LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN

LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
June 07/2018
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani

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Bible Quotations

Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation
Mark 16/15-18: "‘Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation. The one who believes and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: by using my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes in their hands, and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.’"

Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on June 06-07/18
Lebanese Fuming over Secret Citizenship Decree/Agence France Presse/Naharnet/June 06/18
New Proposals May Help Resolve Israel-Lebanon Oil and Gas Dispute/Reuters/Wednesday 06th June 2018
Iran Pays Hezbollah $700 Million a Year, Says US Official/The National/June 06/018
Lebanon Elections: 17 appeals submitted to Constitutional Council/Georgi Azar/Annahar/June 06/18
Confession:” Syrian war between fact and fiction/Zeina Nasser /Annahar/June 06/18
Interview: Islamism's War on the West/Savvy Street/June 5, 2018
The Ethnic Cleansing of Northern Cyprus/Confessions of a Turkish-Cypriot Mass Murderer/Uzay Bulut/Gatestone Institute/June 06/18
Iran: The Hollowing-Out of the Regime/Malcolm Lowe/Gatestone Institute/June 06/18
Will U.S.-Turkish Progress on Manbij Lead to Wider Cooperation in Syria/James F. Jeffrey/The Washington Institute/June 06/18
Qatar: A year of isolation/Salman al-Dosary/Al Arabiya/June 06/18
Iran, the Gulf and European relations/Sawsan Al Shaer/Al Arabiya/June 06/18

Russia’s diplomatic play in southern Syria/Maria Dubovikova/Arab News/June 06/18

Titles For The Latest LCCC Lebanese Related News published on June 06-07/18
Lebanon unable to support refugee 'burden': Aoun
MP Jamil Sayyed Testifies at Hariri Murder Trial
Lebanese Fuming over Secret Citizenship Decree
Berri Unveils Israeli Proposal to Discuss Territorial Issue with Lebanon
New Proposals May Help Resolve Israel-Lebanon Oil and Gas Dispute
Report: Arab, Foreign Embassies 'Request' Naturalization Decree Info
Iran Pays Hezbollah $700 Million a Year, Says US Official
Maronite Patriarch Calls for Exceptional Government
Berri: Hezbollah, Iran Won't Leave Syria Until It's Liberated
Sami Gemayel, Zasypkin Stress Need for Effective and Competent Government
Lebanon Elections: 17 appeals submitted to Constitutional Council
Confession:” Syrian war between fact and fiction

Titles For Latest LCCC Bulletin For Miscellaneous Reports And News published on June 06-07/18

France, Germany, Britain formally request exemptions from US Iran sanctions
French foreign minister: Iran’s uranium enrichment plans are close to the ‘red line’
Obama Administration Allegedly Gave Iran Access to US Financial System
France, Germany, Britain Formally Request Exemptions from US Iran Sanctions
Secluded Resort Chosen for Trump-Kim Summit in Singapore
NATO Rejects Qatar Membership Ambition
Palestinian Shot Dead after Throwing Rock at Israeli Soldier
Tunisia Sacks Officials over Deadly Migrant Shipwreck

Latest LCCC Lebanese Related News published on June 06-07/18

Lebanon unable to support refugee 'burden': Aoun
The Daily Star/June. 06/2018/BEIRUT: President Michel Aoun Wednesday reiterated his belief that Lebanon is unable to bear the burden of Syrian refugees, renewing his criticism of the United Nations’ and European Union’s approach to the matter. Aoun’s comments came one day after the Foreign Ministry’s political affairs director, Ghady al-Khoury, met with UNHCR’s Lebanon representative Mireille Girard to voice Lebanon’s reservations over the agency’s policy on the Syrian refugee presence in the country. “The results of the [Syrian] war resulted in a burden on Lebanon and especially through the influx of displaced Syrians, who, along with the Palestinian refugees, constitute 50 percent of Lebanon’s population,” Aoun told Alliance for Peace and Freedom President Roberto Fiore and a delegation from the European Parliament. Aoun said he believed the refugees had exacerbated economic problems in Lebanon, adding that if the refugee crisis develops further, it will increase the number of displaced persons in Europe as well. He reiterated his call for Syrian refugees to return to their homeland. “The solution to this problem should be through the return of the displaced Syrians home,” Aoun said. “But the recent U.N. and EU decisions have surprised us due to their opposition to [the Syrians’] return and [their connection of the return] to a political solution, which might take a lot of time.”The number of Syrian refugees registered with the U.N. refugee agency in Lebanon dropped below one million in November 2017, for the first time since 2014. Nevertheless, Lebanese officials believe the number exceeds 1.5 million refugees. A groundbreaking census last year on Palestinian refugees in Lebanon found that around 174,422 Palestinian refugees were living in the country. Lebanese leaders have repeatedly called for Syrian refugees to return to areas in Syria they deem safe – a move they argue is feasible as pro-Assad forces continue to win decisive victories across the country. In April, hundreds of Syrian refugees from southeastern Lebanon’s Shebaa left in buses bound for Syria’s Beit Jin, which is 10 kilometers east of the Lebanese-Syrian border. Days after these refugees returned to Syria from Lebanon, the Foreign Ministry accused the agency of scaremongering with its statement on the return, in which the UNHCR said the situation in Syria was not conducive to a large-scale return. The Foreign Ministry at the time demanded the UNHCR refrain from issuing statements on refugee returns, in a statement addressed to the body’s Lebanon representative.

MP Jamil Sayyed Testifies at Hariri Murder Trial
Associated Press/Naharnet/June 06/18/MP Jamil Sayyed, a spy chief once jailed in connection to the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri gave testimony Tuesday to the international tribunal tasked with trying the crime. Sayyed, the former director of Lebanon's General Security, was called to the stand in the Netherlands as a witness for Hassan Oneissi, one of the four defendants on trial. All four are at large and are being tried in absentia. Sayyed, who won a seat in Parliament in Lebanon's May 6 election, is expected to give testimony through Thursday. He was detained months after the February 14, 2005 killing along with three other generals but released nearly four years later without charges. The tribunal indicted five members of the Hizbullah group in the truck bombing that killed Hariri and 21 others. The five indicted and later put on trial in absentia included one of Hizbullah’s top military commanders, Mustafa Badreddine, who was killed in Syria in 2016. Hizbullah denies involvement in the murder and the group's leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, has denounced the court as a conspiracy by his archenemies — the U.S. and Israel. Hariri, who also held Saudi citizenship, was one of Lebanon's most influential Sunni leaders, with wide connections in the Arab world and the international community. Judge David Re apologized on behalf of the tribunal for Sayyed's alleged rough treatment while he was detained in Lebanon.

Lebanese Fuming over Secret Citizenship Decree
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/June 06/18

Lebanese politicians and ordinary citizens alike are fuming over a secretive presidential decree granting nationality to dozens of people, allegedly including Syrian investors close to the Damascus regime. Critics have slammed the secrecy surrounding the move and say it adds insult to injury for thousands unable to acquire nationality because they were born to Lebanese mothers and foreign fathers. Political discourse in Lebanon, a country of just four million, is deeply divided over the war in neighbouring Syria, with allegations of corruption on all sides. The contested decree has brought all of that to the fore. It was reportedly issued on May 11 after being signed by President Michel Aoun, but news of its existence only emerged last week when dozens of names allegedly included in the edict were leaked to the media. It prompted a wave of public outrage, with Lebanese officials scrambling to defend themselves or defect blame. The president's office confirmed the decree's existence, but said it had submitted the names to the General Security agency to verify they all have "the right" to become Lebanese. That agency, in turn, established a hotline and encouraged citizens to call in any relevant information about named individuals. The official list has yet to be made public. Lebanese media reported it may include as many as 300 people, including businessmen known to be close to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Names being circulated include powerful industrialists Khaldun al-Zoabi and Samer Foz, who has since denied he requested nationality, as well as Mazen Mortada, the son of a former Syrian minister. - Investments, outrage -Under Lebanese law, foreign businessmen are not permitted to invest in Lebanon without local partners, and foreigners can only be naturalised by presidential decree, signed by the prime minister and interior minister. Business ties and investments are valid reasons for naturalisation, said Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil, who is also the president's son-in-law. Lebanese nationality could be granted to "anyone useful to the state, whether a businessman, investor or someone with a good reputation, and whose naturalisation would be in Lebanon's interest", Bassil said.
Among those set to become Lebanese citizens are the three sons of Syrian steel and flour mogul Farouq Joud, who told AFP the decree would "make their work easier". "Our industrial work in Syria requires materials transported through Lebanon, and others imported from Lebanon. That's why my children, who travel on an almost weekly basis to Lebanon, resorted to requesting nationality," he said. Joud said his own shipments through Lebanese ports, and those of other Syrian businesses, were boosting Lebanon's economy. With nationality, his family may invest more, he hinted.
"We don't currently have investments in Lebanon for one simple reason: we don't want any partners. We want a company we own," he said. But many Lebanese officials are furious, with parliamentarian Wael Abu Faour warning: "This decree will not slide."
"We won't allow Lebanese nationality to become a commodity to be bought and sold -- and to whom? To killers and their biggest allies," he said Sunday.

'I lost hope' -Critics also took to Facebook, with activist Firas Abu Hatum calling the decree "a business venture to fill coffers".
"And more than that, it's a project to sell the country to the Syrian regime," he wrote.
Naturalisation is controversial in Lebanon, where power is shared according to religious parity.
Fears of upsetting that delicate demographic arrangement are often cited as the reason Lebanese women cannot pass their nationality onto children born to foreign fathers. Today's debate has a precedent: in 1994, during Syria's military occupation of Lebanon, tens of thousands were naturalised by a controversial presidential decree. At the time, Aoun fiercely opposed the move. His issuance of the new decree was like rubbing salt into an open wound -- particularly for thousands in Lebanon officially considered "stateless" and not allowed to work or own property.
"Legally they don't exist. You're nobody: your presence isn't registered, your death isn't registered," says Samira Turad, from Lebanese NGO Frontiers Rights. The group estimates there are up to 60,000 in Lebanon without identity papers, most in marginalised areas. "Before naturalising foreigners, the state should decide to limit this phenomenon of stateless people, who have more of a right to Lebanese nationality," said Turad.Nataly Majdalani, 42, was also outraged. Born to a French father and Lebanese mother, Majdalani has lived in Lebanon since age four but can never be a citizen.
"I was raised here, grew up and studied here, but I can't get nationality," she said. "Every three years I renew my residency. I lost hope in getting nationality, then I find out today that others who don't even live here got it," she told AFP. "Why? Because they have money?"

Berri Unveils Israeli Proposal to Discuss Territorial Issue with Lebanon
Naharnet/June 06/18/Speaker Nabih Berri said that the United States notified Lebanon of Israel's readiness to discuss a controversial issue of defining the land and sea borders between the two countries, Berri told Russian Sputnik news agency on Wednesday. Berri said a “message was received from the United States after a meeting with Israeli (Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu in Israel that they are ready for a final solution on land and at sea.” The Speaker added to Sputnik that Lebanon is ready for talks with Israel to define borders and is waiting for a response from the United States. “Negotiations should continue in Naqoura under the UN auspices,” he noted. In February, Lebanon signed its first contract to drill for oil and gas off its coast with a consortium comprising energy giants Total, ENI and Novatek, including in a block disputed by Israel.
Israel says one of two blocks in the eastern Mediterranean where Lebanon wants to drill for oil belongs to it, and denounced any exploration by Beirut as "provocative". The acting U.S. assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs, David Satterfield, has shuttled between the countries in recent months as a mediator. On Tuesday, Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz said that “suggestion of new ideas proposed through the US back-channel talks to mediate a maritime dispute between Israel and Lebanon have complicated operations for gas and oil exploration.”He added that some “new ideas are on the table,” but declined to elaborate further. On Monday, Lebanon’s senior officials met at the Presidential Palace where talks focused on the demarcation of Lebanon’s border and the dispute with Israel.

