial for Jewish Woman's Killer
Indonesia Finds Missing Submarine, 53 Crew Dead
Yemen Rebels Advance on Marib, Dozens Dead
 

Titles For The Latest The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on April 25-26/2021

The return of the ‘two-state solution’ - opinion/Alan Banker/Jerusalem Post/April 25/2021
Biden ends decades of US appeasement of Turkey, recognizes genocide - analysis/Seth J. Frantzman/Jerusalem Post/April 25/2021
Before lifting Iran sanctions Biden, Blinken, Schumer should remember Nelson Mandela/Abraham Cooper and Johnnie Moore/Al Arabiya/April 25/2021
Growing Calls for Moving or Boycotting the Beijing Olympics/Soeren Kern/Gatestone Institute/April 25, 2021

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on April 25-26/2021

Health Ministry: 1524 new Corona cases, 24 deaths
NNA/April 25/2021
The Ministry of Public Health announced, on Sunday, the registration of 1,524 new Corona infections, thus raising the cumulative number of confirmed cases to-date to 520,939.
It added that 24 deaths were also recorded during the past 24 hours.

Al-Rahi Voices Shock over Judge Aoun's Controversial Raids
Naharnet/April 25/2021
Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Sunday that he was “shocked” as he was watching on TV “a judicial incident that has nothing to do with judicial culture not with the traditions of the Lebanese judiciary ever since its inception.” He was referring to the latest raid by Mount Lebanon Prosecutor Judge Ghada Aoun on the offices of the Mecattaf money exchange firm in Awkar. “What happened tarnishes the image of any upright and nonpartisan judge who has a prestige that calls for the respect of justice and its laws,” al-Rahi said in his Sunday Mass sermon. “We insist that the judiciary should combat corruption and crime without any political interference and we insist on the return of rights to their owners, especially bank deposits, but what happened violated judicial and legal norms,” al-Rahi explained. As for the issue of the stalled government formation process, the patriarch called for the formation of a government through the approach and spirit of the constitution and through equality stemming from the National Pact, without political quota distribution and confessional monopolization.”He added that “despite some parties’ linking of the government’s formation to regional and international developments, there are several Arab and international endeavors to push officials to speed up the government’s formation.”“The last message in this regard came from Pope Francis, who linked his visit to Lebanon to the presence of a government,” al-Rahi added.

Judge Ghada Aoun Denies Attacking al-Rahi
Naharnet/April 25/2021
Mount Lebanon Prosecutor Judge Ghada Aoun on Sunday issued a statement denying social media claims that she has voiced insults against Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi. “I strongly condemn this demonic and militia-like approach to tarnish my reputation,” the judge said. “I certainly cannot utter these silly and obscene polemics, which do not resemble my values and ethics. I’m a practicing Christian believer and I respect the head of the Maronite church,” Aoun added. She also announced that she will file a complaint on Monday against “those circulating these deplored articles” so that they be prosecuted.
 

UAE says it supports Saudi Arabia’s ban on fruit, vegetable imports from
Tamara Abueish, Al Arabiya English/25 April ,2021
The United Arab Emirates supports Saudi Arabia’s decision to ban the import of fruits and vegetables from Lebanon after it was revealed that they were used to smuggle drugs into the Kingdom, the Emirates News Agency (WAM) reported on Sunday. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs affirmed its support for the measures taken by Saudi Arabia to protect its society from drugs and supports all the steps the Kingdom will take to combat the crime. The ministry called for the development of technologies and the implementation of measures to curb the smuggling of drugs. The ban came after Saudi Customs foiled an attempt to smuggle over 5 million pills of Captagon stuffed inside fruits imported from Lebanon, according to the Saudi Press Agency (SPA). The drug is used by fighters at war because of the effects it can have to fight tiredness. It is an amphetamine that has widely been made and exported illegally from Lebanon.
Saudi Arabia said the ban will remain in effect until Lebanese authorities provide sufficient and reliable guarantees that they will take the necessary steps to halt systemic drug smuggling operations.

Lebanon Farmers Union Urges KSA to Repeal Produce Ban
Associated Press/April 25/2021
Lebanon's farmers union has described as "arbitrary and unjust" the decision by Saudi Arabia to ban Lebanese produce from going through the kingdom over drug smuggling allegations, calling for it be repealed. The ban, ordered by the kingdom's Interior Ministry and due to take effect Sunday, is a major blow to the Lebanese economy, already reeling from an unprecedented economic crisis. It came after Saudi Arabia announced Friday it has seized over 5 million pills of an amphetamine drug known as Captagon, hidden in a shipment of pomegranate coming from Lebanon. The official Saudi Press Agency said four Saudis and one displaced it did not identify were arrested. On Saturday, Lebanon's President Michel Aoun called for a meeting next week with Cabinet members, security officials, farmers and exporters to discuss the Saudi decision and its implications. Lebanon's Foreign Ministry on Friday said smuggling of drugs is harmful to the country's reputation and economy. It called on Lebanese customs duty authorities to increase checks and inspections of shipments leaving the small Mediterranean country. But in a statement Sunday, Lebanon's Farmers Union called on the kingdom to repeal its decision. It said the mistake of one person or a criminal gang should not be the reason to punish the entire Lebanese people. Agricultural exports are a major foreign currency earner for Lebanon. Arab countries are Lebanon's main export markets for agricultural products, accounting for nearly 80% of over $190 million of total exports in 2019, where Saudi Arabia had more than 20% of the share, followed by Qatar. Saudi Arabia's decision showed "political maliciousness," and contradicts the kingdom's claims that it protects Lebanon's interests, the statement added. The farmers union accused Saudi Arabia of participating in a policy to besiege Lebanon and change its alliance. While Saudi Arabia has been a major Lebanon supporter, the kingdom has also been locked in a regional struggle with Iran, the main ally of the powerful Lebanese militant group Hizbullah.

Tension between the two regional powerhouses have often spilled into a deadlock in decision-making in Lebanese politics. Saudi Arabia is among Gulf countries that imposed sanctions on Hizbullah. Meanwhile, other officials denied the smuggling was done by Lebanese. The head of the farmers' union in eastern Lebanon's Bekaa valley said the pomegranate shipment was coming from Syria, passing transit through Lebanese port. "It is not our fault. We have absolutely no relation to this," Ibrahim Tarshishi told The Associated Press late Friday. "It is a shame we have to pay the price and prevent us from importing our products to the kingdom." Tarshishi said Lebanon has not been exporting pomegranate for years and is now an importer. There was no immediate comment from Syria. Lebanon is experiencing the worst economic and financial crisis of its modern history. The local currency has lost 85% of its value to the dollar in recent months and businesses have shut down while banks imposed informal controls on transfers and withdrawals.

Berri Urges End to 'Political Absurdity, Narrow Interests'
Naharnet/April 25/2021
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri on Sunday lashed out at what he called “political absurdity” in Lebanon. In a statement, Berri saluted “the Ramadan uprising of the Palestinian people at the al-Aqsa Mosque and in the neighborhoods of the city of Jerusalem.”He added that it represents a call “for us in Lebanon, and across the (Arab) nation, to raise awareness about the importance of consolidating national unity and stopping political absurdity.”Berri also called for stopping “the sacrifice of nations and national and nationalistic principles in return for narrow personal and partisan interests.”

Lebanon Thwarts Attempt to Smuggle 69 Syrians to Cyprus
Associated Press/April 25/2021
Lebanese troops aborted early Sunday an attempt to smuggle dozens of Syrian migrants to the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, the military said. The attempt to smuggle 69 Syrian citizens comes as Lebanon is witnessing a severe economic and financial crisis that has thrown more people into poverty. There have been attempts over the past year to smuggle migrants to European Union member Cyprus during which some of the migrants were killed. The Mediterranean island and Lebanon have an agreement to curb the arrival of boats loaded with migrants from reaching Cyprus. The Lebanese Army said in a statement that soldiers and members of the army intelligence thwarted the attempt in the northern district of Arida near the border with Syria. It added that the smuggler who took money from the migrants to take them to Cyprus has been arrested and is being questioned. Last year, numerous boatloads of migrants sailed to Cyprus -- approximately 172 kilometers from Tripoli, Lebanon -- alarming Cypriot authorities that say the island can't handle any more migrants seeking asylum for economic reasons. Cyprus came under fire by Human Rights Watch last year for allegedly pushing back 200 migrants and refugees arriving from Lebanon aboard boats without heeding their claims for asylum while in some instances using violence and coercive tactics. Lebanon a tiny nation of six million people, including a million Syrian refugees, is passing through its worst economic crisis in its modern history. The crisis that was made worse by coronavirus and a massive explosion at Beirut's port last year, left tens of thousands of people jobless while the local currency has lost about 90% of its value.
 

Lebanon’s private and public sectors cooperate on COVID-19 vaccination campaign
Rawad Taha, Al Arabiya English/25 April ,2021
Lebanon’s private and public healthcare sectors are cooperating to speed up the country’s vaccination campaign. What was a sluggish rollout program accelerated after the government allowed private pharmaceutical companies to import doses at their own expense. Local media reported that the specialist distributor Fattal will import vaccine for the private sector at a rate of $24 for two doses. The total number of doses ordered is still unclear. Fattal is the one of multiple private companies which have received approval from the Ministry of Health to import vaccines. The first pharmaceutical company to secure doses for the private sector was Pharmaline which secured one million doses of the Russian-made Sputnik V vaccine at a price of $38 for two doses. The Lebanese government is aiming to reach herd immunity by the end of 2021 in efforts to end the coronavirus pandemic which has further stagnated Lebanon’s crisis-hit economy. The small Mediterranean country has recorded over 516,600 COVID-19 cases and 7057 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic. Lebanon started its COVID-19 vaccination campaign in February, free of charge for citizens who registered on an online platform. This was introduced after it secured 2.1 million Pfizer doses through a loan approved by the World Bank. An additional order of 750,000 Pfizer doses was secured earlier this month by the government, but this batch is expected to be sold directly through the government to private sector companies, universities and other educational institutions.
Local media reported that around 320,000 doses will be divided between the American University of Beirut, the Lebanese American University, the Universite Saint Joseph and the St. George University Hospital. The state's Lebanese University will receive 50,000 doses, while the Beirut Arab University will receive 15,000, Balamand University and the Holy Spirit University of Kaslik 10,000 each. The Lebanese government also secured 2.73 million AstraZeneca doses through the United Nations COVAX initiative. An additional 1.5 million doses were acquired directly from AstraZeneca itself.
China donated 50,000 shots of its Sinopharm vaccine. Lebanese Caretaker Health Minister Hamad Hassan said that the Sinopharm batches were allocated to the Lebanese army, customs, social security, and other public departments and ministries. Local media also reported earlier this year that some politicians were able to import an unspecified amount of Sinopharm doses prior to its approval from the Health Ministry. Concerns are on the rise as social media reports claimed the Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri was able to import doses of the in-trial one-shot Russian vaccine Sputnik V while awaiting approval by the ministry. According to data released by the Health ministry, Lebanon has vaccinated 258,939 individuals, corresponding to 5.4 percent of the population above the age of 18.

Lebanon Launches First Electric Car despite Crisis
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
A Lebanon-made electric car has been launched, the first time the small country has manufactured an automobile, despite struggling amid a dire economic crisis with frequent power cuts. The red sports car -- named "Quds Rise", using the Arabic name of Jerusalem -- is the project of Lebanese-born Palestinian businessman Jihad Mohammed. It's the "first automobile to be made locally," Mohammed told reporters, at the unveiling in a parking lot south of Beirut. It was built in Lebanon "from start to finish," he said of the prototype, emblazoned at the front with a golden logo of the Dome of the Rock, the shrine in Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque compound, Islam's third holiest site. The car is to cost $30,000. Production of up to 10,000 vehicles is hoped to start later this year in Lebanon, with cars to hit the market in a year's time, said Mohammed, the director of Lebanon-based firm EV Electra. Mohammed, 50, said he set up the company four years ago after years abroad, employing Lebanese and Palestinian engineers among 300 members of staff. He says his long-term goal is to compete on the international market for hybrid and electric cars, as well as to make sales in Lebanon. But the unveiling comes as Lebanon struggles amid its worst economic crisis in decades, and imported car sales are at a record low, in part due to capital controls and drastic devaluation on the black market.
- 'Step in the right direction'? -
Dealers sold just 62 new cars in the first two months of 2021, almost 97 percent less than the same period a year before, figures released by the Association of Automobile Importers in Lebanon showed. The economic crunch since late 2019 has plunged more than half the population into poverty.
But Mohammed said potential Lebanese buyers would be offered the opportunity to pay for half the new electric car in dollars, with the rest paid in Lebanese pounds at an exchange rate better than the black market one, to be paid over five years without interest. Lebanon also relies on fossil fuels for power generation, already insufficient for a population of around six million who suffer daily power cuts. To power its new electric cars, the firm plans to set up around 100 recharging stations across the country connected to generators. These could then be fueled by solar and wind power generation, Mohammed said. Independent energy analyst Jessica Obeid welcomed the innovation, but said the vehicles would only be environmentally friendly if the power sector underwent serious reform.
"The energy sector is the biggest contributor to Lebanon's greenhouse gas emissions," and already under pressure due a shortage in dollars to import fuel, she told AFP. But, she added, "if the electric vehicles have solar charging stations, then this would be a step in the right direction."
 

