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

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Bible Quotations For today

The Parable of the Unmerciful Servant: You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you
Matthew 18/23-35/ Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold[h] was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt. “At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.“But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.“His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’“But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened. “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed. “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”
 

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

Elias Bejjani/Visit My LCCC Web site/All That you need to know on Lebanese unfolding news and events in Arabic and English/http://eliasbejjaninews.com/

MoPH: 3469 new cases, 52 deaths
Guterres Extends Mandate of Special Tribunal for Lebanon
Al-Rahi Says Lebanese Can't Reach Agreement without Foreign Help
Al-Rahi Discusses Govt. Crisis with Hariri, Ibrahim
Aoun Urges Full Survey of Territorial Waters after Oil Spill from Israel
Health Expert: Never Despair, Better Days Lie ahead

Lebanon: Health Minister Fuels Anger over Vaccine Line-Jumping
MP’s House Comes under Fire in Hermel
Feds: Businessman Illegally Exported Vehicles to Lebanon
Loyalty to Resistance' renews call for formation of efficient and productive government
Analysis: Hezbollah renews threats in publication, fails to make an impression/
Joe Truzman/Long War Journal.FDD/ February 24, 2021
Amer Fakhoury Foundation Delivers Aid To Family Of Hostage Held By Iran
Hizbullah Bloc Warns of Damage from Govt. Delay, Urges Concessions
Last Tango in Beirut?/Saad al-Hariri’s wager on a Sunni-Shi‘a partnership in the next phase is no less risky than was his alliance with Michel Aoun./Michael Young/Carnegie MEC/February 25/2021
The Downing of a High Flyer/When Naim Attallah died recently, few remembered the role he played in one of the Middle East’s worst financial scandals./Michael Karam/Carnegie MEC/February 25/2021
Three Women in Beirut/Hazem Saghieh/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 25/2021
Justice is the Only Way to Achieve a 4th Independence/Hanna Saleh/ Asharq Al-Awsat/February 25/2021
 

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

Bahrain, Israel Stress Importance of Regional Role in Iran Nuclear Talks
Iran: UN Investigator Lacks Authority to Comment on Downing of Ukrainian Plane
U.S. patience with Iran on renewing nuclear talks 'not unlimited': State Department
Cotton Leads GOP Warning to Biden Against Iran Sanctions Relief
IAEA Weakens Iran Nuclear Safeguards
‘Fatah’ Urges ‘Hamas’ to Release Political Prisoners Before Elections
Report: More than 6,500 migrant workers have died during Qatar's World Cup prep
U.S. Warns Armenia Armed Forces against Intervening in Politics
Thousands Rally in Armenia after PM Warns of 'Coup Attempt'
EU Chief Warns Vaccine Push Difficult for 'Next Weeks'
Syria Govt. Says It Has Covid Vaccine from 'Friendly Country'
 

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

Rockets against US targets in Iraq seen as Iranian message to Biden/Maya Gebeily/The Times Of Israel/February 25/2021
What’s wrong with appeasement?/Only the fact that concessions don’t actually conciliate despots/Clifford D. May/The Washington Times/February 25/2021
Can Biden Fix the U.N. Human Rights Council?/Richard Goldberg/Foreign Policy/February 25/2021
How the National Cyber Director Position Is Going to Work: Frequently Asked Questions/John Costello and RADM (Ret) Mark Montgomery/Lawfare/February 25/2021
Attributing the Erbil Attack: The Role of Open-Source Monitoring/Crispin Smith, Michael Knights, Hamdi Malik/The Washington Institute For Near East Policy/February 25/2021
Delusions of Dominance/Biden Can’t Restore American Primacy—and Shouldn’t Try/Stephen Wertheim/Council on Foreign Relations, Inc./January 25/2021
Biden: It's Okay to Finance China's Military/Gordon G. Chang/Gatestone Institute/February 25/2021
Muslim Life in 2021, as Predicted in 1921/Daniel Pipes/Gatestone Institute/February 25/ 2021

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

Elias Bejjani/Visit My LCCC Web site/All That you need to know on Lebanese unfolding news and events in Arabic and English/http://eliasbejjaninews.com/

MoPH: 3469 new cases, 52 deaths
NNA/Thursday, 25 February, 2021  
3469 new coronavirus cases and 52 deaths have been recorded in Lebanon during the past 24 hours, as announced by the Ministry of Public Health on Thursday.

Guterres Extends Mandate of Special Tribunal for Lebanon
Naharnet/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres has extended the Special Tribunal for Lebanon's (STL) mandate from 1 March 2021 for "a further period of two years, or until the completion of the cases before the STL, if sooner, or until the exhaustion of available funds, if sooner," the STL said on Thursday. "The extension is in accordance with Security Council resolution 1757 (2007)," the STL added in a statement. In his statement, Guterres reaffirmed "the commitment of the United Nations to support the STL in the fight against impunity for the crimes under its jurisdiction, in order to bring those responsible to justice."“I am grateful for the international community’s continued support towards the STL’s work, which serves as a strong global message that terrorist crimes will not go unpunished. Together with my colleagues at the Tribunal, I remain highly committed to fulfilling the STL’s mandate in a timely manner and render justice to the victims through fair and transparent proceedings," said STL President Judge Ivana Hrdličková. Hrdličková had requested the two-year extension to allow the Tribunal to progressively draw down its activities and complete the judicial work before the different Chambers. The mandate of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, which is based near The Hague in the Netherlands, is to hold trials for those accused of carrying out the attack of 14 February 2005 in Beirut, which killed 22 people, including the former Prime Minister of Lebanon, Rafik Hariri, and injured 226 more. The trial in absentia of four Hizbullah suspects indicted over the killing began in January 2014. On 18 August 2020, Salim Jamil Ayyash was convicted in relation to five counts relating to the attack. In the same judgment, the three other accused, Hassan Habib Merhi, Hussein Hassan Oneissi and Assad Hassan Sabra were found not guilty. On 11 December 2020, Ayyash received five concurrent sentences of life imprisonment. On 13 January 2021, the Prosecution, Defense and Legal Representative of Participating Victims filed notices of appeal. Appeals proceedings are still ongoing. The Special Tribunal for Lebanon also has jurisdiction over attacks carried out in Lebanon between 1 October 2004 and 12 December 2005 if they are connected to the attack of 14 February 2005 and are of a similar nature and gravity. Pre-trial proceedings began in 2019 against Ayyash in relation to three attacks against Marwan Hamade, Georges Hawi and Elias Murr that occurred on 1 October 2004, 21 June 2005 and 12 July 2005 respectively. "The United Nations looks forward to the completion of the mandate of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon in a timely manner. The United Nations also looks forward to the continued support and cooperation of the Government of Lebanon," said a statement by Stéphane Dujarric, the Spokesman for the U.N. Secretary-General.
 

Al-Rahi Says Lebanese Can't Reach Agreement without Foreign Help
Naharnet/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Thursday noted that he has called for an international conference on Lebanon because the Lebanese cannot reach an understanding on their own. “We have proposed an international conference because we are incapable of reaching an understanding, organizing any dialogue or reaching an agreement with each other,” al-Rahi told a delegation from the Lady of the Mountain Gathering, the National Gathering and the National Initiative Movement, which submitted a memo to him. “The international community is responsible for a founding and active members of the United Nations and it has to offer official and serious assistance,” the patriarch added. He also called on all groups to “submit a paper about our problem in Lebanon to present them as a single paper to the U.N.”
 

Al-Rahi Discusses Govt. Crisis with Hariri, Ibrahim
Naharnet/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Thursday received a phone call from Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri, state-run National News Agency reported. The phone talks tackled the issue of the new government’s formation, NNA said. Al-Rahi later met in Bkirki with General Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim. “Visiting the patriarch is always useful and gives momentum, and whoever wants to work for Lebanon and its interest must take the momentum from His Eminence,” Ibrahim said after the talks. “I told His Eminence that the world is built on hope, and we will not grow tired but will rather continue the work that we are doing,” Ibrahim added. “I discussed with His Eminence the issue of the government’s formation, seeing as I’m handling a part of the efforts and His Eminence is handling the other part. That’s why it is necessary to meet every now and then to continue the efforts on the hope of improving things,” the major general went on to say.

FPM Meets Patriarch, Says Ready to Assist in Any Proposal
Naharnet/Thursday, 25 February, 2021 
Maronite Patriarch Beshara el-Rahi received on Thursday a delegation from the Free Patriotic Movement in Bkirki, in the aftermath of his calls for a UN-sponsored international conference to handle the problematic Lebanese file. “The meeting was an occasion to discuss political developments, most importantly the government formation file. We are ready to discuss any proposal on the basis of a comprehensive dialogue between the Lebanese,” MP Roger Azar of the FPM delegation told reporters after the meeting. "We've discussed the need to form a cabinet, whose composition and program are capable of achieving the required reform and gaining the confidence of the Lebanese," he added. Besides Azar, the delegation was composed of Salim Aoun, George Atallah, Salim Khoury, Caesar Abi Khalil. Head of the Movement, MP Jebran Bassil, held a telephone call with Rahi during the latter’s meeting with the delegation. "We have sensed His Eminence's keenness to accomplish the [electoral] deadline as soon as possible, within the framework of constitutional principles and on the basis of full national partnership, and we've informed him that we are ready to discuss and assist in any proposal," Azar added.
 

Aoun Urges Full Survey of Territorial Waters after Oil Spill from Israel
Naharnet/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
President Michel Aoun on Thursday followed up on new reports regarding a disastrous oil spill off Israel which has affected Lebanon’s shores. The National News Agency added that the president explored “the measures that should be taken to limit its negative impact on the Lebanese coastline, especially after the appearance of sporadic black spots on the southern coastline all the way to Ramlet el-Bayda” in Beirut. Accordingly, Aoun stressed the need to “carry out a comprehensive survey of Lebanese territorial waters, from the South to the North, in search of any polluted spots.”He also called for “examining the Lebanese shores for the same purpose, in order to pinpoint the damage and work on addressing it.”The disastrous oil spill has blackened most of Israel's shoreline and deposits of tar have started washing up in the Lebanese south. The management of the city of Tyre's coastal nature reserve, one of Lebanon's last remaining sandy beaches and an important nesting site for endangered Loggerhead and Green sea turtles, said the spill could endanger marine life and biodiversity in the area. The reserve is one of two marine protected areas in Lebanon and contains a wide diversity of ecosystems and is located on a major bird migration route. Hassan Hamza, engineer at the Tyre reserve, said teams were evaluating how much tar washed up to organize quick clean ups. He said it appeared that "most Lebanese beaches have been affected by this pollution." Israel's Environmental Protection Ministry has said it is investigating the cause of the oil spill. The incident is believed to have taken place in early February, and Israel said it received no prior warning before an estimated 1,000 tons of tar started washing up on shore. On Monday, an Israeli court barred publication of all details of the investigation, including the name of the suspected ship believed to have spilled the oil, its route and ports of call. An Israeli journalists' association petitioned the court on Tuesday to have the order lifted.

Health Expert: Never Despair, Better Days Lie ahead
Naharnet/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
Director of the Rafik Hariri University Hospital, Firass Abiad voiced optimism on Thursday urging virus-struck Lebanese to “never despair,” as the country witnesses a national vaccination rollout plan. “The only way it seems to get good news about Covid and the vaccine is to shift your attention away from local news. Worldwide, Covid is on the decline. Many countries have managed to roll out the vaccine without scandal, and the results have been very promising,” said Abiad on Twitter. “Vaccines save lives. Vaccinated individuals are extremely unlikely to develop severe Covid. More encouraging is the data suggesting vaccines are also effective in decreasing transmission. A successful vaccination drive can not only save lives, but restore economy as well,” he noted. Abiad stated: “As more vaccines become available worldwide, and Covid infections fall dramatically, Lebanon will have access to more vaccines. Involvement of the private sector will also improve the vaccine roll out. Better news will come, though for some, it will be too little too late.” “Yesterday, I gave a talk to NGOs working with children who have cancer. The main lesson these NGOs teach you is never despair. Hardships shall pass, and better days lie ahead. Countries too can get cancer. It too shall pass, and better days lie ahead,” the RHUH director concluded.

Lebanon: Health Minister Fuels Anger over Vaccine Line-Jumping
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
rs to receive COVID-19 shots to thank them for passing an emergency law and dismissed anger over politicians jumping the queue as an overreaction. While medical workers and elderly still await their turn, some legislators received vaccines in parliament on Tuesday, prompting the World Bank to threaten to halt its multi-million dollar financing of the inoculation drive. Breaking his silence more than a day later, caretaker health minister Hamad Hassan told state TV late on Wednesday the move was his "sovereign decision" to thank MPs for passing the law that helped ink a deal for the Pfizer-BioNtech shots. "It's not that big a deal," Reuters quoted him as saying. Hassan's comments and pushback by other politicians added to anger in Lebanon, where decades of state waste and corruption have triggered a financial meltdown. "Mr. Hamad, what you call a sovereign decision is in reality an abuse of power," lawyer Nizar Saghieh tweeted. Deputy speaker Elie Ferzli, who at 71 is not in the first priority group but said he had received the vaccine, stormed out of two TV shows on Wednesday night after shouting about the World Bank's regional director Saroj Kumar Jha. "You're a liar and a hypocrite, and you shouldn't stay in Lebanon," Ferzli shouted on live TV. Screenshots went viral among Lebanese on social media with captions such as "What I look like when I stub my toe" or "Vaccine side effect." At an earlier news conference, Ferzli had called Jha, an Indian national, "Mr. Farouj" which sounds similar to his first name and is the Arabic word for rotisserie chicken. The World Bank did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The World Bank is monitoring the rollout to ensure the first shots go to healthcare workers and the elderly and had warned against favoritism. On Tuesday, Jha said a breach could lead the bank to suspend vaccine funding.

MP’s House Comes under Fire in Hermel
Naharnet/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
The house of Deputy Ihab Hamadeh in Hermel was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade and gunfire at dawn on Thursday, the National News Agency reported. NNA said that armed gunmen fired a rocket-propelled grenade followed by gunfire at the house of Hamadeh in the locality of Al-Tal, on the outskirts of Hermel. No one was injured in the incident, and the damages were material, added the Agency. Hamadeh, of the Loyalty to the Resistance parliamentary bloc, and his family were not inside the house during the incident. To maintain security, army patrols immediately spread in the area and erected mobile checkpoints at different locations.For his part, Hamdeh filed a complaint with the Hermel police station, and demanded accountability.

Feds: Businessman Illegally Exported Vehicles to Lebanon
Associated Press/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
A Rhode Island businessman who runs an auto sales company illegally exported 19 vehicles to Lebanon, federal prosecutors said Wednesday. Carlo Fakhri, 50, who operates D'Agostino's Auto Sales and Salvage, Inc., in North Providence, is charged with violating a law that requires him to provide the correct name, address, identification number, and contact information for the purchaser and receiver of each vehicle to the U.S. Commerce Department, according to the U.S. attorney's office in Rhode Island. The law is designed to help the federal government prevent the export of motor vehicles and other items to unauthorized destinations or end users. An email seeking comment was left with his attorney. Fakhri, a U.S. citizen originally from Lebanon who now lives in Fall River, Massachusetts, was arraigned Wednesday on charges of submission of false export information and smuggling. He was released on personal recognizance after pleading not guilty. He allegedly sent 15 pickup trucks, a passenger vehicle, and three SUVs to Lebanon. If convicted, he faces 15 years in prison.
 