New Proposals May Help Resolve Israel-Lebanon Oil and Gas Dispute
Reuters/Wednesday 06th June 2018
Oil and gas exploration
New ideas proposed in U.S. back-channel mediation of an Israeli-Lebanese maritime dispute over oil and gas exploration in the eastern Mediterranean raise the prospect of a partial deal this year, Israel’s energy minister said. Israel kicked off a gas bonanza in the eastern Mediterranean almost a decade ago with the discovery of two huge gas fields. Others were found in Egypt and Cyprus, and companies are now exploring Lebanese waters as well. One of the Lebanese blocks being explored, Block 9, borders Israel’s maritime zone and contains waters claimed by both countries. The disputed border also touches two other not-yet-licensed Lebanese blocks. This has led to years of brinkmanship with officials on both sides promising to protect their resources and warning about encroachment. “There are some new ideas on the table. More than that I cannot discuss,” Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, said in a Reuters interview. He oversees energy exploration in Israel and is the pointman in indirect negotiations with Lebanon. David Satterfield, the acting U.S. assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs, has shuttled between the countries in recent months as a mediator.
Steinitz said that President Donald Trump’s Middle East peace negotiator Jason Greenblatt has also been involved. “There is room for cautious optimism. But not beyond cautious,” Steinitz said. “I hope that in the coming months, or by the end of the year, we will manage to reach a solution or at least a partial solution to the dispute.”But he added: “Nothing has been settled yet.”
Even a partial agreement would be a major diplomatic achievement, as well as timely, since both Lebanon and Israel are planning new rounds of tenders for offshore exploration.
A spokeswoman for Lebanon’s Energy and Water Minister Cesar Abi Khalil declined to comment on the negotiations between Lebanon and Israel or the specific points raised by Steinitz.
Israel recently warned energy companies in Lebanon not to drill close to its border, and the consortium set to explore Block 9 - made up of France’s Total, Italy’s Eni and Russia’s Novatek - has said it would stay away from the disputed area.
NEW LICENCES
Steinitz also said he expected Israel to begin a new round of tenders for offshore blocks sometime between September and November. The new offshore exploration licenses will be modified to make them more attractive to energy groups, after a previous auction got a tepid response, Steinitz said.
Israel launched a bidding round in November 2016 after a number of the fields were found in Israeli waters. It accepted the only two bids it received - from Greece’s Energean and a consortium of Indian firms including ONGC Videsh, Bharat PetroResources, Indian Oil Corp and Oil India.
Steinitz said there were lessons to be learned. “We will change the method in a way that it will be more accessible and attractive,” he said, without elaborating. “Additionally, I think there were two developments that will make the exploration more attractive.”He said companies were put off by concerns that they might not find a buyer for gas they discovered since Israel has a gas surplus and export options at the time were limited. But he said that had changed referring to the opening of two markets over the past year. Progress has been made in plans for an Israeli-European subsea gas pipeline and a $15 billion export deal to Egypt was signed.

Report: Arab, Foreign Embassies 'Request' Naturalization Decree Info
Naharnet/June 06/18/In light of the controversy surrounding a “secretive” presidential decree granting nationality to dozens including Syrian investors close to the Syrian regime, several Arab and foreign embassies have requested information about whether some of the figures are under international and Gulf sanctions, al-Joumhouria daily reported on Wednesday. The daily said the “embassies have shown special interest in the decree in the last 24 hours. They indirectly asked for information about it to know whether the individuals granted citizenship are linked to international and Gulf sanctions.”
Lebanese politicians and ordinary citizens alike are fuming over the presidential decree, as critics have slammed the secrecy surrounding the move and say it adds insult to injury for thousands unable to acquire nationality because they were born to Lebanese mothers and foreign fathers.
It was reportedly issued on May 11 after being signed by President Michel Aoun, but news of its existence only emerged last week when dozens of names allegedly included in the edict were leaked to the media. That agency, in turn, established a hotline and encouraged citizens to call in any relevant information about named individuals. The official list has yet to be made public. Media reported it may include as many as 300 people, including businessmen known to be close to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Names being circulated include powerful industrialists Khaldun al-Zoabi and Samer Foz, who has since denied he requested nationality, as well as Mazen Mortada, the son of a former Syrian minister. Under Lebanese law, foreign businessmen are not permitted to invest in Lebanon without local partners, and foreigners can only be naturalised by presidential decree, signed by the prime minister and interior minister. Among those set to become Lebanese citizens are the three sons of Syrian steel and flour mogul Farouq Joud, who told AFP the decree would "make their work easier".

Iran Pays Hezbollah $700 Million a Year, Says US Official
The National/June 06/018
Iran has multiplied its support for the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah to more than $700 million a year, according to US estimates.
The new figure is more than three times as much as previous estimates of funding for the group.
Speaking at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies (FDD) in Washington on Tuesday, the US Treasury under-secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, Sigal Mandelker, condemned the Iranian government’s behaviour on several fronts, including funding illicit activities and supporting terrorism.
She also referred to US-UAE co-operation and the efforts last month to uncover and break up a secret financial network sending money to Iran’s revolutionary guard (IRGC) and Quds force.
Mandelker accused the Iranian regime of using shell and front companies, and forging documents to conceal its tracks in order to “fund terrorists, support weapons of mass destruction proliferation or exploit its own people through corruption and human rights abuses”.
The US under-secretary said: “Iran provides upwards of $700 million a year to Hezbollah.” That figure is more than triple the $200m previously estimated by the US before Hezbollah’s involvement in Syria.
Mandelker, a former prosecutor at the department of justice, accused Iran of undermining the international financial system. She said Iran’s central bank had a direct role in directing the terrorist funding activities. “What is all the more remarkable about this activity is that we are seeing Central Bank of Iran complicity in Quds force financing.”
She praised UAE-US efforts to break up a financial network funding the IRGC. “We took action with our partners in the UAE to designate this network and shut it down” she said, urging other countries to follow suit. “The UAE also sent a very strong message that these exchanges and the Quds force are not welcome there, designating individuals and entities involved in this network and cutting their access to the UAE’s financial system” she said.
Mandelker said: “Iran’s central bank governor, other Central Bank of Iran officials and the Quds force team up to take advantage of Iraq’s banking sector in order to surreptitiously move funds on behalf of Quds and Hezbollah.” And in Yemen, besides sending ballistic missiles to the Houthis, she said Quds printed “counterfeit Yemeni bank notes, potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars, to support Iran’s destabilising activities”.
She condemned the Iranian regime's clampdown on freedom inside Iran, “restricting access to satellite services, blocking access to social media sites and apps, and imposing other Internet restrictions”.
Mandelker also mentioned Iran’s hacking activities, through the “Mabna Institute, targeting 22 countries, including Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom, as well as our Asian partners such as Japan and South Korea. The institute conducted massive, co-ordinated cyber intrusions into the computer systems of over 300 universities worldwide, including 144 institutions based in the United States.” After America's targeting of Iranian airlines and front companies in Turkey, Mandelker said that “since the onset of the Syrian civil war, Mahan Air and other designated Iranian commercial airlines such as Caspian Air, Meraj Air, and Pouya Air have routinely flown fighters and material to Syria to prop up the Assad regime”.“People do not go on vacation to Syria” she said. Mandelker urged international action in designating these actors and activities linked to terrorism funded by Iran in the eyes of the US, and warned of targeting of those who do business with those networks globally.

Maronite Patriarch Calls for Exceptional Government
Kataeb.org/Wednesday 06th June 2018/Maronite Patriarch Bechara Al-Rahi on Wednesday stressed the need for an "exceptional" government that would carry out the reforms that Lebanon had pledged at the CEDRE conference, adding that it must address all thorny issues facing the country.
Speaking ahead of a spiritual retreat gathering all Maronite bishops in Bkirki, Al-Rahi held the state responsible for the ongoing crisis that is jeopardizing private schools due to the salary scale law, adding that the state is to be blamed for the possible closure of educational institutions.
The Patriarch renewed his call for the Syrian refugees to return home as soon as possible so as to ease the burden that Lebanon has been enduring to this crisis.

Berri: Hezbollah, Iran Won't Leave Syria Until It's Liberated
Sputnik/Wednesday 06th June 2018/Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said that ISIS militants would have reached Lebanon hadn't it been for Hezbollah's fighting in Syria. "If it had not been for Hezbollah there [in Syria], ISIS would have been here [in Lebanon]," Berri said in an interview with Sputnik. Hezbollah and Iran will not leave Syria until the country is fully liberated from terrorists and its territorial integrity is fully restored, he added. Berri noted that Iranian troops were present in Syria at the request of the Syrian authorities, while the United States had deployed its troops in the country without the consent of the Syrian government. The parliament speaker noted that Lebanon and Syria were "like twins," as nearly 1.5 million Syrians reside in Lebanon. "We do not consider them outsiders… Everything that happens in Syria affects Lebanon," Berri stressed. The Syrian crisis cannot be settled without negotiations between Russia, the United States, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and major EU states, Berri said. "I believe that without negotiations between Russia, the United States, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and at least one European country, whether it is France or any other country, it is impossible to resolve the Syrian crisis… Political solution cannot be reached without agreement between these parties," Berri said. Neither France nor the United States has asked Lebanon to assist in establishing contacts with Syrian President Bashar Assad, the parliament speaker pointed out. Berri assured that the U.S. sanctions against Iran are unlikely to affect Lebanon's ties with Tehran. However, he admitted that the Lebanese government would have to adhere to the U.S. sanctions. "My reaction is one thing and the reaction of the Lebanese government is another. The Lebanese government has to abide by the sanctions. If there are sanctions against a certain individual, it cannot interact with him. It will not place him into custody, but will ban his interaction with any [national] bank," Berri explained.

Sami Gemayel, Zasypkin Stress Need for Effective and Competent Government
Kataeb.org/Wednesday 06th June 2018/Kataeb leader Samy Gemayel on Wednesday met with Russian Ambassador Alexander Zasypkin, with talks featuring high on the latest developments in Lebanon and the region. During the meeting held at the Kataeb's headquarters in Saifi, Gemayel suggested that Russia would play a key role in returning the Syrian refugees back to their homeland, noting that Moscow is the only country capable of establishing contacts with all factions in Syria and Lebanon. The Kataeb chief said that the refugees' return issue must be handled away from political developments, adding that they must go back home regardless of the political solution progress. The two men also conferred over the government formation in Lebanon, with both of them agreeing on the need to have a Cabinet that is able to manage the people's affairs with a new approach and a clear vision so as to pull Lebanon out of the critical economic situation it is facing. Gemayel deemed reforms as indispensable to the country's stability, warning that Lebanon will slip into the abyss should no change take place. "Using stability as a pretext to keep the situation unchanged deals a harsh blow to the Lebanese state and to the country's stability," he said.

Lebanon Elections: 17 appeals submitted to Constitutional Council
Georgi Azar/Annahar/June 06/18
Lebanon’s first parliamentary elections in nine years held on May 6 were mired with accusations of bribery, corruption and a lack of transparency, which culminated in a dominant win for the longstanding political establishment.
BEIRUT: 17 appeals were filed to the Constitutional Council as the deadline expired Wednesday, with candidates across eight districts seeking to overturn the recent electoral results.
Lebanon’s first parliamentary elections in nine years held on May 6 were mired with accusations of bribery, corruption and a lack of transparency, which culminated in a dominant win for the longstanding political establishment.
The National Democratic Institute, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization working to support and strengthen democratic institutions worldwide, described the election as one “riddled with breaches, violations, and bribes.”
Beirut’s second district saw six appeals submitted while three appeals were submitted in the second Northern district of Tripoli, Minyeh-Doniyeh and Bekaa’s first district of Zahle respectively.
Caretaker Interior Minister Nouhad Machnouq and MP Faisal Al Sayegh, who retained their seat in Beirut's second district, are being challenged by Zeina Mounzer, while Nadim Kossta challenged the win of MP Edgard Traboulsi.
In Zahle, Myriam Skaff challenged the wins of Michel Daher and George Okaiss.
The Constitutional Council will also look at one appeal submitted in each of the districts of Beirut 1, Metn 4, Metn 3, North 3, and Bekaa 3.
Joumana Haddad, who ran under the independent civil society list Koulouna Watani, remained in pole position until 7 am on election night before suddenly being declared the loser against the Free Patriotic Movement backed Antoine Pano.
Haddad was vying for the Minorities seat in Beirut’s first district and called on the “Constitutional Council to expose the truth of what happened before, during, and after the elections.”
“We found many discrepancies in terms of the expatriate votes, some ballot boxes arrived open at the Interior Ministry and other disappeared for a period of time,” she said.
According to Koulouna Watani, their representatives at Forum de Beirut where a chunk of the votes was being tallied for Beirut’s first district, were forced out of the room for "20 minutes after an unspecified IT malfunction.”
“All these factors make us doubt the authenticity of the results.”
Lebanon's Constitutional Council is a 10-member committee established under Article 19 of the Lebanese Constitution to review the constitutionality of laws and to adjudicate any challenges on presidential and parliamentary election results. Five of the ten members are appointed by parliament and the other five by the Cabinet. The Constitutional Council has three months to study the merit of the cases, before submitting its decision within 30 days. A source, however, told Annahar that the deadline would most likely be extended with the process possibly taking around seven to eight months.

