Category Archives: News

Behind the scenes, tech firms tell U.S. regulators: Make the internet a public utility

Quartz reports: As his own website crashed under the weight of public comments on net neutrality, the top communications regulator in the US was hearing protests directly from tech companies in New York City.

On July 15, at the Brooklyn office of the handicrafts e-commerce site Etsy, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler met with executives from tech companies. Attendants included Kickstarter CEO Yancey Strickler, Tumblr CEO David Karp, Vimeo CEO Kerry Trainor, and representatives from Spotify, Reddit, Foursquare, General Assembly, Buzzfeed, and Warby Parker, participants told Quartz. While the FCC declined to comment on the event, it will be filing an official notice of an outside meeting on its website later this week.

Wheeler has been meeting with different internet stakeholders as his agency moves to write rules designed to preserve the “open internet” this year, but what that means and how to do it remains far from a settled matter. While internet service providers, or carriers, want the freedom to charge different rates for different kinds of data, these technology firms were asking Wheeler’s agency to treat internet communication as a public utility with no discrimination allowed, a so-called “Title II reclassification.” US regulators are, at the moment, caught in the middle. [Continue reading…]

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Correction: Mesut Ozil representative denies reports about donation to Gaza

Update: International Business Times has corrected its earlier report (the one on which this post was based and which is excerpted below):

Germany and Arsenal superstar Mesut Ozil’s representative has denied claims that the star was set to donate his £350,000 [$600,000] World Cup winnings to the children of Gaza following his country’s triumph in the global spectacle.

“The claim that Mesut donated money to Gaza is not true,” said the midfielder’s represenative Roland Eitel.

“Maybe in the future, who knows? He donated money to causes in Brazil and he is now on holiday.”

My comment: Why did International Business Times publish this report in the first place if they hadn’t verified that it was correct? IBT is ranked as fourth-most visited website among business news publications. It’s now put itself in that dubious category of websites which publishes interesting stories that happen to be false. Those of us who sift through hundreds of news stories every day don’t have the time or resources to do what people who claim to be news reporters should be doing themselves.

Original post published July 16, 9.45, under the headline “Brazil World Cup star Mesut Ozil donates $600,000 winnings to Gaza”:
The latest Pew poll indicates that Americans lean heavily in support of Israel as Israel bombs Gaza.

Given the prevailing Islamophobia, continuing irrational fears of terrorism, and the bias of the mainstream media, along with the influence of End Times mythologies among evangelicals, it’s hardly surprising that public opinion in the U.S. remains skewed in this way.

The demographic segment where greatest support for Palestinians can be found, however, is among the religiously unaffiliated 18-29 age bracket. That also, I think it’s reasonable to assume, happens to be the group of Americans who have watched the World Cup most enthusiastically over the last five weeks.

Mesut Ozil’s gesture will resonate deeply among young people who find little to respect in the world run by their hypocritical elders.

Mesut-OzilInternational Business Times reports: Germany and Arsenal superstar Mesut Ozil is to donate his £350,000 [$600,000] World Cup winnings to the children of Gaza following his country’s triumph in the global spectacle.

As the conflict in the Middle East rages following a failed ceasefire, Ozil is set to give the £237,000 bonus he received for helping Germany win the final, and the £118,000 he received for Germany’s semi-final win, to the occupied territory. He is however yet to confirm the actual beneficiaries of his largesse.

Ozil is of Turkish descent and a practising Muslim who recites the Quran before games. He controversially opted not to fast during the tournament, which fell in the holy month of Ramadan in which Muslims fast from dawn until sunset.

According to the Middle East Monitor, Ozil caused controversy when he declined to shake a Fifa official’s hand because of his support for Israel.

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Egypt: No ongoing negotiations for Gaza ceasefire

The Guardian reports: Egypt claims it has not been involved in any negotiations since the failure of its proposed ceasefire in Gaza – which was accepted by Israel but rejected by Hamas – and maintains that it is still waiting for formal confirmation of Hamas’s stance.

“For the time being there are no negotiations,” said Egypt’s foreign affairs spokesman, Badr Abdelatty. “We announced our initiative. There is increasing support from Arab leaders and the international community for the proposals. Abu Mazen [Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas] is coming today and has given them his backing. We are still waiting for the other Palestinian factions to give their official response to the initiative.”

A key mediator in previous Israeli-Palestinian tensions, Egypt proposed a ceasefire on Monday night, which it hoped would end the latest Gaza conflict that has now killed more than 200 Palestinians and one Israeli. The proposals were quickly accepted by Israel. While one Hamas official said the group was mulling its reaction, others in the group’s political and military wings rejected the initiative outright, claiming they had only found about it through the media and were angry that it did not deal with some of the group’s major demands: a conclusive end of Israel and Egypt’s blockade on Gaza, and the release of certain prisoners from Israeli jails.

Observers remain doubtful that Egypt has really stopped participating in negotiations following the failure of its ceasefire, given the embarrassment involved in failing to fulfil its traditional role of mediation. “There is of course contact on all sorts of levels,” said one Cairo-based diplomat.

HA Hellyer, a non-resident fellow at the Brookings Institution and Cairo-based analyst, said the unilateral nature of Egypt’s earlier efforts might now make Hamas even less willing to engage with them. But he doubted that Egypt had taken a backseat. [Continue reading…]

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Water catastrophe looms in Gaza as Israel steps up airstrikes

NBC News reports: A humanitarian catastrophe looms in the Gaza Strip due to a lack of water, aid agencies warned as Israel intensified air attacks on Wednesday and ordered 100,000 Palestinians to evacuate border areas.

