Author Archives: News Sources

Petraeus returns to Iraq

Retired General David Petraeus, who commanded U.S. troops during the 2007-2008 surge, was back in Iraq last week for the first time in more than three years.

In his most expansive comments yet on the latest crisis in Iraq and Syria, he answered written questions from The Washington Post’s Liz Sly:

I would argue that the foremost threat to Iraq’s long-term stability and the broader regional equilibrium is not the Islamic State; rather, it is Shiite militias, many backed by — and some guided by — Iran.

These militia returned to the streets of Iraq in response to a fatwa by Shia leader Grand Ayatollah Sistani at a moment of extreme danger. And they prevented the Islamic State from continuing its offensive into Baghdad. Nonetheless, they have, in some cases, cleared not only Sunni extremists but also Sunni civilians and committed atrocities against them. Thus, they have, to a degree, been both part of Iraq’s salvation but also the most serious threat to the all-important effort of once again getting the Sunni Arab population in Iraq to feel that it has a stake in the success of Iraq rather than a stake in its failure. Longer term, Iranian-backed Shia militia could emerge as the preeminent power in the country, one that is outside the control of the government and instead answerable to Tehran.

Beyond Iraq, I am also profoundly worried about the continuing meltdown of Syria, which is a geopolitical Chernobyl. Until it is capped, it is going to continue to spew radioactive instability and extremist ideology over the entire region.

Any strategy to stabilize the region thus needs to take into account the challenges in both Iraq and Syria. It is not sufficient to say that we’ll figure them out later.

What went wrong in Iraq?

There was certainly a sense in Washington that Iraq should be put in our rearview mirror, that whatever happened here was somewhat peripheral to our national security and that we could afford to redirect our attention to more important challenges. Much of this sentiment was very understandable given the enormous cost of our efforts in Iraq and the endless frustrations that our endeavor here encountered.

In retrospect, a similar attitude existed with respect to the civil war in Syria — again, a sense that developments in Syria constituted a horrible tragedy to be sure, but a tragedy at the outset, at least, that did not seem to pose a threat to our national security.

But in hindsight, few, I suspect, would contend that our approach was what it might — or should — have been. In fact, if there is one lesson that I hope we’ve learned from the past few years, it is that there is a linkage between the internal conditions of countries in the Middle East and our own vital security interests.

The current Iranian regime is not our ally in the Middle East. It is ultimately part of the problem, not the solution. The more the Iranians are seen to be dominating the region, the more it is going to inflame Sunni radicalism and fuel the rise of groups like the Islamic State. While the U.S. and Iran may have convergent interests in the defeat of Daesh, our interests generally diverge. The Iranian response to the open hand offered by the U.S. has not been encouraging.

Iranian power in the Middle East is thus a double problem. It is foremost problematic because it is deeply hostile to us and our friends. But it is also dangerous because, the more it is felt, the more it sets off reactions that are also harmful to our interests — Sunni radicalism and, if we aren’t careful, the prospect of nuclear proliferation as well.

You have had some interactions with Qassem Soleimani in the past. Could you tell us about those?

In the spring of 2008, Iraqi and coalition forces engaged in what emerged as a decisive battle between the Iraqi Security Forces and the Iranian-supported Shiite militias.

In the midst of the fight, I received word from a very senior Iraqi official that Qassem Soleimani had given him a message for me. When I met with the senior Iraqi, he conveyed the message: “General Petraeus, you should be aware that I, Qassem Soleimani, control Iran’s policy for Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, and Afghanistan.” The point was clear: He owned the policy and the region, and I should deal with him.

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ISIS using IEDs in staggering numbers across Iraq

Mike Giglio reports: ISIS is using improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, in staggering numbers across its fronts in Iraq. Experts say the weapon has never been used on this scale before — it is “unprecedented,” says Jonah Leff of the arms-tracking firm Conflict Armament Research, and “a revolution in their use and deployment.”

IEDs were the weapon of choice for Iraqi insurgents during the U.S. occupation — and their use by ISIS now is playing a crucial role as the war against them reaches a pivotal moment in Iraq. While U.S. warplanes pound the militants, they face multipronged assaults from local forces: the Kurds, Iraqi troops, and Iran-backed militia. New offensives countrywide have been billed as preludes to a battle for the northern city of Mosul, the prize of ISIS’s summer onslaught and the Iraqi heart of its self-styled caliphate.