'Loyalty to Resistance' renews call for formation of efficient and productive government
NNA/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
The "Loyalty to the Resistance" parliamentary bloc on Thursday highlighted the necessity to reach an agreement leading to the formation of a new "efficient" and "productive" government, in the nearest time possible. In a statement issued following its weekly meeting, the bloc underlined that the new government "should neither be held hostage nor threatened with unbalance."On the World Bank's social protection loan, the bloc maintained that Lebanon's need of credit did not mean the acceptance of any terms and conditions conflicting with the Lebanese best interest. "Certainly, all the effective international laws and practices offer facilitations that lenders should consider while discussing the loan agreement," the bloc said. On a different note, the bloc called the government and the competent ministries for leading a campaign at the UN and the international instances, to mobilize for the treatment of the offshore oil spill, holding the Israeli enemy responsible for this attack on Lebanon's environment.

Analysis: Hezbollah renews threats in publication, fails to make an impression
Joe Truzman/Long War Journal.FDD/ February 24, 2021
Last week, Hezbollah renewed its threats by publishing a video showing Israel Defense Forces (IDF) military sites embedded in populated areas in an attempt to claim that the IDF is using its citizens as human shields.
However, the publication failed to get its message across – which calls into question the effectiveness of some of Hezbollah’s recent online propaganda campaigns against Israel.
Hezbollah’s online media outlet has recently published several videos responding to Israel’s warnings about the militant group’s activities inside Lebanon and Syria. [See FDD’s Long War Journal report, Hezbollah publication says Israel has become talkative, warns its defeat is coming.]
In its most recent publication, Hezbollah responded to Israeli military official’s accusations that it uses the homes of Lebanon’s civilian population to hide its military arsenal. The video attempted to portray the IDF as hypocritical by displaying the locations of numerous Israeli military sites located near its own civilian population. Some important military locations such as the Kirya and the Northern Command were highlighted in the video with their GPS coordinates.
Hezbollah’s message fails to get its point across
Hezbollah’s attempts to legitimize hiding its arsenal in the homes of Lebanese civilians by equating it to IDF military sites located in Israeli cities is illogical. The publication also conveyed the message that if Israel targets Hezbollah’s concealed arms caches, the group will respond by targeting IDF sites in populated areas of Israel.Publications threatening Israel’s civilian population aren’t new for Hezbollah and the so-called ‘Axis of Resistance.’ In 2019, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Gaza-based militant group, published pictures of Ben-Gurion Airport and the Dimona nuclear reactor with their coordinates as a warning that the sites would be targeted in an attack. The video also highlighted the increasingly repeated propaganda videos published by the militant group. In 2018, Hezbollah published a video of the GPS coordinates of gas platforms located off the coast of Israel in a hint that it would attack the sites in a future conflict. In 2020, Hezbollah republished a video depicting the targeting of military sites in Israel and included the GPS coordinates of those locations. For observers of the group’s propaganda, this type of recycled video production – which can be replicated by using Google Maps – would suggest that Hezbollah is struggling to find new ways to garner its audience’s attention.It’s also worth noting that in Sept. 2019, Hezbollah claimed it successfully struck an IDF ambulance with two ATGM missiles in the northern Israeli community of Avivim, only to be disproven by video evidence after the attack.
Although Hezbollah may find itself slumping in productiveness of its propaganda, the Beirut-based Al-Manar TV and the group’s powerful presence on social media sites have been able to effectively disseminate Hezbollah’s anti-U.S. and Israel rhetoric without impediment.
*Joe Truzman is a contributor to FDD's Long War Journal.
 

Amer Fakhoury Foundation Delivers Aid To Family Of Hostage Held By Iran

February 26/2021

https://www.facebook.com/FakhouryFoundation
Family of unlawfully detained journalist to receive financial gift from a foundation that understands their plight
DOVER, NH – The Amer Fakhoury Foundation (AFF) announced providing a financial gift to the family of Jamshid Sharmahd, the 65-year-old US resident, journalist, and vocal opponent of the Iranian regime. Sharmahd was kidnapped in July 2020 while in Dubai and is now an illegally detained hostage of the Iranian government.
“As the daughters of Amer (Fakhoury), we uniquely understand not only the frustration in the face of such illegal actions by these corrupt regimes,” said Guila Fakhoury, AFF President and Director, “but also the impact on the families.”
The Amer Fakhoury Foundation, a registered not-for-profit organization, was created in response to the illegal detention of Fakhoury’s father, Amer, after he accepted an invitation to travel to his birth home in Lebanon. Upon arrival, Fakhoury was subjected to imprisonment and torture at the hands of the Lebanese government, ultimately leading to his death.
“Our fundraising activities have only recently begun,” continued Guila Fakhoury, “but we are determined to provide assistance to families, such as the Sharmahds, as we are able.” Fakhoury also noted that, as with their previous gift of tuition assistance to youth in Lebanon, AFF was gifting one hundred percent of recent proceeds by covering administration costs.
Guila Fakhoury concluded stating, “Such tragic events put enormous emotional and financial strain on the victim’s family. The Amer Fakhoury Foundation will continue our father’s legacy by being a voice and support system through their hard times.”

Hizbullah Bloc Warns of Damage from Govt. Delay, Urges Concessions
Naharnet/February 25/2021
Hizbullah’s Loyalty to Resistance parliamentary bloc on Thursday criticized the “exchange of accusations” over the formation of the new government, saying it “exposes the flaws of the approach of share splitting.”It accordingly emphasized “the need for an understanding that leads to the birth of a new, effective and productive government.”In a statement issued after its weekly meeting, the bloc added that such a government should not be a “captive” of a certain “number” of seats nor “threatened by imbalance.”“The damage resulting from the delay in forming the government has become much bigger than the damage from offering any concession leading to speeding it its formation, which has become more than a necessity,” the bloc warned.
 

Last Tango in Beirut?/Saad al-Hariri’s wager on a Sunni-Shi‘a partnership in the next phase is no less risky than was his alliance with Michel Aoun.
Michael Young/Carnegie MEC/February 25/2021
Last October 8, Lebanon’s leading Sunni politician Saad al-Hariri was invited by a prominent television talk show host, Marcel Ghanem, to appear on his program. At the time, parliamentary consultations were about to begin to determine who would be designated to form a new government. Ghanem’s main purpose was to see whether Hariri would be willing to replace Prime Minister Hassan Diab, whose cabinet was governing in a caretaker capacity.
The expectation initially was that Hariri would say no, mainly because his main regional sponsor, Saudi Arabia, did not appear to want him to cover for what they regard as a Hezbollah-dominated order in Lebanon. However, Hariri not only said he would agree to being named prime minister, but that as the strongest Sunni politician in the country he was the natural candidate for the post, which is reserved for Sunnis in the Lebanese sectarian system.
However, there was also an understated message in Hariri’s remarks that evening. He was asked about his erstwhile political allies, the Maronite Christian politician Samir Geagea and the Druze leader Walid Joumblatt, who had opposed Hariri repeatedly in previous months. Hariri responded with what was a subtle warning to Geagea and Joumblatt, who come from numerically smaller religious communities. If he, as a Sunni, came to an agreement with the two leading Shi‘a parties, Hezbollah and Amal, then the country’s other communal representatives could follow if they wanted to, but he would forge ahead, regardless, if they did not.
Not surprisingly, two days later Joumblatt, whose reactions are always a good barometer of the trends in Lebanese politics, rallied to Hariri, whom parliament tasked with forming a government on October 22. Joumblatt understood that Sunni-Shi‘a concord could leave communities like the Druze and the Maronites isolated.
While the government formation process has dragged on for months, Hariri has not reversed himself in wanting to base a new government on his partnership with the Shi‘a parties. Indeed, when Ghanem had probed whether a government reform program required to unlock foreign aid to Lebanon could work, Hariri had replied that this was the main question he had for Hezbollah. In other words, he was quite clearly appealing to the Shi‘a parties to side with him on his agenda.
Hariri’s approach rests on an ambiguity in his ties with the Saudis. While the prime minister-designate will never break with Riyadh, nor can he afford to do so, he has sought to widen his margin of maneuver. Doubtless he remembers his humiliation at Saudi hands in 2017, when he was reportedly held against his will in the kingdom. But his attitude today seems to be defined by a sense that the relationship would benefit both sides more if he were to push the envelope, as his father once did. Hariri also understands that if he remains out of office for too long, his value to the Saudis will evaporate completely, which will mean the end of his political career.
Nor have the Saudis given him any reason not to disregard their wishes, having cut him off politically in recent years. However, they also have never openly said that they oppose a Hariri-led government. Their ambassador’s line has been, privately, that Hariri, if he wants to lead a cabinet, must have a program. By telling Ghanem that his aim for a new government was implementation of the French economic reform plan for Lebanon proposed by President Emmanuel Macron last September, Hariri appeared to be fulfilling that condition.
Hariri also seems to enjoy significant domestic Sunni support these days, something facilitated by his ongoing struggles with President Michel Aoun and his son in law Gebran Bassil over the prime minister’s prerogatives in forming a government. By insisting that the president is an equal partner with the prime minister in this process, an interpretation many Sunnis strongly contest, Aoun has bolstered Hariri’s standing within his community. Paradoxically, then, Hariri is leaning on Sunni backing in order to facilitate a rapprochement with Hezbollah and Amal, parties that most Sunnis otherwise oppose.
Beyond that, what does Hariri’s yearning for a Sunni-Shi‘a partnership mean, and on what can it be based? A priority of the prime minister-designate is to isolate Bassil, who as a leading Maronite politician wants so succeed Aoun as president and who was the person most responsible for undermining Hariri’s last government. If he can do so, Hariri feels, he would be in a good position to help bring to office another Maronite, one with whom he has good relations, such as Suleiman Franjieh. Franjieh, presumably, would give Hariri more latitude to operate as he sees fit.
However, that assumption is based on two potential fallacies. The first is that a Franjieh in office, were he to be elected, would be like Franjieh out of office—friendly to Hariri and hostile to Bassil. Nothing guarantees that this is true. For example, if Franjieh were to push for better Lebanese relations with the Syrian regime, with which he has long been close, this could trap Hariri between the president’s preference and a Sunni electorate that views Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as the personification of evil. What would Hariri do then?
A second fallacy may be to assume that Hariri can build a relationship with Franjieh that is stronger than Franjieh’s ties with Hezbollah. Even if Hezbollah seeks a better rapport with a broadly representative Sunni politician, its instinct will often be to back a constitutionally weaker president against the prime minister. Why? Because in Lebanon the cabinet is the executive authority, so putting pressure on the prime minister can mean shaping the government’s agenda.
Does this imply that Hariri should not seek to reinforce his ties with the Shi‘a parties? No, but it would be a mistake for him to assume that such a partnership would buy him more than some wiggling room in certain situations. Maybe that’s enough for Hariri. That’s because another implied message in his interview with Ghanem was that he was not so much committed, on principle, to implementing economic reform, as intent on introducing reforms to salvage the system and the political class’ stakes in it. That is precisely what Hezbollah wants, and is why it so opposed the popular uprising in October 2019.
Time will tell whether Hariri’s wager can succeed, or whether it will lead him down the same blind path it did in 2016, when he thought he could work with Aoun and Bassil. A new failure could leave the prime minister-designate on his own, with his credibility in tatters.

The Downing of a High Flyer/When Naim Attallah died recently, few remembered the role he played in one of the Middle East’s worst financial scandals.
Michael Karam/Carnegie MEC/February 25/2021
Naim Attallah, the colorful publisher, film producer, and entrepreneur, died on February 2 at the age of 89. His lavish parties and stable of glamorous, well-bred, and equally well-educated, young female editors will ensure his place among the London literati. But what is almost never mentioned in the story of his extraordinary rise from a modest Palestinian immigrant to a businessman who scaled the heights of British society is the role he played in what was at the time the largest financial scandal in the Middle East.
Attallah began his career in the late 1950s as a foreign exchange dealer at the London offices of Crédit Foncier d’Algérie et de Tunisie. He later became the protégé and confidante of the brilliant but controversial Palestinian banker Youssef Beidas, the man who made Lebanon’s Intra Bank the biggest in the region.
Founded by Beidas and three other investors in 1951, Intra, as it was known, had become a Middle Eastern powerhouse by the early-1960s, with offices in the United States, major European capitals, Brazil, the Bahamas, and West Africa. Intra’s assets included blue-chip real estate in New York and Paris, Lebanon’s national carrier Middle East Airlines (MEA), and a major French shipyard. The bank seemed to best embody Lebanon’s ephemeral golden age.
Despite Beidas’ local and regional power, the Lebanese establishment had only so much patience for a man whom it regarded as an upstart Palestinian with much of Lebanon in his pocket. In 1966, in a fit of xenophobic pique, the authorities helped to engineer Intra’s collapse.
“Beidas made the cardinal mistake of getting involved in politics,” said Attallah when I interviewed him in London in February 2006. “He used to get drunk on MEA [flights] and shoot his mouth off, saying, ‘The president of the republic came to see me,’ and so on. But it was nothing more than bragging, which doesn’t go down well at the best of times. Being Palestinian, especially then, made it even worse. He should have stayed clear of politics and he shouldn’t have made rash statements.”
In his autobiography, The Flying Sheikh, Najib Alamuddin, the late MEA chairman and government minister, wrote that days before the Intra collapse the deputy governor of Lebanon’s central bank at the time, Joe Orghourlian, had berated Beidas at a meeting in Washington. “Why did you do it? Who asked you to?” Orghourlian demanded to know, referring to the vast assets that Beidas had amassed through Intra. “You are not Lebanese and Lebanon doesn’t want your control of its economy.”
The fall, when it came, was swift and brutal. In early October 1966, it was leaked that Intra was in difficulty. The rumors, according to Alamuddin, came initially from the presidential palace and the office of the prime minister, and then from financial institutions that were rivals of Intra. This provoked a run on the bank, but Lebanon’s central bank, which should have intervened, sat by and did nothing. Even when the central bank bailed out other Lebanese banks affected by the crisis, it refused to throw Intra a lifeline.
“They hated Beidas,” said Attallah. “Here was a man who came from nowhere, who suddenly became the most powerful among them. But he was a foreigner. What do you expect? They were very happy when Intra collapsed. The bank was a threat, and they couldn’t compete.”
Amid the legal debris, Attallah was named as Beidas’ executor, a role that would haunt him for decades afterward. In 1995, a summons was issued by a Lebanese court on behalf of the Beidas family, accusing Attallah of breach of trust in his handling of the aftermath of Intra’s downfall. He fought the case and won.
“The whole affair showed an inherent corruption and vindictiveness in our society and Beidas was the victim,” Attallah told me, his voice betraying a hint of emotion. “When there is a run on a bank in every civilized economy in the world, the central bank comes to its aid. It scotches rumors and tries to stop it. In the case of Intra, it did nothing [and in doing so] it destroyed the financial credibility of Lebanon. I don’t think the country has recovered since.”
Najib Alamuddin went further in his assessment of the fallout, calling the Intra affair “the beginning of the disintegration of Lebanon [by] a system … corrupt in style and morals that had plagued Lebanon since independence and finally plunged the nation into civil war.”
Certainly, after the civil war Lebanon’s reputation as a banking hub was greatly reduced. Long gone were the days when, as Beidas himself once shrewdly pointed out, Lebanon was to money what the Suez Canal was to shipping. By 2016 the highest-ranked Lebanese bank in the region was Banque Audi, in 29th place. At the time the industry was trapped in a giant Ponzi scheme, which would begin collapsing in late 2019. Today, Lebanon’s finances have never been bleaker.
Youssef Beidas was branded a criminal, went to jail, and eventually died a broken man in Switzerland 1968. Naim Attallah wasted no time in reinventing himself for what would be his greatest role among a new set of movers and shakers in 1970s London. Yet he stayed loyal to the man he called “Baba,” or “father,” insisting that he, Attallah, never personally profited from the Intra debacle, despite hinting that Beidas never fully repaid him for his loyalty.
“He always promised me things that never happened. It was always “bukra al-mish mish,” an expression that can be translated as “when the apricots are ripe.” Before Attallah added, “But with Beidas they never ripened.”
*Michael Karam is a Lebanese freelance writer based in the United Kingdom. He is the editor of Tears of Bacchus: A History of Wine in the Arab World (Gilgamesh Publishing, 2020)
 