Confession:” Syrian war between fact and fiction
Zeina Nasser /Annahar/June 06/18
Not only is this play political, but it is also raw, human, and thought-provoking.
BEIRUT: The phone rings, and officer Jalal, who was abandoned by the Syrian regime prior to the war, picks it up only to be informed that he is wanted back, now that there is an uprising.
This is the opening of the play “Confession,” written by Wael Kaddour, and directed by Abdullah Al-Kafri. Not only is it one play, but rather, a play within a play, featuring the renowned “Death and the Maiden,” which was originally written by Argentinean playwright Ariel Dorfman, but, fictionally claimed to be written by Jalal’s nephew, Omar.
The play allows the audience to have a taste of the conscientious torment along with the traumatic experiences of Jalal, caused by the brutality he had both experienced and committed, along with Omar. The phone call he receives however, rejuvenates in the former security officer an old desire to regain the power he once had.
TRUTH, VICTIMS, AND FREEDOM
Abdullah Al-Kafri is a director and playwright from Syria. He is also the director of Ittigahat Company, which was once located in Syria and has been in Lebanon since 2013. One of his previous works is “The threshold of pain for Mrs. Ghada." He has also contributed to two works for Zoukak.
Blurring the lines between fact and fiction, Al-Kafri gives his own definition of the play.
He tells Annahar that the events of the play resemble those that were happening in Syria back in 2012; and while Omar was preparing for the last rehearsals of his play that is based on Dorfman’s “Death and the Maiden,” which focuses on truth, victims, and freedom, his uncle Jalal wanted him to leave the country.
As for the play within the play, the characters of the main production take on the roles of Dorfman’s play, creating a theatrical inception.
Another main character in “Death of the Maiden” is “Haia,” who is in a relationship with Omar. Haia however, does not think it appropriate for her to play the role of Paulina, due to her brother’s imprisonment in Syria, a circumstance that has a significant impact on her.
In Dorfman’s play, Pauline is a rebel in Chile. She was raped by her doctor 14 times in prison while listening to Chopard’s Death and the Maiden. When her abuser paid her a visit in her house with her husband, she wanted to sue him, after recognizing him from his voice.
With the lines between fact and fiction growing thinner, “Death and the Maiden” is actually based on a true story Dorfman had found in a newspaper. This is significant since it is almost what Al-Kafri does in his own play.
How Jalal reacts to the phone call and the sequence of events that will consequently take place are for the audience to experience on June 9 and 10, at the Sun Flower Theater in Tayouneh, Beirut.
In terms of the technicalities of the play, the script is worthy of discussion.
It mainly revolves around five characters conversing in a closed home in Syria. The one hour, and 40-minute play is like a conversational hubbub initiated by Jalal’s sudden phone call, and the possibility of Omar stealing money from Hamza.
Furthermore, English subtitles are available throughout the whole performance for non-Arabic speakers. This idea was first presented by the play’s team during the Red Zone Festival last month, taking into consideration the cosmopolitan and multi-lingual audience of Lebanon.
As they say, less is more; which is reflected in the simplicity of Confession’s art direction. It is mostly focused on space and emptiness, and how spaces are present at all times. In other words, the decoration is always moving on stage, and everyone is playing a role in life in this way. It’s all about constant motion.
The play, as the director puts it, was about acting vs. reality, and about analyzing the script of “Death and the Maiden” and manipulating its ending.
This is not the first time that art triumphs where reality fails, and Confession, being a script that delves deep into political tension with the aid of art, is a great example of that. It poses questions regarding social and political change, the meaning of art, and the importance of confessing. Not only is it political, but it is also raw, human, and thought-provoking.
THE HUMANISTIC ELEMENT
Jamal Salloum, an actor playing the role of Jalal in Confession, is also a cinema director and has directed two films so far.
“I created Jalal’s history,” he says.
Salloum graduated with a Theatrical Arts degree from Syria in 2004 and has been acting ever since. His latest film “Swing” was directed in 2018, and it will soon be screened in Metropolis Sofil cinema in Beirut.
Characters such as that of Jalal’s are so dear to Salloum’s heart, yet very tiring at the same time. People love his technique, but the exhaustion that follows the creation is something he deals with.
“I’m mostly into the theme of people who die for no reason,” he says. For him, the most important thing at all time, and especially at times of war, is the human being.
IDIOMS VARY, WAR REMAINS
Furthermore, 39-year-old Chadi Moukresh, a Syrian actor who has been living in Lebanon for four years, and acting for 22 years, is playing the role of Akram. He is a previous political prisoner, who was released after a general amnesty law.
Akram visits Omar’s house, and to his surprise, discovers the person who contributed to his imprisonment, is no one other than Jalal.
The young actor sees that the play is viable anywhere where there is war, since war is a humanitarian incident, and its effects seem alike everywhere.
“Idioms quite change during times of war, yet there are always beneficiaries and victims,” he says. According to him, those who make war become leaders and the ideology that has led to a brutal war somewhat outlives it.
Ideology seems to be the biggest winner in war, as Moukresh says.
Moukresh is currently preparing for another play “The Other Side of the Garden,” and he is working on his own project “My Imagination is Always Bigger”.
War has had a major impact on Moukresh’s journey as an actor, which led him to quit theater from 2008 until his most recent return in 2018.
To him, theater, is his most preferred outlet, existing as a cultural venue; unlike TV, which is for mere entertainment.
THE FACTS BEHIND THE FICTION
The characters in the play, such as Jalal, are not pure fictitious creations, but rather fictitious representations of real people, whose stories are often untold.
After 2006, the Syrian regime cut down a huge number of former security officers for their their acclaimed brutality. They were sent home, while still having privileges, such as a personal driver and a guard.
In 2012 however, the Syrian regime requested the return of those military officers, which is a case almost identical to Jalal's.
Art imitates life, after all.
PLAY CREDITS
Text by: Wael Kadour
Directed by: Abdullah Alkafri
Performed by: Hamza Hamadeh, Jamal Saloum, Oussama Halal, Suha Nader, Shadi Moqresh
Scenography: Karam Abu Ayash
Production Management: Marwa Chehadi
Original Music Composer: Abed Kobeissy
Artistic Collaboration: Eric Deniaud, Chrystele Khodr, Christine Youakim, Ariane Langlois
Visual Materials Design: Abraham Zeitoun – Be:Kult
Promotional Material: Amr Koukach
English Translation: Hassan Abdulrazzak
French Translation: Chrystele Khodr
Stage Manager: Hassan Akkol
Implementation of Model (Maquette): Fares Khalif
Set Executer: Abdul Qader Al Abdullah
Arab Fund for Arts and Culture – Culture Resource in cooperation with KKV - This performance was developed within an Artist residency at Hammana Artist House and with the support of Koon Studio
Tickets are available at Sunflower theatre: 20000 LBP, 15000 LBP For students

Latest LCCC Bulletin For Miscellaneous Reports And News published on June 06-07/18

France, Germany, Britain formally request exemptions from US Iran sanctions
AFP/June 06, 2018/The three countries and the EU were asking the US “to exempt European businesses doing legitimate trade in Iran from all extraterritorial American sanctions”European firms which have rushed to invest in Iran after the lifting of sanctions over the past three years have the most to lose from the renewed sanctions

PARIS: France, Britain, Germany and the EU on Wednesday sent the United States a joint official request for their companies to be exempt from punitive measures resulting from fresh US sanctions on Iran. “As allies, we expect that the United States will refrain from taking action to harm Europe’s security interests,” said the letter to US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. French Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire said the three countries and the EU were asking the US “to exempt European businesses doing legitimate trade in Iran from all extraterritorial American sanctions.”“Those businesses must be able to pursue their activities,” he wrote on Twitter.The plea comes as European leaders scramble to save the hard-fought deal signed between Iran and world powers in 2015 under which Tehran agreed to limits on its nuclear capacities in exchange for relief from crippling economic sanctions. US President Donald Trump announced he was abandoning the deal last month — which will mean new sanctions on the Islamic republic and punitive measures for those who trade with it. Analysts say European firms which have rushed to invest in Iran after the lifting of sanctions over the past three years have the most to lose from the renewed sanctions. Several major companies including France’s Total and the Netherlands’ Maersk have already said it will be impossible to stay in Iran once the sanctions are fully reimposed over the next six months, unless they receive explicit exemptions from Washington. French automaker PSA said Monday that it would pull out of two joint ventures to sell its cars in Iran to avoid the risk of punishing fines.

French foreign minister: Iran’s uranium enrichment plans are close to the ‘red line’
AFP/June 06/18/Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei said on Monday he had ordered preparations to increase uranium enrichment capacity if the nuclear agreement collapsed. European powers are scrambling to save the deal as they regard it as the best chance to stop Tehran developing an atomic bomb
PARIS: Iran’s declaration that it could increase its uranium enrichment capacity if a nuclear deal with world powers falls apart risks sailing close to the “red line,” France’s foreign minister said on Wednesday. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei said on Monday he had ordered preparations to increase uranium enrichment capacity if the nuclear agreement collapsed after the United States withdrew from the deal last month. It also informed the UN nuclear watchdog of “tentative” plans to produce the feedstock for centrifuges, which are the machines that enrich uranium. “This initiative is unwelcome. It shows a sort of irritation,” Jean-Yves Le Drian told Europe 1 radio. “It is always dangerous to flirt with the red lines, but the initiative taken ... remains totally within the framework of the Vienna (nuclear) deal.” Tensions between Iran and the West have surged since President Donald Trump pulled the US out of the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran last month, calling it deeply flawed and reimposing unilateral sanctions. European powers are scrambling to save the deal — under which Iran curbed its nuclear program in return for a lifting of international sanctions — as they regard it as the best chance to stop Tehran developing an atomic bomb. However, they have warned Iran that if it were not to abide by the terms of the deal, then they would also be forced to pull out and reimpose sanctions as Washington has done. “If they go to a higher level then yes the agreement would be violated, but they need to realize that if they do then they will expose themselves to new sanctions and the Europeans will not remain passive.” Le Drian, who said Iran was for now still abiding by its commitments, was speaking a day after Israel’s leader urged France to turn its attention to tackling Iran’s “regional aggression,” saying he no longer needed to convince Paris to quit a 2015 nuclear deal between various world powers with Tehran as economic pressure would kill it anyway.

Obama Administration Allegedly Gave Iran Access to US Financial System
Fox News/Wednesday 06th June 2018/The Obama administration granted a license letting Iran access the United States financial system despite officials’ pledges that they would prohibit it, according to a draft report from the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.
“On Feb. 24, 2016, the Treasury Department issued a specific license to Bank Muscat to authorize the conversion of Iran’s rials to euros through ‘any United States depository institution …,’” the draft report said. “Even after the specific license was issued, U.S. government officials maintained in congressional testimony that Iran would not be granted access to the U.S. financial system.”“The Obama administration during the negotiation of the Iran deal misled the American people,” said Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), subcommittee chairman. “I think they did so because they were desperate to get a deal.”When the nations involved in the Iran nuclear agreement implemented the deal, Iran had $5.7 billion in assets at Bank Muscat in Muscat, Oman, maintained as Omani rials, according to the subcommittee. Iran wanted to access that money, and using the U.S. financial system to convert it “was the most efficient means, even though U.S. sanctions prohibited it,” according to the report. Government officials tried to convince two U.S. banks to execute the conversion. They both declined, citing the complexity and the unwanted appearance involved in processing an Iranian transaction, according to the report.
Without a compliant American bank, a senior State Department official said he believed Bank Muscat and Iran eventually used European banks to convert the funds, said the committee. Portman said his subcommittee began investigating the transaction last summer. In an interview with an unnamed senior State Department official, the panel said, the official acknowledged that the administration “’exceeded our JCPOA commitments’ because there was nothing in the JCPOA that required the issuance of the specific license,” according to the report. (JCPOA is the acronym for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran.) A former administration official disputes the subcommittee's conclusion, saying the Treasury Department never authorized Iran to access U.S. investments or markets, conduct commercial transactions in U.S. dollars or open correspondent accounts at U.S. banks.
“This specific license cannot be described as ‘granting access to the U.S. financial system,’” the former official said. “This specific license was in fulfillment of JCPOA commitments to give Iran access to pools of its money held overseas. It was aimed solely to allow the movement of Iran’s own funds stranded at an Omani bank into euros at a European bank, where Iran could then make use of them.”

France, Germany, Britain Formally Request Exemptions from US Iran Sanctions
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/June 06/18/France, Britain, Germany and the EU on Wednesday sent the United States a joint official request for their companies to be exempt from punitive measures resulting from fresh US sanctions on Iran. "As allies, we expect that the United States will refrain from taking action to harm Europe's security interests," said the letter to US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. French Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire said the three countries and the EU were asking the US "to exempt European businesses doing legitimate trade in Iran from all extraterritorial American sanctions". "Those businesses must be able to pursue their activities," he wrote on Twitter. The plea comes as European leaders scramble to save the hard-fought deal signed between Iran and world powers in 2015 under which Tehran agreed to limits on its nuclear capacities in exchange for relief from crippling economic sanctions. US President Donald Trump announced he was abandoning the deal last month -- which will mean new sanctions on the Islamic republic and punitive measures for those who trade with it. Analysts say European firms which have rushed to invest in Iran after the lifting of sanctions over the past three years have the most to lose from the renewed sanctions. Several major companies including France's Total and the Netherlands' Maersk have already said it will be impossible to stay in Iran once the sanctions are fully reimposed over the next six months, unless they receive explicit exemptions from Washington. French automaker PSA said Monday that it would pull out of two joint ventures to sell its cars in Iran to avoid the risk of punishing fines.