The offensives span from Kirkuk in the north to the edge of Anbar province west of Baghdad and the city of Tikrit, where some 20,000 militia and Iraqi soldiers are engaged in the largest operation against ISIS to date. All have slowed amid the havoc wreaked by IEDs. Fighters from each of the forces battling ISIS say that — like U.S. troops before them — they suffer most of their casualties from the bombs. [Continue reading…]

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Iraq’s top Shi’ite cleric urges more professionalism in fight against ISIS

Reuters reports: Iraq’s most important Shi’ite religious leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, called on Friday for greater professionalism and planning by government forces and allied militias in fighting Islamic State insurgents.

Sistani, who speaks for millions of Iraqis and has a worldwide following, also urged greater participation of Sunni residents in Islamic State-controlled areas of Salahuddin and Anbar provinces in the fight.

In Salahuddin, Iraqi security forces and mainly Shi’ite militia are fighting to dislodge the insurgents from Saddam Hussein’s hometown, Tikrit, which they overran last summer.

Some local Sunni tribes are supporting the efforts to retake Tikrit, where government and allied forces have not made any advances since last Friday. [Continue reading…]

Nancy A. Youssef adds: Iraqi politicians and military commanders have said repeatedly the self-proclaimed Islamic State’s grip on the city of Tikrit was about to end in the face of an overwhelming Iraqi military and militia offensive.

Just last week, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al Abadi reportedly declared that victory was near and “achieved totally by Iraqi hands.” And in an interview with ABC’s This Week that aired March 8, the prime minister said the forces’ advances were “ahead of planning.”

But two Pentagon officials told The Daily Beast on Thursday that the fall of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s hometown was at least two weeks away, as the campaign now is “stalled.” As Army Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman, told reporters Thursday, the Iraqi forces have not yet reached the center of the city. [Continue reading…]

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Iran nuclear talks lag, with status of new centrifuges another hurdle

The New York Times reports: A dispute over what limits should be placed on the development of new types of centrifuges has emerged as a major obstacle as negotiators try to work out an initial accord on Iran’s nuclear program, Western officials said on Thursday.

The negotiators’ goal has been to agree on the outlines of an accord by the end of March that would limit Iran’s nuclear program. A detailed and comprehensive agreement is to be completed by the end of June.

Secretary of State John Kerry told reporters on Thursday that while some progress had been made, the negotiators were still “pushing some tough issues.”

A European negotiator, who asked not to be named while discussing closed talks, was more skeptical, stressing that an accord would not be possible unless the Iranians showed significantly more flexibility over the coming days.

“We are not close to an agreement,” the official said. “We are not there at all.”

Western officials have suggested in recent weeks that the agreement six world powers are negotiating with Iran could allow it to retain and operate about 6,000 centrifuges. [Continue reading…]

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PM dismisses ‘French Patriot Act’ fears as spies get more powers

Reuters reports: French spy agencies will have more powers to bug and track would-be Islamist attackers and authorities will be able to force Internet providers to monitor suspicious behavior under a draft law unveiled on Thursday.

Just over two months after 17 people were killed in attacks by homegrown Islamist gunmen in Paris, Prime Minister Manuel Valls unveiled a bill to allow spy agencies to tap phones and emails without seeking permission from a judge.

Surveillance staff will also be able to bug suspects’ flats with microphones and cameras and add “keyloggers” to their computers to track every keystroke.

Civil liberties advocates said the bill went too far and lacked adequate privacy protections but Valls pledged France would not hoover up vast quantities of data under the new law. [Continue reading…]

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Bardo Museum attack in Tunis

The New York Times reports: The massacre of tourists on Wednesday, scholars said, was in some ways a throwback to the tactics that older militant groups had relied on in the 1980s and ’90s. But the attack also comes at a time when some Islamist militants elsewhere, most notably in Egypt, are gravitating to the idea that economic interests may be a vulnerable point they can exploit to destabilize governments.

A statement about the attack posted by the Afriqiyah Media, a jihadi forum often used by Uqba bin Nafa, a Tunisian group linked to Al Qaeda, even included graphs and price charts to show the economic pain the museum assault had already inflicted.