Three Women in Beirut…
Hazem Saghieh/Asharq Al-Awsat/February 25/2021
Lebanese women did not have the chance to build an image of themselves that corresponds to their weight and influence or describes their struggle to obtain their weight and influence.
It is true that Lebanon has known many prominent women intellectuals, writers, artists, and academics, and many businesswomen, women professionals, journalists, militants, and activists who fought to the end for what they believe in.
The colored revolution of 2019- 2020 was also a brilliant site for exposing women’s shining and active presence.
These developments flew in the face of the deeply entrenched traditional image of the women- the mother and the woman- the wife and woman- the daughter or sister, not to mention “the fairer sex” and “the salon ladies” who embrace folkloric activities, touristic festivals or institutions described as philanthropic.
Three weeks ago, Lebanese women’s image gained an extremely bright and substantial addition. The sad occasion of executing Lokman Slim pointed us in the direction of the three women of the same household grieving the same great murdered man.
Those three women who were put in the media’s spotlight by the crime manifest a different Lebanon, pluralistic and colorful, one of renaissance and enlightenment that cuts across identities and sects, and defends the victim and the weak.
The mother, Salma Mershaq Slim, is Syrian-Lebanese-Egyptian; the wife, Monika Borgman, is German-Lebanese, and between them is the sister, Rasha al-Ameer. Rasha, who lived in France before Lebanon, acquires her many identities not from nationalities but from her ideas, languages, and places. She worked as a journalist while living in Paris; then, she published the novel “Yum al-Din” (Judgement Day) and a language education book called “Kitab al-Hamza.” In the meantime, Rasha worked with her brother Lokman to co-found the “Dar al-Jadeed” publishing house. Abdullah Al-Alayli and Muhammad Khatami’s works were among those they sought to publish.
Writing and the issues relevant to it, especially the Renaissance and religious reform, found an early advocate in the mother, Salma, who lived in Egypt before moving to Lebanon. In two books, Salma introduced Nicolas Haddad, whom she called “the erudite literati,” and Ibrahim al-Masri, whom she described as a “pioneer of the psychological novel.” As for her interest in the “Shawam”- that is, the Syrians and Lebanese who immigrated early on to Egypt (Slama is herself among their descendants)- it emerged from the modern and liberating values that these “Shawam” held and were nurtured by the illuminating British presence at the time.
This transnational awareness was complemented by her husband’s understanding of politics. Before sectarian identities exploded in the manner we know today, the lawyer Mohsen Slim was close to the National Bloc Party that linked Mount Lebanon with the southern suburbs of Beirut, that is, Christians with Shiites. At the time, this suburb still identified with Lebanon, and its ties to Beirut were much stronger than those with Tehran. In line with his reformist attitude toward religion, Slim defended the prominent intellectual Sadiq Jalal al-Azm and the novelist Laila al-Baalbaki when they came under the fire of religious fanatics. Before that, he took on the case of the journalist Kamel Mroue, the founder of “Al-Hayat” newspaper, who had been assassinated by Nasser’s intelligence services and its subordinates in Beirut.
All of these proclivities and attitudes come together in Monika Borgman. She wrote a book in French about the Algerian journalist Saeed Moqbil, who founded, in his country, the ‘‘Le Matin” newspaper before being assassinated by fanatics, either loyal to the Islamists or the military. Monika is also an internationalist: she became very Lebanese while also remaining very German, and she did not see how the former could contradict the latter. She worked for the German press and studied Arabic in Bonn before continuing her studies in Damascus. After marrying Lokman, they founded “UMAM Research and Documentation” together, and they directed the two films, “My Murderer,” about the victims of the Sabra and Shatila massacre in 1982, and “Palmyra”, on the Lebanese prisoners’ suffering in this jail in Syria.
The three women’s determination to search for the truth, defend the victims, and seek a more just and dignified world persists, to live in the depths of languages and on their borders, in countries and on their margins... They have been cutting across identities amid the accelerating general plunge into sub-identities and fanatical murders like that which ended Lokman’s life, those that came before and ended the lives of Kamel Mroue and Saeed Moqbil, who joined this family of great sorrows.
These women are the most refined linkages between one part of Lebanon and another, women who pull Lebanon to the world and draw the world to Lebanon. They could have formed a bridge between the most splendid aspects of this country’s past and a tomorrow that was not fated to be.
Salma, Monika, and Rasha did not only lose their beloved. They live by an avenue named “Khomeini Avenue,” close to a mural of Qassem Soleimani that dominates the public space today. This is an assault, a blatant, constant, and continuous assault on our three ladies.
 

Justice is the Only Way to Achieve a 4th Independence
Hanna Saleh/ Asharq Al-Awsat/February 25/2021
Lebanon is once again in the midst of a battle to seize its freedom and independence, this time from the control of the Iranian regime, as it seeks to preserve its existence by preventing the Iranian regime from turning it into a puppet state. In doing so, Lebanon will strive to achieve its fourth independence. The first of the previous three was the independence of 1943 from the French mandate. Then came the independence of 2000, which emerged as a result of the Israeli occupier's defeat. The latest independence is that of 2005, when the Syrian regime was expelled from the country.
Corruption, which has crawled into the core of the Lebanese state and delegitimized it, is one of the main reasons why a fourth independence is of the utmost necessity. Corruption has wreaked havoc in Lebanese institutions, crippled the economy, impoverished the population, weakened the healthcare sector, and led to the crime of the century. The Beirut port explosion that almost destroyed one-third of the city and shook the entire world didn't seem to affect the ruling clique, nor was there any sense of accountability on their part. In truth, it revealed the lengths that the corrupt ruling class is willing to maintain power and the indifference of the Lebanese state to the lives of its citizens. Amidst all this, the threat of impunity looks very real.
Indeed, justice and accountability seem irrelevant to the current Lebanese state, as evidenced by the overuse of force by security services to disperse demonstrators since the beginning of the October revolution in 2019. Moreover, the politically motivated decision to remove Fadi Sawan, the chief prosecutor for the Beirut port explosion, prompted a furious reaction from the families of the victims affected by the blast, who took the streets to voice their anger, shouting: "We will not allow you to kill us twice. We will seek justice ourselves if we have to!" The decision to dismiss chief prosecutor Sawan from the investigation came as a result of his uncompromising stance against the ruling clique, which is trying to deliberately interfere with the investigation in order to gain time and evade any responsibility related to the explosion, for which they could be incriminated.
Throughout this process, it has been apparent that Hezbollah's stance is the most influential, indeed, that it is shaping the new approach. The day after the port crime, its secretary-general declared that he had no idea what was in the port, as they were concerned with the Port of Haifa and those beyond Haifa, demonstrating that Hezbollah's actual stance is consistent with the ruling clique's campaign or perhaps that the party was instructing them to"contain the investigation." On the eighth of January, Nasrallah announced: "Honorable judicial investigator, if you continue along this path, it means we will not reach a conclusion... The course of the investigation must be corrected." In truth, many have spoken about the investigation as though they were judicial "references", giving the judge advice and guidance, and the secretary-general would announce that the time to turn the page had come: "The technical investigation with the army is finished, and its conclusions have been sent to the judicial investigator. It is his duty to announce the conclusions of the technical conclusions…," emphasizing the need to solve what he considered the central issue, ending the disputes between the affected families and the insurance companies that gave been waiting for the nature of the explosion to be determined before paying! Yes, financial compensation is the solution, the technical investigators informed the judiciary that fate and the neglect of the sparks that flared from the "welding" had blown up Beirut!
If the technical investigation is the reference and the judicial authorities' investigations should depend on it as its basic and only reference, what is the purpose of the forensic investigation and the judiciary? But wait, a group of judges frightens the "Nitrate clique," and so the decision to sideline them was taken. With Judge the publication of Judge Fadi Al-Aridi's grounds for refusing the dismissal, the weak arguments against Judge Sawan were exposed on the one hand, while the findings and the expansion of the investigation exposed the other aspects.
They used the fact that Judge Sawan had said he would do everything he could to reveal the truth against him, that he wouldn't be hindered by any immunity in the face of the destruction and loss of life of this magnitude. Rather, he would be firm because blood immunity was what troubled him, and there was no sin in the matter. In his statement, Judge Aridi considered that what was said about "immunities" came in the context of "generalizations and was said under the presumption that the prosecution would look into any layman or official against whom serious suspicions are raised." That is, they held his determination to reveal the truth without fear of accusing anyone against him. Here, an important aspect that transpired in the Court of Cassation during the discussion of "immunities" is revealed. Judge Sawan's framework narrowed the scope of immunity in the interest of protecting human rights, to prevent it from continuing to allow for impunity. The evidence is overwhelming. However, after all the plunder, impoverishment, and banditry, and despite the evidence implicating the ruling clique, the charges were made to disappear from public space. No international body trusts the regime with even a carton of basic foodstuffs, but not a single charge was against an official of any level... The majority in court decided to "conform" to the political suggestions, and contain the courts, especially when it comes to holding those accused of deadly sins accountable. The latter are being protected at the expense of justice, truth, society, and its interests! Those who issued the decision did were not burdened by its implications for the judiciary and the primacy of the battle for its independence.
What reaches the level of scandal is that they held the fact that Judge Sawan was among those who suffered material losses because of the explosion, assuming he would be sympathetic to those afflicted and abandon his duties, as though a judge can only be objective if he was not affected by a disaster of this magnitude! Put simply, this means that it is impossible to find a judge who was not affected by what had befallen all of Lebanon, and in the future, once the inevitable investigations of plunder begin, it will also be impossible to find a judge who was not affected.
Of course, charging the prime minister and ministers (the investigation demonstrated that serious suspicions surrounded them) worried the political class, so, wielding the sword of immunity, it did away with it. But the biggest surprise that accelerated the dismissal decision is the audacity of issuing charges against Syrian regime affiliates suspected of owning the shipment of death! From the beginning, the accumulation of evidence was like a straight line pointing to politicians and security officials responsible for bringing the Ammonium to the port and gradually removing 75 percent of the shipment; and where to? It became apparent that the investigation could potentially expose details of other dangerous crimes linked to the explosion, like the assassinations of Retired Colonel Mounir Abu Rajeli and photojournalist Joe Bejjani, whose widow revealed that security agencies had seized his photographic archive, including pictures of Hangar 12. They are conducting their investigation into the "bags of pillows (...) as though the victims are the perpetrators!
From their approach of creating starvation to allying with the pandemic, stealing the vaccine, violently clamping down on peaceful protests, undermining justice, bring assassinations back, and invoking ISIS on demand, to preparing to appoint a president of the republic who perpetuates the position's vacancy and entrenches subordination, everything they do is meant to sow fear and spread terror! The obviousness of their objectives must crystallize the means for fighting back, the banner of justice as an umbrella that brings together all the political advocates of change. Justice is the gateway to retrieving the state that would allow for the regaining of rights and stolen money, and it is a headline that the world could rally around in support of the Lebanese in their fight to end tyranny.

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on February 25- 26/2021

Bahrain, Israel Stress Importance of Regional Role in Iran Nuclear Talks
Asharq Al-Awsat/February 25/2021
Bahrain's Crown Prince and Israel's Prime Minister stressed in a phone call the importance for the "countries of the region" to take part in any talks about Iran's nuclear program, Bahrain News Agency reported Thursday.
Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the Crown Prince and Prime Minister, and Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu “stressed the importance of regional participation in any negotiations on the Iranian nuclear deal, provided that the talks include broader issues to consolidate regional security and stability,” it said. “Joint investment in the field of healthcare, to supplement and develop the health sectors in both countries, was also discussed,” said the news agency. The Crown Prince and Netanyahu “reviewed regional and international developments and joint cooperation across various fields,” it added.

Iran: UN Investigator Lacks Authority to Comment on Downing of Ukrainian Plane
Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
Iran dismissed as “immature” a statement by a UN investigator that inconsistencies in its explanation of the shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger plane last year raised questions over whether the act was intentional, Iranian media said on Thursday. All 176 people aboard the Ukraine International Airlines Flight PS752, most of them Canadian, were killed when the plane crashed shortly after takeoff en route from Tehran to Kiev on Jan. 8, 2020. Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said on Tuesday she had found no concrete evidence the plane was targeted intentionally but that Iran had not proven it was accidental. After denying blame for three days, Iran’s Guards said they had shot it down by mistake while under high alert for a possible attack. Hours earlier it had attacked US targets in Iraq in retaliation for Washington’s killing of Iran’s top general, Qassem Soleimani, with a drone strike five days before. Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said Callamard’s “sphere of activity has nothing to do with these regulations and frameworks. Rather, her unwarranted involvement might not have a constructive impact on the legal procedures as well,” Reuters reported. Callamard, who carried out a six-month investigation into the case under her global mandate, said on Tuesday that Iran had not replied to her detailed queries. She is stepping down from the independent post at the end of March, a year early in the six-year term, to take another job, officials said.
Khatibzadeh accused her of rushing out her statement. “Maybe one of the reasons of this unwarranted haste is her resignation from her post as special rapporteur, and by issuing an immature and impetuous text ... she may have been promised a new job positions,” Iran’s state news agency IRNA quoted him as saying. “Accordingly, some charges have been leveled against the Islamic Republic of Iran without any valid evidence and documents.”In December, Khatibzadeh said an indictment would be issued in less than a month against “those whose negligence caused the accident”. But Iran’s military court, which is handling the case, has yet to publicly announce it.

U.S. patience with Iran on renewing nuclear talks 'not unlimited': State Department
WASHINGTON (Reuters)/February 25/2021
The United States’ patience with Iran on returning to discussions over the 2015 nuclear deal is “not unlimited,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Wednesday.
Iran has not formally responded to a U.S. offer last week to talk with Iran in a joint meeting with the countries that negotiated the deal.
Asked at a news briefing whether there was an expiration date on the offer, Price said Iran’s moves away from compliance with the 2015 agreement’s restrictions on its nuclear activities made the issue an “urgent challenge” for the United States.“Our patience is not unlimited, but we do believe, and the president has been clear on this ... that the most effective way to ensure Iran could never acquire a nuclear weapon was through diplomacy,” Price said.