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on April 25-26/202

Fire Kills 82 at Iraqi Covid Hospital, Health Minister Suspended
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
More than 80 people died Sunday in a fire that ripped through an Iraqi Covid-19 hospital, sparking anger and prompting the suspension of top officials in a country with a long-dilapidated health infrastructure. Many of the victims were on respirators and were suffocated or burned in the smoke and flames when the blaze at eastern Baghdad's Ibn al-Khatib hospital started with an explosion caused by "a fault in the storage of oxygen cylinders", medical sources said. The health ministry said 82 people were killed and 110 wounded, while the Iraqi Human Rights Commission said 28 of the victims were patients who had to be taken off ventilators to escape the flames. The blaze spread quickly across multiple floors in the middle of the night, as dozens of relatives were at the bedsides of the 30 patients in the hospital's intensive care unit where the most severe Covid-19 cases are treated, a medical source said. "The hospital had no fire protection system and false ceilings allowed the flames to spread to highly flammable products," Iraq's civil defense services said. Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhemi suspended Health Minister Hassan al-Tamimi -- who is backed by the powerful Shiite leader Moqtada Sadr -- amid angry calls on social media for him to be sacked, as part of a probe that would also include the governor of Baghdad. Kadhemi also declared three days of national mourning, while parliament said it would devote its Monday session to the tragedy. Witnesses said the evacuation was slow and chaotic, with patients and their relatives crammed into stairwells as they scrambled for exits. "It was the people (civilians) who got the wounded out," Amir, 35, told AFP, saying he saved his hospitalized brothers "by the skin of his teeth." Iraq's hospitals have been worn down by decades of conflict and poor investment, with shortages of medicines and hospital beds. But many also said negligence and endemic corruption were to blame for the deadly inferno.
Negligence
"The tragedy at Ibn al-Khatib is the result of years of erosion of state institutions by corruption and mismanagement," President Barham Saleh tweeted. The fire triggered outrage on social media, with a hashtag demanding the health minister be sacked trending on Twitter, a demand echoed by the human rights commission. Baghdad governor Mohammed Jaber also called on the health ministry "to establish a commission of enquiry so that those who did not do their jobs may be brought to justice". The Iraqi Human Rights Commission denounced a "crime against patients exhausted by Covid-19 who put their lives in the hands of the health ministry and its institutions. "Instead of being treated, (they) perished in flames," it added. Witnesses and doctors told AFP many bodies had yet to be identified, the remains too charred by the intense flames. One of the victims, Ali Ibrahim, 52, had been treated for coronavirus at the Ibn al-Khatib hospital and was buried by his family on Sunday at Zaafaraniya, a neighborhood near the hospital. "He had spent 12 days in hospital and was due to be discharged on Saturday evening after recovering. He was just waiting for the result of the last Covid-19 test," one of his relatives told AFP. Kadhemi also suspended the head of the health department in eastern Baghdad, the hospital director as well as those in charge of security and maintenance at the medical facility. All of them are being questioned, he said, adding that no one would be released "until those who have done wrong are brought to justice."He also pledged to submit the results of the investigation to the government within five days.
Mounting virus cases -
The U.N.'s top representative in Iraq, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, expressed "shock" at the tragedy and called "for stronger protection measures to ensure that such a disaster cannot reoccur."Pope Francis, who paid an historic visit to Iraq in early March, called for "prayers" for all the victims of the fire. On Wednesday, the number of detected Covid-19 cases in Iraq surpassed one million, the highest of any Arab state. The health ministry has recorded more than 15,000 deaths since the pandemic broke out last year, and has carried out around 40,000 tests daily from a population of 40 million. Iraq rolled out its vaccination campaign last month and has received nearly 650,000 doses of different vaccines -- the majority by donation or through the Covax scheme for low and middle income nations.
Around 300,000 people had received at least one dose as of Sunday, the ministry said.

Iran says US must lift sanctions from 1,500 Iranians to fix nuclear deal
Bloomberg/25 April ,2021
The U.S. must remove sanctions designations for some 1,500 individuals as part of efforts to revive the 2015 nuclear accord, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, said in an interview with the state-run ICANA news agency.
Araghchi didn’t give more details but Sunday’s comments are in line with Iran’s demands that the U.S. lift both the sanctions it reimposed on the Islamic Republic after then President Donald Trump abandoned the landmark agreement and hundreds of more penalties added by his administration. Diplomats will convene in Vienna for a third consecutive week from Monday to try to salvage Iran’s nuclear accord with world powers as time runs down on an interim monitoring agreement between Tehran and United Nations inspectors at the International Atomic Energy Agency. Araghchi’s comments followed a meeting he had with Iran’s majority-hardline parliament about progress in the talks. Many lawmakers oppose President Hassan Rouhani’s efforts to resurrect the deal and have tried to influence the negotiations. Arghchi didn’t comment about the outcome of that meeting. Earlier on Sunday the head of the chamber’s National Security Commission, Mojtaba Zolnour, said he was leading efforts to prevent the restoration of the nuclear agreement without full parliamentary approval and said lawmakers must be present in the Vienna meetings, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported. The European Union will chair the talks in Vienna, where envoys are trying to synchronize a U.S. return to and Iranian compliance with the 2015 agreement. After Trump jettisoned the accord and unilaterally imposed punishing sanctions on Iran, Tehran’s government ramped up its nuclear capacity and production of enriched uranium. Araghchi said the sequencing of the U.S.’s return to the accord and Iran’s return to full compliance with its terms, which is the subject of crucial multilateral talks involving both countries in Vienna in the week ahead, won’t involve a “step by step format and will be in line with the Islamic Republic’s demands.

Armenia PM Resigns to Enable Snap Polls
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan resigned on Sunday while staying on in a caretaker capacity, setting the stage for a June 20 parliamentary election aimed at defusing a protracted political crisis. Pashinyan has faced calls to stand down since his November signing of a Russian-brokered peace agreement with Azerbaijan that ended a war between the two arch-foes for control of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region. "I am resigning from my post as prime minister today" to hold the snap vote on June 20, he said in an announcement broadcast on his Facebook page. "I am returning to the citizens of Armenia the power they gave me, so that they decide the government's fate through free and fair elections," he said. After Pashinyan announced his resignation, all members of his cabinet handed in their own resignations, as required by Armenian law. Pashinyan said he would continue to fulfil his duties as head of the interim government before the vote, and that he would stand as a candidate for prime minister. The move comes a day after Joe Biden became the first U.S. president to recognize the 1915 killings of Armenians by Ottoman forces as genocide, in a landmark move that drew praise from Pashinyan and condemnation from Turkey's ally Azerbaijan. Ex-Soviet Armenia has been embroiled in a political crisis in the wake of its humiliating defeat to Azerbaijan, which was backed by Turkey during the conflict. The defeat spurred mass protests in the impoverished tiny Caucasus nation on the borders of Turkey and Iran, which came to a head in February after Pashinyan accused Armenia's top military official of staging a coup. To defuse the crisis, Pashinyan last month announced the snap election, which was welcomed by prominent members of the opposition.
Clinging to power
Fighting over Nagorno-Karabakh broke out in September and saw Azerbaijan's better-equipped army make steady gains against Armenia's military, which uses ageing Soviet-era hardware. The six weeks of fighting claimed around 6,000 lives and saw Armenia cede swathes of territory to Azerbaijan under the peace deal signed by Pashinyan. Pashinyan has insisted he handled the war correctly, saying he had no choice but to concede or see his country's forces suffer even bigger losses and that snap polls were the best way to end the post-war political stalemate. Analysts say Pashinyan will likely retain his grip on power after the June 20 election. His Civil Contract party "may not garner more than 50 percent of the vote needed to form new cabinet, but would retain a parliamentary majority in coalition" with other parties, political analyst Stepan Grigoryan told AFP. The 45-year-old former newspaper editor came to power spearheading peaceful protests in 2018 dubbed the Velvet Revolution. He launched an anti-graft crusade, initiated sweeping economic reforms and sidelined corrupt oligarchs and monopolies. Analysts credited the policies with helping to accelerate economic growth, reduce poverty rates and create tens of thousands of new jobs. But then the coronavirus pandemic struck, stopping the economic revival in its tracks -- followed by the outbreak of fighting in the decades-long dispute with Azerbaijan for control of Karabakh.
 

Iran, Syria say 'attack' on tanker never happened

Jerusalem Post/April 25/2021
Iranian media walked back initial reports of an alleged "drone" attack on a tanker off the coast of Syria, calling it a welding accident. Saturday was filled with reports about an alleged “drone” attack on a tanker off the coast of Syria. According to early reports that were picked up in international media, an Iranian tanker was struck by some kind of attack, causing a fire and even casualties. This appeared linked to previous reports of attacks on a dozen Iranian ships over the last two years and an attack on an IRGC ship in the Red Sea earlier this month. The Iranian and Syrian regimes are now walking back any reports about an attack. A “Syrian military official denied any military operations against the damaged tanker, adding: ‘After completing the expert review of technical factors, the previous news published by the official authorities will be corrected,’” Iran’s Tasnim News Agency reported. Three workers who were “welding” on the ship did suffer some burns. That is why there was a smoke and a fire. It was an accident, the reports now say. One worker died at a hospital from burns. “Earlier, some media outlets mistakenly reported that an Iranian ship had been attacked by a drone,” Tasnim reported. “The name of the tanker is Wisdom, and its flag belongs to Panama... This accident occurred due to carelessness and lack of safety measures during the welding operation while attending the SPM and performing the offloading operation.” SPM is the acronym for a Single Point Mooring buoy, where ships can offload or evacuate oil and gas. It is a “floating buoy anchored offshore that allows the handling of liquid cargo in areas where a dedicated onshore facility for loading and unloading cargo is not available,” a website with knowledge about the matter reported. “They serve as a link between shore-based facilities and large oil tankers for loading or offloading oil and gas cargo.” “The tanker seen burning today off the coast of Baniyas is not an Iranian vessel, but a Beirut-registered tanker called WISDOM,” TankerTrackers.com, which tracks tankers around the world, reported. “She has assisted the Iranian VLCC supertanker ARMAN 114 (ex. ADRIAN DARYA-1) by offloading 300-350K barrels at a time due to depth restrictions.”
Samir Madani, an expert who co-founded TankerTrackers, cast doubt on the welding story. “Welding on a fully laden tanker while discharging oil at an SPM?” he said. “I have read Syria’s maritime safety protocols. You’re not even allowed to strike a match. It was most likely something that got past the Russian Navy, and it is embarrassing because they can’t guarantee safety.” Video from the Arman 114 showed a helicopter bringing aid to the Wisdom. The Adrian Darya was seized by British commandos in July 2019 but then released. It then went to Syria to allegedly offload oil in October 2019. It was previously known as the Grace and was once known as the most tracked ship in the world. “US special representative to Iran, Brian Hook, emailed the captain of the Adrian Darya 1 about sailing the vessel to a country that would impound it on behalf of Washington,” CNBC reported in 2019.
It is part of the shadowy world of Iranian tankers, the shadow war at sea, where countries have tried to interdict Iranian oil exports, and the way Tehran gets around those attempts. Iran also sent ships to Venezuela with gasoline in 2020. The US did seize Iranian fuel last August and offloaded it at sea. Reports that month noted that ships were stopped in the Atlantic Ocean, “where the fuel was offloaded, after exiting the Mediterranean Sea, the officials said.” The US is now seeking a return to the Iran nuclear deal and therefore appears to have reduced pressure on Iran’s shipments.
Iran has allegedly attacked three commercially owned Israeli ships in the Gulf of Oman, one of them being the Helios Ray; another is known as the Hyperion Ray. The alleged “attack” on the tanker is not the first incident that was recorded recently, only to then be downplayed. Iran’s media claimed there was an accident in Israel involving a missile factory, which also apparently never happened or was not as described. The region is tense, and every small fire or bit of smoke can appear to be an attack. On the other hand, there are questions about what happened aboard the ship off Syria and whether the new Syrian and Iranian cover story downplaying the incident may be for other reasons, such as to obscure their lack of security and failure to protect the ship.

Syria Says Iran Tanker Attacked by Drone Flying over Lebanon Waters
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
At least three people died when an Iranian tanker was attacked off Syria's coast, in the first assault of its kind since the war started a decade ago, a war monitor said. "At least three Syrians were killed, including two members of the crew" in the attack that sparked a fire, said Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. It was not clear who carried out the attack, the war monitor said. "We don't know if this was an Israeli attack," Abdel Rahman told AFP, adding that "the Iranian tanker came from Iran and was not far from Banias port." It was also not clear if a drone or a missile was used in the attack, the Observatory said. State news agency SANA, quoting the oil ministry, said the fire erupted after "what was believed to be an attack by a drone from the direction of Lebanese waters." The flames were later extinguished. In a report published last month that cited U.S. and Middle East officials, the Wall Street Journal said Israel had targeted at least a dozen vessels bound for Syria and mostly carrying Iranian oil since late 2019. Hundreds of Israeli air strikes have also struck Syria since the war began in 2011, mostly targeting Damascus regime allies from Iran and the Lebanese Hizbullah movement and Syrian government troops. The Banias oil refinery is located in the regime-controlled coastal province of Tartus. "It's the first such attack on an oil tanker, but the Banias terminal has been targeted in the past," Abdel Rahman said. Early last year, Damascus said divers had planted explosives on offshore pipelines of the Banias refinery, but the damage had not halted operations. And in February 2020, four oil and gas sites in the central province of Homs were attacked by armed drones, sparking fires and causing material damage.
Nuclear facility
Saturday's attack comes after a Syrian officer was killed and three soldiers wounded Thursday in strikes launched by Israel, after a missile was fired towards a secretive nuclear site deep in Israel. The Israeli army said at the time that a surface-to-air missile had been fired from Syria toward the southern Negev desert, where the Dimona nuclear reactor is located. The exchange of fire came less than two weeks after Iran accused Israel of "terrorism" following an explosion at the Islamic republic's Natanz nuclear facility. Israel is considered the leading military power in the Middle East, and is widely believed to possess its sole nuclear arsenal. It has never disclosed its atomic arsenal, but foreign experts say the Jewish state has between 100 to 300 nuclear warheads. There were no immediate reports of any casualties or damage on the Israeli side. Israel has long sought to prevent bitter foe Iran from establishing itself in war-torn Syria. Before Syria's war, the country enjoyed relative energy autonomy, but production has plummeted during the war, pushing the government to rely on importing hydrocarbons. Western sanctions on oil shipping, as well as U.S. punitive measures against Iran, have complicated these imports. Pre-war production was 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) in Syria. But it stood at just 89,000 bpd in 2020, Syria's oil minister said in February, of which up to 80,000 came from Kurdish areas outside government control.