Celebrating “the sharp collapse of the Tunisian markets after a simple operation involving only two individuals,” the statement asked: “What do you think would happen if an organized attack happened, and simultaneously on several military, vital, and tourist targets?”

Some analysts said they saw an ominous trend. “The shooting spree tactic is really catching on, and that is going to be a huge headache for security services around the world,” said Will McCants, a scholar of Islamist militancy at the Brookings Institution, noting the similarities with recent attacks on the Canadian Parliament and Charlie Hebdo.

Brian Fishman, a researcher at the New America Foundation in Washington, said he, too, foresaw more low-tech assaults, “because these attacks are easy.”

Tunisian officials said Thursday that they had not yet found evidence tying either of the two gunmen to any known terrorist group. Both men were killed by security forces in a gunfight at the museum, and the authorities identified them as Yassine Laabidi and Hatem Khachnaoui, both Tunisian. [Continue reading…]

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The virtual significance of Boko Haram’s pledge of allegiance to ISIS

By Terje Ostebo, University of Florida

The Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram’s recent pledge of allegiance to ISIS has generated a wave of speculation about its significance.

ISIS’s response was to release an audio tape purporting to welcome the pledge. In the rest of the world one dominant view is that ISIS and the jihadi front is spreading and becoming more organized, which, in turn, has spurred the US government to consider expanding its military actions to include ISIS affiliates.

There are, however, good reasons not to read too much into the Boko Haram pledge. It is probable that it will have little or no real practical significance, beyond the initial public relations bump.

Boko Haram under pressure

The pledge of allegiance (Arabic: bayat) by Boko Haram’s leader Abubakar Shekau on March 7 was made in an audio-message, in which the organization expresses its support for ISIS.

The announcement was hardly surprising; Boko Haram had been for some time praising ISIS’s actions. Also, the pledge comes at the time when Boko Haram is under much pressure. The recent coordinated offensive by the Chadian, Cameroonian and Nigerian armies has taken its toll on the organization. The pledge could possibly be seen as an act of desperation.

It is, however, doubtful if the pledge will turn any tide, and it is unlikely that the announced cooperation between Boko Haram and ISIS would mean much – in practical terms – to either party.

The Somali organization al-Shabaab made a similar pledge to al-Qaida in 2012 without having any practical implications.

It is unlikely that ISIS will provide Boko Haram with fighters and arms. Boko Haram has, in fact, been critical of “Arab” involvement in its activities in Nigeria. Foreign fighters are not flocking to Nigeria as they are to ISIS-held areas. Nor is it likely that Boko Haram will provide soldiers to ISIS. It might mean infusion of funds from ISIS, but also that is uncertain.

Boko Haram and ISIS are rooted in different localities

Keep in mind that both organizations – even if they claim to represent something global – reflect their respective localities.

Boko Haram has its specific history and ethnic particularity and is geographically confined to northeast Nigeria. It has been haunted by internal divisions, and there are many questions as to how strong and coherent the current leadership is. Thus it is doubtful that the recent pledge will mean that Boko Haram would submit to the will of ISIS, take orders from Bagdadi, and view itself as a branch of ISIS.

This situation relates to the larger issue of constant fragmentation among militant Islamic groups.

The rise of ISIS has created tensions within the jihadi camp, with al-Qaida going against ISIS, and rifts developing between ISIS and Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi – the main jihadi ideologist associated with ISIS’s forerunner, al-Qaida in Iraq.

Boko Haram is itself a coalition of various factions, and it is unclear how strong this alliance actually is. While affiliating itself with ISIS, Boko Haram has at the same time not distanced itself from al-Qaida.

Everyone wants to be a caliph

A pattern of disintegration seems to be at play: exclusive ideologies coupled with violent struggles are empowering to individuals.

When groups under the leadership of strong personalities experience success they create momentum and leadership. Everyone, basically, wants to be a caliph or spiritual leader.

Just as al-Shabaab’s pledge to al-Qaida and its push beyond the confines of Somalia produced conflicts within that organization, Boko Haram’s pledge to ISIS may possibly spur further internal tensions.