Cotton Leads GOP Warning to Biden Against Iran Sanctions Relief
Nick Wadhams/Bloomberg News./February 25/2021
Senator Tom Cotton and more than 40 other Republican lawmakers introduced a resolution Wednesday opposing any move to lift sanctions on Iran, underscoring the resistance the Biden administration will face in trying to get back into the 2015 nuclear accord.
The resolution “rejects and opposes the reapplication of sanctions relief for Iran” and expresses disapproval of any move to reverse a ban that keeps Iran from accessing the U.S. financial system, according to a copy obtained by Bloomberg News.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken has vowed not to ease sanctions on Iran until it returns to compliance with the multinational accord that former President Donald Trump abandoned. But the U.S. has offered to meet with Iran under the auspices of the five other nations that joined in crafting the nuclear agreement. So far, Iran has spurned the offer. “The U.S. must maintain sanctions on the Iranian regime until it abandons its nuclear ambitions and ends its support for violence and terror around the region,” the resolution’s House and Senate sponsors say in a statement. “Iran took advantage of weak policies during the Obama administration, and President Biden must not repeat those same mistakes.” The resolution is largely symbolic and stands little chance of passage given that Democrats control both chambers of Congress. Nonetheless, it’s a warning to both the Biden administration and Iran that circumventing Congress would only jeopardize any future agreement. In that respect, it echoes a letter Cotton, Arkansas’s junior senator, initiated before the accord was completed under President Barack Obama in 2015, warning Iran that the next American president could revoke it -- as Trump did. Cotton has remained one of the nuclear deal’s most persistent critics.
Like the original Iran accord, any renewed agreement would be unlikely to be offered as a treaty that would require a two-thirds vote of approval in the Senate.
— With assistance by Daniel Flatley
 

IAEA Weakens Iran Nuclear Safeguards
Anthony Ruggiero/Policy Brief /February 25/2021
Before departing Iran on Sunday, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi issued a joint statement with his hosts, announcing they had reached an agreement on Tehran’s nuclear safeguards implementation, but would not disclose all of its provisions. Based on the limited information available, it seems the Iran-IAEA deal may set a dangerous precedent by weakening safeguards and will have long-term consequences for the IAEA’s ability to monitor nuclear developments in Iran and other countries.
Iran spurred Grossi’s visit by threatening to suspend implementation of the Additional Protocol (AP) – an agreement that allows short-notice inspections at undeclared facilities – on February 23. Grossi arrived on February 21 to broker a solution and returned with a compromise that he described as providing the IAEA “less access.” He said the deal still allows “snap inspections,” but they are not the same as those allowed under the AP.
Unfortunately, the details of this compromise are still hidden in a secret technical annex. According to the Iranian government, the deal allows IAEA cameras to continue monitoring activities at Iranian facilities, but the IAEA will not have access to the data for three months. Even then, access will depend on whether Iran receives sanctions relief from the United States. If not, then the data will be deleted.
Last year, Iran manufactured another safeguards crisis when it rejected a January 2020 IAEA request to investigate two locations where Iran is suspected of having used or stored nuclear material but did not declare those activities to the IAEA as required. In that instance, Tehran met with a firmer response from both the United States and its European allies. The E3 (France, Germany, and the United Kingdom) noted that Iran’s actions risked “seriously undermining the global safeguards system if no progress is made.” The E3 also sponsored an IAEA resolution that was adopted in June 2020, reaffirming that Iran should “cooperate fully and in a timely manner with the IAEA.”
While Iran denied access to the sites in question for nearly seven months, Grossi brokered a deal in August 2020 to secure access. In a new report released to IAEA member states yesterday, Grossi states the IAEA found the presence of altered (non-natural) uranium particles at the sites in question, indicating a major violation of Iran’s safeguards agreement. So far, Iran has not responded to a January 14 IAEA letter requesting clarification of its findings.
The IAEA’s willingness to let Iran choose its safeguards implementation could be a problem over the long term. North Korea could use Iran’s playbook to delay and disrupt safeguards implementation if the IAEA returns to North Korea to implement an interim or final deal on denuclearization. Saudi Arabia is also watching for lessons on how to weaken IAEA safeguards as Riyadh expands its own nuclear program.
The first step to rectifying this situation is for the IAEA to release immediately the technical annex containing the details of its deal with Tehran. This would allow an open discussion of the deal’s implications, while preventing Iran from selectively releasing details to serve its own interests.
The Biden administration, in concert with the E3, should use next week’s IAEA Board of Governors meeting to condemn Iran’s attempt to extort sanctions relief and reduce its safeguards implementation. The United States should also lead the effort to derestrict (that is, publish) the technical annex if Grossi does not release it.
The IAEA-Iran standoff and the Biden administration’s response are an early window into how the United States will handle negotiations with Iran, and an unfortunate signal to others, such as North Korea, Russia, and China. If Biden folds on Iran’s safeguards obligations, Tehran will know it can demand even greater incentives to return to the negotiating table for discussions on the 2015 nuclear deal.
*Anthony Ruggiero is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), where he also contributes to FDD’s Iran Program and Center on Military and Political Power (CMPP). He previously served in the U.S. government for more than 19 years, most recently as the National Security Council’s senior director for counterproliferation and biodefense, where he chaired senior U.S. government meetings on U.S. IAEA policy. For more analysis from Anthony, the Iran Program, and CMPP, please subscribe HERE. Follow Anthony on Twitter @NatSecAnthony. Follow FDD on Twitter @FDD and @FDD_Iran and @FDD_CMPP. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

‘Fatah’ Urges ‘Hamas’ to Release Political Prisoners Before Elections
Ramallah- Asharq Al-Awsat/Thursday, 25 February, 2021
Member of Fatah's Central Committee Ahmed Helles has warned that the elections will be undermined if Hamas refuses to release the political detainees. In comments to the Voice of Palestine radio station, he said the first test for practicing democracy is the release of all political prisoners, calling on Hamas to reconsider its position. Helles further called on Hamas to act in favor of national interest, by releasing the detainees and moving towards elections without obstacles. However, Hamas denied that it was holding political detainees. All detainees and prisoners in Hamas prisons have been convicted of criminal or security offenses, the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Interior said in a statement. The statement came in response to Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh demand that Hamas release all political prisoners in the Gaza Strip. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas issued a decree ordering the respect of freedom of expression ahead of legislative elections in May, a step demanded by Palestinian factions who discussed the polls in Egypt-hosted talks this month. Helles said that all the Palestinian factions welcomed the decree. But the statements made by Hamas reveal no intention to release the detainees. Fatah's official called on rights organizations to play their part in bringing this matter to a closure. In this context, Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Executive Committee member Wasel Abu-Yousef called on Hamas to release the political detainees. He urged adherence to the Palestinian President’s decree and the release of all political detainees to guarantee the success of elections.

Report: More than 6,500 migrant workers have died during Qatar's World Cup prep
Jason Owens/Yahoo/February 25/2021
More than 6,500 migrant workers have died in Qatar amid the nation's preparation to host the 2022 World Cup, The Guardian reports.
The report cites government data from the home nations of migrant workers, including India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. The data have been compiled since Qatar was awarded the World Cup in 2010, working out to an average of 12 deaths per week, according to the report.
FIFA awarded the World Cup to Qatar despite widespread concerns over human rights violations and treatment of migrant workers. Amnesty International has since documented conditions of workers being "exploited" and "subjected to forced labor."
"They can’t change jobs, they can’t leave the country, and they often wait months to get paid," a report from the human rights organization states.
Guardian estimate: Actual death toll 'considerably higher'
According to The Guardian, 2,711 workers from India, 1,641 from Nepal, 1,018 from Bangladesh, 824 from Pakistan and 557 from Sri Lanka have died working in Qatar since 2010. The Guardian estimates that the actual death toll of migrant workers is "considerably higher" since the data it cites is limited to the listed countries.The nation with a population of less than 3 million is depending on 2 million migrant workers to man its labor force. The Philippines and Kenya are among other nations to send migrant workers to Qatar, according to the report.
The listed causes of death include electrocution, blunt injuries due to a fall from height and suicide. Most of the deaths are listed as "natural" while citing heart or respiratory failure, according to the report.
Daytime temperatures in Qatar can approach 120 degrees during the summer. Normally played in the summer, Qatar's World Cup will be held in November and December because of the oppressive heat.
Massive nationwide construction project, including a new city
Nick McGeehan of labor rights organization FairSquare Projects told The Guardian that World Cup construction accounts for much of the death toll.
“A very significant proportion of the migrant workers who have died since 2011 were only in the country because Qatar won the right to host the World Cup,” he said.
Qatar has built or is building seven new stadiums in addition to significant infrastructure upgrades, including roadways, hotels and an airport in preparation to host the World Cup. The opening and closing matches will be held at Lusail Iconic Stadium in Lusail, a city being built from the ground up ahead of the World Cup.
Qatar: Death toll within 'expected range'
Qatar's government didn't dispute The Guardian's findings and characterized the death toll as "expected" in a statement to publication.
“The mortality rate among these communities is within the expected range for the size and demographics of the population," the statement read. "However, every lost life is a tragedy, and no effort is spared in trying to prevent every death in our country."
FIFA also provided a statement to The Guardian.
“With the very stringent health and safety measures on site … the frequency of accidents on FIFA World Cup construction sites has been low when compared to other major construction projects around the world,” the statement reads, per The Guardian.
FIFA did not provide The Guardian with data to back up its claim.
Why do workers risk these conditions?
According to Amnesty International, migrant workers seek employment in Qatar to escape poverty and unemployment at home. It describes dirty living conditions with eight workers living in a single room once they arrive. Workers are sometimes promised one salary only to be provided a lower wage once they arrive.The group spoke to workers who agreed to anywhere from $500 to $4,300 in recruitment fees to agents that left them in debt before they began working in Qatar.
 

U.S. Warns Armenia Armed Forces against Intervening in Politics
Agence France Presse/February 25/2021
The United States on Thursday warned ally Armenia's armed forces against intervening in politics as the elected prime minister said there had been a coup attempt. "We urge all parties to exercise restraint and to avoid any escalatory or violent actions," State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters.
"We remind all parties of the bedrock democratic principle that states' armed forces should not intervene in domestic politics."
 

Thousands Rally in Armenia after PM Warns of 'Coup Attempt'
Agence France Presse/February 25/2021
Armenia's Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan defied calls to resign and accused the military of an attempted coup on Thursday, as divisions over his handling of last year's war with Azerbaijan brought thousands to the streets.
Hours after the general staff of Armenia's military made a shock call for his government to step down, Pashinyan rallied some 20,000 supporters in the center of the capital Yerevan against what he said was an attempt to oust him.
The opposition gathered some 10,000 of its own supporters not far away, then began putting up tents and building barricades outside parliament as it vowed to hold round-the-clock demonstrations. There were no signs of any military action against Pashinyan, who ordered his armed forces to stand behind the government. "I am ordering all generals, officers and soldiers: do your job of protecting the country's borders and territorial integrity," he said during the rally. The army "must obey the people and elected authorities," Pashinyan said. The defense ministry also issued a statement declaring that "attempts to involve (the military) in political processes are unacceptable." Pashinyan said he was ready to start talks with the opposition, but also threatened to arrest any opponents who "go beyond political statements." The prime minister has been under intense pressure over his handling of the conflict for control of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, but has ignored repeated calls to resign for losing swathes of territory to Azerbaijan.
- Opposition warns of 'bloodshed' -
After backing the prime minister for months, the military's general staff on Thursday joined calls for him to step down, saying in a statement that he and his cabinet "are not capable of taking adequate decisions". Pashinyan hit back with an accusation that top brass were mounting an "attempted military coup" and ordered the firing of the chief of the general staff Onik Gasparyan. Pashinyan then led supporters through the streets of the capital, surrounded by his family, ministers and security detail, as marchers chanted "Nikol Prime Minister!"He attempted to downplay the military statement, saying it had been an "emotional reaction" to his firing the previous day of the deputy chief of the general staff, Tigran Khachatryan. Khachatryan had ridiculed claims by Pashinyan that Iskander missiles supplied by Russia -- Armenia's main military ally -- had failed to hit targets during the war over Nagorno-Karabakh.
But Armenia's opposition urged him to heed the demand.
"We call on Nikol Pashinyan not to lead the country towards civil war and to avoid bloodshed. Pashinyan has one last chance to avoid turmoil," Prosperous Armenia, the country's largest opposition party, said in a statement. Prosperous Armenia and another opposition party, Bright Armenia, called for the holding of an extraordinary session of parliament, which is controlled by Pashinyan's allies. Their supporters had gathered outside parliament in the early evening, blocking traffic, erecting tents and making barricades out of rubbish bins. "We will bring tents, stoves, everything we need. We are staying here. The lawmakers can either come or we will bring them to parliament," said Ishkhan Saghatelyan of the opposition Armenian Revolutionary Federation, also known as Dashnaktsutyun. President Armen Sarkisian, whose role is largely symbolic, said he was taking urgent steps to try to defuse the crisis, while Armenia's Apostolic Church called for all sides to hold talks "for the sake of our homeland and people."
Call with Putin -
Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke to Pashinyan and "called on all parties to show restraint," the Kremlin's spokesman said. The European Union's spokesman said it was following developments closely and called for the armed forces to "maintain neutrality in political matters" in line with Armenia's Constitution. Pashinyan has faced fierce criticism since he signed a peace deal brokered by Russia that ended the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian region that broke from Azerbaijan's control during a war in the early 1990s. Fresh fighting erupted over the region in late September with Azerbaijani forces backed by ally Turkey making steady gains. After six weeks of clashes and bombardments that claimed some 6,000 lives, a ceasefire agreement was signed that handed over significant territory to Azerbaijan and allowed for the deployment of Russian peacekeepers. The agreement was seen as a national humiliation for many in Armenia, though Pashinyan has said he had no choice but to agree or see his country's forces suffer even bigger losses.

EU Chief Warns Vaccine Push Difficult for 'Next Weeks'
Agence France Presse/February 25/2021
EU chief Charles Michel admitted Thursday that Europe's coronavirus vaccine rollout could continue to struggle for momentum in the coming weeks before picking up speed. "We know that the next few weeks will continue to be difficult as far as vaccinations are concerned," he said, after a video summit of 27 EU national leaders. But Michel, president of the European Council, added: "We do have the means, we have the resources, we have the capability to succeed over the next few months."

Syria Govt. Says It Has Covid Vaccine from 'Friendly Country'
Associated Press/February 25/2021
Syria's health minister on Thursday said his government procured coronavirus vaccines from a friendly country which he declined to name, adding that frontline health workers would be the first to be inoculated starting next week.
It was not clear why Hassan Ghabbash declined to name the country that provided the vaccines. He spoke at a press conference where only reporters from local media outlets were invited. The announcement comes days after international and Israeli media reports revealed that Israel paid Russia $1.2 million to provide the Syrian government with coronavirus vaccines, as part of a deal that secured the release of an Israeli woman held in Damascus. The terms of the clandestine trade-off negotiated by Moscow remained murky; Damascus denied it happened and Russia had no comment. Such Israeli bankrolling of Syria's vaccination efforts would be an embarrassment Syrian President Bashar Assad's government, which considers Israel its main regional enemy. The two countries remain at war and Israel occupies the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed in 1981, a move not widely recognized internationally. On Tuesday, Syria's ambassador to Moscow told Russian media his country was ready to receive the Russian-made vaccine, but didn't elaborate. However, a pro-Syrian government private newspaper, Al-Watan, reported Wednesday that the vaccine available in Syria is Chinese, quoting unnamed officials. It added that the first available batch consisted of 5,000 shots to cover 2,500 health workers in isolation centers. The World Health Organization has said war-ravaged Syria is eligible to receive vaccines for free through the global COVAX effort aimed at helping lower-income countries obtain the shots. It said that the vaccine rollout depends on availability and distribution, and may initially cover only 3% of the population. Authorities in areas outside Syrian government control in the country's northwest have said they are negotiating with donors to receive vaccines, possibly as early as late next month. In government-controlled parts of Syria, authorities recorded nearly 16,000 infections and just over 1,000 deaths. In opposition-held Syria, over 21,000 infection cases and more than 400 deaths were reported.