Turkish restrained anger at Biden’s recognition of Armenian genocide
The Arab Weekly/April 25/2021
ISTANBUL / WASHINGTON--Turkey rejected Saturday the statement by US President Joe Biden recognising the 1915 killings of Armenians by Ottoman forces as genocide. But beyond its expression of anger, Ankara did not seem inclined to take retaliatory measures after the US move. Biden became the first US president to use the word genocide in a statement on the anniversary, a day after informing Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan of the decision and seeking to limit the furor from the NATO ally. “We remember the lives of all those who died in the Ottoman-era Armenian genocide and recommit ourselves to preventing such an atrocity from ever again occurring,” Biden said. “We affirm the history. We do this not to cast blame but to ensure that what happened is never repeated.” The statement is a massive victory for Armenia and its extensive diaspora. Starting with Uruguay in 1965, nations including France, Germany, Canada and Russia have recognized the genocide, but a US statement has been a paramount goal that proved elusive under previous presidents. In a message to the Armenian patriarch in Istanbul, Erdogan accused “third parties” of trying to politicise the century-old debate. “Nobody benefits from the debates — which should be held by historians — being politicised by third parties and becoming an instrument of interference in our country,” Erdogan wrote. On a more conciliatory note, Erdogan said Turkey was “ready to develop our relations with Armenia based on good neighbourhood and mutual respect”. “Words cannot change or rewrite history,” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu tweeted moments after Biden’s statement. “We will not take lessons from anyone on our history.” “We reject and denounce in the strongest terms the statement of the president of the US regarding the events of 1915 made under the pressure of radical Armenian circles and anti-Turkey groups,” the Turkish foreign ministry said in a statement. “It is clear that the said statement does not have a scholarly and legal basis, nor is it supported by any evidence,” it said. The Turkish foreign ministry later summoned US Ambassador David Satterfield to express its displeasure, noting that Biden’s decision caused “a wound in relations that is difficult to repair,” the Anadolu state news agency reported. Explaining Biden’s thinking, an administration official pointed to the Democratic president’s vows to put a new priority on human rights and highlighted his outspokenness on systemic racism in the United States. Across the world, “people are beginning to acknowledge and address and grapple with the painful historical facts in their own countries. It’s certainly something that we are doing here in the United States,” the official said.
No retaliatory measures
As many as 1.5 million Armenians are estimated to have been killed from 1915 to 1917 during the waning days of the Ottoman Empire, which suspected the Christian minority of conspiring with adversary Russia in World War I. Armenian populations were rounded up and deported into the desert of Syria on death marches in which many were shot, poisoned or fell victim to disease, according to accounts at the time by foreign diplomats. Turkey, which emerged as a secular republic from the ashes of the Ottoman Empire, acknowledges that 300,000 Armenians may have died but strongly rejects that it was genocide, saying they perished in strife and famine in which many Turks also died. Recognition has been a top priority for Armenia and Armenian-Americans, with calls for compensation and property restoration over what they call Meds Yeghern — the Great Crime — and appeals for more support against Turkish-backed neighbor Azerbaijan.
The Azerbaijani foreign ministry said Biden’s statement “distorted the historical facts about the events of 1915” and echoed Turkey’s call for the killings to be “studied by historians, not politicians.” Azerbaijan defeated Armenia last year in a war over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, in which Ankara backed its ally Baku and which left Armenia traumatized. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan thanked Biden for his “powerful step towards justice and invaluable support to the heirs of the Armenian genocide victims.” In the Armenian capital Yerevan, Taline Nourian, 41, said her people have been waiting for this moment for years. “We wanted it before Biden,” she told AFP. “I think Turkey will be afraid now because all countries are going to start recognising (the genocide).”Biden, whose call to Erdogan Friday to inform him of the genocide recognition was their first conversation since the US leader took office three months ago, signaled he hoped to contain the fallout. They agreed in their call to meet in June on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Brussels, officials said. Beyond statements and the summoning of the US ambassador, Turkey did not immediately announce any retaliatory steps — in contrast to angry measures taken over previous Western moves to recognise the genocide.
NATO tensions
Tensions have risen sharply with Turkey in recent years over its purchase of a major air defense system from NATO adversary Russia, and its incursions against pro-US Kurdish fighters in Syria. The US Congress in 2019 voted overwhelmingly to recognize the Armenian genocide, but the Trump administration made clear that the official US line had not changed. Alan Makovsky, an expert on Turkey at the left-leaning Center for American Progress, said that the 2019 congressional resolution had “no discernible impact” on US-Turkey relations — and paved the way for Biden to go ahead. At a pro-Armenia rally in New York on Saturday, the crowd of several hundred included Aram Bowen, 33, whose great-great-grandfather was beheaded by the Ottomans during the massacres.
“Turkey is never going to recognise it as genocide,” he said. “So for us on so many levels, the closest thing to that actually becoming official worldwide, it was when the United States and the president himself acknowledged the genocide.”
 

Turkey’s genocide blackmail: Threats to work closer with Iran and Russia

Jerusalem Post/April 25/2021
The Biden administration has called Turkey’s bluff: that it might leave NATO because it is angry to hear the word “genocide” – and that Ankara should never be offended, but can do what it wants. The US decision to finally recognize the Armenian genocide comes after decades in which Turkey and its lobbyists in Washington threatened the US. Their narrative was that if Washington would just use the term “genocide” – for a crime committed 106 years ago by a former government in what is now Turkey – then Ankara would rapidly move to sanction the US, close its bases, threaten its citizens and ally with Iran, China and Russia, or other US enemies. This bizarre, mafia-like threat is the same one that Tehran used regarding the Iran deal. It is because non-Western countries learned that the way to deal with Western countries was to prey on their fears. For instance, today Pakistan is threatening to expel France’s ambassador because far-right religious extremists in Pakistan claim to be offended by cartoons published years ago in a French magazine. Ankara’s attempt to hold countries hostage regarding the Armenian genocide worked well for many years. It prevented many countries, including Israel, from “offending” Ankara by mentioning the genocide. It’s unclear if this same blackmail would have worked had Germany in 1946 also told countries that they can’t mention the Holocaust or Germany would be “offended,” so that Western countries would have denied the Shoah the way some continue to deny the Armenian genocide.
Turkey was coddled for many years because it sold itself as a key to helping the West confront the Soviets. When the Soviets were gone in 1989, Turkey shifted its pattern of denial to claims that it wanted to be part of the European Union, was somehow a bridge between the West and Asia, and that if it was offended it might aid Islamist extremism or something. That claim has now grown to arguments in Turkey that openly bash the West, calling Western countries and Israel “Nazi” and then asserting that Ankara will position itself with Russia, China and Iran against Western democracies.
THE TURKEY that is running to embrace Russia and Iran is the same one that still talks about the myth of joining the European Union. It’s unclear how a Turkey that has an authoritarian regime and where there are almost not critical journalists allowed and where people are put in prison for decades for tweets, could ever join an EU that is ostensibly democratic.
NATO was also supposed to be about values and democracy, and yet it has empowered Ankara for years to become more authoritarian, including excusing Ankara’s invasion of Kurdish Afrin in 2018 and the ethnic cleansing of Kurds. Now the crescendo of threats has risen again. Those who opposed genocide recognition argued that Turkey would drift away from NATO – which it was already doing. They argued that it will work with Russia – a country it already buys S-400s from. They argue it would work with China – a country Turkey already openly works with and to which it plans more overland truck and rail links via Russia, Central Asia and Iran. The argument against America recognizing the genocide was that the US must think “geopolitically” and not use a “stunt” to hurt Turkey’s feelings. This is the same Ankara that openly opposes NATO countries like Greece and France and which often slanders various countries in the West. It was unclear why Turkey wasn’t held to the same standard: If Ankara wanted the West to refrain from just mentioning “genocide,” why Turkey wasn’t required to also do what Western countries want and also be polite in international relations. Instead, the argument went that Ankara should never be offended, but that it can do whatever it wanted.
THE BIDEN administration has called Turkey’s bluff. The idea that just recognizing a genocide from 106 years ago would somehow lead Turkey to close US bases and rapidly work with Russia, Iran and China seems strange considering the fact that Ankara must think “geopolitically” as well. The argument was always that the West needs Turkey more than Turkey needs the US and the West. This seems to turn “geopolitics” on its head. If “geopolitics” requires appeasement and always begging a country and isn’t a two-way street based on respect and strength, then it’s unclear what the US ever achieved over the last decades by placating Turkey.
The theory is that Turkey might leave NATO because it is angry it heard the word “genocide.” If it was just mentioning genocide that causes it to leave, then it means the NATO alliance wasn’t worth more than one word: not worth the training, the German tanks, the intelligence sharing and everything else. Turkey would bury itself because it was offended about being asked about what happened in 1915? Never in history has a country left a massive military alliance worth billions of dollars because someone used one word to refer to something that happened 106 years ago. Only Turkey used this blackmail to prevent any mention of the fact that the modern day country is largely built on hundreds of thousands of homes of Greeks and Armenians and other minorities who were expelled and murdered, sold into slavery and and suffered genocide between 1915 and 1955. The modern Turkish AKP Party, which is rooted in Islamist thinking, could have blamed the atrocities on previous Turkish governments.
ANKARA'S SUPPORTERS sometimes argue that Turkey could recognize the US genocide of Native-Americans. But unlike Turkey, it's not very controversial in the US to say that Native Americans suffered genocide. Turkey has already accused other countries of genocide, including claiming Israel is like the Nazis and has committed genocide. So if Turkey was so afraid of the word “genocide” why does it accuse Israel of “genocide”?
Turkey’s policy was to pretend it was above history, above ever being held to account or even critiqued. Many US diplomats went along with this; for years they appeared almost more pro-Turkey than Turkey’s own diplomats. Ankara cast a kind of spell over Western policymakers, usually through quiet or open threats. The ability of Turkey to spread real-world threats has also grown. Last year it engineered a crisis with France over cartoons published years ago, and its rhetoric likely led to at least one terror attack in France.
Turkey will continue to try to leverage Islamist extremism in Europe to its own ends. It has already threatened at various times to use refugees against Europe unless the EU pays it more money. Meanwhile, it radicalizes the refugees and uses them as mercenaries. Turkey played a key role as a conduit for ISIS members from Europe, including providing a base for radicalization. It is entirely possible that Turkey could end up doing for the next Al-Qaeda what Pakistan and Afghanistan did for the Al Qaeda of the 1990s: providing a base and conduit for extremism. That trajectory is one that Turkey will ride regardless of whether the US recognizes the genocide. Supporting extremism comes with its own negatives though, because extremist countries usually suffer economic decline. Turkey’s confrontation with the US over the term “genocide” will be weighed against its desire to have economic power, which underpinned its claims in the past to being of “geopolitical” importance. If it cares about “geopolitics,” as Western analysts claim it does, then it will have more to lose from confrontation. The trend in Ankara was to work with Iran, China and Russia anyway.
Whether the Biden administration finally standing up to Ankara will lead it to work with authoritarians more is a question Ankara has to weigh against its own claims of wanting “reconciliation” with countries it has attacked in the last few years. There is no evidence that denying the genocide helped keep Ankara more liberal, tolerant, democratic and open minded and more close to the West.

Analyst: Rocket engine test likely caused blast in Israel
The Associated Press/25 April ,2021
A mysterious blast heard in central Israel appears to have come during a rocket engine test conducted at a secretive military base associated with the country's missile program, according to an analyst and satellite images. Video of the incident at Sdot Micha Air Base circulated online last week. Iranian state media seized on it amid its tensions with Israel after a series of attacks targeting its nuclear program and amid negotiations in Vienna over its tattered atomic accord. However, the smoke and flames filmed April 20 appear to be from a rocket engine test, said Jeffrey Lewis, an expert at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, who located the site with others. Lewis said the image compared to others of similar tests he and experts have extensively studied. Satellite photos taken by Planet Labs Inc. and analyzed by The Associated Press of a known rocket test stand at Sdot Micha showed char marks and foliage burned away at the site after April 20. However, the surrounding buildings bore no signs of damage. The location also mirrored details of the video posted to social media. The Israeli Defense Ministry did not immediately respond to questions from the AP. Tomer, an Israeli government-owned company, told the AP on Sunday the blast came from “a conventional, controlled test in accordance with the working plan.”The incident came just after Israel and the U.S. announced in February they would begin work on a new generation of interceptor missiles called the Arrow-4. Tomar on its website describes itself as producing the “rocket motors of the Arrow missiles,

Shavit satellite launchers, ELRAD air defense systems and artillery rockets.” Such test-stand experiments often involve new systems. Tomer declined to comment on whether the test involved the Arrow. Israel hopes to replace its Arrow-2 missiles for the Arrow-4. The missiles, fired out of canisters, intercept and destroy ballistic missiles. The Arrow missiles are key to Israel's defense from the ballistic missile program of Iran, Israel's regional archenemy. In a February statement, Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said the Arrow-4 would provide Israel with a “technological and operational leap forward, preparing us for the future battle field and evolving threats in the Middle East and beyond.” The air base, some 35 kilometers (21 miles) southeast of Tel Aviv, includes a system of bunkers and underground facilities, some built with assistance from the U.S. government. Defense analysis firm Janes believes the air base also is home to Israel's nuclear weapon-capable Jericho ballistic missiles. Under its policy of nuclear ambiguity, Israel neither confirms nor denies having atomic weapons though it is widely believed to possess them.