The US and other Western powers should, therefore, be careful not to interpret the pledge as yet another sign of a more solidified front. While there obviously is an urgent need to reduce the human suffering caused by these organizations, there is a similar need to maintain a realistic view of the situation, to avoid exaggerating the threat scenarios, and to apply strategies that reduce the risk of political collateral damage.

It is also important to note the format of the pledge – an audio-message posted online. This is in clear contrast to how such pledges traditionally were done, when individuals or groups declared their allegiance in real time and space.

Boko Haram’s pledge obviously has an important symbolic meaning, but there is a noncommittal flavor to it. It says what it says, but that’s not necessarily binding for either party.

In a world with constant flows of messaging, including the posting of online fatwas (legal rulings) and jihadi propaganda videos, let’s not forget the ephemeral nature of such messages. Yesterday’s postings are forgotten and substituted by today’s postings.

Boko Haram’s pledge of allegiance to ISIS can therefore for practical reasons remain what it is: virtual.

The Conversation

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The CIA just declassified the document that supposedly justified the Iraq invasion

Jason Leopold reports: Thirteen years ago, the intelligence community concluded in a 93-page classified document used to justify the invasion of Iraq that it lacked “specific information” on “many key aspects” of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs.

But that’s not what top Bush administration officials said during their campaign to sell the war to the American public. Those officials, citing the same classified document, asserted with no uncertainty that Iraq was actively pursuing nuclear weapons, concealing a vast chemical and biological weapons arsenal, and posing an immediate and grave threat to US national security.

Congress eventually concluded that the Bush administration had “overstated” its dire warnings about the Iraqi threat, and that the administration’s claims about Iraq’s WMD program were “not supported by the underlying intelligence reporting.” But that underlying intelligence reporting — contained in the so-called National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that was used to justify the invasion — has remained shrouded in mystery until now. [Continue reading…]

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Does Pope Francis say too much?

Paul Vallely writes: It was conservatives in the church who were first most disconcerted. They bemoaned the “lamentable fuzziness” in his extemporaneity. One called him “the blabbermouth pope”. The conservative moral philosopher Germain Grisez – a man immensely respectful of popes in the past – accused Francis of talking in public as he might “unburden himself with friends after a good dinner and plenty of wine”. The arch-traditionalist Cardinal Raymond Burke, whom Francis sacked last year as the Vatican’s top judge, has accused him of causing confusion among the faithful.

More recently liberals got a dose of the same medicine when Pope Francis defended the official Catholic ban on contraception. He called Pope Paul VI who upheld it, in Humanae Vitae, a prophetic genius. In the Philippines in January Francis departed from his official text to repeat that. But then, on the plane home, he glossed that with a series of statements which went off in all directions like a theological firecracker.

Catholics should not breed “like rabbits” but should exercise “responsible parenthood”. Population experts said that three was the ideal size for a family, he told airborne reporters, and announced that he had “rebuked” a woman who had “irresponsibly” had eight children by caesarean section. Again aides had to put out a statement afterwards saying Francis thought big families were “a gift from God”; after the Italian association of large families complained to the Vatican.

What did all that mean? Was the pope trying to say something to please everyone and pleasing no one in the process? Was he thinking, to quote Pope John XXIII, “I have to be pope both for those with their foot on the accelerator and those with their foot on the brake”? One thing was clear in all the contradiction. This was a perspective from the pastoral south rather than the philosophical north. What particularly irked the Argentinian pope was what he called neo-Malthusian assumptions by rich nations that the way to eliminate poverty was to eliminate poor people. [Continue reading…]

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Growing skepticism about whether Israel and the U.S. genuinely have ‘shared values’

McClatchy reports: For years, American politicians have waxed poetic about the “shared values” of the United States and Israel – ideals that typically aren’t spelled out but usually are taken to mean the basic tenets of Western democracy.

That time-worn phrase came under scrutiny this week in the aftermath of a particularly ugly Israeli election. Some Americans, both Jews and non-Jews, have questioned what the common threads are as Israeli provocations force the Obama administration into the uncomfortable role of having to publicly rebuke an ironclad ally.

In the past several weeks, Americans have seen Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu undermine their president before Congress over differences on Iran, use anti-Arab language about his own citizens, and jettison the two-state framework that international powers have agreed for years is the best way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Meanwhile, the Israeli foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, made headlines this month by saying that any Arab Israeli who isn’t sufficiently loyal to Israel should take an ax to the head.