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

Rockets against US targets in Iraq seen as Iranian message to Biden
Maya Gebeily/The Times Of Israel/February 25/2021
Analysts say Tehran looking to boost its leverage as Washington seeks to rein in its nuclear program.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AFP) — Renewed rocket attacks on US targets in Iraq show Iran-aligned factions are heaping pressure on the government while Tehran may be seeking leverage over America’s new administration, analysts say. Iraq, scarred by years of war and insurgency, has been a strategic battleground for arch-foes the United States and Iran, both allies of Baghdad who remain sharply at odds over Iran’s nuclear program.
Analysts and officials in Iraq say the resumption of attacks after four months of relative calm shows that Iran and its Iraqi allies are now abandoning de-escalation and seeking leverage over their rivals.“It seems we’re back to last year,” a senior US military official in Iraq told AFP, referring to several months in 2020 when rockets rained down on American sites once a week or more. On Monday, two rockets hit near the US embassy in Baghdad, days after a volley hit an airbase further north where a US military contractor is maintaining F-16 fighter-jets purchased from Washington.
US President Joe Biden and Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhemi spoke Tuesday by phone about this week’s rocket strikes and agreed that those responsible “must be held fully to account,” the White House said.
Rockets also hit a military complex in the Kurdish region’s capital Arbil on February 15, killing a civilian and a foreign contractor working with US-led troops. The incidents were consistent with the dozens of attacks last year, which usually involved a score of 107mm rockets fired from a truck, security officials said. This year, the pro-Iran groups typically blamed for such attacks — including Kataeb Hezbollah and Asaib Ahl al-Haq — have been quick to condemn the strikes.
Few are convinced. “All indications are it’s the same style of attacks,” said the US military official, speaking on condition of anonymity. “And intelligence shared with us says there are more to come.”
‘Boosting leverage’
Both local and international dynamics may have prompted the resumed attacks. There are “domestic considerations” as Iraqi armed groups are keen to challenge Kadhemi’s assertion that he can rein them in, said Aniseh Bassiri of the Royal United Service Institute. “They want to remind everyone they have not disappeared and show the PM they have not been restrained,” she told AFP. With parliamentary elections scheduled for October, these factions, whose political branches are running at the polls, are flexing their muscles, Bassiri added. But the rockets may also carry a message from Tehran to Washington, which under Biden is offering to revive the Iran nuclear deal which his predecessor Donald Trump abandoned in 2018.
Iran is demanding Washington lift sanctions immediately, while the US wants Iran to move first by returning to all its nuclear commitments.
Iran has struck a tough tone this week, restricting some nuclear site inspections and warning it could further step up uranium enrichment.
“The renewed attacks could be an attempt by those close to Iran to increase Tehran’s leverage in light of looming talks with the US,” Bassiri said.
Blocked cash
Geopolitical considerations aside, Iran may also have purely financial reasons to pressure Baghdad, local and Western officials told AFP. With its economy squeezed, Tehran is desperate for unfettered access to an account at the state-run Trade Bank of Iraq (TBI), where Baghdad has been paying for imported Iranian gas. Iraq has been unwilling to disburse the equivalent of around $2 billion freely, fearing it would anger the US — mirroring disputes about frozen funds Tehran has with other countries including South Korea.In January, Iraq’s Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein and the premier’s chief of staff Raed Juhi traveled to Tehran with a message from Kadhemi asking Tehran to restrain armed groups in Iraq, after three rocket attacks. They met Esmail Qaani, who became head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force after a US drone strike in Baghdad early last year killed his predecessor Qasem Soleimani.
“Qaani told them that unless they get money out of the TBI account, they wouldn’t be able to control the activities of armed groups in Iraq,” a senior Iraqi official with close knowledge of the trip told AFP. Another Iraqi official, a Western diplomat and a US official confirmed links between the TBI account and the threat of rockets. For now it remains to be seen how Biden’s administration will respond to the new attacks. US State Department spokesman Ned Price said Monday the US would “hold Iran responsible for the actions of its proxies that attack Americans” but would not “lash out” and risk destabilizing Iraq.
The US military official said that, in talks with Washington, “we’ve provided options, including striking inside and outside of Iraq, but we haven’t heard yet from the new administration.”

What’s wrong with appeasement?/Only the fact that concessions don’t actually conciliate despots
Clifford D. May/The Washington Times/February 25/2021
We all disapprove of appeasement, right? The term evokes Munich, where British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain made concessions to Adolf Hitler in the hope that would sate, rather than whet, the Fuhrer’s appetite for conquest.
“You were given the choice between war and dishonor,” Winston Churchill famously chastised Chamberlain afterwards. “You chose dishonor and you will have war.”
Also attributed to Churchill is the definition of an appeaser as “one who feeds a crocodile – hoping it will eat him last.” The implication: As a description of policy, appeasement is a misnomer since it suggests not the conciliation of adversaries but rather the futility of attempts to alter their intentions when, at best, only their timetables are subject to change.
To be fair to Chamberlain, he had no good alternatives. Britain had for years allowed its military strength to deteriorate while Germany rearmed. Churchill warned of the danger, and was roundly denounced as a “war-monger.”
By 1938, Chamberlain could not convincingly tell Hitler: “Keep your troops within your borders – or else.” So, he cut a deal under which Hitler agreed to conquer only part of Europe – to “share the neighborhood,” one might say. Hitler, of course, didn’t keep his part of the bargain. Despots seldom settle for win-win solutions.
Appeasement is, or should be, a pertinent and timely issue now because President Biden is deciding how to deal with a number of despots, none of them half-a-loaf kinds of guys, none of them likely to keep promises if they can get away with breaking them.
In particular, Mr. Biden appears inclined to replicate the approach of President Obama who believed that in exchange for riches and respect, Iran’s rulers would slow (not terminate) their pursuit of nuclear weapons, and “share the neighborhood,” putting aside their ambition to spread Iran’s Islamic Revolution across the Middle East and, in time, beyond.
Unlike Chamberlain, Mr. Biden has alternatives to appeasement. The least bad would be a policy of “peace through strength.” Were he to embrace that approach, he would refrain from alleviating economic pressure on Iran’s rulers so long as they are actively engaged in terrorism – including unleashing militias to attack Americans in Iraq as recently last week – hostage-taking-and-holding, illicit nuclear weapons and missile development, and both threatening and assaulting their neighbors.
A peace-through-strength policy also would mean ending our reliance on China’s rulers for strategic commodities and, as a matter of morality, not buying from them anything produced by workers deprived of basic human rights. Sen. Tom Cotton has just released a report on “Targeted Decoupling and the Economic Long War” with Beijing. It should be required reading within the Biden administration.
Most essential: Peace through strength implies no diminishment of the American military power needed to deter despots. Deterrence makes shooting wars less likely. It’s puzzling that so many Western leaders find the logic behind that aphorism difficult to comprehend.
These days, there are those on both the right and the left – I’d call them isolationists, they prefer to be called “restrainers” – who are determined to “end endless wars.”
It’s a nice bumper sticker. In reality, there’s a distinction between wars and long-duration, low-intensity conflicts in which American forces train, advise and assist foreign partners as part of what should be a broader strategy to defeat or at least contain common enemies.
As I write this, there are about as many American troops in Washington, D.C. as in Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan – combined. Those forward deployments are economy-of-force missions, enabling our partners to bear the brunt of the fighting.
We have many more troops, tens of thousands, in Europe, Japan, South Korea, and the Gulf. Their job is to project American power in order to secure America’s national interests in those regions.
“An estimated 33,000 Americans died fighting in Korea and 47,000 in Vietnam,” Harvard Professor Graham Allison points out in the current issue of Foreign Policy: “But since the fall of Saigon in 1975, the total number of U.S. battle deaths stands at fewer than 7,500.”
Every such death is a tragedy, about that there can be neither dispute nor doubt. But historical perspective is essential in policy-making. In reality, “endless wars” don’t end when we stop fighting. Our withdrawals merely cede swaths of the globe to our enemies in the hope they will leave us alone thereafter. But, as noted above, despots are not easily appeased.
On both the right and left there also are those attempting to debunk the endless-war narrative. “Disengagement from competitions overseas would increase dangers to the United States,” writes Gen. (Ret.) H.R. McMaster, who served as President Trump’s National Security Advisor. “The paltry savings realized would be dwarfed by the eventual cost of responding to unchecked and undeterred threats.”
Leon Panetta, who served as CIA director and secretary of defense under President Obama, writes: “Moscow, Beijing, Tehran, and Pyongyang, in addition to a number of determined terrorist organizations, continue to pursue objectives inimical to American interests. More than ever, Americans must go abroad to remain secure at home. Such a view is neither right nor left policy – it is smart policy informed by a modern history of devastating wars, hard lessons from more recent conflicts, and current realties.”
Both quotes are from “Defending Forward: Securing America by Projecting Military Power Abroad,” a recently released FDD monograph that should be required reading within the Biden administration as well.
Maintaining deterrence is an endless struggle – not quite the same as an endless war. By contrast, appeasement appears to provide a quick and easy way to resolve a conflict. But when dealing with despots, that’s an illusion – one that cannot be endlessly maintained.
*Clifford D. May is founder and president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and a columnist for the Washington Times. Follow him on Twitter @CliffordDMay. FDD is a nonpartisan think tank focused on foreign policy and national security issues.

Can Biden Fix the U.N. Human Rights Council?
Richard Goldberg/Foreign Policy/February 25/2021
The administration insists it can succeed where two U.S. presidents already tried and failed.
Against the backdrop of crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and the imprisonment of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken addressed the United Nations Human Rights Council in a video message this week—a first for an American diplomat since Washington withdrew from the council under the previous administration. But it will take more than a speech by Blinken to reform this deeply flawed body, which boasts perennial human rights abusers such as China and Russia among its members and devotes much of its time to castigating Israel. President Joe Biden’s team needs a plan. And failing that, the administration should push ahead at double speed to institute a new body backed by the world’s free and democratic states, not its worst human rights abusers.
In announcing the U.S. return to the council earlier this month, Blinken said he recognizes “that the Human Rights Council is a flawed body, in need of reform to its agenda, membership, and focus,” yet he believes “the best way to improve the Council is to engage.” After his eight years in the Obama administration, Blinken should know that’s easier said than done.
In 2009, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared the United States would join the council and attempt to reform it from within. “We will engage in the work of improving the UN human rights system,” she said. Weeks later, China and Russia were elected to the council alongside the United States. Both won reelection in 2013.
Even the Trump administration, which exhibited deep skepticism and disdain for international organizations, tried engagement to reform the council. U.S. diplomats pressed for an end to the elections by secret ballot that allow countries to vote for human rights abusers without admitting it. They also sought elimination of what seems to be the council’s single standing agenda item: targeting Israel. Their campaign failed, and the United States withdrew from the council in mid-2018.
Last year, China, Cuba, Gabon, Pakistan, Russia, and Uzbekistan were elected to three-year terms on the council. Since its founding in 2006, the Human Rights Council has not passed a single resolution condemning any of these countries. Meanwhile, Israel has been the target of 90 separate condemnations.
Most egregious, of course, is China’s election to the council amid what Blinken calls a genocide in Xinjiang. In true Orwellian fashion, China was previously appointed to a panel within the council that evaluates experts on religious discrimination—presumably including those who might have looked at China’s horrific human rights abuses against its Muslim citizens.
Shaping the Human Rights Council is a primary objective of China’s larger strategy to exploit the U.N. system.
So, what is the Biden administration’s plan to achieve reform where its predecessors tried and failed? In her confirmation hearing last month, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield pledged to confront China inside the U.N. system and combat the double standards applying to Israel. Now is the time to make good on that pledge.
Shaping the Human Rights Council is a primary objective of China’s larger strategy to exploit the U.N. system. While running candidates to take control of standards-making bodies and U.N. agencies that can be used to support Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative—such as the International Telecommunication Union, the International Civil Aviation Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization, and the Industrial Development Organization—China’s growing influence over the council serves to whitewash its human rights record while putting the United States and its allies on the defensive.
As a first step to pushing back against China, the Biden administration should meet with a Human Rights Council whistleblower, Emma Reilly, who has evidence that the council regularly turns over names of Chinese dissidents to Beijing. The administration should make clear to the council that Washington will not tolerate any retaliation against Reilly by the U.N. or China and expects full transparency regarding her allegations. The State Department should also launch an independent investigation into the circumstances she describes.
At the same time, the Biden administration should build a multilateral coalition to implement the working definition of anti-Semitism developed by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance at the Human Rights Council and other U.N. agencies. Crucially, the definition includes using a double standard that only applies to Jews or the Jewish state. The Biden State Department affirmed its support for this definition, a precedent first set by the Obama administration in 2016.
As long as the council officially maintains a standing agenda item on Israel while single-mindedly pursuing other activities to delegitimize the Jewish state, it is in clear violation of the State Department’s standard. If the administration returns to the council without challenging this prejudice, it will be speaking from both sides of its diplomatic mouth when it comes to fighting hatred of Jews.
Even with these initiatives, the council’s key structural challenge remains: the secret ballot election process that allows human rights abusers to sit in judgement of human rights abuses. This systemic problem has only two solutions: changes mandated by the U.N. General Assembly or the establishment of a new group outside the U.N. system composed only of free and democratic states. If Biden makes good on his pledge to host a “global summit for democracy” during his first year in office, reform or displacement of the Human Rights Council should be high on the agenda.
In the meantime, however, the U.S. Congress should stand ready to exercise its oversight prerogative. American taxpayers’ money should not be spent legitimizing a genocide or mainstreaming anti-Semitism. The Biden administration says it can reform the broken Human Rights Council when two presidents tried and failed for years. History suggests otherwise.
*Richard Goldberg is a senior advisor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. He served on Capitol Hill, on the U.S. National Security Council, and as the governor of Illinois’s chief of staff. Follow him on Twitter @rich_goldberg. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