Netanyahu Calls for 'Calm' in Jerusalem amid Fresh Violence
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
Fresh clashes broke out late Saturday between Palestinians and Israeli police after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for "calm on all sides" after several nights of unrest in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem. But the premier also warned that Israel remains "prepared for all scenarios" after dozens of rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel, prompting Israeli retaliatory air strikes. Thirty-six rockets were launched overnight Friday, the Israeli army said, the most in a single night this year, after Gaza's Islamist rulers Hamas voiced support for the east Jerusalem protests. Netanyahu made the remarks after attending an emergency security meeting with senior officials, including army chief Aviv Kohavi, hours after Israeli warplanes struck Gaza early Saturday and a second night of clashes between Palestinians and police in Jerusalem. "First of all we want to ensure that law and order are respected... now we demand compliance with the law and I call for calm on all sides," Netanyahu said in a statement after the security talks. The clashes on Saturday evening were less severe than on previous days, according to an AFP journalist at the scene. Six Palestinians were injured, the Palestinian Red Crescent said. After Netanyahu's comments, the Israeli army said it intercepted another rocket launched from the Gaza Strip on Saturday evening. There have been nightly disturbances since the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on April 13, amid Palestinian anger over police blocking off access to the promenade around the walls of the Old City and a ban on gatherings. A series of videos posted online have also shown young Arabs attacking ultra-Orthodox Jews, and Jewish extremists taking to the streets to bully Arabs. A march into the heart of Arab east Jerusalem by hundreds of supporters of far-right Jewish nationalist group Lehava added fuel to the fire.
'Playing with fire'
At least 125 people were injured Thursday when Palestinian protesters, angered by chants of "death to Arabs" from far-right Jewish demonstrators, clashed repeatedly with police. Skirmishes broke out again on Friday when tens of thousands of Muslim worshippers left Jerusalem's revered Al-Aqsa mosque after night prayers and found themselves confronted by dozens of armed police, some on horseback. Protesters hurled water bottles at police, who fired stun grenades to disperse them. The violence was the worst in years between Israeli police and Palestinians in the disputed Holy City. "We uphold freedom of religion... for all residents and visitors of Jerusalem," Netanyahu said. Expressions of concern and calls for restraint have come from the European Union, United Nations and other countries. The United States, which has taken a more even-handed approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since President Joe Biden took office in January urged "calm and unity." "The rhetoric of extremist protesters chanting hateful and violent slogans must be firmly rejected," State Department spokesman Ned Price tweeted. Hundreds of Palestinians also rallied Friday at the Qalandiya checkpoint between Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, police said. In the West Bank town of Bethlehem, Palestinians threw stones and petrol bombs towards the tomb of biblical matriarch Rachel, a shrine venerated by Jews and Muslims. Jerusalem mayor Moshe Lion told public radio he was in talks with Palestinian community leaders in east Jerusalem "to end this pointless violence" and that he had tried to cancel Thursday's far-right march. The office of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas condemned "the growing incitement by extremist far-right Israeli settler groups advocating for the killing of Arabs." Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi condemned "racist attacks" by Israelis against Palestinians in east Jerusalem, and called for "international action to protect them."
"Jerusalem is a red line and touching it, is playing with fire," he warned.
Gaza rocket fire
Israel's arch-enemy Iran also weighed in, with foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh praising Palestinian "resistance" and condemning what he called the "Zionists' savage actions". U.N. special coordinator for Middle East peace Tor Wennesland, urged all sides to "exercise maximum restraint and avoid further escalation", adding "the provocative acts across Jerusalem must cease". Hamas's military wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, voiced support for the east Jerusalem protesters. "The spark you light today will be the wick of the explosion to come in the face of the enemy," it said in a statement. An alliance of Palestinian militant groups, including Hamas and its smaller ally Islamic Jihad, issued a statement warning we "cannot remain silent" in the face of the violence. Militants in Gaza fired a first salvo of three rockets at Israel shortly before midnight (2100 GMT) Friday, the military said. Israeli tanks shelled Gaza in response and launched air strikes on the blockaded coastal enclave controlled by the Muslim militant group Hamas after more rockets were fired.Defense Minister Benny Gantz said the army "was ready for the possibility of escalation." The Israeli army said the 36 rockets fired at Israel were intercepted or hit open  ground. It said the air strikes, involving fighter jets and attack helicopters, struck Hamas military targets as well as underground infrastructure and rocket launchers. "Concerning the Gaza Strip, I gave instructions that we be prepared for all scenarios," Netanyahu said.

Jerusalem escalation could be how Israel's next war starts - analysis

Jerusalem Post/April 25/2021
It is important to understand that this timeline is similar to how tensions grew in 2014 and other cycles that led to tensions in Gaza and Jerusalem. The recent string of events leading to greater clashes in Jerusalem and rocket fire from Gaza is part of the cycle that has led to conflicts in the past.
The recent Jerusalem escalation coincided with Ramadan and TikTok videos of Orthodox Jews being attacked. Numerous arrests were made, but that didn’t calm tensions. A massive far-right rally this past Thursday then led to further tensions, including early-Saturday morning rocket fire from the Gaza Strip.
It is important to understand that this timeline of events is similar to how tensions grew in 2014 as well as other cycles of violence that led to tensions in Gaza and Jerusalem – for example the 2017 installation of temporary metal detectors in the Old City of Jerusalem.
However, there is a central difference. The July 2017 events and the 2014 war began with terror attacks – specifically, a July 14, 2017 terror attack by a gunman on the Temple Mount, and the June 12, 2014 kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teens in the West Bank.
In both cases, Israel responded. In the 2014 incident, a right-wing march led to the murder of Palestinian teen Mohammed Abu Khdeir on July 2, resulting in the Jerusalem clashes and riots. The “gates of hell” comments from Hamas, which are rhetoric again being used by Palestinian factions, are often a prelude to rising attacks. Similar comments have been heard: On June 30, 2014, and in November 2012. In December 2017, Hamas said the decision of then-President Donald Trump’s administration to move the embassy to Jerusalem would open the gates of hell. The 2012 comments came after Israel killed Ahmed al-Jabari, a senior Hamas commander. It is not often remembered now, but the Hamas comments of December 2017 did lead to rising tensions that ultimately culminated with the killing of 58 Palestinians in Gaza during violent protests and riots along the border, as the US moved its embassy in May 2018.
The 2014 cycle of violence culminated in a war in Gaza: Operation Protective Edge. It also led to widespread rioting in Jerusalem that damaged parts of the infrastructure for the light rail in Beit Hanina and to a massive March on Kalandiya checkpoint that resulted in some 287 injuries and two Palestinians killed.
SO WHERE ARE we today? Hamas and Palestinian groups in Gaza have vowed solidarity with Jerusalem. The dozens of rockets fired on Saturday morning – the most fired in months – are an escalation. The rocket fire is reminiscent of the increase in 2019 that led to some 2,600 rockets being fired at Israel in two years from 2018 to 2019. Around 1,000 of those were fired in 2018.
In November 2019, Israel launched an assassination airstrike against an Islamic Jihad leader. That escalated to further airstrikes, including a strike in Syria that Russia revealed that November 20.
The current tensions are not yet in a cycle like that, involving international repercussions. However, the US State Department has put out a statement about the recent clashes and the far-right march in Jerusalem. America’s concern comes amid discussions about a new or renewed Iran Deal and the planned trip of high-level Israeli security officials to Washington. The situation is also not like the “stabbing intifada,” a wave of lone-wolf violence from 2015-2016 that led to numerous attacks and the killing of knife-wielding Palestinians. This is because the current clashes have not yet involved terror attacks by Palestinians.
But this does not mean that what is happening is not serious. The linkage of Jerusalem to Gaza and the demands by Hamas to get involved not only in the tensions, but also the Palestinian elections, are a precursor to more tensions. Hamas and Palestinian factions also want there to be Palestinian elections next month, with voting in east Jerusalem. Elections cannot be held if the Palestinians in Jerusalem can’t vote, the factions say. This could give them an excuse to heat up violence in Jerusalem as a way to cancel the elections or try to force Israel’s hand. It is not yet clear what trajectory and shape this violence will take. The emergence of hundreds of far-right Israelis chanting anti-Arab slogans this past Thursday has led to a laser focus on Jerusalem. The police have tried and succeeded to reduce tensions. But the month of Ramadan brings other considerations. Clashes at Kalandiya checkpoint on Friday evening represent the type of wave of clashes that can spread. In Israel’s favor, the country has learned how to prevent deaths as in past clashes. It is worth considering that the current clashes also come after a year in which the global pandemic mostly helped keep people home and quiet. Under health regulations, there were no large marches, religious events, or far-right rallies that can spark more tensions. That isn’t the case now, however, because of Israel’s vaccination campaign. The determining factor now is whether agendas in Ramallah, Gaza and Jerusalem may heat up or reduce tensions. And Israel still lacks a new coalition government, which also gives wind to the flames of extremism and chaos because Israel’s parties also cannot seem to agree.

Paris terror attack could influence French elections
The Arab Weekly/April 25/2021
PARIS--The French government held an emergency meeting Saturday after a Tunisian man stabbed a police employee to death near Paris in a suspected Islamist attack as investigators questioned three people linked to the assailant. The attack is seen as possibly influencing the course of upcoming French elections in favour of the far right. In Tunisia, the assailants’ native country, and in the Tunisian diaspora in France many were shocked by the involvement of yet another national in a terrorist attack in Europe. “I am ashamed”, was a recurring refrain among Tunisians in their social media messages. Some activists are alleging the perpetrator has connections to local Salafist preachers and had expressed sympathies in his Facebook account to radical Islamist politicians. At least one person was arrested by Tunisian police investigators. The murder on Friday at a police station in Rambouillet, a commuter town about 60 kilometres from Paris, revived the trauma of a spate of deadly Islamist attacks in recent years. The victim was a 49-year-old woman named as Stephanie M., a police administrative assistant and mother of two teenage girls. She was stabbed twice in the throat at the entrance of the station. Her alleged 36-year-old attacker Jamel Gorchene, identified in Tunisia as Jamel Ben Salem Gorchene, was shot and killed by an officer at the scene. He was unknown to the police and intelligence services. President Emmanuel Macron, who was out of the country on a visit to Chad at the time, tweeted that France would never give in to “Islamist terrorism”.On Saturday, he visited the victim’s husband at his bakery after meeting with the police divisional commander in Rambouillet, the presidency said. The family was “very upset and very dignified”, it said.
Prime Minister Jean Castex cut short a visit to France’s Occitanie region to hold an emergency meeting with the interior, justice and armed forces ministers which lasted for two hours. The latest violence targeting police is likely to focus attention further on the danger of Islamist extremism in France and wider concerns about security a year ahead of a presidential election. The French government has been emphasizing security, mindful of the presidential election next year. Macron has vowed to put more officers in the streets and the interior minister says 10,000 will be added by next year. Darmanin has made a point of defending police amid claims of brutality amid the Black Lives Matter movement and the growing popularity of far-right leader Marine Le Pen.
The attack jolted the French government into taking a deeper look at new steps needed to protect police officers. Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin is to present a bill shortly giving new teeth to an anti-terrorism law, the national intelligence coordinator, Laurent Nunez, said Saturday on BMFTV.National anti-terrorism prosecutors have opened a terror investigation. One source close to the inquiry told AFP the knifeman had shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is Greatest) during the attack. Chief anti-terror prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard confirmed “comments made by the assailant” indicated a terror motive and said the attack might have been premeditated. Nunez told the media that Gorchene had shown no signs of radicalisation. He was, he said, one of those individuals “who are very isolated, have no relations with other individuals that make the detectable”. “It’s becoming very, very complicated to … detect this type of profile” with no apparent links to known extremists, Nunez said.
Uncovering connections
The suspect’s father and two other people said to have hosted him were taken into custody on Friday, and questioning continued on Saturday as police delve into his background, contacts and possible motives. A fourth person was also taken into custody and the homes of all four people searched. A source close to the investigation said Gorchene’s phone contained religious chants often used to spread jihadist propaganda. The assailant had arrived in France illegally in 2009 but had since obtained residency papers, a police source said. He had just moved to Rambouillet and was working as a delivery driver. Relatives in Tunisia described him as depressive and not devout, and they expressed shock and disbelief at the murder. Some have noted a change of demeanor when he last visited a few months ago. Gorchene was from M’saken, the same hometown as Tunisian Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, who carried out a deadly attack in France in July 2016. Far-right leader Marine Le Pen immediately questioned why the attacker had been able to settle in the country, and hit back at recent criticism about police brutality in France. “We need to get back to reason: supporting our police, expelling illegal immigrants and eradicating Islamism,” she wrote on Twitter.
Polls show Le Pen running close to Macron in next year’s election, though experts warn that surveys conducted so far ahead and during a pandemic should be interpreted with caution.
About 30 police officers wearing balaclavas raided the suspect’s home in Rambouillet on Friday. At the same time police in the Paris region searched the home of the person who had sheltered him when he first arrived in France, sources close to the inquiry said.Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin, who also visited officers in Rambouillet, said security would be stepped up at stations nationwide.
Terror trail
France has been repeatedly targeted by Islamist attackers since 2015, with a series of incidents in the last year keeping terrorism and security as a leading concern. Macron’s government has introduced legislation to tackle religious extremism, which would make it easier for the government to close places of worship and track foreign funding of mosques. In October, a young Chechen refugee beheaded teacher Samuel Paty who had showed caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed to his pupils, a crime that profoundly shocked the country.
In the most serious recent attack against French police, three officers and one police employee in Paris were stabbed to death in October 2019 by an IT specialist colleague who was himself then shot dead. He was found to have shown an interest in radical Islam. These attacks came after the massacres carried out by Islamist extremists from 2015 that began in January with the killing of staff in the offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, which had printed Prophet Mohammed caricatures. In France’s deadliest peacetime atrocity, 130 people were klled and 350 were wounded when Islamist suicide bombers and gunmen attacked the Stade de France stadium, bars and restaurants in central Paris and the Bataclan concert hall in November 2015. The following year Lahouaiej-Bouhlel — the man from Gorchene’s hometown — rammed a truck into a Bastille Day crowd in Nice, killing 86 people.
 