“Can you imagine a foreign minister anywhere else in the world saying that his citizens should be beheaded? We’ve gotten to this environment of complete impunity,” said Diana Buttu, a former legal adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Palestinian negotiators. “It’s not just that Netanyahu won – it’s that the entire country has shifted to the right.”

Analysts said that such inflammatory conduct by top Israeli officials runs the risk of fueling what they described as a glacial, grass-roots shift in American public opinion from unconditional support for Israel to greater skepticism about policies such as the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza or settlement construction. And while the United States is no stranger to racial politics, the overt anti-Arab sentiment coming from Israel’s highest offices probably isn’t what American politicians have in mind when they talk of shared values. [Continue reading…]

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Enraged by Netanyahu’s rhetoric, White House officials believe Israeli-U.S. relations fundamentally changed

Peter Beinart writes: On Wednesday, I asked a senior Obama administration official whether there was anything Benjamin Netanyahu could do to repair the damage done by his comments late in his reelection campaign. The official’s answer: “You can’t unring the bell.” Other officials, off the record, put it far, far more harshly than that.

Top Obama officials loathed Netanyahu already. But three of his campaign comments drove them to new levels of fury.

The first was Netanyahu’s comment about “Arab voters coming out in droves,” which some in the administration view as racist. There is little President Obama considers more loathsome, administration officials note, than stoking racism to win votes. “Given our own history we have a unique perspective on the idea that minorities’ voting is not something to be condemned or feared,” said one administration official. The analogy is significant because the civil rights movement is Obama’s moral compass. For an administration official to compare Netanyahu to George Wallace or Bull Connor, even obliquely, says a lot about which side of history they believe he’s on.

The second comment that enraged Team Obama was Netanyahu’s boast that he built the settlement of Har Homa as “a way of stopping Bethlehem from moving toward Jerusalem.” Bibi, said a senior administration official, was “confirming that settlement policy has been a means of undermining a Palestinian state.” Which is to say: Netanyahu was confirming that by continuing settlement expansion, he had knowingly sabotaged John Kerry’s peace negotiations. White House officials believed that already. But they didn’t expect Bibi to publicly rub it in their face.

Thirdly, of course, Bibi said he would not allow a Palestinian state. Administration officials expect their Israeli counterparts to parse Bibi’s words in an attempt to downplay their importance. In private conversations, top AIPAC officials have already tried. But people inside the administration find that effort laughable, in part because they never thought Bibi wanted a Palestinian state even when he was on record as supporting one.

It is the Palestinian state comments, in particular, that are leading the Obama administration to, in one official’s words, “reassess our options.” The administration’s basic problem is this: For years, America has fought Palestinian efforts at the UN by insisting that bilateral negotiations offered the only path to Israeli-Palestinian peace. Administration officials stress the extraordinary, exhausting, diplomatically costly lengths to which they went to stymie various Palestinian UN moves. Obama and Kerry lobbied world leaders personally. Now, they argue, Netanyahu has destroyed their argument. How can they tell other countries that negotiations offer the best path to a Palestinian state when the leader of Israel has said he will not allow a Palestinian state? “It’s the prime minister taking this position,” says a senior administration official, “that forces this reassessment.” [Continue reading…]

Haaretz adds: U.S. President Barack Obama on Thursday evening spoke by phone with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and protested remarks made by the latter during his election campaign against the establishment of a Palestinian state and Israel’s Arab citizens.

Obama did not accept the explanations Netanyahu provided during an interview with NBC, in which he backtracked on some of the statements he has made.

According to a senior White House official, Obama told Netanyahu that the U.S. will need to reassess its options regarding the Israeli-Palestinian peace process in light of the prime minister’s new position rejecting Palestinian statehood.

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Dear Mr Netanyahu: Sorry we dared to dream. Yours, Israel’s Arab population

Sayed Kashua writes: For a moment I was optimistic.

For one moment this week the hope I had utterly lost last summer – a summer suffused with racism, hatred, blood and devastation – came back. For one moment, after I left Jerusalem with my family for life in Illinois, I thought that maybe there’s still a chance, maybe there are still enough people in Israel who refuse to rule and oppress another nation.