Secluded Resort Chosen for Trump-Kim Summit in Singapore
Associated Press/Naharnet/June 06/18/President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will meet at a luxury resort on Sentosa Island for nuclear talks next week in Singapore, the White House said Tuesday. The historic meeting will be held at the Capella Hotel, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders tweeted. "We thank our great Singaporean hosts for their hospitality," Sanders said. Trump and Kim's highly anticipated meeting is scheduled for 9 a.m. local time June 12 at — or 9 p.m. June 11 on the East Coast of the U.S. — after a flurry of on-again-off-again action.
Trump hopes to secure a nuclear deal with the North Koreans, seeking for Kim to give up his nuclear program, though he stressed last week that the process would likely take longer than a single meeting. Located a quarter-mile off the coast of the city-state, Sentosa Island is known for its high-end beach hotels, golf courses and amusement parks. A U.S. advance team was spotted at the Capella Hotel last week meeting with North Korean officials in preparation for the summit. The hotel is known for luxury amenities, impeccable service and, above all, privacy for business and leisure. Two of the hotel's buildings were built in the 1880s for British officers based on the island. On Tuesday evening, workers were painting a fresh coat on the façade, extra security was in place and red carpets were being rolled out at the hotel's two entrances. Officials had also considered the Shangri-La Hotel, which hosts an annual international security summit and was the venue for a 2015 meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou. Trump is expected to stay at that hotel, which is near a major shopping district and less secluded than the island facility chosen for his meeting with Kim.

NATO Rejects Qatar Membership Ambition
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/June 06/18/NATO on Wednesday declined an overture by Qatar to join the Western military defence alliance, saying membership was reserved to the United States and Europe. It was responding to a comment by Qatar's defence minister on Tuesday that his country's long-term strategic "ambition" was to join NATO. "According to Article 10 of the Washington Treaty, only European countries can become members of NATO," an official of the 29-country alliance told AFP. "Qatar is a valuable and longstanding partner of NATO," the official said.
Speaking on the anniversary of a bitter year-long diplomatic dispute among Gulf nations that has seen Qatar isolated from its former regional allies, Defence Minister Khalid bin Mohamed Al-Attiyah said Qatar wanted to become a full member of NATO. "Qatar today has become one of the most important countries in the region in terms of the quality of armament," Attiyah told the official magazine of the Qatari defence ministry, Altalaya. "Regarding the membership, we are a main ally from outside NATO... The ambition is full membership if our partnership with NATO develops and our vision is clear."His remarks come at a politically sensitive time in the region. On June 5, 2017, Saudi Arabia the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt abruptly severed ties with Qatar, accusing it of supporting terrorism and Iran. The four countries expelled Qataris, and the country's only land border with Saudi Arabia has been closed for the past year. Diplomatic efforts have so far proved fruitless in what was previously one of the most stable regions in the Arab world.

Palestinian Shot Dead after Throwing Rock at Israeli Soldier
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/June 06/18/A Palestinian who threw a rock at Israeli troops in the occupied West Bank on Wednesday was shot dead by a soldier, the Israeli army said in a statement. It said the troops were on a search and arrest operation in the village of Nabi Saleh, northwest of Ramallah, when they were attacked by at least 10 stone-throwing Palestinians who hit one soldier on the head. The soldier hit by the rock then fired at the Palestinian who threw it, who was given medical treatment but later died, the statement added. Last month a soldier from the Duvdevan special forces unit was fatally struck on the head by a granite slab thrown from an upstairs window during an arrest raid in the Amari Refugee Camp in Ramallah. Israeli forces regularly carry out night raids in Palestinian-administered parts of the West Bank to arrest suspects they accuse of militant activities against Israel.

Tunisia Sacks Officials over Deadly Migrant Shipwreck
Agence France Presse/Naharnet/June 06/18/Tunisia on Wednesday announced the sacking of officials accused of negligence over a shipwreck this weekend that killed at least 66 migrants. The casualties, mostly Tunisians, drowned when their overcrowded boat sank after leaving the Kerkennah islands off the coast of Sfax province. Interior Minister Lotfi Brahem said Wednesday a "preliminary investigation" had shown that officials had "directly or indirectly" failed to carry out their duties. A total of 10 people were fired, among them national guard officials based in Sfax and others from the maritime unit in Kerkennah, the interior ministry said in a statement. A total of 68 people were rescued from the vessel after it ran into trouble late on Saturday evening. On Monday the International Organization for Migration said "at least 112 people" had died in the accident. Survivors have said the boat was packed with more than 180 people, which would mean dozens are still missing. The shipwreck is the deadliest in the Mediterranean since February 2, when 90 people drowned off the coast of Libya, according to the IOM. Tunisians and other migrants regularly try to cross the Mediterranean to seek a better future in Europe. In March, 120 people -- mostly Tunisians -- were rescued by the navy as they tried to reach the Italian coast.

Latest LCCC Bulletin analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on June 06-07/18
Interview: Islamism's War on the West
Savvy Street/June 5, 2018
http://www.danielpipes.org/18367/islamism-war-on-the-west
Daniel Pipes (DP) kindly offered The Savvy Street, represented by Vinay Kolhatkar (VK), an engaging Q&A which contains some of his key insights into the phenomenon of Islamism.
VK: Does Islam's canon foment terrorism?
DP: I've stopped using the word terrorism, finding it meaningless because no two people agree on its definition. So, let me re-ask your question: Does Islam's canon foment jihadi violence? Yes. Islam is premised on (1) the superiority of Islam, (2) the need to spread its message, and (3) the legitimacy of force to do so. These fundamentals of faith have been apparent from Muhammad's time to the present, though not everywhere and not at all times.
VK: Is a gay-friendly, women-friendly, Islam possible?
DP: Of course. Every faith evolves. Centuries ago, who could have imagined homosexual and female Christian bishops? Looking at Islam's present tells us little about its future.
VK: How big is the intrusion of Islamism into the U.N.? What are the consequences of such intrusion?
Antonio Guterres blames "Islamophobia" for jihadi violence.
DP: The Organization of Islamic Cooperation has 56 member-states (plus "Palestine"), 47 of which have a majority Muslim population. This is roughly a quarter of the United Nations membership and in the amoral game of give-and-take that lies behind most votes, that bloc can get nearly the entire 193 governments to back it or at least abstain on issues it cares about. Take the vote against moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem: 9 in favor, 128 against, 35 abstentions, and 21 not present. It also permits the forwarding of Islamist initiatives, such as U.N. General Assembly Resolution 16/18 adopted to prevent criticism of Muslims or Islam. This influence led to Secretary-General Antonio Guterres amazingly stating that "One of the things that fuel terrorism is the expression in some parts of the world of Islamophobic feelings and Islamophobic policies and Islamophobic hate speeches."
VK: How significant is the risk of Sharia law intrusions into Western legal systems?
DP: This process has already begun. For instance, polygamy has made rapid progress as a legitimate life-style option. While laws banning female genital mutilation are on the books, famed lawyer Alan Dershowitz has offered his services for a doctor to be tried for conducting FGM surgeries. Fashion houses have taken up hijabs and even jilbabs. Mosques manage to ban alcohol within a wide perimeter. First-cousin marriages proliferate, with attendant genetic problems. Interest-free banks grow.
VK: Do Islamists fund major political parties in the West? What is the impact of such actions?
DP: My organization, the Middle East Forum, has focused on precisely that question in the United States in its Islamist Money in Politics Project. The thousands of entries here, dating back to 1979, reveal many patterns. For example, 90 percent of Islamist donations go to Democratic candidates. Obviously, the goal of these donations is to make Islamism acceptable. The liberal-left being more sympathetic to this goal, it receives the bulk of the donations. And it's worked. Rare are the liberal-left voices anymore that stand up to Islamism.
VK: How can the West best deal with the threat of jihadi violence?
DP: By addressing the core ideas behind the resort to violence, such as: living by a medieval code, the superiority of Islam and Muslims to other faiths and believers, the validity of force and coercion to spread the faith, and the notion of God giving specific orders.
VK: What's the best way for the West to avoid seeping Islamization: open debate on Islam's canon calling for reform, exposing Islamist political donations, encouraging apostasy within Islam, immigration policies designed to uncover Islamists, or all these and more?
DP: I'd stay away from encouraging Muslims to leave Islam, but the other ideas are all good. However, there's a more fundamental priority, which is to convince the liberal-left that Islamism presents a threat. So long as this huge segment of Western populations largely remains blind to the Islamist threat, the measures you propose have limited utility.
VK: Is there something intrinsic to Islam that the Western mainstream media wishes to hide?
DP: Yes. The mainstream media, and the Establishment in general (what I call the 6Ps - police, politicians, press, priests, professors and prosecutors) pretend that the Sharia, a medieval law code that calls on Muslims to engage in actions deeply at odds with modern ways, does not exist. This leads them to the inane conclusion that living according to the Sharia is in opposition to Islam. The most spectacular instance of this is the absurd debate on the question whether jihad is Islamic, akin to asking whether the pope is Catholic. And in that discussion, the most extravagant statement was by former Vermont governor Howard Dean, who said of the Charlie Hebdo attackers, "They're about as Muslim as I am."
Tommy Robinson in Dec. 2017.
VK: Are you familiar with the case of Tommy Robinson (U.K.)? Do you have a view on it?
DP: I spent much of a day with Tommy in December 2017 as he took me around his hometown of Luton. He is knowledgeable, draws a distinction between Islam and Islamism, and is a leader. Toffs should get over their class bias against him and the authorities must treat him fairly. I hope the outrageous treatment he suffered on May 25 – being arrested, denied a lawyer, tried, sentenced, and dispatched to prison, all within a few hours – serves as a wake-up call to the British public.
VK: What should be the U.S. policy toward Saudi Arabia?
DP: Had you asked me this before 2015, I would have answered, keep a distance, bargain hard, root out the evil influence. Since the coming to power of King Salman and his all-powerful son Muhammad, however, I answer differently: Focus on helping Muhammad's radical reforms succeed.
VK: What's your view on the Iran nuclear deal?
DP: A scandalous attempt by the six participating governments to defer the problem of Iranian nuclear weapons for about a decade – to when current office holders will presumably no longer be in charge. It is an obnoxious farce.
VK: Did President Assad gas his own citizens or was that brought about by Islamic militant groups to foster an ousting of Assad?
DP: The Syrian regime has more than once gassed its subject population, full stop. More generally, however repugnant the Islamist groups, the regime has carried out the great majority of killings in Syria, both before and after the civil war began in 2011. It is a monstrosity.
VK: Thank you for your time, and for speaking truth to power. We wish you the best in your endeavors.