Protests in France over No Trial for Jewish Woman's Killer
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
Protesters gathered in several French cities and Israel on Sunday to condemn a court's refusal of a trial for a man who killed a 65-year-old Jewish woman, after experts determined he acted in a "delirious fit" due to heavy marijuana use. The decision infuriated the victim's family as well as Jewish groups, and prompted President Emmanuel Macron to urge a change in French law to ensure people face responsibility for violent crimes while under the influence of drugs. Sarah Halimi was pushed out the window of her Paris flat by neighbor Kobili Traore, 27, who shouted "Allahu Akbar" ("God is greatest" in Arabic).
The country's highest court said this month that while the murder was anti-Semitic, Traore could not be held criminally responsible since he had acted in a state of dementia. He has been in psychiatric care since Halimi's death. "The clamor has risen and hope has returned. That hope is all of you here," Halimi's brother William Attal told a crowd of several thousand at the Trocadero esplanade in Paris. The MP who leads Macron's Republic on the Move party, Christophe Castaner, addressed the protest, which was also attended by opposition leaders and by several well-known actors. Former French first lady Carla Bruni, wife of Nicolas Sarkozy, also appeared at the Paris rally, as did Mayor Anne Hidalgo, who said the city would soon name a street in Halimi's memory. "It will also be a way of doing her justice," Hidalgo said.
'Ashamed'
Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti confirmed Sunday that a new penal responsibility law would be presented by end May to fill a "legal void". But France's CSM judiciary council rejected the government's "disparagement" on Sunday and insisted that judges had correctly applied the law in a "painful" case. Between 1,500 and 2,000 people also marched at a protest in the Mediterranean city of Marseille, while around 600 gathered outside a synagogue in the eastern city of Strasbourg, authorities said. In Israel, hundreds of people gathered outside the French embassy in Tel Aviv, waving French and Israeli flags and placards with slogans such as "Shame on France". "I am ashamed to be French, the France of my childhood no longer exists," said Roselyne Mimouni, a Franco-Israeli retiree. "I am appalled that a Jewish woman was murdered in France because she was Jewish," she added. Israeli lawmakers from across the political spectrum attended, with Diaspora Minister Omer Yankelevitch calling the court's decision "absurd, scandalous and dangerous". "From Tel Aviv to Paris, the Jewish people, in Israel and the entire world, stand in solidarity with the Halimi family and the Jewish community of France," she said. Jewish groups say the court ruling has made Jews less safe in France, while lawyers representing Halimi's family have said they will take the case to the European Court of Human Rights. French Jews have been repeatedly targeted by jihadists in recent years, most notably in 2012, when an Islamist gunman shot dead three children and a teacher at a Jewish school in the southern city of Toulouse. In 2015, a pro-Islamic State radical gunned down four people at a Jewish supermarket in Paris.

Indonesia Finds Missing Submarine, 53 Crew Dead
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
A missing Indonesian submarine has been found cracked apart on the seabed in waters off Bali, the military said Sunday, as it confirmed that all 53 crew perished in the disaster. Authorities said that they received signals from the location more than 800 meters (2,600 feet) deep early Sunday morning. They had used an underwater submarine rescue vehicle supplied by Singapore to get a visual confirmation of the KRI Nanggala 402. More parts from the vessel were also retrieved, including an anchor and safety suits worn by crew members, they said. "There were parts of KRI Nanggala 402 -- it was broken into three pieces," said Navy Chief of Staff Yudo Margono. The discovery comes a day after the navy had first confirmed the retrieval of fragments from the submarine, including items from inside the vessel. They had also declared that it had sunk, effectively ending any chance of finding survivors.
Among the earlier items recovered were a piece of the torpedo system and a bottle of grease used to lubricate periscopes. They also found a prayer mat commonly used in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation. Warships, planes and hundreds of military personnel had led a frantic search for the submarine since it disappeared this week during training exercises, hoping for a miracle rescue before its known oxygen reserves ran out. But on Sunday, Indonesian military head Hadi Tjahjanto confirmed there was no chance of finding any of the crew alive. "With deep sadness, I can say that all 53 personnel onboard have passed," he told reporters.
'Folding accordion' -
Earlier Sunday, the relatives of First Lieutenant Muhammad Imam Adi, a 29-year-old father of a young son, clung to hope. "My wish now is that my son and all the crew can be found," Adi's father Edy Sujianto said from his home on Java island. "My son had wanted to become a soldier since he was a child. That was his dream."President Joko Widodo described the missing sailors as Indonesia's "best patriots"."All Indonesians convey their deep sadness over this incident, especially to the families of the submarine crew," he said. Authorities have not given an official explanation for the accident, but said that the submarine may have suffered a blackout and left its crew unable to resurface. They discounted an explosion, however, saying Saturday that the evidence suggested the submarine came apart as it was crushed by water pressure at depths of more than 800 meters (2,600 feet) -- pressure much higher than the German-built Nanggala was built to withstand. "Submarine hulls are pressurized... but when they're breached then water would come flooding inside," said Wisnu Wardhana, a maritime expert at Indonesia's Sepuluh Nopember Institute of Technology. "Can you imagine if water with that kind of pressure hits people?"Retired French vice-admiral Jean-Louis Vichot earlier told AFP that a submarine's steel shell could break "like a folding accordion" when it hits depths way beyond its limits.
- Salvage operation -
Authorities have warned that any salvage operation would be risky and difficult in the deep waters. Neighboring Malaysia, as well as the United States, India and Australia, were among the nations helping in the search. Search vessels, reconnaissance aircraft and submarine rescue ships had been deployed to scour a zone of about 10 square nautical miles (34 square kilometers). The submarine -- one of five in Indonesia's fleet -- disappeared early Wednesday while it was scheduled to do live torpedo training exercises off Bali. The crew asked for permission to dive. It lost contact shortly after. Later, search teams spotted an oil spill where the vessel was thought to have submerged, pointing to possible fuel-tank damage, and a catastrophic accident. Authorities have said that the submarine -- delivered to Indonesia in 1981 -- was seaworthy. The model has been used by more than a dozen navies around the world. But investigators would look at the Indonesian submarine's age as a potential factor, analysts have said. The disaster was among a string of fatal submarine accidents over the past few decades. Among the worst was the 2000 sinking of the Kursk, the pride of Russia's Northern Fleet. That submarine was on maneuvers in the Barents Sea when it sank with the loss of all 118 aboard. An inquiry found a torpedo had exploded, detonating all the others. Most of its crew died instantly but some survived for several days before suffocating.

Yemen Rebels Advance on Marib, Dozens Dead
Agence France Presse/April 25/2021
Yemen's Huthi rebels have made important gains in the battle for the government's last northern stronghold, advancing close to the center of Marib city despite heavy casualties, military sources said Sunday. The rebels have taken full control of the northwest Kassara battlefield and made progress on western frontlines despite airstrikes by the Saudi-led coalition which backs Yemen's government, the loyalist military sources said. Marib and its surrounding oil fields make up the last significant pocket of government-held territory in the north, the rest of which is under rebel control, including the capital Sanaa. Fierce fighting has left at least 65 dead over the past two days alone, including some 26 loyalist personnel, among them four officers, the government sources told AFP. The Iran-backed Huthis rarely disclose their own losses. With the Huthis taking control of the Kassara front, the battles have moved to the Al-Mil area, which is a mere six kilometers (four miles) from the center of Marib and its population centers, they said. However, mountains around Al-Mil remain a formidable barrier to the rebels who launched their fierce campaign for Marib city in February. The government sources said the Huthis had poured in hundreds of reinforcements in recent days to achieve the gains, resorting to motorbikes after the coalition targeted their military vehicles.
Camps overflowing
The loss of Marib would be a major blow for the Yemeni government and for Saudi Arabia which has supported its militarily since March 2015, after the rebels captured Sanaa. Observers say the Huthis are intent on capturing the city in order to gain leverage before entering into any negotiations with the government, amid a U.S. push to revive peace talks. The city's fall could also lead to a humanitarian disaster, as vast numbers of civilians displaced from fighting elsewhere have sought refuge in the area. Around 140 camps have sprung up in the surrounding desert to provide basic shelter for up to two million displaced, according to the Yemeni government. Hundreds of combatants have been killed since the large-scale offensive began, with the toll fueled by wave after wave of Huthi fighters arriving on frontlines around the city. A government commander told AFP in Marib earlier this month that the Huthis are deploying young recruits, many of them children, with the goal of wearing out loyalist forces and depleting their ammunition. These recruits are used in first wave attacks, followed by a more lethal wave of experienced Huthi fighters under the cover of constant shelling, the commander said of a rebel strategy that is heaping pressure on loyalist forces. The escalation in hostilities has displaced 13,600 people in Marib this year, according to the U.N. refugee agency, putting a heavy strain on the city in the midst of a second coronavirus wave. Lacking clean water and electricity, makeshift settlements are overflowing and camp residents say they have repeatedly come under Huthi shelling. The rebels have also stepped up missile and drone strikes against neighboring Saudi Arabia in recent months, demanding the opening of Yemen's airspace and ports. They have rejected a Saudi proposal for a ceasefire.
The U.S. administration of President Joe Biden is mounting a renewed push to end the conflict, warning that the suffering will only end when a political solution is found.

The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on April 25-26/2021

The return of the ‘two-state solution’ - opinion

Alan Banker/Jerusalem Post/April 25/2021
With the advent of the Biden administration in the US, the phrase “two-state solution” appears to have returned to the forefront in the new US administration’s “reset” of its policy.
With the advent of the Biden administration in the US, the phrase “two-state solution” appears to have returned to the forefront in the new US administration’s “reset” of its policy priorities regarding the Palestinian–Israeli dispute.
The question arises whether the massive, liberal, effusive and generally off-the-cuff usage of the term “two-state solution” by all and sundry has any relation to its historic and substantive context in the Israeli-Palestinian realities, and whether it takes into account the complex and practical aspects of its realization.
The term “two-state solution” has become a useful slogan and political declaration by leaders in the international community, often the result of political correctness and lip-service to a growing international trend.
In addition to some former Israeli leaders, the phrase is being repeated daily by White House and State Department spokespersons and other administration officials, as well as by international leaders and organizations, as it was during the Obama and previous administrations.
As most recently reported by The Jerusalem Post, the April 18-19 J Street annual conference, presently being held virtually, the “two-state” mantra is figuring high among the stated priorities of the participants.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, invited by J Street to participate as a keynote speaker at its conference, affirmed the belief by the PA in “the two-state solution based on pre-June 1967 borders based on international law” with “east Jerusalem as its capital.” Former prime minister Ehud Olmert expressed his own firm belief in the importance of a two-state resolution to the conflict.
Similar calls supporting the two-state solution were expressed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as well as Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer
However, as in the past, the phrase is again being bandied-about as a form of collective and generalized wishful thinking, as the only panacea to the Palestinian-Israeli dispute, but without full awareness of its history, its practical implications and the feasibility of its implementation in light of the realities of the dispute.
IT IS BEING repeated despite the fact that a two-state solution has, in fact, never been accepted and agreed-to by the parties to the dispute, and despite the fact that the permanent status of the territories, as agreed in the Oslo Accords, remains an open negotiating issue. As such, repetition of the call for a two-state solution would appear to be an attempt to prejudge the outcome of that negotiating process.
The 1991-93 Oslo Accords remain the only agreed, and still valid internationally legal basis for the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiation process. Together with Yasser Arafat representing the PLO, and prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, the Accords were countersigned by the leaders of the US, the EU, Russia, Norway and Egypt. They make no mention of the ultimate outcome of the permanent-status negotiations, whether that be in the form of a one-, two- or three-state solution, a federation, confederation or condominium, or anything else. All this is left to the parties to negotiate in good faith. The solution cannot be imposed, prejudged or predetermined by non-binding political resolutions of international organizations or by the wishful thinking of political leaders, however genuine and well-meaning they may be.
While the two-state vision has become a standard component of non-binding UN political documentation, it has never been part of any formal, binding resolution or agreement between the parties.
The accepted, and logical assumption has been that whatever solution will be achieved, will only be through negotiation and agreement between the parties, and not through the imposition of such a solution, through prejudgment of the outcome of such negotiation or through glib declarations expressing the hope for a two-state solution. Clearly, any concept of a two-state solution that would indeed include the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, could only emanate from direct, bona fide negotiations between Israel and a unified Palestinian leadership, and not through partisan political resolutions emanating from the UN or any other source, or from vague and generalized calls from international leaders for a two-state solution as a form of collective wishful thinking.
*The writer served as the legal adviser to Israel’s Foreign Ministry and as Israel’s ambassador to Canada. He participated in the negotiation and drafting of the Oslo Accords. He presently serves as director of the International Law Program at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs

Biden ends decades of US appeasement of Turkey, recognizes genocide - analysis

Seth J. Frantzman/Jerusalem Post/April 25/2021
The level of appeasement and catering to endless threats from Ankara has no parallel in US history.
US President Joe Biden has ended decades of US appeasement of Turkey by recognizing the genocide carried out 106 years ago against Armenians by a previous Turkish government.
The symbolic recognition comes decades too late for any survivors. It is a testament to the will of Joe Biden and his administration that the blackmail Ankara has imposed over just using the term “genocide” has finally ended.
For many years, Turkey not only was able to prevent the US leadership from using the word genocide, but was able to threaten US soldiers in Syria, kidnap and detain Americans, harass US consular employees, even possibly get security clearance revoked for Americans, and get people banned from the US as “terrorists.”The level of appeasement of Turkey and catering to endless threats from Ankara has no parallel in US history. No other government in the world has exercised such control over even the language used by the White House.
The White House statement on April 24 still came with a conversation between Biden and Ankara’s extremist far-right authoritarian leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan. To understand how important the US decision was, it is important to understand how Turkey has silenced critics and bullied people and countries the world over.
UNDER ERDOGAN, Turkey has become the world’s leading jailor of journalists, removed almost all critical media, imprisoned students, attacked gay rights activists, hunted down and murdered women activists abroad, illegally renditioned people from third countries, crushed refugees and critics, arrested people for tweets, purged almost 200,000 people from various government roles, launched invasions and ethnic cleansing of Kurds in Syria’s Afrin, bulldozed parts of Kurdish cities in Syria, threatened Yazidi genocide survivors in Iraq, unleashed mercenaries to attack Armenians in Azerbaijan, and illegally funneled weapons and mercenaries to Libya.
Under the ruling AKP party, Turkey has threatened most of the countries in the Middle East and the region, including Egypt, Israel, the UAE, Greece, Armenia and others. It has established increasing military bases abroad, developed armed drones, threatened to attack Greece in 2020, compared Israel to Nazi Germany and accused numerous European states of being like Nazis. It has demanded to have political rallies in Europe, radicalized far-right Islamists to carry out attacks in France, slandered the French president, Israel’s president, Greek leaders and many other world leaders, including Biden, and threatened wars and attacks against critics.
All this has happened as Turkey has purchased Russia’s S-400, drifted away from NATO, used claims of mythical “terrorism” to justify attacks, and worked closely with the Iranian regime and Russia to try to remove US forces from Syria.
Turkey's AKP ruling party's ability to influence US foreign policy goes back decades. Turkey became a close Western ally partly at the behest of the US in the 1950s. At the time, the country was a populist secular republic that suppressed what remained of its Greek and Armenian minorities, most of whom had been expelled and genocided between 1850 and 1950.
Even in 1955, more attacks on Greeks would occur in Turkey. Armenians who remained in the country, such as Hrant Dink, would be hunted down by extremists. Turkey’s secular extremist mentality nevertheless worked well alongside Western countries that needed a more right-leaning Turkey that would be a block against the Soviets.
TURKEY WAS a country that recognized Israel early, and they grew closer up into the 1990s. However, Turkey’s secular and ethnic nationalism changed when the AKP came to power. The right-leaning Islamic party had roots in the Muslim Brotherhood but promised Ankara democratic changes. Under the guise of those changes, it radically reshaped Turkey. Soon Islamist views, chauvinism, attacks on women and homosexuals and even the removal of things like smoking from television shows were occurring. Journalists like Can Dundar had to flee or face prison. Most free thinkers in Turkey, from academics to fashion people, were silenced.  The high hopes for a new Turkey that once existed in the 1990s and early 2000s vanished. Turkey joined a growing wave of authoritarian regimes, from Russia to China and Iran, as well as a growing wave of far-right Islamic politics happening from Pakistan to Malaysia. There would be no democratic spring, the kind US officials might have envisioned in the '90s. None of George Bush’s “New World Order” of 1991 would come to pass and none of the humanitarian liberal world order Bill Clinton had promised would happen. Instead, Turkey turned inward and then began projecting religious far-right views abroad.
US APPEASEMENT of Turkey is founded on several pillars. There is one argument that sees it as an important “geopolitical” asset and a “NATO ally.” This view is rooted in the Cold War and argues that Turkey can be a buffer against Russia.
However, Turkey has grown closer to Russia, and US administrations never demanded that Ankara be close to the West. Instead, Turkey did what it wanted and played US policymakers like a fiddle, pretending to confront Russia. Turkey would even bring this up to encourage US support for Azerbaijan against Armenia, even though it didn’t actually roll back Russian influence. In fact, Russia’s role in Syria grew alongside Turkey’s role as they carved up Israel's northeastern neighbor for influence and signed deals at Astana and then in 2018 and early 2020.
The next theory is that Turkey must be appeased or it will get worse. This theory is used by US policy makers, often at the State Department and in think tanks, to argue that if the US offends Ankara’s increasing dictatorship, the country might become even more extreme. This was the same logic that underpinned appeasement of Fascism and Hitler. It has led to the same thing in Turkey: increasing attacks on minorities and rights activists, with Western silence.  A LAST pillar of Turkey’s influence in the US relied on its lobbying arm and recruitment of US officials inside and outside of government, sometimes at think tanks. It even operationalized pro-Israel voices in the early 2000s to get them to deny the Armenian Genocide under the auspices that Ankara was close to Jerusalem and denying genocide would “help Israel.”
The ADL in the US finally recognized the Armenian Genocide in 2016 after years in which its previous leader Abe Foxman had not. Ankara’s influence peddlers sought to use pro-Israel groups; it took years for their efforts to be reduced, and it didn’t help Israel in the long run. Turkey ended up hosting Hamas terrorists who applaud the murder of Israelis. Turkey sent activists of the conservative Turkish NGO IHH on the Mavi Marmara in 2010 to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza, sending hundreds of far-right male activists to the coastal enclave. Israel had to stop them; ten of them were killed in clashes with Israelis who raided the ship. Turkey’s regime gambled on Donald Trump in 2016. The New York Times reported on November 19, 2016, that “Ankara has paid attention to General Flynn's full-throated support for Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government, and its desire to extradite Fethullah Gulen,” a Turkish Islamic scholar, dissident and influential Ottomanist.
The Times claimed in March 2017 that “Michael T. Flynn, who went from the campaign trail to the White House as President Trump's first national security adviser, filed papers” that showed he was “paid to represent Turkey’s interests.” NBC later reported in 2018 that “prosecutors for special counsel Robert Mueller say that Flynn’s lies ‘impeded the ability of the public’ to know the extent of Turkey's efforts to influence public opinion.”
TURKEY, like Russia, had sought to influence the 2016 US election and leverage it to play a leading role in Trump circles. Trump was a “big fan” of Erdogan’s authoritarian style, reports indicated. “Frankly, he’s getting very high marks. He’s also been working with the United States,” Trump said in September 2017. "We have a great friendship and the countries: I think we’re right now as close as we’ve ever been… a lot of that has to do with a personal relationship."
This was after Erdogan had been invited to Washington and, on May 16, 2017, Turkish presidential bodyguards and far-right supporters of Erdogan attacked peaceful protesters in DC. Their message was that they controlled Washington and they would do to the US what was done to critics in Ankara.
Under the US administration’s appeasement, US officials went to bat for Turkey to get charges quietly dropped. It was now legal for Turkey to assault and attack Americans on US soil. The US State Department denied any role in the decision to drop the charges.
Erdogan used his Washington power to begin calling Trump on speed dial. Reports emerged later in 2020 that he was calling the US president sometimes twice a week, as if the US worked for Ankara. Turkey was also bolstered by key support among policymakers, including US Syria envoy James Jeffrey, Deputy assistant secretary for Levant Affairs Joel Rayburn and others.
Jeffrey would fly frequently to Turkey to express support, even as Ankara’s anti-American attacks grew. Turkey’s right-wing, pro-government media would herald these trips, noting that “accompanying Jeffrey, the ambassador's senior adviser, Rich Outzen, said the US ‘strongly condemned the attacks of the Damascus regime.’ Stressing the importance of solidarity, Outzen said his country will continue to be in close contact with Turkey.” THE PROBLEM was that the same Turkey that kept demanding concessions from the Trump administration was also accusing the US of training “terrorists” in Syria. In January 2018, Turkey accused the US of training a “terror army” in Syria. This was the Syrian Democratic Forces who were fighting ISIS and never carried out any terror attacks. Nevertheless, pro-Ankara writers tended to sympathize more with ISIS than the SDF.
They claimed that Kurds defending themselves from ISIS genocide in Kobani in 2014 had used “suicide bombers” against ISIS. The same Ankara voices never condemned ISIS attacks. Ankara enabled some 50,000 people to cross into Syria and join ISIS and only closed its border with Syria when Kurdish forces liberated the area from the global jihadist group. For Turkey, ISIS was not the problem – in fact, its leader was found in 2019 living near Turkey’s border in Idlib.
For Turkey, the Kurds were the problem. In January 2018, Turkey invaded Kurdish Afrin in Syria to ethnically cleanse it of 170,000 people. It used its links to the US to enable this attack, even as US officials like William Roebuck, the deputy special envoy to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS who tried desperately to assure Kurds in eastern Syria, where US troops were located, that they would not be abandoned. Turkey was pleased to see US envoys distance themselves from the SDF in 2018, declaring US support for the anti-ISIS fighters as “temporary, tactical and transactional.” In short, Washington said it shared Ankara’s views on Syria. Meanwhile, Turkey was arming jihadist-extremist groups and hiring mercenaries to fight Kurds.
Turkey demanded the US leave Syria in late 2018 and Trump consented, not even informing his advisors or officials that America would leave. This caused chaos, leading to the resignation of defense secretary Jim Mattis and special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS, Brett McGurk. But this was good news for pro-Ankara voices in the US. They argued that McGurk was “pro-Iran” and now they could bring in the pro-Turkey team.
For a long time in the US, pro-Turkey voices had argued that US support for the SDF was actually support for Iran, the Damascus regime and the PKK. They wanted a pivot back to the “NATO ally.”
THROUGHOUT 2019, Turkey increasingly pressured the US to leave Syria. It got the US to send national security advisor John Bolton to Ankara to seemingly beg Turkey not to invade Syria. Turkey presented a map of areas it demanded as a “safe zone.” It wanted to ethnically cleanse more Kurds and demanded US help to accomplish that. Ankara didn’t hide this demand; it said it would move several million, mostly-Arab refugees, to depopulate Kurdish areas like Kobani and Qamishli that had resisted ISIS. Not since the Balkan wars had ethnic cleansing been so openly proposed.
Yet US officials didn’t push back, instead appearing to approve the plan, and even bringing maps to Ankara to partition part of northern Syria the US had helped liberate from ISIS. Interviews would later show how far Washington went to support Ankara’s authoritarianism and brutal actions in 2019, emboldening Ankara to then host Hamas with a red carpet in 2019 and 2020, treating blood-drenched Hamas leaders as if they were rock stars and world leaders.
Soon, an emboldened Ankara would be threatening NATO members Greece and France and calling Israel a “Nazi” country. Ankara would also begin snubbing any US critics, like Bolton, indicating it now controlled US policy. Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state who was among Trump’s longest serving officials, was snubbed in 2020; he made his views clear by increasing US ties to Greece and Cyprus.
The US decision to withdraw from Syria was the biggest appeasement of Erdogan. Never in history had the US been ordered to withdraw by an “ally” with threats that Turkish tanks would roll over US troops. But Erdogan felt he ran the Trump administration and could get the US to leave Syria. He accomplished this through a phone call in December 2018 and then another one in October 2019. He would call Trump, who wouldn’t even consult with key advisors before ordering US withdrawals.
JARED SZUBA, who interviewed Jeffrey after the Trump administration left office, noted that “opposition from European allies eventually convinced the president to reverse the order, Jeffrey said. But less than a year later, as Turkish forces built up on the Syrian border in October of 2019, Jeffrey and other officials arranged yet another call between Trump and Erdogan.”Jeffrey later praised Erdogan in an interview with Al-Monitor. “Erdogan is a great power thinker. Where he sees vacuums, he moves. The other thing about Erdogan is he’s maddeningly arrogant, unpredictable and simply will not accept a win-win solution. But when pressed – and I’ve negotiated with him – he’s a rational actor.”
The same Erdogan called Israel a “Nazi” country and hosted Hamas terrorists. Under the Obama administration, the US had critiqued Turkey-Hamas ties in 2015, but it took the Trump administration until August 2020 to critique Hamas's red-carpet meetings in Ankara.
The October 2019 demand got US troops to leave parts of Syria, to be replaced by Russian, pro-Iranian and Turkish forces. The anti-Iran voices, who claimed that if the US only worked with Turkey then Russia and Iran would be rolled back, were wrong. Turkey, Iran and Russia were working to remove the US. Ankara also arrested more than 20 Americans, including a Turkish employee of the US consulate. It detained a US pastor to blackmail the US administration. It harassed US journalists to get positive coverage or get them expelled from Turkey. It assassinated Hevrin Khalaf, a young Syrian woman in Syria who had been working with the US, using Syrian mercenary extremists. Turkey was so abusive of the US, and likely using US intelligence sharing to target innocent people, that Washington ended a secretive drone program with Ankara in February 2020, as well as removing it from the F-35 program. But the US also did other things to appease Turkey, putting millions in bounties on PKK leaders in November 2018.
MURKY STORIES about Turkey’s influence and threats continue to remain. In early April, Politico reported that “a top aide to the U.S. envoy to the United Nations has stepped aside after her security clearance was revoked, according to two people familiar with the matter. Jennifer Davis, the de facto chief of staff to Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, is a career Foreign Service officer who has worked at the State Department for 18 years, with previous postings in Colombia, Mexico and Turkey.”It was unclear what role the Turkey posting or Ankara may have had. But “the investigation concerned Davis’s tenure as consul general of the US consulate in Istanbul, where she served from August 2016 to August 2019. In that role, she had a conversation with a reporter, Amberin Zaman of the Middle Eastern-focused news outlet Al-Monitor, about the problem of local staff being hassled and detained by Turkish authorities, according to the person close to her.” This shows how Ankara was able to hassle US officials and staff in Turkey and how it had the former US president on speed dial, literally calling the White House to order US troops around. No other US ally is able to do this, and only some US adversaries, such as China or Russia, harass US diplomatic staff the way Turkey did. It’s unclear if the Biden administration has put an end to all of Turkey’s influence in official US circles. Decades of cultivating ties has given Ankara a lot of power in Washington, power it used to target journalists, protesters and innocent people like Hevrin Khalaf. The full details about Ankara’s role may never be known. What is known is that Biden has recognized the Armenian Genocide despite Turkey’s threats.