The last pre-election polls in the Israeli media predicted a loss for the prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, and the head of the Arab parties’ Joint List, the young lawyer Ayman Odeh, gave me hope that it was not too late to stop the fascism. Odeh took part in a television debate with Israel’s foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, who as usual called Odeh and the rest of the country’s Arab citizens – people like me – a fifth column, the spearhead of the terrorist organisations in the Knesset.

Odeh smiled tranquilly, and spoke about unity, cooperation, terminating the occupation in the Palestinian territories and forging a future of equality in Israel. The young lawyer succeeded in cutting Lieberman down to size, and showed him exactly for what he is: a benighted, pathetic racist.

For a moment I no longer felt afraid of Lieberman and of his threats against the Arab citizens; for a moment I wanted to believe it was still possible. [Continue reading…]

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Netanyahu’s win is good for Palestine

Yousef Munayyer writes: The re-election of Mr. Netanyahu provides clarity. Two years ago Secretary of State John Kerry declared that the maximum time left for a two-state solution was two years. Mr. Netanyahu officially declared it dead this week in order to drive right-wing voters to the polls. The two-state solution, which has seen more funerals than a reverend, exists today only as a talking point for self-interested, craven politicians to hide behind — not as a realistic basis for peace.

The old land-for-peace model must now be replaced with a rights-for-peace model. Palestinians must demand the right to live on their land, but also free movement, equal treatment under the law, due process, voting rights and freedom from discrimination.

Mr. Netanyahu’s re-election has convincingly proved that trusting Israeli voters with the fate of Palestinian rights is disastrous and immoral. His government will oppose any constructive change, placing Israel on a collision course with the rest of the world. And this collision has never been more necessary. [Continue reading…]

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Light between Israel and America becomes increasingly visible

The New York Times reports: President Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel had a poisonous relationship long before Mr. Netanyahu swept to victory on Tuesday night in elections watched minute-by-minute at the White House.

But now that Mr. Netanyahu has won after aggressively campaigning against a Palestinian state and Mr. Obama’s potential nuclear deal with Iran, the question is whether the president and prime minister can ever repair their relationship — and whether Mr. Obama will even try.

On Wednesday, part of the answer seemed to be that the president would not make the effort.

In strikingly strong criticism, the White House called Mr. Netanyahu’s campaign rhetoric, in which he railed against Israeli Arabs because they went out to vote, an attempt to “marginalize Arab-Israeli citizens” and inconsistent with the values that bind Israel and the United States. The White House press secretary, Josh Earnest, told reporters traveling with Mr. Obama on Air Force One on Wednesday that Mr. Netanyahu’s statement was “deeply concerning and it is divisive and I can tell you that these are views the administration intends to communicate directly to the Israelis.”

And with Mr. Netanyahu’s last-minute turnaround against a Palestinian state alongside Israel, several administration officials said that the Obama administration may now agree to passage of a United Nations Security Council resolution embodying principles of a two-state solution that would be based on the pre-1967 lines between Israel and the West Bank and Gaza Strip and mutually agreed swaps. [Continue reading…]

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Palestinian leaders see validation of their statehood effort

The New York Times reports: Under most circumstances, an Israeli leader’s frank admission that he would never agree to a Palestinian state would be a disaster for the Palestinian leadership. But when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said precisely that in the heat of the recent election campaign, it seemed to have the opposite effect, validating the unilateral approach the Palestinians have decided to follow.

“We will continue a diplomatic intifada. We have no other choice,” said Assad Abdul Rahman, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s central council and executive committee, its top decision-making body.

With Mr. Netanyahu having dropped, for now at least, the pretense of seeking a two-state solution, the Palestinians can argue to Europe and the United States that they no longer have a negotiating partner, strengthening their case for full statehood and recognition in the United Nations, as well as membership in important international bodies. They are already members of the International Criminal Court and Unesco.

“If somebody said, ‘We are with two states, and real negotiations,’ we would return to negotiations,” said Assad Abdul Rahman. “But there is no partner for that.”

In addition to considering seeking full statehood at the United Nations, the Palestinians may now curtail security coordination with Israel, reducing Israel’s ability to seize suspected militants in the West Bank, two P.L.O. officials said.