How the National Cyber Director Position Is Going to Work: Frequently Asked Questions
John Costello and RADM (Ret) Mark Montgomery/Lawfare/February 25/2021
The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal 2021 created the Office of the National Cyber Director within the Executive Office of the President. The office will be headed by the United States’s first national cyber director (NCD) and is intended to lead the implementation of national cyber policy and strategy, with a focus on making rapid progress on domestic cybersecurity. The director will serve as the president’s senior adviser for cyber issues.
The creation of the Office of the National Cyber Director comes at a pivotal time in the development of the nation’s cybersecurity and on the heels of one of the most widespread cyber incidents ever inflicted on the country. The nation’s lead cyber agency, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) at the Department of Homeland Security, continues to slowly mature into its crucial role. Still in the midst of the presidential transition, President Biden has begun to organize his staff at the White House, including with the creation of a deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies. While Biden has made it clear that cybersecurity will be a top priority for his administration—and the creation of the new deputy national security adviser is certainly indicative of this—many questions remain. The confluence of these developments and the creation of the Office of the National Cyber Director has led some observers in the administration, the private sector, and the media to pose questions about the nature and role of the new office. The NDAA provides clear descriptions of the office’s several mandates. But questions remain about the motivation for the creation of the office, its authorities and how it relates to other cyber-relevant roles within the White House.
The NCD provision in the NDAA stems from a recommendation by the Cyberspace Solarium Commission, a bipartisan, bicameral commission created by the 2019 NDAA and charged with crafting a new strategic vision for the United States in cyberspace. Here, we provide the commission staff’s answers to these questions in an effort to clarify the commission’s intent in recommending the creation of the Office of the National Cyber Director.
Was the creation of the national cyber director position motivated by the abolishment of the cybersecurity coordinator position in 2018?
Yes and no. Commentators have rightly noted that the creation of the NCD position was motivated partly by former National Security Adviser John Bolton’s abolishment of the cybersecurity coordinator position in 2018, but they tend to overestimate the part Bolton’s move played. Cyber policy experts have long called for a national-level, senior official in the White House to bring coherence and direction to cyber policy, strategy and operations. And Congress has demanded—and continues to demand—accountability and communication from the executive branch on cybersecurity issues. Despite substantial progress by federal departments and agencies, the U.S. government has lacked institutionalized leadership, coordination and a consistent advocate for the appropriate prioritization of cybersecurity in the White House.
To date, the existence of national cyber leadership has been a matter of executive branch policy, not an enduring legislative requirement. The prominence of the role has fluctuated across administrations, with some declining, at times, to fill the position at all. These changes have prevented the persistence and consistency needed to establish enduring policy and strategy. While these issues were cast in stark relief when the Trump administration abolished the position, the fundamental problem is more systemic and long term than any one administration’s actions.
More than anything, the legislative establishment of the position is an affirmative statement from Congress on the need for good governance and effective organization in cybersecurity. The NCD ensures the government’s focus on cybersecurity is a consistent and unified national priority, while also shielding it from bureaucratic turf battles or interest of the president. In this regard, the creation of the Office of the National Cyber Director is not dissimilar to the creation of the Office of Science and Technology Policy in 1976, which was motivated in part by President Nixon’s abolishment of the President’s Science Advisory Committee a few years prior. In both cases, Congress responded by cementing a national priority through its power to organize the executive branch, establishing new positions, and empowering them as best they could.
What will the NCD do?
The NCD role is designed to act as the president’s senior adviser on cybersecurity and associated emerging technology issues, except for Title 10 (offensive) and Title 50 (intelligence) cyber operations and programs. The NCD is intended to focus on implementing the national strategy and policies for cybersecurity, as defined by the National Security Council, and coordinating, supporting, and deconflicting whole-of-nation cybersecurity and defensive cyber efforts led by executive branch agencies and the private sector. The NCD is intended to connect, complement, and strengthen, rather than duplicate, existing organizations and processes. In general terms, the 2021 NDAA confers on the NCD the following functions:
Advise the president. The NCD serves as the principal adviser to the president on cyber policy and strategy implementation relating to cyber defense, and engagement with industry and international partners.
Advise the White House and U.S. government agencies. The NCD provides advice to the National Security Council (NSC), the Homeland Security Council, their staff, and relevant federal departments and agencies.
Lead cyber policy and national cyber strategy implementation across agencies. The NCD assesses agency performance; reviews agency budgets in coordination with the Office of Management and Budget and the NSC; and recommends changes to agency policy, organization, and resources, to include changes to the Federal Information Security Management Act.
Prepare plans for the federal government response to cyberattacks and cyber campaigns. The NCD develops integrated plans, processes, and playbooks that are interoperable across agencies. The NCD also leads departments and agencies in exercising and updating these plans, including coordination of offensive and defensive operations and integration with the private sector.
Lead coordinated response to cyber attacks. The NCD leads preincident coordination and actual incident response by the federal government to cyberattacks and cyber campaigns of significant consequence. The NCD supports the deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies, who is responsible for coordinating the government’s overall response to an incident.
Engage with the private sector and international partners. The NCD leads efforts to coordinate and consult with the private sector and international partners on cybersecurity and emerging technology issues in support of, and in coordination with, the rest of the federal government.
Report to Congress. The NCD reports annually to Congress on cybersecurity issues facing the United States, providing a vehicle for congressional oversight of the overall process.
Issue rules and regulations. The Office of the National Cyber Director promulgates rules and regulations as may be necessary to carry out the functions, powers, and duties vested in the director, an authority that is rare among White House offices. This will be in coordination with the Office of Management and Budget and the new deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies, who has the lead for developing strategy and policy on cyber and integrating it with the broader economic and national security strategies.
Represent the president. The NCD acts as a senior representative on the behalf of the president in any forum, domestic or international, at the direction of the president.
Does the NCD have the authorities and powers necessary to be effective in the role?
No, not through legislation alone. Legislation confers the NCD with functions and responsibilities but few authorities independent of those already vested in the president. This was intentional. Congress, with few exceptions, takes a relatively light touch in dictating how presidents use their advisers—beyond organizing the Executive Office of the President. Importantly, the chief of staff and the national security adviser, the most empowered positions in the Executive Office of the President, derive their influence not from law but from convention and their proximity to the president.
Senate-confirmed positions in the White House like the NCD, such as the U.S. trade representative, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, and the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, straddle a unique line. The positions within the Executive Office of the President are extensions of the president but as separate, Senate-confirmed office-holders with responsibilities and authorities conferred by Congress, they are accountable officials in their own right. Despite these positions being given responsibility by Congress, their effectiveness and ultimate authority beyond what is prescribed in law hinges on their proximity to—and the confidence of—the president they serve. This rings particularly true in the ability of any of these positions to influence policy. The NCD is no exception.
Much of the exact powers and influence of the NCD will need to be defined through executive orders and, over time, convention. This will need to be a priority for the Biden administration, which will need to update existing executive orders such as Presidential Policy Directive-41 (PPD-41), to account for the position and define its role in national security policymaking, budget review, operational coordination and rule-making. These executive orders will be essential in delegating the necessary authorities to make the position effective and consistent with congressional intent.
How will the NCD work with the National Security Council and the national security adviser?
The 2021 NDAA amended the National Security Act of 1947 to allow the NCD to be a participant in the NSC where cybersecurity issues are a substantial topic and to be included in the development of cyber policy, the National Cyber Strategy, and coordinating U.S. government defensive cyber efforts. However, the NCD serves on the NSC Principals Committee at the president’s discretion, much like the director of national intelligence or the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The Biden administration affirmed this status for the NCD in the recently released National Security Memorandum-2 (NSM-2), which renewed and organized the National Security Council system.
The national security adviser is the principal adviser to the president on national security issues, of which cybersecurity is one. As such, national security policy and strategy, including the development of the national cyber strategy and many national cyber policies, will continue to flow through the national security adviser. In this regard, the Biden administration’s decision to create a new deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies is particularly meaningful. This position will lead the development of a national cyber strategy for the national security adviser and the president, and the NCD should provide advice on the formulation of the strategy.
The NCD will also need to work closely with the deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies on the development of cyber policy, as each will have a role in developing policies. In this regard the NCD is intended to play a critical role in working with federal departments and agencies on developing and implementing policies and strategies to make the NSC’s strategic vision a reality.
What role will the NCD have in operational coordination?
The NCD position was established to lead the coordination of integrated response by federal departments and agencies against cyberattacks and cyber campaigns of significant consequence, and to ensure coordination with the private sector in these responses. The NCD’s efforts should include significant preplanning before an incident such as plan and “playbook” development and cross-sector exercises. In this responsibility, the NCD will work across government and the private sector to define priority, risk-based scenarios by which to guide and direct interagency planning efforts. These plans, regularly exercised, will serve to prepare both public- and private-sector partners to shift seamlessly to response and recovery efforts when a major cyber incident occurs. These efforts will no doubt help enable the NCD to serve a critical leadership role in coordinating initial incident response efforts, a chaotic period where visible leadership, clear communication, and a concrete plan-of-action do much to instill order and credibility. This vantage point will also serve to inform the NCD on key areas of critical infrastructure where additional attention is warranted for long-term cyber resilience.
To facilitate this role, the NCD is intended to play a leading role in the Cyber Response Group, the current NSC-led, interagency body authorized under PPD-41. The Cyber Response Group coordinates, plans, and oversees U.S. government responses to cyber incidents and malicious cyber campaigns. Before the position was abolished, the NSC’s cybersecurity coordinator was charged with leading the Cyber Response Group. It was the original intent of the NCD legislation for the president to update PPD-41 and give management of the Cyber Response Group to the NCD. However, given the Biden administration’s creation of the new deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies, it is far more likely the NCD will share responsibility for this interagency body. In any case, given the necessary interplay of offensive and defensive efforts, the NCD and the deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies will need to work closely together, both inside and outside the Cyber Response Group, to ensure a consistent and comprehensive approach to U.S. actions in cyberspace.
What is the NCD’s role in Title 10 and Title 50 operations?
The NCD will have no role in coordinating Title 10 (offensive) and Title 50 (intelligence) operations. That said, the NCD is intended to have visibility into these operations. Given the NCD’s roles in organizing, planning, and coordinating defensive cyber operations and as a representative of the U.S. government in international forums, he or she should at least be aware of any operation that could inadvertently cause retaliation and, to the degree the director is able, preemptively prepare for it. That said, the degree that the NCD will be allowed to weigh in—and at what level—in the planning and coordination process is at the discretion of the president.
Because the president has established the NCD’s position on the NSC Principals Committee, the NCD will likely have some voice on operations if and when they rise to that level of decision-making. Given this, it would be shrewd on the part of the national security adviser to include the NCD or his or her staff early in any decision-making process that would eventually come before the NCD in a Principals Committee meeting to which the director is a part.
What is the NCD’s relationship with the director of CISA? What is the relationship with other departments and agencies?
The NCD is intended to connect, complement, and strengthen, not duplicate, the existing work of departments and agencies. CISA is no exception. CISA will maintain responsibility for the coordination of U.S. government-wide cybersecurity and defense efforts at the operational level; the NCD will focus on the strategic level, namely in the development and implementation of plans, programs and strategy. While CISA has well-established responsibilities, programs, and processes to lead the overall U.S. government-wide cybersecurity effort, the agency is limited in its ability to cajole or persuade other departments and agencies to participate and follow suit—particularly when parochial agency interests run counter to greater integration. Department and agency priorities, policies, programs, and, most importantly, budgets can diverge markedly from CISA’s vision and its conception of a well-coordinated U.S. government effort. The NCD in this capacity will be a useful ally for CISA in ensuring that the agency’s central role in cybersecurity is reinforced and made manifest through programs and execution.
The NCD will also need to manage the varying interests of the interagency, a more perilous balancing act that requires compromise between long-term vision and department and agency priority. National-level strategy and policy implementation in cybersecurity are complex endeavors, one where tension often exists between White House-led top-down design and bottom-up department and agency defense of bureaucratic self-interest. After all, policy and strategy development proceeds by consensus before reaching the president’s desk, and Cabinet members are not inclined to consent to any measure that promises to reduce their role or their organization’s room to maneuver. That said, as part of the president’s ostensible “inner circle,” the NCD position was designed to have sufficient proximity to the president to define a long-term strategy, weigh its trade-offs with bureaucratic interests, and ensure its successful implementation. Managing this tension and navigating the push-and-pull relationship between department and agency principals will be a key factor in the director’s ultimate effectiveness.
What will be the NCD’s role in engagement with the private sector?
In the 2021 NDAA, the NCD is given nominal responsibility for leading coordination and consultation with the private sector on cybersecurity and emerging technology issues. What this looks like in practice, however, is complicated. Even with a full office of 75 personnel, the NCD will lack the bureaucratic strength and existing private-sector relationships to manage or run a full-fledged industry engagement process. Nor would such a thing be desirable. The U.S. government maintains a number of fora for industry engagement on cybersecurity, including those led by the Department of Homeland Security (through CISA) and the Department of Commerce (through the National Institute of Standards and Technology, for example). Adding another player to compete with these efforts, rather than coordinate them, would only further stoke industry frustration and run counter to the type of government integration the NCD is intended to produce. The NCD has a critical role here in establishing the broad elements of national strategy, supporting lines of effort, and, in turn, supporting, enabling, coordinating, and deconflicting department and agency cyber engagements as they execute their roles within that strategy. The national cyber strategy should account for the need to coordinate and bring coherence to U.S. government engagement with the private sector writ large.
That said, the NCD will need to engage directly with the private sector on national-level cyber policy implementation and development of responses to and recovery from cyber incidents. This is a critical piece of why the NCD position was created—to ensure there is a reliable, senior-level official who can, on behalf of the entire U.S. government, act as both a voice and a touchpoint on cyber issues for the public, industry, Congress or otherwise. In this, the NCD will complement, not replace, private-sector engagement led by CISA. CISA, as the executive agent for the Critical Infrastructure Partnership Advisory Council, manages the U.S. government process for cybersecurity and infrastructure security engagement with the private sector. This process runs through sector coordinating councils, which are jointly led by CISA and the relevant department or agency (called the Sector Risk Management Agency) for each of the 16 critical infrastructure sectors. The NCD was designed to lead the implementation of national-level defensive policy and strategy, allowing CISA to focus on plans, operational collaboration, and more tactical and technical issues. Where those issues overlap or merge, the NCD would be well served to leverage the established processes CISA already has in place. In any case, communication and close coordination between the director of CISA and the NCD will be a necessary reality of both positions.
What is the NCD’s role in international engagement?
It is expected that the NCD, in coordination with the national security adviser and the national economic adviser as appropriate, would participate in meetings with international partners on topics of cybersecurity and emerging technologies to implement the National Cyber Strategy and advance the president’s international priorities. The NCD would be expected to coordinate closely with relevant offices within the State Department when participating in international cyber and cybersecurity-related initiatives, international agreements, standards-setting bodies, and capacity-building efforts. The NCD will be included as a participant in preparations for the execution of cybersecurity summits and other international meetings at which cybersecurity or related emerging technologies are a major topic.
Is the NCD subject to Freedom of Information Act requests? Will this impede the director’s ability to do his or her job as an adviser to the president and coordinator on cybersecurity?
Broadly speaking, yes, the NCD is subject to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Andrew Grotto brings up a good point that the new Office of the National Cyber Director will not benefit from FOIA exemptions afforded to the NSC. This is, in broad strokes, accurate, but the framing is misleading. The NSC is not exempted from FOIA by statute, but, as Grotto points out, through a Supreme Court decision. “Because the NSC operates in close proximity to the President … and because the NSC does not exercise substantial independent authority[,]” the Supreme Court concluded that the NSC is not an “agency” for the purposes of FOIA and thus not subject to its requirements. Rightly or wrongly (and the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote a compelling dissent), the same argument could be equally applied to the NCD, who, as noted above, does not enjoy substantial independent authority beyond that delegated by or derived from his or her proximity to the president. Still, it is worth acknowledging that the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, and the Office of National Drug Control Policy—arguably more similar to the Office of the National Cyber Director than the NSC for reasons covered below—are not exempt from FOIA requirements.
It is reasonable to expect that much of the NCD’s work will be exempt from FOIA under one of the law’s nine categories of exemptions. Exemption 1 covers information classified to protect national security. Exemption 4 covers trade secrets or commercial or financial information—a pertinent exemption given the NCD’s expected role in liaising with the private sector. Finally, and most importantly, exemption 5 covers privileged communications between agencies or deliberative, pre-decisional documents. According to the Department of Homeland Security, this “[p]rotects the integrity of the deliberative or policy-making processes within the agency by exempting from mandatory disclosure opinion, conclusions, and recommendations included within inter-agency or intra-agency memoranda or letters.” It is difficult to imagine a scenario in which much of the NCD’s substantive work wouldn’t qualify under this exemption and its subset of executive privilege. The concerns over FOIA undermining the integrity and confidentiality of the president’s deliberative process are overblown. This should not impede the director’s ability to do his or her job.
Does being Senate confirmed impede the NCD’s ability to do his or her job as an adviser to the president and coordinator on cybersecurity?
Andrew Grotto points out rightly that “Senate and House oversight committees consider it a matter of institutional right to have Senate-confirmed officials appear before them.” And it should be expected that the NCD will be called upon routinely to testify before the House and the Senate. It’s worth noting, however, that NSC deliberations include Senate-confirmed positions at the assistant secretary, deputy secretary, undersecretary, and secretary levels at successive stages of the policy process. The same logic of concern that is leveled at the NCD could be applied equally to these positions, which are similarly beholden to Congress. But does the president keep the secretary of defense at arm’s length because he or she can be called to testify before Congress? No. Executive privilege would almost certainly apply.
Does this put the NCD in an uncomfortable position between Congress, which desires to know more, and the president, who prefers to keep deliberations confidential? Certainly. But no more than it does the director of the Office of Management and Budget, the U.S. trade representative, the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, or the director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy. Each of these positions is both Senate confirmed and appointed in the Executive Office of the President. Each is involved, in various degrees, with national security decision-making. And each invokes executive privilege where appropriate and where applicable. It is a space the White House knows how to navigate well.
Will the NCD position require changes?
The NCD was never intended to spring fully formed from the minds of the multi-stakeholder commission that recommended it or the Congress and the pages of statute that gave birth to it. It will take time and considerable effort to find its way among the dynamic environment of the White House and the fray of the interagency. The creation of the deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technologies is a positive development and will need to be accounted for. The NCD is not and likely will not remain static. The president holds preeminence in delegating authority to the position through executive order. And Congress maintains its prerogative to empower the position further and in response to, and support of, how the president manages the position. It is an iterative dynamic that will lend itself well to evolving needs of cybersecurity and the demands of the office.
But the fundamental argument for the establishment of the position remains the same: The U.S. government needs vision, leadership, and unity of effort in cyberspace. This is true irrespective of political party or administration—though the Biden administration is off to a good start. That said, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome. The NCD position changes the institutional dynamic and is a marked step forward in ensuring enduring leadership and accountability. It will need to evolve, certainly, but as it stands the position is a good start. It is up to the Biden administration to make it successful.
**John Costello is the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Intelligence and Security and former Senior Director and Lead, Task Force Two for the Cyberspace Solarium Commission. Mark Montgomery is the senior director for the Center on Cyber and Technology Innovation at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and senior adviser to the Co-Chairmen of the Cyberspace Solarium Commission. Follow Mark on Twitter @MarkCMontgomery. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