The Ethnic Cleansing of Northern Cyprus/Confessions of a Turkish-Cypriot Mass Murderer
Uzay Bulut/Gatestone Institute/June 06/18
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12463/cyprus-ethnic-cleansing
"Why is there not peace yet? How can we make peace when we have rabid murderers living among us? Instead of prosecuting them, we enable them to appear on TV and to boast about their murders.... If you do not even bring to account a murderer who says, 'killing was my art,' who will you bring to account?" — Şener Levent, the editor-in-chief of the Turkish Cypriot newspaper Afrika.
So far, these "rabid murderers" have not been held accountable for the slaughter of innocent Greek Cypriots: the ethnic cleansing of northern Cyprus. The greater issue is that he and his partners in crime were aided and abetted by the Turkish authorities. All of those responsible need to be tried at international criminal tribunals -- the sooner, the better.
Is Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, who keeps talking about Cyprus as a security threat to the eastern Mediterranean, trying to deliver a message? Erdogan has long been warning Cypriot and international companies exploring energy resources in the region not to "trust the Greek side in Cyprus."
The Turkish president's repeated verbal attacks on Greek Cypriots also shed light on a recent interview, broadcast live on Turkish Cypriot TV, with 84-year-old Turgut Yenağralı -- a former member of the paramilitary Turkish Resistance Organization (TMT), founded in 1957 and known for its criminal activities in Cyprus.
Yenağralı, in the interview, boasted about his role in the mass murder of Greek Cypriots and the reason for it.
"We traveled across Cyprus and either beat up or killed those who committed crimes against Turkishness," he began.
Question: Why did you engage in those activities? Was it an adventure or for excitement?
Yenağralı: No, it was for Turkishness.
Question: Was it easy to kill these people?"
Yenağralı: There is nothing more enjoyable... We took great pleasure after we killed those people.
Question: Did you care about whether these people were criminal or not?
Yenağralı: Why would anyone [care]? Criminal or not... As long as they are kafirs [infidels], they belong to the same race of dogs... When we wanted to shoot the kafir, [the two women members of the group] hid guns in their [brassieres] and carried them for us.
Yenağralı said that he and his friends were never told by Turkish Cypriot leaders to reduce or stop their activities. This omission is probably not surprising, given that one of TMT's key founders was Rauf Denktaş, who served as the head of the "Turkish Federated State of Cyprus" between 1975 and 1983 and subsequently as the president of the "Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus" from 1983 to 2005 -- both "states" recognized only by Turkey.
Yenağralı said that after Cyprus gained independence from British rule in 1960, the TMT buried their weapons and continued their activities in an "underground" way -- only to take them back later. However, "Guns kept coming from Turkey," he added. "We started sending men to Turkey for military training. I too went to Turkey twice for military and intelligence training before 1960."
Yenağralı claimed that when the United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) was established in 1964, he befriended some UN officials -- something that made it even easier for the TMT to reorganize and take up positions in the area. "A UN commander prepared a UN Peace Corps uniform for me," he said "and I wore it and traveled in his UN vehicle. Because I sent them lamb meat every week and I sent them two women [prostitutes] one night."
"Killing was my art," he said, describing his group's activities after the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974. "It was the Turkish Cypriots who killed the Greek Cypriot captives more than the Turkish military did."
He also expressed sadness that a Turkish commander prevented him from killing Greek Cypriot prisoners of war on the Karpas peninsula after the invasion. "I am still grieving over missing [that opportunity]," he said.
Pictured: A fence demarcating the "Buffer Zone" manned by United Nations peacekeeping soldiers at the "Green Line" in Nicosia, Cyprus. (Image source: Marco Fieber/Flickr)
Yenağralı said he was also involved in transporting illegal settlers from Turkey to Cyprus, to replace the Greek Cypriots who had fled the carnage in the northern part of the island to seek refuge in the free, southern part. The invasion was what changed the demographic structure of the island, turning what was once a Greek majority in the north into a Turkish area for the first time in the island's history.
One thing Yenağralı's confessions do is to expose the lie behind Turkey's referring to its invasion as a "peace operation" launched to protect Turkish Cypriots. Turkey, as Yenağralı illustrated, had been involved in criminal activities in Cyprus for decades prior to the invasion -- both before and after Cyprus' independence in 1960.
After Yenağralı's interview, Şener Levent, the editor-in-chief of the Turkish Cypriot newspaper Afrika, wrote:
"Our Greek Cypriot brothers who have migrated from Mesarya [Mesaoria] villages who read this might ask: 'Did this man [Yenağralı] kill my father? Did he kill my mother, my sibling?' I too would ask if I were them. This man is still alive and lives in Mağusa [Famagusta]. I know he is not the only one. There are others. A citizen of ours says that 'another one in Serdarlı [Tziaos] also boasted like that for crushing the head of a Greek Cypriot with a piece of rock. And he is proud of that!
"Then we ask: Why is there not peace yet? How can we make peace when we have rabid murderers living among us? Instead of prosecuting them, we enable them to appear on TV and to boast about their murders. Are we still looking for missing people? Go and ask this man... After carrying out his 'art,' in what wells did he dump those he murdered, or where did he bury them? If he and the like do not know, who else will? If you do not even bring to account a murderer who says, 'killing was my art,' who will you bring to account?"
So far, these "rabid murderers" have not been held accountable for the slaughter of innocent Greek Cypriots: the ethnic cleansing of northern Cyprus. The greater issue is that he and his partners in crime were aided and abetted by the Turkish authorities. All of those responsible need to be tried at international criminal tribunals -- the sooner, the better.
*Uzay Bulut, a journalist from Turkey, is a Distinguished Senior Fellow at Gatestone Institute. She is currently based in Washington D.C.
© 2018 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.

Iran: The Hollowing-Out of the Regime
Malcolm Lowe/Gatestone Institute/June 06/18
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12464/iran-hollowing-out