“There is a feeling that if there really is no hope for the peace process, the best thing they can have is an Israeli government that will advance its own isolation,” said Nathan Thrall, senior analyst with the Middle East and North Africa Program of the International Crisis Group. [Continue reading…]

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Iran’s physicists

Jeremy Bernstein writes: The Iran University of Science and Technology in Tehran was founded in 1929 as a school of engineering. It became a general technological institute in 1972. It now has more than a dozen departments with thousands of undergraduate and postgraduate students. Few if any American universities have a more complete list of undergraduate physics courses. Looking at the faculty reveals an interesting split. The senior professors all did much of their degree work abroad. One of them for example was an undergraduate at Columbia. The junior faculty, including one woman, all did their degree work in Iran. In another generation, it may be that all of Iran’s physicists will have been educated in Iran. No other country in the Middle East would show a demographic like this. Taken in the large this means that Iran has a serious scientific infrastructure, which must be taken into account in any negotiations over its nuclear programme. The notion that the country can be negotiated into a scientific stone age is nonsense.

I am going to take a quick detour to Libya. In 1968, King Idris made the country a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. When Colonel Gaddafi took over the following year he did not change this treaty status. Indeed Libya began a modest development in peaceful nuclear activities. This did not last long; on a state visit to China in 1970 Gaddafi made an unsuccessful attempt to buy nuclear weapons. He then tried both India and Pakistan and had a go at enriching uranium. What characterised the Libyan programme throughout was the lack of a real scientific infrastructure. In the 1980s, the Pakistani metallurgist A.Q. Khan began selling nuclear secrets. In the late 1990s Gaddafi bought the package which included plans and parts to build centrifuges. When he decided to give the programme up in 2003, even with the aid of foreign scientists the Libyans had succeeded in building only one centrifuge. [Continue reading…]

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These terrorists in Tunisia were targeting democracy

Lina Ben Mhenni writes: Two days before Tunisia was due to celebrate its independence day, a horrible terrorist attack has shaken the country. The barbaric, bloody assault on the Bardo museum near the parliament, that claimed the lives of 19 people, seems to open a new chapter for terrorist operations in my country. It also looks set to be the worst for foreigners in Tunisia since the attack on Djerba’s synagogue in 2002.

The symbolism of such an attack occurring in Tunisia – the birthplace of the so-called Arab spring – is significant. It was here that the self-immolation of Mohammed Bouazizi in December 2010 spawned a series of street demonstrations that culminated in the ousting of longtime president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. Tunisia’s reputation as the Arab spring’s “model pupil” may be questionable given that the country contributes the highest number of jihadis to countries such as Syria.

Nevertheless, it is a fact that while chaos is reigning in other countries in the Middle East, Tunisia has succeeded in ensuring a relative stability despite two political assassinations and some terrorist attacks targeting members of the security and military forces in remote areas such as Mount Chaambi. This attack occurred a few months after successful democratic and transparent elections in the country. Furthermore it happened while MPs were discussing an anti-terrorist law not far away from the museum where everything occurred. The two buildings lie within the same fence. [Continue reading…]

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ISIS claims responsibility for Tunisia museum attack

The Associated Press reports: The Islamic State group issued a statement Thursday claiming responsibility for the deadly attack on Tunisia’s national museum that killed 23 people, mostly tourists.

The statement described Wednesday’s attack in Tunisia as a “blessed invasion of one of the dens of infidels and vice in Muslim Tunisia,” and appeared on a forum that carries messages from the group.

The statement said there were two attackers and they weren’t killed until they ran out of ammunition and it promised further attacks.

“Wait for the glad tidings of what will harm you, impure ones, for what you have seen today is the first drop of the rain,” the statement, which was also announced by U.S.-based SITE Intelligence Group.

IS, which is based in Syria and Iraq, has affiliates in neighboring Libya, where many Tunisians have gone to fight and train with extremist groups.

Earlier this week, a prominent Tunisian field commander for IS was killed in fighting inside Libya.

Tunisia’s government, meanwhile, announced the arrest of nine people — four of whom were connected directly to the attack and five others who supported them elsewhere in the country, authorities said. [Continue reading…]

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