Before lifting Iran sanctions Biden, Blinken, Schumer should remember Nelson Mandela
Abraham Cooper and Johnnie Moore/Al Arabiya/April 25/2021
إبراهام كوبر وجوني مور/ العربية: مطلوب وقبل رفع العقوبات عن إيران أن يتذكر كل من بايدن ومولي وشومر ما قاله نلسون مانديلا للكونغرس قبل 30 سنة: لا ترفعوا العقوبات عن بلادي  لأنها لم تحقق أهدافها بعد
http://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/98259/abraham-cooper-and-johnnie-moore-before-lifting-iran-sanctions-biden-blinken-schumer-should-remember-nelson-mandela-%d8%a5%d8%a8%d8%b1%d8%a7%d9%87%d8%a7%d9%85-%d9%83%d9%88%d8%a8%d8%b1-%d9%88%d8%ac/

Robert Malley, thinly disguised as an “unnamed State Department official,” informed the media this week that negotiations with Iran in Vienna have one goal “to come back into compliance with the JCPOA, all of the JCPOA, and nothing but the JCPOA.”
This is the same Iran deal that the same Robert Malley negotiated on behalf of President Obama. The result then was that 60 percent of Congress voted against the deal including virtually all Republicans and almost 30 Democrats. Indeed, the deal would have been rejected by the US Senate if it had been properly designated as a treaty.
While the Biden administration seems poised to rush back into the fatally flawed nuclear agreement, US officials should stop and take heed of Nelson Mandela’s sage advice delivered to a joint session of Congress 30 years ago.
South Africa was faced with severe global economic sanctions as the international community took a firm stand with the South African people against the abhorrent policy of apartheid. Today, the Iranian people similarly look for hope from the US, as the country’s corrupt regime continues to oppress its people and fund terror campaigns across the Middle East in a bloody quest for regional expansion.
Mandela urged that sanction remain in place on South Africa, “because the purpose for which they were imposed has not yet been achieved.”
“We plead that you cede the prerogative to the people of South Africa to determine the moment when it will be said that profound changes have occurred and an irreversible process achieved, enabling you and the rest of the international community to lift sanctions,” Mandela said.
The Iranian regime is desperate for sanctions relief. Tehran’s accessible cash reserves have plummeted to under $4 billion dollars from around $122 billion in 2018.
But it is the US that appears the desperate party, ready to offload the powerful leverage built up against the evil regime of the Ayatollah and his IRGC henchmen, for a photo op and meaningless, empty promises.
“I have decided I must oppose the agreement,” the 2021 Senate Majority Leader, Senator Chuck Schumer wrote in 2015.
“I believe Iran will not change, and under this agreement it will be able to achieve its dual goals of eliminating sanctions while ultimately retaining its nuclear and non-nuclear power. Better to keep US sanctions in place, strengthen them, enforce secondary sanctions on other nations, and pursue the hard-trodden path of diplomacy once more, difficult as it may be.”
If anything, given Iran’s history of lying and cheating on the nuclear deal, and its continuous upgrades to its missile technologies and non-stop support for global terrorism, Schumer’s advice is even more appropriate today. But that’s not what’s playing out. Dual working groups for Iran and the US have been set up by external parties, such as China, with the express purpose of determining which sanctions could be removed in order to restart the JCPOA.
The leaders of the anti-Apartheid movement understood that sanctions were the key to winning. Oliver Tambo cautioned Mandela during secret negotiations with South African President P.W. Botha, “Don’t maneuver yourself into a situation where we have to abandon sanctions … we should not get stripped of our weapons of struggle, and the most important of these is sanctions.”
As early as 1962, when Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. appeared alongside the former President of the African National Congress, Albert Luthuli, their joint statement included a call to “urge your government to support economic sanctions.”
But today, far more relevant than Senator Schumer or even Nelson Mandela are the pleas coming from the long-suffering Iranian people begging that this time the US listen to them – not the Ayatollahs.
Ahmad Obali opened the lines of his weekly dial-in show on March 30, a favorite of thirty million Azerbaijanis living in Iran-one third of Iran’s entire population.
Forty-eight of the 50 who called in from Iran risked their lives to ask for America to keep the sanctions.
Here are some of their comments:
• “Even though we suffer, I support the sanctions.”
• “If the sanctions are kept intact, the regime will collapse.”
• “When the sanctions were lifted [with the JCPOA], $150 billion came to Iran, but not a single dollar went to the people. Maintain the sanctions.”
• “When a terrorist regime gets money, we know how they spend it, what kind of problems they create in the Middle East and around the world.”
• “The sanctions must stay. Whatever money you give, the mullahs will pocket it.”
• “The sanctions should stay. The mullahs should go.”
The Iranian people know what the Biden administration seems to ignore: Their rulers cannot be trusted. The good people of Iran know that any sanctions relief for Iran’s financial services, construction, energy, mining, automotive or petrochemical sectors will directly fund the terrorist activities of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.
Iranians know that lifting sanctions will allow the further suppression of Baha’is, Christians and other religious communities. They know Iran will continue to crush the dissent of their own citizens, murder gays, and fund global terrorists all over the world including Houthi child soldiers in Yemen forced to shout, “death to Israel and death to America.”
The JCPOA did not result in a vaunted new era for Iran. A former State Department official documented 70 individual incidents committed by the Iranians while the JCPOA was in full effect. Then, of course, were the myriad violations of the nuclear agreement uncovered by Mossad in 2018 when they captured Iran’s nuclear archives. Iranians denied the files were real until just last week when a powerful Iranian official inadvertently confirmed the confiscated documents were authentic.
We urge President Biden not to reward Tehran’s serial cheating and lying. Don’t re-enter the nuclear agreement until massive loopholes are closed. Lifting sanctions should come only after proof a revamped, more expansive, and stronger agreement is fully adhered to. The silent cries of the long-suffering Iranian nation need to be listened to, and their grievances addressed.
Do we really want to prop up a fanatical regime that hates America, Americans, and our democratic values?