The analogies with the former East Germany suggest that Iran, too, is ripe for regime change. They also suggest that a change may come in weeks, months or years, depending on chance events and particularly on whether the local authorities and their security forces, at least in some areas, get tired of killing people.
What is likely to push such developments forward? The answer is that the new American policy, whether by chance or intent, may be as good as anything.
On December 28, 2017, major protests against the Iranian regime broke out in Mashhad and quickly spread to numerous other urban centers. Mostly merely noisy at first, some turned violent and eventually the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) suppressed the phenomenon, killing some and arresting thousands of others. Protests have continued, but news about them is scanty. How are they to be evaluated?
There are interesting parallels with the twilight of the East German regime. By a coincidence, the Iranian regime is in its fortieth year and the East German regime suddenly collapsed just after its leaders had held a large-scale pompous celebration of its fortieth anniversary in the capital, East Berlin.
At its downfall, the government and security apparatus of the so-called "German Democratic Republic" appeared to be, as always, thoroughly in control, yet it took only a few chance events to start a domino effect that swept it away. There was the swell of holidaymakers who drove their polluting "Trabis" into Hungary or Czechoslovakia and thence via Austria into West Germany, because those East European countries had stopped preventing them. Beginning on September 4, 1989, there were the Monday marches that set out after the morning "Prayer for Peace" in Leipzig's St. Nicholas Church.
The fortieth anniversary celebration took place on October 6. On October 9, the morning march in Leipzig encompassed 70,000. In a fateful turning point, the local leaders of the regime decided not to send in the police for fear of mass casualties. Thereafter the marches knew no limits and not just in Leipzig. On November 9, a government spokesman, trying to placate the citizens with a minor concession, issued a mumbled announcement about making it easier to get permits to visit West Germany. East Berliners misunderstood him to mean that the border was now open and rushed to the checkpoints to West Berlin. The guards, equally confused, let them through. Where a hundred thousand had marched to celebrate the regime on October 6, now tens of thousands began to stream through daily in both directions.
Within a year, Germany was reunited. The sturdy-looking tree that had been East Germany had collapsed to a few bursts of wind because the tree had been hollowed out by the mass cessation of its citizens to have any esteem for their rulers or to identify with the ruling ideology.
It is crucial to understand that neither in East Germany nor in Iran did the regime originally come to power through the machinations of a small clique, as in Russia's October Revolution, but in virtue of an ideological basis that commanded considerable popular support. It was the withering of such support that turned East Germany into a hollow tree and now threatens to do the same in Iran. Let us consider first the German and then the Iranian case.
The East German SED Regime
The German Communist Party had been a mass movement in the Weimar Republic. In the federal German election of November (vs, March) 1932, the results for the biggest parties were: Nazis 196 (-34), Social Democrats 121 (-12), Communists 100 (+11) out of 584 (-24). Thus any majority coalition could not exclude both the Nazis and the Communists. What brought Hitler to power was that President Hindenburg this time invited Hitler to head a right-wing coalition with a small majority, whereas in previous hung parliaments he had invited a centrist politician to head a minority government. This, although the Nazis had lost seats and the Communists had gained seats.
After World War II, the Soviet Union allowed several of the prewar political parties to exist (at least nominally) in its zone of occupied Germany, but pressurized the former Social Democrats and Communists in April 1946 to merge into the Socialist Unity Party (SED: Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands). This party then (at least nominally) ruled throughout the existence of the German Democratic Republic (DDR: Deutsche Demokratische Republik), as the Soviet zone was renamed in October 1949. The combined party inherited a degree of legitimacy from the Weimar Republic, since both components had been major parties and their announced joint program included typical socialist policies of the Weimar period.
Of course, the SED and the DDR quickly showed themselves to be instruments of Communist totalitarianism and Soviet (or rather Russian) imperialism. Still, for those who started and persisted as wishful thinkers, the regime was not entirely deprived of an authentic ideological basis. This is why disaffection was not overwhelming at the outset, but was a slow hollowing-out process that began among clear-cut ideological opponents, spread to the increasing numbers of hapless victims, the disappointed and the disillusioned, and eventually undermined the enthusiasm even of stalwarts of the regime.
A few examples will illustrate how hollowing-out worked. An acquaintance in West Berlin used to make numerous visits to the DDR for family reasons. According to her, the decisive moment in the process of decay came precisely when the regime thought that it had achieved all its original aims. Despite the general nationalization of industry and services, which also occurred to a degree under socialist governments in Western Europe, very small local businesses with a handful of employees were legally permitted for a long time. Eventually, the regime announced the perfection of socialism: also these last vestiges of capitalism were terminated. After that, she said, a general apathy set in.
A second example of hers concerned the universal provision of subsidized housing. The regime was grossly inefficient in repairing all those buildings. Since the residents were paying so little for their accommodation, they had the means to do such tasks as repainting themselves, but considered it none of their business. This is why, when the border was opened, visitors were shocked to see everywhere the peeling facades and dilapidation of originally stoutly built houses. Architectural masterpieces were in a catastrophic state of disrepair. For instance, it took 25 years after German reunification to restore the famous Dutch Quarter of Potsdam.
A third example came from another visitor, one who gave his hosts a present of West German money. As in other parts of the Soviet empire, they could then go off to special shops where foreign goods were available only to those who had some hard foreign currency. There they bought some foodstuffs. The emptied boxes and tins were then placed decoratively on the mantelpiece in the sitting room alongside older such items. Asked about this, the hosts said that as the food was soon consumed, it seemed a pity to discard the containers with their prettily designed exteriors. The visitor subsequently noticed that other households had similar little displays. Subsidized basic food in plain exteriors might once have won their hearts, but now their hearts had moved on.
The Regime of the Ayatollahs
The current Iranian regime, too, started with a degree of legitimacy and plausible self-justification. This crucially important fact needs to be explained, since it seems to be unknown to the foreign politicians that deal with the regime and to the commentators on Iran in distant countries. In particular, it is a mistake to dismiss the 1979 revolution as an illegitimate seizure of power by antiquated religious bigots. Instead, in a word, the 1979 revolution was initially widely seen – and not just by the ayatollahs – as the legitimate reinstatement of the aborted constitutional revolution of 1906.
In those earlier days, the ruling dynasty was the Qajars. Its founder, Mohammad Khan Qajar, conducted a particularly brutal fifteen-year campaign to take over the whole country, including massacres of whole populations and blinding 20,000 males in Kerman when the city resisted him. Fortunately for other Iranians, he was assassinated in 1797 a year after his coronation. His nephew and successor distinguished himself by producing between one and four hundred children from a harem of up to 1000 women and by losing vast territory in two disastrous wars with Russia. Later rulers of the dynasty were variously corrupt or incompetent; they also tried to finance their overspending by granting concessions to foreign governments. By the end of the nineteenth century, not surprisingly, there had developed a strong constitutionalist movement in Iran. Its aims were to introduce parliamentary government on a European model and to free the country from servitude to foreigners.
The constitutionalists found their chance during popular disturbances that began in 1905. Without going into further details, one can note three similarities with the events of 1979. The disturbances began not merely among Farsis but also among Azeris, the country's largest minority. Second, the revolution brought together liberal reformers with the bazaar merchant class and the Shiite clergy. Third, the Constitution of 1906 had a two-tier structure: its opening articles required that all laws passed by the parliament be submitted to a committee of Shiite clerics to be vetted for conformity with Islam.
The then Qajar Shah signed the constitution at the end of 1906, but died five days later, whereupon his son and successor set out to cancel it, an aim that he achieved in 1908 with Russian and British help. The following year, the constitutionalists rallied forces, expelled him and installed his infant son. In practice, however, neither the parliament nor the young Shah, when he tried to cooperate with it after coming of age, were very effective rulers, although a considerable modernization program was attempted. World War I brought fresh misfortunes: first the British and then the Russian Communist regime invaded Iran when the British tried to reverse the Russian October Revolution via Iran.
The resulting misery and confusion enabled a young army officer, Reza Pahlavi, to rise to power in the 1920s, expel the Qajars and become Shah himself. He adopted a policy of modernization and secularization similar to what Ataturk had initiated in Turkey. By the beginning of World War II, however, he was suspected of accumulating vast hidden wealth; he also opposed the wish of the British to supply the Soviet Union by rail via Iran. British and Soviet forces invaded on August 25, 1941 and controlled the country within a month The British made him an offer he could not refuse: to abdicate in favor of his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and go into exile.
The son's career (1941-1979) is well enough known not to need much recalling. Important to note, however, is that he owed his downfall not merely to personal extravagance and oppressive internal security. Nor was it just the megalomaniac eccentricities of his last years, such as the incredibly expensive pageant in 1971 to celebrate 2500 years of Persian monarchy, although his own monarchy had nothing to do with ancient Persia and stemmed merely from his father. Or his decision in 1976 to change year one of the calendar (a mixed Islamic/Persian calendar introduced by his father in 1925) from Muhammad's Hijra to the conquest of Babylon by Cyrus, whereby he needlessly inconvenienced the entire population.
Beyond all that, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi alienated all three classes involved in the revolution of 1905/06, for good or bad reason. The constitutionalists were infuriated by his abolition of the Communist Party and then of all other parties in favor of his own one party in 1975. The economic and agricultural reforms of his so-called White Revolution of 1963-1978 ("white" meaning "bloodless") offended the bazaar merchants and big landowners, including Shiite religious foundations. His abolition of discrimination against women and religious minorities, including the perennially persecuted Bahais, infuriated conservative clerics. When his eventual successor, Ruhollah Khomeini, went into voluntary exile in 1964, it was in protest against the White Revolution and specifically against the intolerable prospect that a Muslim male could be tried by a female Christian judge. In previous decades, the two Pahlavi Shahs had managed to disregard the constitutional requirement to submit laws to the clerics for Islamic approval, but this went too far.
Thus when all those who opposed the Shah for non-religious reasons united around Khomeini to bring him to power in 1979, they mostly imagined that he would merely reinstate the religious provisions of the Constitution of 1906. They were soon to discover that their political aspirations, strongly curtailed by Mohammad Reza, would vanish and that they would suffer far worse persecution under the new religiously oriented regime. Unknown to them, or not taken seriously by the few who found black market copies in the bazaars, was a book of lectures given by Khomeini in exile (1970) in which he explained his own conception of two-tier government.
Khomeini's blueprint for Shiite religious government was quickly and fully implemented in the 1979 Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Instead of just a committee of clerics to review legislation, there was to be a whole parallel tier of religious supervision imposed upon the lower tier of elected representatives. Thus the elected president and parliament would merely be responsible for the mundane tasks of running everyday affairs, while the fundamental course of the country would be in the hands of a Supreme Leader (Khomeini himself) and a Guardian Council consisting of – and chosen exclusively by – the highest regarded Shiite clerics and jurists. Only persons approved by the Guardian Council could become candidates for popularly elected office in the lower tier. Moreover, the entire judicial system would be subordinate to the Supreme Leader.
A telling example of how the two-tier system works in practice was recently given by Amir Taheri, the editor of Iran's most prestigious newspaper before 1979. This is why the current President Hassan Rouhani, although he came to power wishing to free some reformists from house arrest, has been unable to do so. It is also why the death penalty was applied more frequently after his election than under his crazy fundamentalist predecessor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. (The latter's craziness is now judged to be too dangerous even by the Guardian Council, which vetoed his recent attempt to run again for the presidency.)
It is also why things have not changed greatly even though in recent elections the reformists (eslahtalaban, literally "callers for reform") captured the Tehran municipality from the fundamentalists (osulgarayan) and established themselves as the bigger faction in the parliament, where the balance is held by independents. (The foreign press and Wikipedia translate osulgarayan obscurely as "principalists," but since osul means both "fundaments" and "principles," the translation "fundamentalists" is both literal and more intelligible,)
Through the upper tier of the regime, which is packed with fundamentalists, the desires of reformists are easily frustrated. Moreover, these are "tame" reformists whom the Guardian Council has judged not to be dangerous candidates for election and who can easily be removed if that judgment proves wrong. Indeed, an excuse was quickly found to spur the resignation of Mohammad-Ali Najafi, the new reformist mayor of Tehran. His replacement is also a reformist, who will need to be tamer.
In the meantime, the dual structure has been extended to other areas of the state. The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) is a parallel army that carries out the wishes of the Supreme Leader; it was all the more needed after elements of the army attempted a coup in 1980. It both suppresses internal disturbances and conducts the ever-increasing military interventions of Iran in Arab countries.
All the big factors in the economy were declared state property in Article 44 of the Constitution of 1979, but in the meantime a parallel economy has emerged under the control of the Guards Corps and Islamic trusts. (Similarly, the East German Stasi also owned factories and a large part of the economy of Egypt is owned by the Egyptian Army.) In recent years, the Guards Corps has been estimated to own a third or more of the Iranian economy. When Article 44 was modified – more than a decade ago – to enable privatization, some state businesses were simply bought by companies owned by the Guards Corps.
Most recently, even Khomeini's successor as Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was persuaded by President Rouhani to order the Guards Corps to divest itself of non-military industries. Yet privatization itself has often meant that the state handed concerns to private companies to pay off its debts to them and many top ex-Guards went on to a career in private business. Even official media have admitted that the privatization program is vexed with problems.
The wild enthusiasm for Khomeini continued until his death in 1989, when millions turned up for his funeral and created mass chaos. Never mind that he had killed tens of thousands of political opponents and that he had sent hundreds of thousands, especially children, to their deaths in human waves in the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-1988. It has taken four decades for Iranians to grasp fully the damage caused to their country by their hybrid regime and to perceive how it facilitates corruption, cronyism and incompetence as well as expensive foreign adventures.
An example is the environmental disasters. Mohammad Reza initiated a series of dam projects with Israeli advice. The Israelis were expelled in 1979 and later dam projects were undertaken by regime individuals in the wrong places to favor their personal constituencies. Add on years of drought and Lake Urmia in Iranian Azerbaijan, formerly the biggest salt water lake on earth, has largely dried up. The Zayande Rud – the "Living River" – that used to flow majestically through Isfahan under a series of bridges with up to 33 arches now dies before it reaches Isfahan. Farmers in Isfahan Province itself face ruin because its water has been diverted elsewhere.
In September 2017, Iran seemed to be facing up to the water problem at last by appointing Kaveh Madani – a distinguished Iranian expert teaching abroad – to deal with it. President Rouhani expressed the hope that he would be the first of many returning Iranian professionals. Seven months later, Madani resigned and hastened to leave the country after the security services started to investigate him and he was accused in the press of debauchery and of acting as a foreign agent. Such a case indicates that the regime is irredeemable.
Madani's parting words: "Yes, the accused fled from a country where virtual bullies push against science, knowledge and expertise and resort to conspiracy theories to find a scapegoat for all the problems because they know well that finding an enemy, spy or someone to blame is much easier than accepting responsibility and complicity in a problem."
Iranian cities also excel in air pollution. In this list of the 500 most polluted cities of the world, Iran with 19 cities comes fifth after India, China, Poland and Turkey.
Pictured: The Iranian city of Mashhad, enveloped in a haze of air pollution. Of the 500 most polluted cities of the world, Iran with 19 cities comes fifth. (Image source: Tasnim/Wikimedia Commons)
While such misfortunes have provoked local protests in the past, the latest disturbances have a fundamentally different quality. They can be contrasted with the more violent protests of greater numbers in 2009 against the voting irregularities involved in the reelection of President Ahmadinejad. Then the protests were against abuse of the Constitution of 1979, implicitly accepting the validity of its two-tier regime; this time they were against the regime itself.
We saw that the disappearance of East Germany was provoked by individual – even accidental – turning points following a long period of hollowing-out. It may be possible to identify the crucial turning point in the cases of the ayatollahs. A prime project of Rouhani's presidency was to relieve popular discontent by ending the economic sanctions on Iran. After the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, aka Iran nuclear deal) was agreed, US President Obama released over $150 billion of frozen Iranian assets. Rouhani and the Iranian public assumed that the money would be available to relieve the poverty and debts of many Iranian families. Instead, the Supreme Leader decided to use the windfall to boost the military adventures of the Guards Corps and foreign Shiite militias in Arab countries.
Thereby Ayatollah Khamenei destroyed the long and patient policy of Rouhani and the hopes of millions of Iranians. Iran is also spending vast sums trying to gain influence in Africa. To make it worse, during 2017 Rouhani had been attempting to reduce the grants given to religious institutions, which are often the private fiefs of prominent clerics and do not need to report their finances. When the budget was announced in December, however, it contained cuts in subsidies to the general public and increases for religious institutions. The result is that, despite the suppression of the original disturbances, a series of strikes and protests has continued. Plainly, many workers feel that the religious tier of the regime treats them as tools of an ideology and that the elected tier cannot help them.
That such arrogance may prove to be the fatal error of the ayatollahs is corroborated by a recent curious incident at the airport of Mashhad (May 24, 2018). Suddenly the flight information on electronic screens was replaced by a message from a so-called "Throbbers Group" (presumably: people with throbbing hearts). As the message can be clearly read on a photograph uploaded to the internet, which received many pseudonymous Iranian likes, it is worth translating it in full.
We the "Throbbers" Group have in these moments taken over the monitors of the airport in a protest action. For the last five months, the Guards Corps has been destroying the life and treasury of the people of Iran in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria. Until when? It [the Corps] will no longer choke our voice in the throat. We unite with the noble people of Kazerun. This is only the beginning of our actions. If you are fellow-sufferers with us, take and share a photograph.
Here "Kazerun" refers to the violence that erupted a week earlier when regime forces confronted protesters against the plan to divide that city in two, a plan advanced by a member of the parliament for his own personal advantage. The violence provoked internet posts such as "(The government) is supporting Gaza and committing crimes in Kazerun" and "All the time, they said America was the enemy. The enemy is right here." As for Mashhad, the second largest city in Iran, it is a major Shiite holy site and was imagined to be a stronghold of the fundamentalists, but it is where the series of big disturbances broke out in December 2017.
The hollowing-out of the regime has been seen prominently, of course, among women. In January 1936, Reza Shah introduced a ban on Islamic head-coverings for women. Despite years of planning for this step, it met with violent opposition and its enforcement became a major task for the police. His son relaxed that enforcement, so that many women did not cover their heads but others could insist on doing so. After the revolution of 1979, the policy was wholly reversed and now women were ordered to cover their whole head apart from the face and also to wear loose-fitting clothing. Specifically recommended, though not obligatory, was the chador – literally "tent." The erstwhile supporters of Khomeini for non-religious reasons were again dreadfully disappointed and protested, but the new ban was enforced as brutally as the old one.
On December 27 last, the day before the disturbances, Vida Movahed was inspired to go to Islamic Revolution Street in Tehran, stand on an electricity box and hold her head covering aloft on a stick. Vida is now serving a two-year prison sentence and the graffiti-covered box has been removed, but she spurred a copycat movement of "girls of Revolution Street" (dokhtaran-e Khiyaban-e Enqelab) in Iranian cities.
Even stalwarts of the regime do not know how to deal with this phenomenon. Pictures have emerged of chador-clad women holding head-coverings aloft, to emphasize that they like traditional clothing themselves but do not want it imposed on other women. When someone filmed a woman being struck by chador-clad morality police for wearing her head-covering too loosely, the internet post of the video attracted millions of views and tens of thousands of comments. Even the official Vice-President for Women's Affairs – who herself wears a heavy chador – denounced the violence, telling a press conference that the government needed a dialogue with a younger generation that no longer shares the values of the generation of 1979. The Tehran police chief, for his part, insisted that his people would continue to enforce the law vigorously. Yes, Tehran now has a reformist city council and a reformist mayor, but the police remain the police.
Female lifestyle has indeed changed decisively since 1979. Then women had an average seven children. By 2012 it had dropped to 1.9 before rising to about 2.1 today, which is generally seen as the replacement rate in a modern society. Women also form a decisive majority of university students. Curiously, Khomeini's late fatwas authorizing birth control were partly responsible for this development.
Other women recently entered Tehran's Azadi Stadium disguised in fake facial hair to watch a football match and posted a gleeful picture on internet. Another recent post shows football fans in the same stadium shouting "Reza Shah, may your soul be happy" (Reza Shah, ruh-ash shad). It is difficult to verify the authenticity of the video because individual fans cannot be distinguished in the crowd. In another video from the early days of the disturbances, however, individuals shouting the same chant can be seen, as also at the recent funeral of an actor. (In this last video, the men are chanting Reza Shah and the women are responding with ruh-ash shad. It is a liturgy of nostalgia.)
Before the 1979 revolution, the stadium was called "Aryamehr" ("Light of the Aryans"); this was a title conferred on Mohammad Reza by the parliament in 1965. The ayatollahs changed it to "Azadi," meaning "Freedom," as part of their imposition of servitude. So currently it is indeed being exploited for surreptitious freedoms.
Nostalgia for the Pahlavi period (from 1921, when Reza Pahlavi first seized power, to 1979) has been growing since the 1990s; now it is emerging into the open. Apart from forty years to forget the problems of that period, there are several factors favoring such sentiments.
First is the Persian language itself (Farsi plus its slightly different Dari and Tajik variants). There is not a great difference between spoken and written Persian, indeed less than between spoken and written French. A grammar of Persian can summarize the principal differences in two pages. Contrast that with the differences between written Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) and the six main modern spoken Arabic dialect groups (the extremes are mutually incomprehensible). MSA has whole grammatical structures that have been replaced in the spoken dialects. Even to express "come," "go" and "see," there are verbs that are always used in MSA but never colloquially spoken and words that are colloquially spoken but never used in MSA. The result is that the proficient speakers of MSA are mainly clerics, politicians, broadcasters and academics – and they revert to their spoken dialect when "off duty." There is no standard way of writing down the dialects, although people now improvise spellings for emails and internet posts
In Iran, by contrast, most people can get up and make a respectable speech or write grammatically in Farsi. The same is true, incidentally, of Israel Hebrew, so most Israeli Arabs can get up and make a speech in Hebrew.
Second, printing got off to a better start in Iran. Unlike printing in Europe, all Arabic printing is the reproduction of cursive handwriting. So a font requires up to four characters for each letter plus numerous ligatures (combinations of letters) and may total over 200 characters. Even by the mid-nineteenth century, there were very few printing presses in the Arab world. In Iran, though Persian uses the same script plus extra letters, they got around the problems by lithographic printing of whole pages. Given the closeness between the written and spoken languages, finding a market was also easier, European books spread in translation and modernization was accelerated.
Third, the standards of modern Persian prose and poetry were established in the Pahlavi period by writers who might be anticlerical or antimonarchist or both. After 1979, the ayatollahs tried to censor or suppress books of such writers as the essayist Sadegh Hedayat (1903-1951) or the feminist poetess Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967, a frequent target of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei), but such attempts have had limited success because those writers are indispensable standards for contemporary Persian writing. So whereas before 1979 the bazaars held black market copies of the writings of Khomeini, today people go there to find old copies of Forough.
The horrific experience of a contemporary Iranian poet with the censorship apparatus can be read here. He eventually left Iran because of the failure of reformist presidents to stop the misery, which included assassinations of authors by the state intelligence apparatus.
In general, modernization advanced more broadly and deeply in Iran even than in Turkey, let alone than in the Arabic-speaking world. Add this to the failures of the Islamic Republic in the economic and environmental spheres and you have the underlying basis for both Pahlavi nostalgia and the prospects of regime change.
What is to be done?
The analogies with the former East Germany suggest that Iran, too, is ripe for regime change. They also suggest that a change may come in weeks, months or years, depending on chance events and particularly on whether the local authorities and their security forces, at least in some areas, get tired of killing people. Before we discuss this further, a common illusion needs to be dispelled.
Those who are unfamiliar with modern Iranian history are sometimes impressed by the language map of Iran. They notice that native Farsi speakers are merely half of the population and imagine that the country could easily split into its component linguistic areas. This is an illusion, first of all because the largest minority, the Azeris (variously estimated as between 13% and 22% of the total population) are strongly represented in the regime. The father of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Sayyed Javad Khamenei Tabrizi (1896-1986), was himself an ethnic Azeri. (Tabriz is the biggest Azerbaijani city in Iran.)
Azeri dynasties ruled the country in the past, while using Farsi as the language of officialdom. A notable case was the Safavids (1501–1736), the dynasty that imposed Twelver Shiism as the state religion. (Significantly, there were not enough teachers in Iran for this task, so the Safavids recruited teachers from the Shiites of Lebanon. Thus the Iran-Hizbullah relationship, from a historical perspective, is not a mere client relationship; there was a reverse dependency. Both partners are aware of this, but foreign politicians and commentators are totally unaware of it.) The Constitution of 1979 permits the auxiliary use of local languages where they predominate, so there could in principle be school education in Azeri, but it does not happen and there seems to be little interest in it; Azeris are rulers as much as ruled in Iran.
The other notable non-Iranian minority, the Arabs of Khuzestan (where the Iranian oil fields are concentrated), have occasionally been restive. But they form only 2-3% of the population. They gave little trouble to the regime during the Iran-Iraq War because of how Saddam Hussein treated his own Shiite Arabs. Among the minorities speaking an Iranian language, only the Kurds (7%-10%) have caused significant trouble. They suffered, however, more under the Pahlavis than under the present regime and they obtained their own Kurdistan province over thirty years ago, whereas the Iraqi Kurds received autonomy only after the downfall of Saddam Hussein and the Syrian and Turkish Kurds so far have no recognized autonomy at all. Moreover, the Safavids already simplified Iran's Kurdish problem by transporting many Kurds from Kurdistan to Khorasan in the opposite corner of the country, where a million of them remain to this day.
The big disturbances of December 2017 to January 2018, like their sporadic resurgences, occurred all over the country – irrespective of ethnicity – and even in supposed strongholds of the fundamentalists. Among other things, the protestors called for the abolition of the office of "Supreme Leader." The original draft of the Constitution of 1979 did not include this office; it was added at the insistence of Khomeini against the opposition of other ayatollahs.
Discontent about the office among senior clerics has been growing since the 1990s. A current opponent is Ayatollah Hussein Shirazi, like his revered father, Grand Ayatollah Sadiq Shirazi (b. 1942). The younger Shirazi was arrested on March 6, or – as it seems – was rather kidnapped by the Guards Corps on the orders of the Supreme Leader and sentenced summarily to 120 years in prison. His alleged "crime" was referring to the Supreme Leader as "Pharaoh." The subsequent widespread protests led to his release and his ability to visit his friends and admirers in the substantial Shiite community in Kuwait. Indeed, the protests were loudest outside Iran in Iraq and the Arab Gulf States, where Shiites form a majority in Bahrain and up to a third of the population in Kuwait, for example.
In the Iraqi general election on May 12, the party of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr surprisingly won the largest number of seats. He is an outspoken champion of excluding Iranian influence from Iraq, while Iran had expressly opposed the inclusion of his party in any future Iraqi government. The attempt of the Iranian regime to eliminate Hussein Shirazi can only have promoted the success of al-Sadr. It was another influential chance event, one that seriously damaged a major aim of the Iranian regime: to undermine Arab states via their Shiite communities.
The wish of the Guards Corps to establish itself permanently in Syria has also suffered serious setbacks. These include not just the attacks attributed to Israel but also the Syrian air force's request for Iranian forces to leave its facilities and, above all, Russia's declaration that all foreign forces – and specifically Iranian ones and Hizbullah – must leave Syria when the civil war is over.
The question is thus: What is likely to push such developments forward? The answer is that the new American policy, whether by chance or intent, may be as good as anything.
This policy has two arms. The first arm was President Trump's decision on May 8, 2018 to reimpose sanctions on Iran. This ended the opportunity for the Iranian regime to relieve significantly the economic miseries of its citizens. We have seen that many Iranians are blaming not Trump but their own rulers. More surprisingly, thousands have used the internet to welcome Trump's decision.
Even while the sanctions were suspended, the sufferings of ordinary Iranians continued to mount. On March 29, the International Monetary Fund reported that the Iranian financial system's weaknesses continue to be grave and that the upper tier of the regime, as usual, is largely responsible. "According to the IMF, at least two 'credit institutions'—most of which are connected to clerics or the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps—have experienced 'bank runs' recently." (Desperate Iranians had sought to evade high inflation by investing in such "credit institutions," but lost money when suspicions arose that they were Ponzi-type schemes.) Moreover, "The three largest [public] pension schemes (90% of the system) are insolvent."
One result has been a rush to buy dollars, further leaps of the value of the dollar on the black market, and a fresh attempt by the regime to ban the black market altogether. The attempt failed because the regime made far too few dollars available, queues for them became long and they effectively vanished from the official market. Iranian banks offer a yearly rate of 20% on deposits, but inflation recently rose at more than that rate in half a year. So Iranians put their trust in the currency of the Great Satan, in a further hollowing-out of faith in their own regime.
The West European trio of the P5+1 (the UK, France and Germany) have expressed their wish somehow to continue the nuclear deal with Iran. Supreme Leader Khamenei has responded, according to recent statements on his website, by making two main demands of the trio: "European banks should safeguard trade with the Islamic Republic. We do not want to start a fight with these three countries, but we don't trust them either... Europe should fully guarantee Iran's oil sales. In case Americans can damage our oil sales..., Europeans should make up for that and buy Iranian oil."
Khamenei's two demands are as impudent as they are ignorant. The large European banks cannot risk their connections with the US banking system by violating US sanctions in their dealings with Iran. Thus also European firms will have to abandon trade with the US to do the same, in which case they will not get credit from those banks.
Likewise, European oil companies are already drawing back from prospective business with Iran. According to Bloomberg, three leading figures in the oil business have stated that getting around US sanctions will be virtually impossible: Chairman Ian Taylor of Vitol ("the world's top oil trader"), Total CEO Patrick Pouyanne and BP CEO Bob Dudley. Further afield, Reliance of India , "owner of the world's biggest refining complex," plans to halt oil imports from Iran, while Lukoil, "Russia's second biggest oil producer," announced that it had put on hold plans to involve itself in the development of two Iranian oilfields.
The other arm of the new American policy is the "new Iran Strategy" presented by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in his speech at the Heritage Foundation on May 21. It consists of sixteen unconditional demands upon the Iranian regime. We cannot disagree with him, after recommending a similar approach in a recent article.
The question posed in the article was: What has fundamentally changed since Israel captured the hidden Iranian archive testifying to the existence of a fully-fledged Iranian program to produce nuclear-armed missiles, despite the insistent Iranian denials thereof throughout the negotiations over the nuclear deal? The answer was that the aims over which the US negotiated with Iran have now become imperatives that Iran must accept in advance of negotiations. All that can now be discussed in negotiations is the modalities and timetable for implementing the imperatives. Specifically, "the sunset clauses must be cancelled, the IAEA must have freedom to inspect whatever it demands, and Iran's long-range missile capacity must be curtailed."
A comparison with Pompeo's speech shows that those three imperatives coincide with his first four. His fifth imperative, the liberation of American hostages seized by the Iranian regime, is self-evident in its own right. The other seven are simply subdivisions of a single imperative: the Iranian regime must end all threats to and interference in other states and restrict its aims to solving its massive internal problems, for the benefit and joy of all Iranians and not just for a corrupt ideological clique. This comprehensive imperative lies outside the original scope of the nuclear deal, but since the Israeli discovery has shown that Iran negotiated in bad faith, the US can legitimately lay down this further imperative as a condition for renewed negotiations.
We have said that it is unpredictable when the hollowed-out Iranian regime will be blown over and Iranians are liberated from its bizarre ideological obsessions. But the two arms of the new American policy must surely bring that welcome day closer.
*Malcolm Lowe is a Welsh scholar specialized in Greek Philosophy, the New Testament and Christian-Jewish Relations. He has been familiar with Israeli reality since 1970.
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Will U.S.-Turkish Progress on Manbij Lead to Wider Cooperation in Syria?
James F. Jeffrey/The Washington Institute/June 06/18
The feuding NATO allies have apparently agreed on a concrete roadmap for rolling back the Kurds, but broader strategic cooperation would require them to overcome tall political obstacles.
By all reports, the June 4 Washington meeting between Turkish foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made significant progress on resolving a thorny bilateral issue: what to do with the Democratic Union Party (PYD), America’s local Syrian ally in the fight against the Islamic State. Ankara understandably sees the Syrian Kurdish group and Washington’s arming of it as a threat, since the PYD is tied to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), the insurgent organization that has battled the Turkish government for more than three decades.
The specific problem is the area around Manbij, Syria, where U.S.-backed PYD forces first advanced west across the Euphrates River in 2016, stepping over Turkey’s repeatedly stated redline in the process. Like the Obama administration before it, the Trump administration has committed in principle to move PYD cadres out of the area and back across the Euphrates. Yet the group’s refusal to pull out—coupled with the exigencies of America’s still-incomplete fight against Islamic State remnants in northeastern Syria, which requires PYD cooperation—has torqued U.S.-Turkish relations dramatically, at one point spurring the two NATO allies to threaten each other’s military forces.
The situation was calmed somewhat earlier this year when former secretary of state Rex Tillerson met with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and committed in principle to a solution. Turkish and U.S. officials have since been working on a roadmap to remove the PYD from the Manbij area, which is largely Arab in population (though possibly not the 90 percent proportion the Turks claim). Once the group withdraws, security is to be provided by a joint U.S.-Turkish presence and local authorities.
Yet the main roadblocks—the PYD’s refusal to leave, and the U.S. military’s need to continue operating in the northeast—persist, and various other bilateral disputes have further darkened the relationship, from Erdogan’s demand that Washington extradite alleged 2016 coup mastermind Fethullah Gulen, to Ankara’s purchase of Russian S-400 air defense systems. Tough anti-U.S. rhetoric from Erdogan in the run-up to Turkey’s June 24 national elections has raised hackles as well, spurring U.S. politicians, media outlets, and analysts to speculate that Ankara is straying into the Russian camp.
But yesterday’s discussions in Washington may represent a big step toward dissipating these tensions. After the meeting, Cavusoglu tweeted that he and Pompeo had agreed on a Manbij roadmap, later telling reporters more about the “concrete results” emerging from the “fruitful and successful” summit. According to various U.S. and Turkish sources, the plan is to start moving the PYD back across the Euphrates, possibly within ninety days if conditions permit. U.S. and Turkish forces will then take over patrolling the area, working with local security and governance organs.
The Turks and some Americans also see this plan as the first step in a new kind of bilateral cooperation on Syria, after similar efforts failed during the Obama administration. Cavusoglu hinted at this broader cooperation in his tweet. According to sources in both governments, the idea is to jointly press the Assad regime, Iran, and ultimately Russia to accept a political solution through the UN-sponsored Geneva process, an important long-term Turkish goal that the United States agrees with, albeit less vigorously. When Turkish officials speak generally of “pressuring” the Assad camp, what they usually mean is Turkish and U.S. forces occupying almost all of northern Syria, which encompasses over 40 percent of the country’s territory, tens of thousands of well-armed local allies, and millions of Syrian citizens either resident there or displaced by the war, including many across the border in Turkey.
Until such plans are actually set in motion, Turkey has felt compelled to engage with Russia and Iran on limited military deconfliction in Syria, much like the U.S. and Israeli militaries have done with Moscow. Yet the Turks seem to believe that Damascus and Tehran are still bent on achieving military victory throughout the rest of Syria—a scenario that only U.S.-Turkish cooperation can forestall.
Turning a tactical bilateral success on Manbij into a strategic front is an interesting concept, but several serious challenges would need to be overcome. First, the United States would need to remain militarily engaged in northeastern Syria at the very least, and perhaps elsewhere. Yet that requires cooperation with the PYD in their homeland east of the Euphrates—a thorny prospect given that Turkey is technically still at war with the group. Although Turkish and PYD forces have maintained a de facto ceasefire along the northeastern border, Turkey has crushed the group in the northwestern Afrin canton and is apparently gearing up for a similar operation against its PKK “cousins” in northern Iraq.
Second, Washington has apparently not yet secured PYD acquiescence to the Manbij roadmap. If the Kurds balk, the local U.S. military command responsible for coordinating with them against Islamic State remnants will likely balk as well.
Third, U.S. strategic goals in Syria remain opaque. President Trump’s expectation that American forces will pull out within six months is not compatible with the Turkish approach. Meanwhile, some officials in the United States, Jordan, and Israel seem to be putting all their Syria eggs into another basket: Russia, which they see as the key to making Iran pull out. In Ankara’s view, however, any solution that leaves an unfettered Assad regime in charge will not produce an Iranian withdrawal; rather, it will pose greater dangers to everyone.
As for Turkish domestic considerations, Erdogan will likely try to use the Manbij deal to burnish his nationalist credentials in the upcoming elections. Facing strong competition in the polls, he may cast the roadmap’s proposed PYD withdrawal east of the Euphrates as a victory against the PKK, despite the fact that the pullout is unlikely to precede the vote even under the best of circumstances.
*James Jeffrey is the Philip Solondz Distinguished Fellow at The Washington Institute and former U.S. ambassador to Iraq and Turkey.