Attributing the Erbil Attack: The Role of Open-Source Monitoring
Crispin Smith, Michael Knights, Hamdi Malik/The Washington Institute For Near East Policy/February 25/2021
Even Iran’s proxies now have proxies, but authorities can still untangle and attribute their illegal acts through expanded use of rich open-source evidence.
The February 15 rocket attack on Erbil International Airport was the second such strike on the city and the fourth major rocket attack on coalition facilities in Iraq since September 2020. Following these and other attacks, the propaganda arms of Iran-backed militias have sought to trumpet their successes against the coalition while obfuscating who carried them out. The United States and other coalition partners should therefore invest more effort in forensically linking the online “facade groups” that publicize attacks to major fasail (militias) such as Kataib Hezbollah (KH), Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH), Hezbollah Harakat al-Nujaba, and Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada (KSS). Even using non-classified means, it is possible to generate strong attribution evidence through careful online analysis of each group’s makeup, language, and interactions with one another.
Attributing Erbil Using Online Evidence
The ample open-source evidence surrounding the Erbil attack strongly suggests that it was undertaken and publicized by AAH, potentially with other groups providing assistance. Anonymous media accounts and facade groups have tried to muddy attribution, slow their adversaries’ decisionmaking, and introduce enough uncertainty to make decisive retaliation politically unpalatable. Overall, however, even open-source analysis alone generates a “preponderance of evidence” (the U.S. civil standard of evidence) or a “balance of probabilities” (the British equivalent) that AAH undertook the attack.
Before reviewing this evidence, it is important to define the dramatis personae in the case, since the interconnections between the facade groups and AAH are valuable evidence in their own right. A standout feature of the Erbil attack was the prominent role of three players: Sabereen News, Ashab al-Kahf, and Saraya Awliya al-Dam (the only group to officially claim the attack):
Sabereen. A major militia media channel with 80,000 Telegram subscribers as well as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube accounts, Sabereen has consistently demonstrated a deep affinity with AAH and its leader, Qais al-Khazali. In its first days of operation, it signaled obedience to Khazali with the symbolic phrase “we have answered your call,” and since then it has made more special references to him than to any other militia leaders—an unusual pattern for an Iraqi militia channel. This close connection was demonstrated in November 2020, when Sabereen took AAH’s side in a public quarrel over vigilante violence in Baghdad, spurring KH to distance itself from the channel. A month later, Sabereen led calls for the release of an imprisoned AAH operative, posting “we are Asaib Ahl al-Haq.”
Ashab al-Kahf. The links between this prominent facade group and AAH became evident when militias disagreed over the wisdom of the November 17, 2020, rocket attack on the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. Ashab al-Kahf and AAH supported the strike, while KH officials and media channels criticized it for violating a ceasefire intended to last until the Trump administration left office. Ashab al-Kahf also went further than other militia entities in subordinating itself to Khazali and seeking the release of an AAH prisoner, whereas KH entities (e.g., Unit 10,000 and affiliated channels) were muted on that issue. It is perhaps not a coincidence that one of AAH’s names around the time of its founding as a Sadrist breakaway was “Ashab al-Kahf.”
Saraya Awliya al-Dam. Prior to the Erbil strike, this facade group had only been used to claim four minor roadside bombings of Iraqi convoys carrying coalition materiel. Notably, its statements have always been posted first on Sabereen, and while AAH-affiliated channels have mentioned the group by name many times, prominent KH insider channels have never done so. The group also claimed the August 26, 2020, roadside bombing of a UN World Food Programme vehicle in the exact area from which the September 30 rocketing of Erbil was launched: an AAH stronghold near Bartella in the Nineveh Plains.
In combination with this background knowledge, the facts of the Erbil attack provide persuasive evidence that AAH was responsible:
Foreshadowing by Ashab al-Kahf. At 21:02 hours local time, thirteen minutes before the attack, Ashab al-Kahf posted a statement criticizing the Iraqi Kurdish leadership and threatening that “misery in Erbil is easy to bring about.” The statement was reposted one minute later by Sabereen, with other channels following suit afterward.
Preferential early reporting by Sabereen. At 00.11 hours local time, Sabereen broke the news that Saraya Awliya al-Dam had claimed the attack. One minute later, Sabereen was again first to post the group’s 113-word statement about the attack, before all other militia channels. From then on, Sabereen and other AAH-affiliated channels led the coverage. The following day at 17.33 hours, Sabereen was also the first to post an official statement on the incident branded as Saraya Awliya al-Dam material. That statement, which criticized the United States, Turkey, and Kurdish leaders, was later reposted on the group’s Telegram account. No other group disputed or duplicated these claims, suggesting strong AAH ownership and deconfliction with other Iran-backed militias.
AAH’s involvement should not be surprising, since it closely matches the group’s well-established patterns. As noted above, AAH twice broke the militia truce with the United States by launching rockets at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. Both attacks were heavily criticized by KH, leading to hostile messaging with AAH and a December 31 statement by Ashab al-Kahf that appeared to criticize KH strategy against the coalition and call the group “trembling hypocrites.” AAH also seemed frustrated with Iran’s perceived restraint, firing one rocket at the U.S. embassy at the very same time that Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force chief Esmail Qaani was landing in Iraq for goodwill talks, embarrassing the general.
In the wake of the Erbil attack and a smaller February 22 attack on the U.S. embassy, AAH-affiliated channels resumed their squabbling with KH and other accounts, once again criticizing perceived restraint against the coalition after KH publicly distanced itself from these attacks. This came despite a KH spokesman praising an attack on Saudi Arabia last month, suggesting the group’s outward posture is not one of blanket restraint.
None of this open-source information definitively rules out the possibility that Erbil was a joint operation between AAH and smaller militias such as KSS or Kataib al-Imam Ali, nor does it spell out Iran’s precise level of involvement. Yet it does go far in peeling back the layers of obfuscation, potentially enabling authorities to impose consequences on those involved and, eventually, help victims seek redress for their injuries.
Attribution Means Accountability and Deterrence
There are many downsides when the United States and its partners cannot quickly and accurately attribute attacks to specific perpetrators: the culprits suffer no cost for their action and may conclude they can attack again without fear of retaliation; the United States looks weak, the greatest military force on earth brought low by a handful of online propagandists running Telegram, Twitter, and Facebook channels; and other adversaries in China, Russia, and North Korea take note.
The good news is that U.S. authorities can generate a preponderance of evidence for attribution using open sources and classified intelligence reporting. Although top-secret intelligence (e.g., classified signal intercepts) can provide even clearer proof of enemy actions and intentions, access to such data is limited to certain officials and is very difficult to use in policy or legal contexts for fear of comprising intelligence sources and methods. Moreover, during the COVID-19 pandemic, many U.S. government desk officers have been forced to work from home, where they lack access to classified intelligence and have learned to appreciate the “open-source revolution” of publicly accessible, if hard-to-find, information. U.S. agencies should not fall back into the habit of believing that only highly classified intelligence can provide vital clues in cases like the Erbil attack.
Indeed, to prevent militias from creating a “post-truth” environment where they are not accountable for their terrorist attacks or human rights abuses, relevant authorities in Washington and Europe will need to implement powerful intelligence collection methods that incorporate social media monitoring, artificial intelligence tools, and subject expert analysis. In the Erbil attack, strong evidence points to AAH being the lead perpetrator, but if another militia such as KSS were instead leading, this would pose complex questions about the manner in which media networks like Sabereen and facade groups like Saraya Alwiya al-Dam may be permitted to claim attacks undertaken by more shadowy cells, or may fluctuate in their alignment with different militias.
Extensive evidence gathering is particularly important due to the rising prevalence of offensive and defensive “lawfare.” Knowing that they bear legal responsibility for their actions, Iran-backed militias are now quick to blame the coalition for civilian casualties when rocket attacks go awry, and they have threatened spurious lawsuits against Iraqi and Western entities.
The ability to attribute responsibility is the first step for Iraqi and coalition victims seeking redress for injuries and unlawful deaths caused by militia bombs and rockets. The Iraqi state may bear some liability as well, since groups like AAH and KSS are legally incorporated into the state-funded Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF). Following this logic, residents of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq who were harmed in the February 15 attack could file lawsuits seeking damages against the Iraqi government, as could Baghdad residents hurt by past militia rocket strikes there.
Meanwhile, U.S. citizens harmed by these attacks may be able to recover damages under U.S. laws related to foreign sponsors of terrorism, such as the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA, 1996) and the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA, 2016). Iraq is not currently designated as a state sponsor of terrorism, but Iran is, and Washington has applied terrorism designations to AAH and KH as well. U.S. persons have successfully brought many legal cases against Iran and its proxies, including large monetary judgments against Tehran for illegal AAH acts targeting Americans in Iraq (e.g., the 2018 case Fritz v. Islamic Republic of Iran).
Crispin Smith is an associate at a Washington national security law group; his research focuses on Iraqi security, human rights, and law of armed conflict issues. Michael Knights, the Bernstein Fellow with The Washington Institute, has profiled Iran-backed militias and politicians in Iraq since 2003. Hamdi Malik is an associate fellow with the Institute, specializing in Shia militias.
**Michael Knights is the Boston-based Jill and Jay Bernstein Fellow of The Washington Institute, specializing in the military and security affairs of Iraq, Iran, and the Persian Gulf states.
**Hamdi Malik is a London-based Associate Fellow at The Washington Institute and a Middle East analyst at IITV whose writing on Shia militias has been published by "Al-Monitor," the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and other outlets.