Growing Calls for Moving or Boycotting the Beijing Olympics
Soeren Kern/Gatestone Institute/April 25, 2021
"We're dealing with a government of intolerance, dictatorial, brooks no dissent, arrests people at a drop of a hat. I think there's a very strong case to be made that China should not be rewarded for its astonishingly bad behavior." — British MP Sir Ian Duncan Smith, Co-chair, Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China.
"We therefore call on governments to boycott the Beijing 2022 Games — anything less will be seen as an endorsement of the Chinese Communist Party's authoritarian rule and blatant disregard for civil and human rights." — A coalition of more than 180 human rights groups, in a letter to the International Olympic Committee.
"The IOC's failure to publicly confront Beijing's serious human rights violations makes a mockery of its own commitments and claims that the Olympics are a 'force for good.'" — Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch.
"We must boycott the 2022 Winter Olympics in China. It would be a terrible loss for our athletes, but that must be weighed against the genocide occurring in China and the prospect that empowering China will lead to even greater horrors down the road." — Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley.
"To be clear, I do not support a boycott. Boycotting these games will only hurt athletes who have spent their lives training to represent their country on the international stage. Instead, it should be the position of all democratic nations that the IOC can and should move the 2022 Games to a nation that respects human rights." — U.S. Senator Rick Scott, in a letter to German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
"This is not about 'opposing views' between countries. There is no room for a middle ground. Either you make yourself an accomplice by closing your eyes, or you stand up for the values ​​that are close to your heart — such as freedom and democracy." — Glacier Kwong, a human rights activist from Hong Kong who is currently residing in Germany.
A growing number of Western lawmakers and human rights groups are calling for a boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, in response to burgeoning evidence of human rights abuses against Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang, a remote autonomous region in northwestern China. Human rights experts say that at least one million Muslims are being detained in hundreds of internment camps.
A growing number of Western lawmakers and human rights groups are calling for a boycott of the next Winter Olympics, set to take place in Beijing in February 2022.
The calls for a boycott have come in response to burgeoning evidence of human rights abuses against Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang, a remote autonomous region in northwestern China. Human rights experts say that at least one million Muslims are being detained in hundreds of internment camps, where they are subject to torture, mass rapes, forced labor and sterilizations.
Anger is also simmering over China's political repression in Hong Kong, Tibet and Inner Mongolia; its increased intimidation of Taiwan; its threats to its other neighbors; as well as its continued lack of transparency over the origins of the Coronavirus pandemic, which has resulted in the deaths of more than three million people around the world, according Johns Hopkins University.
Boycott options include: 1) moving the Winter Olympics to another country; 2) an athletic boycott — prohibiting athletes from participating in the Games; 3) a diplomatic boycott — barring senior political representatives from travelling to Beijing to attend the opening ceremony; 4) an economic boycott — pressuring multinational corporations to cancel multi-million dollar Olympic sponsorship deals; or 5) a media boycott — limiting television coverage of the Games, thus depriving China of an important propaganda tool in the West.
Regardless of what transpires, China's human rights record is sure to be the focus of increased scrutiny during the months leading up to the Games.
The global boycott campaign is being led by the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC), an international cross-party group of more than 100 legislators from 13 countries who are working towards reform on how democratic countries approach China. IPAC's co-chair, British MP Sir Ian Duncan Smith, has repeatedly called on governments around the world to boycott the Beijing Winter Olympics as punishment for China's human rights abuses. He said:
"We're dealing with a government of intolerance, dictatorial, brooks no dissent, arrests people at a drop of a hat. I think there's a very strong case to be made that China should not be rewarded for its astonishingly bad behavior."
In August 2020, the Germany-based World Uyghur Congress (WUC), the world's largest group of exiled ethnic Uyghurs, called on the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to reconsider holding the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing, citing what it said is evidence of crimes against humanity committed in China's Xinjiang region.
In a formal complaint to the IOC's Ethics Commission, the WUC said that the IOC had "acted in breach of the Olympic Charter by failing to reconsider holding the 2022 Olympics in Beijing following verifiable evidence of genocide and crimes against humanity taking place against the Uyghur and other Turkic Muslims by the People's Republic of China."
In September 2020, a coalition of more than 160 human rights groups demanded that the IOC "reverse its mistake in awarding Beijing the honor of hosting the Winter Olympic Games in 2022." In a letter, the coalition said:
"The IOC must recognize that the Olympic spirit and the reputation of the Olympic Games will suffer further damage if the worsening human rights crisis, across all areas under China's control, is simply ignored....
"The IOC's reputation was indelibly tarnished by its mistaken belief that the 2008 Olympics would work to improve China's human rights record. In reality the prestige of hosting the Olympic Games merely emboldened the Chinese government's actions and, since then, we have witnessed a gross increase on the assault on communities living under its rule: the construction of an Orwellian surveillance state in occupied Tibet, the incarceration of between 1.8 to 3 million Uyghurs, the recent demolition of 'One Country Two Systems' in Hong Kong that breach multiple international laws and the UN Declaration of Human Rights, the erasure of Southern Mongolian culture and language, the ongoing military intimidation and geopolitical bullying of Taiwan, and the detention, disappearance and death of countless Chinese lawyers, feminists, democracy activists, and anyone else deemed a threat by the Chinese Communist Party....
"Despite appeals from frontline communities and human rights groups, the IOC has repeated the same mistakes as the past and remained unresponsive to evidence of the sharp decline in human rights protections before and after the 2008 Games in Beijing; evidence that illustrates that the 2022 Games will also have no positive impact on China's adherence to human rights standards, and could even contribute to more repression."
In February 2021, in the largest coordinated boycott effort to date, a coalition of more than 180 human rights groups called on world leaders to boycott the Winter Games in Beijing. In a letter, the coalition said:
"At the end of July 2015, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) selected Beijing as the host city for the 2022 Winter Games. Since then — and despite claims by the IOC and Beijing Olympic Committee that the Games will serve as a catalyst for progress — President Xi Jinping has unleashed an unrelenting crackdown on basic freedom and human rights...."The IOC refused to listen in 2008, defending its decision with claims that they would prove to be a catalyst for improved human rights. As human rights experts predicted, this decision proved to be hugely misplaced; not only did China's human rights record not improve but violations increased substantially without rebuke.
"Now, in 2021, we find ourselves back in the same position with the IOC who are refusing to act despite the clear evidence of genocide and widespread and worsening human rights failures. "It now falls on governments to take a stand and demonstrate that they have the political will to push back against China's reprehensible human rights abuses. "We therefore call on governments to boycott the Beijing 2022 Games — anything less will be seen as an endorsement of the Chinese Communist Party's authoritarian rule and blatant disregard for civil and human rights."The IOC, which derives more than 70% of its income from broadcasting rights, has resisted pressure to relocate or boycott the Games. IOC President Thomas Bach has said that a boycott would not work:
"We can only repeat and give advice to learn from history — a boycott of the Olympic Games has never achieved anything.
"Be mindful of the boycott in Moscow in 1980 because of the intervention of the Soviet army in Afghanistan. The Soviet army withdrew from Afghanistan in 1989 — nine years after.
"So, it really served nothing but punishing the athletes and then led to the counter-boycott in Los Angeles. It also has no logic, why would you punish the athletes from your own country if you have a dispute with athletes from another country? This just makes no real sense. The athletes would be the ones who are suffering."
German Greens MEP Reinhard Bütikofer, a vocal proponent of a boycott, countered:
"I think the IOC is not a sports organization, but a business that uses athletes. I think we have to remind the IOC that it has a social responsibility like any company. The starting point for me would be that before 2008, when Beijing was allowed to host the Summer Games, efforts were still made to obtain certain concessions from [Chinese] authorities, for example with regard to the unrestricted freedom of movement of journalists throughout the country.
"I do not know that the IOC would insist on at least the same commitments today as it did twelve years ago. I would also like to start a critical debate with many top politicians about this: Do you absolutely have to stage a beautiful sports event against the background of totalitarian oppression? And I would also like to talk to the sponsors: Do you really think you have to earn your money by closing your eyes to these unbearable conditions? Do you have to sully your own name by complicity with it?"
Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, added:
"The IOC knows the Chinese authorities are arbitrarily detaining Uyghurs and other Muslims, expanding state surveillance, and silencing numerous peaceful critics. Its failure to publicly confront Beijing's serious human rights violations makes a mockery of its own commitments and claims that the Olympics are a 'force for good.'"
Growing Calls for a Boycott
United Kingdom, April 23. The House of Commons unanimously passed a non-binding motion declaring that the Chinese government is perpetrating genocide against Uyghurs and others in Xinjiang. The motion is intended, among other aims, to increase pressure on the UK government to clarify its stance on the Beijing Olympics.
United Kingdom, April 23. MP Layla Moran tweeted: "A diplomatic boycott of next year's Beijing Winter Olympics would send a clear message. We've had enough hand-wringing and prevaricating. We cannot repeat the mistakes of the past. The genocide against the Uyghurs cannot be ignored."
United States, April 21. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved the "Strategic Competition Act of 2021" by 21-1. If approved by the 100-member Senate, the bipartisan bill, aimed at counting China, would force a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Beijing Olympics by U.S. officials, but not athletes.
United States, April 21. The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, in its 2021 annual report, recommended that the U.S. government "publicly express concerns about Beijing hosting the 2022 Winter Olympic Games and state that U.S. government officials will not attend the games if the Chinese government's crackdown on religious freedom continues."
Germany, April 18. Free Democratic Party MP Gyde Jensen, in an interview with the newspaper Die Welt, said: "Anyone who remains silent about the most serious human rights violations, such as those in Xinjiang, is also making a political statement. It would be a fatal sign if top German politicians would do the Communist Party a favor and allow themselves to be turned into part of a propaganda story through their public appearance at the Olympics."
Germany, April 18. Greens MP Margarete Bause said: "The Chinese state has been perpetrating systematic crimes against Uyghurs and other minorities in Xinjiang for years. In Hong Kong, in front of the world's eyes, international law is being broken and opposition members are sentenced to arbitrary prison terms. The world must not overlook these crimes. The Olympic Games must be politically ostracized. I expect the sponsors not to make themselves complicit with a totalitarian regime that tramples on human rights."
United States, March 15. Former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted: "The Olympics are an expression of freedom and athletic talent. To hold them in Beijing, while the CCP is committing crimes against democracies around the world, is completely inappropriate."
Finland, March 8. Green MEP Alviina Alametsa said: "I hope that all the EU countries could get together to decide to boycott the Beijing Winter Olympics. It is positive that the EU has condemned China's human rights violations. We now have to choose what are the lines that China cannot cross without consequences."
United States, March 4. A group of seven U.S. senators, led by Rick Scott (R-FL), introduced a resolution calling on the IOC to move the 2022 Winter Olympics out of China and rebid it to another country unless Beijing addresses its violation of human rights.
United States, February 28. Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, tweeted: "We must boycott the 2022 Winter Olympics in China. It would be a terrible loss for our athletes, but that must be weighed against the genocide occurring in China and the prospect that empowering China will lead to even greater horrors down the road."
The Netherlands, February 25. The Dutch parliament passed a non-binding motion saying the treatment of the Uyghur Muslim minority in China amounts to genocide. It was the first such move by a European country. The author of the motion, lawmaker Sjoerd Sjoerdsma of the center-left D-66 Party, separately called on the IOC to move the 2022 Winter Olympics from Beijing.
Canada, February 22. Canada's House of Commons voted 266-0 to declare China's treatment of its Uyghur minority population a genocide. Lawmakers also passed an amendment asking Canada to call on the IOC to move the 2022 Winter Olympics from Beijing "if the Chinese government continues this genocide."
Canada, February 16. Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole called for the relocation of the 2022 Winter Olympics out of Beijing: "I think Canadians would agree that it would violate universal fundamental ethical principles to participate in an Olympic Games hosted by a country that is committing a genocide against part of its population. Canada must take a stand."
United Kingdom, February 8. Iain Duncan Smith, former leader of the Conservative Party, in an interview with LBC radio, said: "I think that the Government should boycott the Olympics. Given the nature of all that is going on, the appalling behavior of China across a whole range of issues. Sadly it's not just what I believe to be the genocide of the Uyghurs. It's also the fact they have got half a million Tibetans in forced labor camps, and they have been attacking Christians, killed some Indian soldiers on their border the other day and have taken over south China sees and are now beginning to decree that those from Inner Mongolia, which is part of China, cannot speak their own language and of course Hong Kong, where they just simply decided to trash their agreement with us."
Canada, February 7, 2020. An open letter signed by 13 MPs, a half-dozen Quebec politicians and others called for the 2022 Winter Olympics to be moved outside China. The letter demanded that the IOC relocate the global competition to avoid having athletes "tainted" by an event that legislators said would be comparable to the 1936 Berlin games under the Nazi regime, rendering it "The Games of Shame."
Australia, November 9, 2020. Senators Jacqui Lambie and Rex Patrick proposed a boycott of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics on human rights grounds. The motion was voted down.
United Kingdom, October 6, 2020. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said that a UK boycott of Beijing Winter Olympics was possible due to Uyghur abuses: "Generally speaking, my instinct is to separate sport from diplomacy and politics, but there comes a point when it is not possible."
United States, September 3, 2020. The Washington Post Editorial Board wrote: "The world must ask whether China, slowly strangling an entire people, has the moral standing to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games. We think not."
Canada, June 9, 2020. Canada's former top diplomat to Hong Kong, John Higginbotham, called on the Canadian government to boycott the Beijing Olympics: "Winter Games are in February, 2022, not long from now. China wants them badly as the latest pageant of national power and prestige. Canada should organize a boycott of those Games unless China lays off Hong Kong. Winter Olympics are easier to organize a boycott than Summer. Medals are concentrated in a few friendly, cold, democratic countries."
United States, October 10, 2018. The bipartisan Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC), in a letter to IOC President Thomas Bach, urged him "to take steps to reassign" the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing given "credible reports of the mass, arbitrary internment of one million or more Uyghurs and other predominately Muslim ethnic minorities" and other gross violations of universally recognized rights, "which may constitute crimes against humanity."
United States Remains Divided
On April 6, U.S. State Department Spokesman Ned Price said that the United States was considering joining with allies to boycott 2022 Winter Games in Beijing. "A coordinated approach will not only be in our interest but also in the interest of our allies and partners," he said.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian threatened retaliation:
"I stress once again that the allegation of 'forced labor' in Xinjiang is the most outrageous lie of the century.... The wheels will come off for the U.S. if it continues to turn a blind eye to facts and truth, and attack and malign China based on deliberate lies. This will ... meet with the resolute opposition of the Chinese people and the forceful responses from the Chinese side."
The Biden Administration quickly backtracked: "Our position on the 2022 Olympics has not changed," said White House press secretary Jen Psaki. "We have not discussed and are not discussing any joint boycott with allies and partners."
The apparent contradiction is eliciting a response by lawmakers who are demanding that the United States boycott the Games. The issue of human rights in China is emerging as a key foreign policy issue ahead of the American midterm elections set for November 2022.
On April 21, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved the "Strategic Competition Act of 2021" by a vote of 21-1. If approved by the 100-member Senate, the bipartisan bill, aimed at counting China, would mandate a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Beijing Olympics by U.S. officials. Under the legislation, Secretary of State Antony Blinken could waive the boycott if the situation warrants.
On April 15, a bipartisan group of American lawmakers called for the United States to boycott the 2022 Winter Games. In a roundtable — sponsored by U.S. Congressman Michael Waltz (R-FL), co-hosted with Congressmen Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA) and Tom Malinowski (D- NJ), and joined by former U.S. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley, and various human rights organizations — participants discussed human rights abuses being carried out by the Chinese Communist Party against the Uyghurs, Tibetans, Hong Kong, and other groups.
After the roundtable, Waltz tweeted:
"We can't in good conscience let the U.S. aid in whitewashing the #CCP's genocide and mass sterilization taking place in Xinjiang & Tibet AND the human rights abuses in Hong Kong. We must #BoycottBeijing2022."
U.S. Representative Tom Malinowski (D-NJ) added:
"It is completely inappropriate for the [International Olympic Committee] to be holding Olympic Games in a country that is in the process of committing what the State Department, what the Biden Administration, has termed a genocide."
U.S. Senator Rick Scott (R-FL) has argued that a boycott is insufficient; he has called for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games to be moved out of Beijing altogether. In a February 25 letter to the White House, he wrote:
"I write to you today to make clear that the horrific human rights abuses perpetrated by China's communist government against its own people cannot be ignored. Under no circumstance should the global community give Communist China an international platform to whitewash its crimes, which is what will happen if they are allowed to host the 2022 Olympic Games in Beijing."
In a subsequent letter addressed to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Scott wrote:
"I encourage you to join me in calling on the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to move the 2022 Olympics Games out of Beijing. Governments and international organizations have the ability and responsibility to address human rights concerns, and calling on the IOC to move the 2022 Olympics Games out of Beijing is the right course of action.
"To be clear, I do not support a boycott. Boycotting these games will only hurt athletes who have spent their lives training to represent their country on the international stage. Instead, it should be the position of all democratic nations that the IOC can and should move the 2022 Games to a nation that respects human rights."
Scott has made similar requests of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison and French President Emmanuel Macron.
U.S. Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT) has argued that a full boycott of the Beijing Games would unfairly harm American athletes. Instead, he has called for a targeted economic and diplomatic boycott. In a March 15 opinion article, published by the New York Times, he wrote:
"Prohibiting our athletes from competing in China is the easy, but wrong, answer. Our athletes have trained their entire lives for this competition and have primed their abilities to peak in 2022.... It would be unfair to ask a few hundred young American athletes to shoulder the burden of our disapproval....
"The right answer is an economic and diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Olympics. American spectators — other than families of our athletes and coaches — should stay at home, preventing us from contributing to the enormous revenues the Chinese Communist Party will raise from hotels, meals and tickets. American corporations that routinely send large groups of their customers and associates to the Games should send them to U.S. venues instead.
"Rather than send the traditional delegation of diplomats and White House officials to Beijing, the president should invite Chinese dissidents, religious leaders and ethnic minorities to represent us.... [Romney overlooks the fact that the Chinese government severely restricts free speech and dissidents are subject to arrest, torture and often lengthy detention.]
"We should enlist our friends around the world to join our economic boycott. Limiting spectators, selectively shaping our respective delegations and refraining from broadcasting Chinese propaganda would prevent China from reaping many of the rewards it expects from the Olympics."
U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), in an opinion article, "Don't Boycott China Olympics," added:
"To be clear, I and many others hope that the International Olympic Committee comes to its senses and moves the 2022 Olympic Winter Games out of Beijing. As someone who was sanctioned twice by the government of China, I am flabbergasted that the IOC would ever give this human rights-abusing, free speech-repressing, trade-and-currency manipulating set of totalitarians who make up the Chinese Communist Party the honor of hosting the Olympic Games in the first place. Here's hoping that reason prevails and the Games are sent to any place but China.
"That said, we have tried this boycott business before, and it utterly failed....
"The worst thing we can do to stand up to China is to keep our athletes home. As anyone who has ever faced down a bully knows, when you decide to hide and not to fight, the bully wins.
"Our athletes should go to Beijing next year proudly, bring home medal after medal, and show the world what it means to compete on behalf of a free society. We shouldn't give China an easy way to run up its medal count by preventing Americans from going to the Olympics."
Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, in an essay, "Biden Should Boycott China's Winter Olympics Next Year," countered:
"Given Communist China's direction, it could soon become what Nazi Germany was in the 1940s. It is not a country the United States should glorify through participation in the Winter Olympics.
"President Xi Jinping wants the propaganda boost of the games. He remembers well the widespread praise China received after hosting the Summer Olympics in 2008. Symbolism matters, and if the United States and other free nations participate in Beijing 2022, the Chinese Communist Party will claim it as further proof of China's good global standing and world leadership. "But if the United States boycotts the Winter Olympics, it will send an unmistakable message that China's tyranny and threats are unacceptable. It will show that actions have consequences....
"Some will say U.S. athletes should be allowed to compete after years of training. While my heart would break for our great athletes, their concerns must be weighed against the suffering of millions of people, and the millions more under threat. Individual and national athletic glory are not as important as upholding America's guiding principles.... "When you let your counterpart get away with genocide, which is literally true of China, you're negotiating from a position of weakness. If you stand strong on non-negotiable issues, you're in a position of strength. Ignoring China's evil actions is no way to stop those actions in the future, much less make progress on other critical security and economic issues. "A boycott is in the best interests of the United States and our principles. It would be even better if Biden urged America's allies to join us."
Glacier Kwong, a human rights activist from Hong Kong who is currently residing in Germany, in an article, "Beijing Genocide Olympics," published by Die Welt, concluded:
"This is not about 'opposing views' between countries. There is no room for a middle ground. Either you make yourself an accomplice by closing your eyes, or you stand up for the values ​​that are close to your heart — such as freedom and democracy."
*Soeren Kern is a Senior Fellow at the New York-based Gatestone Institute.

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