Qatar: A year of isolation
Salman al-Dosary/Al Arabiya/June 06/18
Qatar completed yesterday the first year of the diplomatic boycott imposed on it by four Arab countries over its support of terrorism and rapprochement with Iran in a manner that harms its neighbors. Throughout that year, Qatar did not cease its attempts to restore some sense of normalcy.
It tried everything over the table and under the table through legal and illegal means. It sought to achieve a diplomatic breakthrough with the four countries. It tried to use money to pressure the West. It bought the allegiance of several figures inside and outside its borders to promote lies and rumors.
Today is June 5, 2018 and nothing has changed. Qatar is still where it started. All it did was create more isolation for itself. No one can predict when its crisis will end.
Are there signs of an imminent solution? There is no doubt that politics has taught us that surprises cannot be ruled out and nothing is completely final. I, however, do not see any signs for a possible settlement, at least not for the next year. This is not pessimism, but rather a reflection of Qatar’s exposed diplomacy that does not deserve much attention and analysis.
Let us recount what Qatar has done to tackle its crisis. It first resorted to money, then money and later, even more money. This is what it is good at. It believes that wealth alone can end its isolation or ease its suffering.
For example, Doha purchased Paris’ neutrality when it signed a deal, worth 14 billion dollars, with President Emmanuel Macron at the end of 2017. After that, Macron no longer criticized Qatar over its terrorism funding as he had did during his presidential electoral campaign.
Qatar may have spent some $40 billion on major military deals during a single year, but it has practically grown weaker militarily, politically and diplomatically than what it was before June 5, 2017
Shopping cart
What about the United States? It struck a deal with it to acquire F-15 jets worth $12 billion. In Britain, its shopping cart included Typhoon jets worth $6 billion. In the Italian bazaar, it struck a deal to buy seven military ships worth $6 billion. In Germany, it purchased 62 Leopard 2 tanks worth 2 billion euros. We must also not forget the negotiations with Russia over the S-400 missile air defense system.It is interesting to point out what Russian military expert Viktor Murakhovsky said about Qatar. He noted that any weapons deal does not have a practical purpose, but a political one. “This rich country can buy the S-400 system simply to improve ties with Russia,” he remarked.
Qatar may have spent some $40 billion on major military deals during a single year, but it has practically grown weaker militarily, politically and diplomatically than what it was before June 5, 2017. It is in an unenviable position, even as it frantically piles up the military deals. More importantly, no one knows whether all the weapons, rockets and jets Qatar is collecting can actually fit in its territories.
After a year of isolation, Qatar’s defense minister is entitled to say that his country will not allow its territories to be used for a potential American strike against Iran. The whole world can laugh at this because it knows that if Washington wanted to go through with the strike, it will not pause to wait for Qatar’s permission.
After a year living in crisis, Qatar has the right to “protect the safety of its consumers” by announcing a ban on the import of all products made in the four Arab countries. It also has the right to import food products from other countries, such as Turkey, Morocco and Iran, even as it claims that it is being “besieged.”At the same time, the four Arab countries have the right to practice their sovereignty and take a firm stance against this country, even if the boycott lasted for the next ten years. Qatar is entitled to many of the things it does, practices and says. Its major problem though is that nothing it does, practices or says can break its isolation.