Delusions of Dominance/Biden Can’t Restore American Primacy—and Shouldn’t Try
Stephen Wertheim/Council on Foreign Relations, Inc./January 25, 2021
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/.../delusions-dominance
Four years ago, as Joe Biden prepared to leave the vice-presidency, he told the World Economic Forum that the United States would continue to lead the “liberal international order” and “fulfill our historic responsibility as the indispensable nation.” The years that followed were not kind to Biden’s assurances. President Donald Trump rejected a world-ordering role for the United States, unleashing “America first” nationalism instead. More important, perhaps, Trump exposed the shallow domestic political support for the high-minded abstractions for which foreign policy elites ask soldiers to fight and citizens to pay. By the time of his presidential campaign in 2020, Biden no longer spoke much about the liberal international order or American indispensability. He emphasized healing the country’s domestic wounds and influencing others “not merely by the example of our power, but by the power of our example.”
But Biden will need to be much bolder if his presidency is to succeed. He is inheriting a long-standing U.S. grand strategy that is systemically broken and that no tonal adjustment or policy nuance can fix. For three decades, successive presidents—Trump included—continually expanded U.S. wars, forward deployments, and defense commitments in the pursuit of armed dominance across the globe. The price of primacy, as I wrote in these pages last year (“The Price of Primacy,” March/April 2020), has been severe. By seeking global dominance rather than just its own defense, the United States has acquired a world of antagonists. These antagonists have in turn further increased the costs and dangers of dominance. As a result, U.S. foreign policy has failed in its most essential purpose: it has made the American people less safe where they live.
The Biden administration enters office intending to restore American primacy, not preside over its destruction. Yet realities will intrude. As Biden addresses urgent priorities in his early days—repairing democracy at home, ending a mass-killing pandemic, averting climate chaos, rescuing U.S. diplomacy—he will find, if he takes a hard look, that the burdens of primacy contradict his own goals at every turn.
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BREAKING THE CYCLE
Biden has immediate decisions to make that will either set him on a constructive course or ensnare him in the same way, over the very same issues, as his predecessors. He has pledged to bring the United States’ “forever wars” to an end and enhance diplomacy in the greater Middle East. In his first hundred days, he will have two time-limited opportunities to do so. First, he can revive the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and reverse the pressure toward war ahead of Iran’s presidential elections in June. Second, he can abide by the Doha Agreement with the Taliban and withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by May. On both, he will have to go big or see his efforts fail later.
Getting back into the nuclear deal will not be easy after the Trump administration senselessly punished Iran for holding up its end of the bargain. But Biden will require even more discipline and creativity in order to make the strategic changes needed for the deal to endure. The Obama administration suffered from excessive modesty when it concluded the agreement in 2015. To domestic audiences, it maintained that Iran remained a major threat to the United States. In the Middle East, it compensated Iran’s foes with aid, arms sales, and support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen. These allowances made sense if the goal was to maintain U.S. military dominance of the Middle East. But they also fueled the forces that led the United States to leave the nuclear deal under Trump.
The Biden administration must learn the right lesson. Not only should it come back into compliance with the agreement immediately, eschewing any temptation to use Trump’s sanctions as leverage, but it should unapologetically pursue a new era of normal diplomatic relations with Iran. Rather than reward U.S. partners in the region, Biden should fulfill his pledge to terminate U.S. support for Saudi intervention in Yemen, slash arms sales to the kingdom, and cut aid to Israel. Such measures are simply what is required to rescue American diplomacy in the Middle East. By the same stroke, however, the Biden administration would change U.S. grand strategy in the region, disentangling the United States from its excessive identification with one constellation of actors against the other.
Biden is inheriting a long-standing U.S. grand strategy that is systemically broken.
Afghanistan offers another early opportunity for Biden to make rapid and lasting improvements. The Trump administration has handed him a mere 2,500 ground troops in the country and an agreement to withdraw the rest. Biden should accept the unwitting favor. His best chance to end the United States’ war in Afghanistan is now. He should order a full military withdrawal, scrapping his campaign plan to leave behind a residual counterterrorism force. Such a force is unnecessary to deter terrorist attacks emanating from Afghanistan, where the United States long ago achieved its mission of decimating al Qaeda and punishing the Taliban. Now, moreover, failing to withdraw fully would abrogate the U.S.-Taliban deal that Biden has inherited, causing the Taliban to abandon talks and pursue further gains on the battlefield.
Some U.S. officials will no doubt disagree, arguing for delaying withdrawal to allow more time for the parties within Afghanistan to negotiate a final settlement. But such negotiations can take place without U.S. forces, whose presence might even impede Afghans from finding a stable balance of their own. For the United States, half measures will perpetuate endless war. If Biden starts moving back the goalposts for withdrawal, he will embolden domestic critics to argue, in effect, that U.S. forces must remain under any circumstances, whether to preserve hard-won gains or to forestall further losses.
A NEW STRATEGIC LOGIC
If Biden acts decisively, he will emerge from his first six months having broken the grip of the old strategic logic and established proof of concept of a new one that puts the identifiable interests of the American people ahead of the futile quest for global dominance. As he engages diplomatically with Iran and ends the United States’ war in Afghanistan, Biden will face predictable accusations of abandoning U.S. partners and emboldening U.S. adversaries. For example, H. R. McMaster, Trump’s former national security adviser, has contended that pulling back U.S. forces would fail to tame bad behavior by Iran, the Taliban, and others.
Biden can use the bully pulpit to show how badly such arguments miss the point. The point is not to transform Iran or the Taliban into benevolent actors; it is rather to render them no longer threats to and problems for the United States. Iran will continue malign activities in the Middle East, and the Taliban will remain repressive, but they would have little to gain by targeting the United States if the United States were to stop attempting to control events in their neighborhood. By jettisoning grandiose objectives, the United States can shed unnecessary enemies and free itself to advance its interests. It can regain control over its foreign policy.
After scoring early successes in the greater Middle East, the administration could then apply its strategic logic elsewhere: step back from the frontlines to reduce the United States’ liabilities and make the gains that matter. North Korea presents a prime example. Having failed in every attempt to rid the regime of nuclear weapons, the United States should play a different game. It should accept that the regime will possess a nuclear capability for the foreseeable future, encourage peace building on the peninsula, and move to normalize relations. One day it might even be able to remove U.S. troops from the South. Such action is the best way to address the North’s threat—not by defusing all its bombs but by removing potential reasons for them to target the United States.
If Biden acts decisively, he will emerge from his first six months having broken the grip of the old strategic logic.
It will be more difficult for the Biden administration to exhibit restraint in relations with Russia and especially China. It will also be more important, lest the failures of U.S. policy that have afflicted the Middle East over the past two decades expand to Europe and East Asia in the next two decades. Biden has already signaled a desire to work with Beijing on public health and the environment and with Moscow on arms control. But these laudatory aims will ultimately be overwhelmed by rigid adherence to grand-strategic primacy, by which the United States, seeking to dominate each region permanently, fuels intense security competition with rising or assertive powers.
Biden can set clear priorities early by scrapping the last administration’s self-fulfilling construct of “great-power competition.” His first National Security Strategy should recognize that pandemic disease and climate change constitute far more direct threats to the American public than does the specter of armed attack by rival states. Further, it should highlight that China, as the world’s number two power and the leading producer of low-carbon energy technologies, remains an essential partner in addressing both challenges.
In order to limit antagonisms counterproductive to U.S. interests, Biden should resist growing calls to commit explicitly to waging war with China to defend Taiwan. He should proceed to revamp U.S. military strategy in East Asia. Rather than exercise dominance, the United States should equip its allies and partners to deny dominance of waterways and airspace to China. In Europe, he should call a halt to NATO enlargement, breaking with three decades of expansion that saddled the United States with unwarranted commitments, damaged relations with Russia, and stifled European initiative. Through prudent retrenchment, the United States can coexist with China and Russia and find the right mix of competition and cooperation as U.S. interests dictate. The alternative is to spend the rest of the twenty-first century guaranteeing conflictual relations, risking great-power war, and crowding out domestic investments.
DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA
The United States faces existential challenges at home, as Biden appreciates. His national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, has pledged to judge each policy “by a basic question: Will this make life better, easier, safer, for families across this country?” The American people need every part of their government to work to improve their lives and strengthen their democracy. A grand strategy of armed primacy does the opposite. It sustains animosity with the world, whips up fears of foreigners and supposed internal enemies, and lavishes more than half of federal discretionary spending on the Pentagon year after year. It straitjackets domestic renewal.
For the same reason, Biden has a surprising opportunity. He would foster national unity by pulling back U.S. forces abroad. Fully two-thirds of veterans, like the wider public, support bringing all U.S. troops home from Afghanistan and Iraq. It is finally time to deliver on the public’s demand to do less nation building abroad and more building in America. The United States remains an indispensable nation—to its people. Only by serving them can it play a responsible role in the world.
STEPHEN WERTHEIM is Deputy Director of Research and Policy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and a Research Scholar at the Arnold A. Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia
©2021 Council on Foreign Relations, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
 

Biden: It's Okay to Finance China's Military
Gordon G. Chang/Gatestone Institute/February 25/2021
Wall Street wants to finance the enemy, and the Biden administration is opening the door wide.... Beijing views the U.S. financial community as its channel to influence the highest levels of the American political system.
"It would be a tragic mistake for the new administration to postpone, dilute, or otherwise eviscerate implementation of the key provisions of Executive Order 13959. Doing so would only serve to enrich Wall Street and Beijing at the expense of American security, fundamental values, and investor protection." — Roger Robinson, chairman of the Prague Securities Studies Institute, interview with Gatestone.
The People's Republic of China is a unified state, so the investment ban should apply not only to companies the Trump administration designated but also to all state-owned enterprises. State enterprises are by no means separate businesses. The divisions among them are artificial, and all are tightly controlled by the Communist Party. Each one of these entities, therefore, is military-linked and Party-controlled.
China's Military-Civil Fusion means the People's Liberation Army "has the right to raid any non-military Chinese company for any technology it decides could advance its military strength." — Richard Fisher, of the International Assessment and Strategy Center, interview with Gatestone
The Biden administration is allowing Wall Street to use the cash of "scores of millions, up to 160 million Americans" to "fund ICBMs targeting their families, to fund concentration camps in Xinjiang." Most Americans will have no idea their retirement and other savings are being used to finance their own destruction.... financing China's war on America.
Wall Street wants to finance the enemy, and the Biden administration is opening the door wide.
How can this be?
On January 26, the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control issued General License No. 1A, which permits Americans to continue acquiring shares in certain companies associated with "Communist Chinese Military Companies," known as CCMCs, until May 27. The previous deadline, set by the Trump administration, was January 28.
The General License delayed a portion of the application of President Trump's landmark Executive Order 13959, issued November 12, 2020.
EO13959 stopped investors, subject to wind-down provisions, from purchasing or possessing shares in any company designated a CCMC. In short, Trump ordered Americans to stop financing China's military, the People's Liberation Army.
There are now 44 companies designated as off-limits to investment, including Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., China's leading chipmaker, and China National Offshore Oil Corporation.
The best minds in America did not know how to apply EO13959, which is why Trump amended it on January 13 by issuing another executive order. Moreover, the Office of Foreign Assets Control has issued at least 15 explanations in the form of Frequently Asked Questions.
Some argue that Biden's General License No. 1A is merely one more clarification. Yet in essence, it guts EO13959, allowing investment into dozens of companies that should be off-limits.
The Biden administration, therefore, caved. Wall Street had fiercely opposed Trump's executive order and now has additional time to work for its repeal.
"It would be a tragic mistake for the new administration to postpone, dilute, or otherwise eviscerate implementation of the key provisions of Executive Order 13959," Roger Robinson, chairman of the Prague Securities Studies Institute, told Gatestone. "Doing so would only serve to enrich Wall Street and Beijing at the expense of American security, fundamental values, and investor protection."
Robinson, also a former chairman of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, is right. Beijing views the U.S. financial community as its channel to influence the highest levels of the American political system.
Di Dongsheng of Beijing's Renmin University, in a widely publicized November 28 event in China, spoke about how Chinese leaders had in the past used Wall Street — "the core power of the United States" as he put it — to tell American presidents what to do. Di also said that the link had been broken during the Trump years and that Beijing was looking forward to reestablishing the Wall Street channel to the then-upcoming Biden administration.
It is now time to break the Beijing-Wall Street-White House connection for good. Ultimately, Americans should not be allowed to invest in any Chinese business, whether or not now formally designated as a Communist Chinese Military Company.
The People's Republic of China is a unified state, so the investment ban should apply not only to companies the Trump administration designated but also to all state-owned enterprises. State enterprises are by no means separate businesses. The divisions among them are artificial, and all are tightly controlled by the Communist Party. Each one of these entities, therefore, is military-linked and Party-controlled.
Moreover, America's investment ban should apply to privately owned businesses. As President Trump wrote in the preamble to EO13959, "the national strategy of Military-Civil Fusion" means that the party-state compels private companies to support the "military, intelligence, and security apparatuses and aid in their development and modernization."
As Richard Fisher of the International Assessment and Strategy Center told Gatestone, China's Military-Civil Fusion means the People's Liberation Army "has the right to raid any non-military Chinese company for any technology it decides could advance its military strength."
Money is fungible. Every dollar that goes into a Chinese enterprise, whether state or private, enriches a regime that has declared a "people's war" on the United States. Therefore, every company should be off-limits to investment from Americans.
The Biden administration is allowing Wall Street to use the cash of "scores of millions, up to 160 million Americans" to "fund ICBMs targeting their families, to fund concentration camps in Xinjiang." Most Americans will have no idea their retirement and other savings are being used to finance their own destruction.
Wall Street, with the help of its friend at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, is financing China's war on America.
*Gordon G. Chang is the author of The Coming Collapse of China, a Gatestone Institute Distinguished Senior Fellow, and a member of its Advisory Board.
© 2021 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.

Muslim Life in 2021, as Predicted in 1921
Daniel Pipes/Gatestone Institute/February 25/ 2021
The Muslim world "sunk to the lowest depth of its decrepitude" in the eighteenth century; "the life had apparently gone out of Islam, leaving naught but a dry husk of soulless ritual and degrading superstition behind." Meanwhile, Europe discovered ocean routes, established economic hegemony, and exploited its power as "mistress of the world" to indulge in "recklessly imperialistic policies." Its conquests of Muslim-majority lands prompted a massive "flood of mingled despair and rage" against the West.
The "great Mohammedan Revival" began with the Wahhabis in eighteenth-century Arabia and entailed a "profound ferment" and a "stirring to new ideas, new impulses, new aspirations. A gigantic transformation is taking place whose results must affect all mankind." This process was well underway by 1921: "The world of Islam, mentally and spiritually quiescent for almost a thousand years, is once more astir, once more on the march."
The "great Mohammedan Revival" began with the Wahhabis in eighteenth-century Arabia and entailed a "profound ferment" and a "stirring to new ideas, new impulses, new aspirations. A gigantic transformation is taking place whose results must affect all mankind." This process was well underway by 1921: "The world of Islam, mentally and spiritually quiescent for almost a thousand years, is once more astir, once more on the march."
Do not try to reduce causation to interests. Beliefs and passions count at least as much.
Lothrop Stoddard's prescient 1921 study, The New World of Islam, saw the shape of what was to come. He correctly understood Islam as the permanent force it is. This remains an excellent lesson for today's analysts. Do not try to reduce causation to interests. Beliefs and passions count at least as much. Pictured: A Moroccan coin from 1921. (Image source: iStock)
When Lothrop Stoddard (1883-1950) is still recalled, it is as a prominent racist who had a major but malign influence on the budding field of international relations, who acted as theoretician for the Ku Klux Klan, and who contributed the concept of Untermensch (sub-human) to the Nazis.
Stoddard, however enjoyed a high and favorable profile during the 1920s. He had earned a Ph.D. in history from Harvard University and traveled widely. President Warren Harding praised him, and F. Scott Fitzgerald obliquely referenced him in The Great Gatsby.
Stoddard also wrote a prescient 1921 study, The New World of Islam, a survey of 250 million Muslims "from Morocco to China and from Turkestan to the Congo." Despite his consuming racism, Stoddard impressively recognized trends underway in Islam. As Ian Frazier observed in the New Yorker, "Whatever his philosophy and methods, his guesses sometimes proved out."
His book had a substantial impact on public opinion, including on such notable figures as the German strategist Karl Haushofer, the Lebanese pan-Islamist Chekib Arslan, the Indian scholar S. Khuda Bukhsh, and Indonesia's President Soekarno. So, despite Stoddard's well-deserved ignominy, his New World of Islam is well worthy of scrutiny on its centenary.
Stoddard wrote at a moment when Muslim power and wealth were at their nadir: 1½ centuries of Western territorial expansion, 1764-1919, had just ended, leaving about 95 percent of Muslims under non-Muslim overlords. Independence movements were just beginning. Middle East oil had yet to be discovered. It was also the moment when, thanks to the catastrophe of World War I and the profound self-doubt it prompted, Europe's prestige and influence began a steep, century-long decline.
Stoddard calls the initial rise of Islam "perhaps the most amazing event in human history" and (consonant with his racist outlook) praises its progress so long as Arabs led the way but condemns its backwardness under the rule of "dull-witted" Turks. As "the refined, easygoing Saracen gave place to the bigoted, brutal Turk, ... chauvinist reactionaries" took over. The Muslim world "sunk to the lowest depth of its decrepitude" in the eighteenth century; "the life had apparently gone out of Islam, leaving naught but a dry husk of soulless ritual and degrading superstition behind."
Meanwhile, Europe discovered ocean routes, established economic hegemony, and exploited its power as "mistress of the world" to indulge in "recklessly imperialistic policies." Its conquests of Muslim-majority lands prompted a massive "flood of mingled despair and rage" against the West. This response then fashioned the new world of Islam in Stoddard's title. The "great Mohammedan Revival" began with the Wahhabis in eighteenth-century Arabia and entailed a "profound ferment" and a "stirring to new ideas, new impulses, new aspirations. A gigantic transformation is taking place whose results must affect all mankind." This process was well underway by 1921: "The world of Islam, mentally and spiritually quiescent for almost a thousand years, is once more astir, once more on the march."
In part, this march means modernizing, that is transplanting "Western ideas and methods" to Muslim-majority countries. In part, it means expanding: "everywhere except in Europe, Islam began once more advancing portentously along all its far-flung frontiers." In part, it means pursuing pan-Islamic ambitions to unify Muslims under a single ruler, the caliph.
Western influence created profound tumult: "Fathers do not understand sons; sons despise their fathers." Stoddard accurately anticipated that "a generation (perhaps a decade) hence may see most of the Near and Middle East autonomous or even independent."
He offers contradictory predictions. Writing just as the Muslim liberal age began shuddering to a close, he over-optimistically foresees the probable "ultimate triumph of the liberals." More accurately, he expects that what he calls pan-Islamic nationalism (and what today we call Islamism) may "become a major factor which will have to be seriously reckoned with" because of its deeply anti-Western outlook.
Thus did the infamous Stoddard see the shape of what was to come, 55 years before it was recognized in 1976 by Bernard Lewis. Stoddard could do so because, at a time of rampant philosophical materialism and economic determinism, he took ideas seriously, even religious ones. He correctly understood Islam as the permanent force it is.
That remains an excellent lesson for today's analysts. Do not try to reduce causation to interests. Beliefs and passions count at least as much. Let us see how your – and my – analysis holds up in 2121.
Mr. Pipes (DanielPipes.org, @DanielPipes) is president of the Middle East Forum. © 2021 by Daniel Pipes. All rights reserved.
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© 2021 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.