Iran, the Gulf and European relations
Sawsan Al Shaer/Al Arabiya/June 06/18
It has become necessary that Gulf States put pressure on the Europeans so they understand that their interests in the Gulf are much higher than the losses they think they may suffer if they choose to withdraw from the nuclear agreement with Iran.
Trade before terror
Europeans, namely Germany and France, are trying to save whatever they can of the trade agreements signed between their companies and banks and Iran. They are thus not trying to save the nuclear deal as they claim. Since signing the nuclear deal in 2015, Germany has witnessed an increase in its trade relations with Iran, with its exports to Iran rising to as high as 2.57 billion euros in 2016, with an annual increase of 22 percent and 2.97 billion euros last year, registering an annual increase of 5.15 percent. According to Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, trade between Iran and France rose to 1.7 billion euros in 2017, which means it increased threefold since 2015 when the sanctions were lifted.
The Europeans are aware that Iran supports terrorist militias that spread destruction in our region. Europe overlooks this and does not want to admit it. The most they say to defend their position regarding Iran’s terrorist actions is that they are “worried” about the destruction Iran is causing to the region. Europeans are aware that Iran supports terrorist militias that spread destruction in our region. Europe does not want to admit it
Iran using the Houthi card
As such, the Iranians and the Europeans have agreed to use the Houthi card as part of an Iranian sacrifice to waylay the region’s countries and the US to engage again in a tunnel of negotiations with Iran and freeze the situation until Trump’s term ends. This will save European companies and banks from the great losses they might suffer in November when sanctions will be re-imposed.
In fact, European governments are under great domestic pressure to protect the agreement. German banking lobby group Kreditwirtschaft has called on Berlin and other EU nations to clarify their stance and to make sure banks and their clients are “effectively protected against possible American sanctions.”Sacrificing the Houthi card is an exposed and blatant attempt in the present circumstances and at the current time. Iranian officials and European diplomats have stated that both parties “have made important progress in talks to end the conflict in Yemen.” It was noted that Tehran has shown its readiness to “pressure” the Houthi group for a ceasefire and resume negotiations.
Accordingly, Saudi Arabia has acted alone — as any country should act — by associating its security interests with its commercial interests, just like Iran and Europe are doing.
Saudi-German trade
The German magazine Der Spiegel has reported that 800 German companies have been active in Saudi Arabia for years. In 2017, the size of German exports to Saudi Arabia was 6.6 billion euros. The magazine quoted Jörg Mayer, a senior official at SPECTARIS, a German association for optical and medical technologies, as saying that “Saudi Arabia is disregarding German products for political reasons.”He added: “The federal German government should work through diplomatic channels to start dialogue with Riyadh that leads to suitable framework so that our business relationship can continue.”The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper quoted anonymous sources as saying that trade transactions between Berlin and Riyadh are declining. It added that Saudi government agencies have not given new contracts to German companies for months now.
It is noteworthy that the United States has included in its list of sanctions against Iran two people and four companies, two of which are registered in Germany for supporting activities of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
European role critical
A statement issued in November and signed by United States Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin said “the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated a network of individuals and entities involved in a large-scale scheme to help Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) counterfeit currency to support its destabilizing activities.”“This network employed deceptive measures to circumvent European export control restrictions and procured advanced equipment and materials to print counterfeit Yemeni bank notes potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars for the IRGC-QF,” it added.
The European role is still critical in our war against Iran, and it is swinging in Iran’s favor. Therefore, our collective effort to pressure European banking and industrial lobby groups will make Europe think twice if it feels that its interests with us as a purchasing bloc is larger than its interests with Iran.

Russia’s diplomatic play in southern Syria
Maria Dubovikova/Arab News/June 06/18
What is happening in and around southern Syria can serve as a good example to understand what Russian diplomacy is and what its capacities are.
The recent sequence of events has seen a declaration by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that all foreign forces should retreat from the south of Syria; the Syrian Air Force prohibiting Iran and Iran-backed militias from using its facilities; talks between Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman and his Russian counterpart Sergey Shoygu; and subsequent media rumors regarding a Russian-Israeli deal on the withdrawal of Iranian troops. These are all links in one chain. Amid these events and rumors there were deep concerns regarding a possible assault on the occupied Golan Heights by Shiite militias, which could spark a regional war with unpredictable consequences.
Who could pull matters back from the brink? The only country that has strong relations with all sides is Russia. Moscow has no interest in losing either Israel or Iran as a partner, so it cannot let the rivalry between the two spoil the Syrian settlement. Instead it is making great efforts to move Iran and Israel away from a direct clash and a serious regional escalation.
The withdrawal of all foreign forces is a must for de-escalation of the tense situation in southern Syria, particularly in the context of the de-escalation zone in the area that is operated by Russia, Jordan and the US. Furthermore, the expected Assad offensive in Daraa is opposed by both by the US and Israel due to serious concerns over the presence of Iran-backed Shiite militias. To solve this issue, Russia has to persuade Israel that the Daraa operation is vitally needed for the further stabilization of the situation in Syria and will not in any way pose a threat to its security, while also persuading the Iran-backed militias to retreat from the area. Iranian officials have already expressed their support for de-escalation, while Hezbollah will retreat from the area upon Russia’s request.
Tehran is in a very fragile position, having a limited number of countries with which it succeeds in keeping stable political and economic ties
Russia is continuing intense talks with Israel through all channels regarding the settlement of existing disagreements, hoping to ease Tel Aviv’s concerns. Moscow is also making an effort to exert pressure on Iran to take it away from the brink of a confrontation, though this will fracture Iran’s regional presence, to the great discontent of Tehran.
However, in the current circumstances, Iran has little room for maneuver. As the US under Donald Trump has changed its policy toward Iran, Tehran is in a very fragile position, having a limited number of countries with which it succeeds in keeping stable political and economic ties. Furthermore, it has certain long-term political goals in Syria and in the region in general.
The agreements already reached and the trilateral efforts by Russia, Turkey and Iran are vital for Tehran’s own geopolitical interests. Thus, to spoil relations with Russia is not in its interests. However, Russia’s position and friendship with Israel seriously irritates Iran, fueling historical mistrust.
Israel is winning so far in the indirect Tel Aviv-Tehran clash over Syria, as its bombings of the Syrian bases to which the Iranian and Shiite militias had access made the Assad regime think twice about the “hospitality” it offered and has made them pay dearly. Iran is unhappy but can do nothing about this. Tehran wants a long-term presence in Syria and is ready to suffer all inconveniences on the way to its overall goal.
It must be admitted that there is no unanimity between Russia and any of the regional players, including Turkey, Iran and Israel. Contradictions are numerous, but Russian policy is likely to concentrate on the common points and to involve all the players and not isolate any of them.
The foreign forces in the south of Syria might be replaced by redeployed Syrian Army contingencies or by Russian military police. Both variants are acceptable for the Israeli side as they guarantee the retreat of Iranian forces from its border areas. The US, in this case, will go along with the Israeli stance.
Russia is trying to arrange a compromise that suits all sides. Talking to Israel does not betray Iran but, in the long run, the Iranian problem in Syria will not be solved and the prospect of a conflict between Israel and Iran still remains. But the current diplomatic steps being taken by Moscow are aimed at easing the rising tensions and solving the issues that cloud the south of Syria.
** Maria Dubovikova is a prominent political commentator, researcher and expert on Middle East affairs. She is president of the Moscow-based International Middle Eastern Studies Club (IMESClub). Twitter: @politblogme