Airstrikes have caused massive damage to water and sewage infrastructure and have destroyed at least 560 homes, the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) said as it declared an emergency in the area.

“Within days, the entire population of the Strip may be desperately short of water,” Jacques de Maio, head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) delegation in Israel and the occupied territories, said in a statement. If hostilities continue, just as temperatures soar in the region, “the question is not if but when an already beleaguered population will face an acute water crisis,” he said.

“Water is becoming contaminated and sewage is overflowing, bringing a serious risk of disease,” de Maio added.

At a news briefing, ICRC spokeswoman Nada Doumani said: “Water is a problem and it can quickly turn into a catastrophe.” [Continue reading…]

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Israel, Palestinians battle as Egyptian-proposed Gaza ceasefire collapses

Reuters reports: Israel resumed air strikes in the Gaza Strip on Tuesday after agreeing to an Egyptian-proposed ceasefire deal that failed to get Hamas militants to halt rocket attacks.

The week-old conflict seemed to be at a turning point, with Hamas defying Arab and Western calls to cease fire and Israel threatening to step up a week-old offensive that could include an invasion of the densely populated enclave of 1.8 million.

Under a blueprint announced by Egypt – Gaza’s neighbour and whose military-backed government has been at odds with Islamist Hamas – a mutual “de-escalation” was to have begun at 9 a.m. (0600 GMT), with hostilities ceasing within 12 hours.

Hamas’ armed wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, rejected the ceasefire deal, a proposal that addressed in only general terms some of its key demands, and said its battle with Israel would “increase in ferocity and intensity”.

But Moussa Abu Marzouk, a top Hamas political official who was in Cairo, said the movement, which is seeking a deal that would ease Egyptian and Israeli border restrictions throttling Gaza’s economy, had made no final decision on Cairo’s proposal. [Continue reading…]

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Syrian parliament condemns Israel’s ‘war of annihilation’

During the period since Israel launched its latest assault on Gaza, more than 300 people have been killed in Syria, mostly by the Syrian government, mostly by barrel bombs. The Syrian parliament, nevertheless felt that it was important to go on the record, denouncing the Israeli operation:

The People’s Assembly expressed on Saturday a vehement condemnation of Israel’s brutal aggression it has unleashed against the besieged Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip over the past days.

The Assembly dismissed in a statement on Saturday the aggression as “a war of annihilation” that demands international prosecution for the Israeli enemy’s authorities and all their supporters.

Likewise, Syria’s closest military ally, Iran, is deeply troubled about the plight of Palestinians in Gaza (Palestinians in Syria, not so much):

Iran Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani has condemned the silence of international organizations on the Israeli regime’s ruthless massacre of Palestinians.

In separate telephone conversations with his Emirati, Pakistani and Syrian counterparts on Tuesday, Larijani highlighted the Muslim leaders’ responsibility in preventing the criminal Zionist regime’s ruthless actions and the carnage of Gazans.

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Kurds enter Syria from Turkey to fight ISIS

AFP reports: Hundreds of Kurdish fighters have entered northern Syria to help battle jihadists besieging the Kurdish city of Ain al-Arab, a monitor said Tuesday.

“At least 800 Kurdish fighters crossed the Turkish-Syrian border to help their comrades in Ain al-Arab (Kobane in Kurdish), which is under total siege by Islamic State jihadists,” Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.

A Kurdish Syrian activist said the flow of fighters came as the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), blacklisted in Turkey as a terrorist organisation, gave orders for Kurdish fighters to move to protect Kobane.

“Fighters started going into Kobane from Turkey some four or five days ago,” said Havidar, who goes by only one name.

“But the latest entry, last night, came after orders from the higher leadership of the PKK. Last night, there were celebrations in Kobane — fighters were firing into the air as they arrived in the town,” he told AFP.

The Observatory’s Abdel Rahman also said the mobilisation had come after a call by the PKK, which has branches in Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria.

“The Kurds are preparing for an assault by the Islamic State,” he said.

Syrian Kurds have been fighting the IS for many months.

“But this is the first time that the jihadists appear to be advancing while the Kurds are suffering real setbacks. That is because IS has brought in a lot of weapons from Iraq,” said Havidar, referring to weapons seizures from the Iraqi army amid an IS offensive there.

“Kurds going in to fight are from everywhere — Turkey, Iran, Syria and others. Even some Kurds based in Europe are saying they want to go fight,” he added. [Continue reading…]

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Iraqi army remains on defensive as extent of June debacle becomes clearer

McClatchy reports: Five weeks after Islamist fighters stormed across northern and western Iraq in a surprise offensive that nearly reached the outskirts of the Iraqi capital, virtually every captured location remains firmly in rebel hands, while the central government’s meager efforts at a counteroffensive have met with failure on virtually every front.

Worse yet, Iraqi and U.S. officials have confirmed that fighters allied with the Islamic State not only captured hundreds of U.S.-supplied Humvees and large amounts of ammunition in their march across Iraq, but they also now possess as many as 52 U.S.-supplied artillery pieces with GPS aiming systems. The 155mm guns have a range of 20 miles, putting many Iraqi cities still in government hands easily within range of Islamic State positions.

Even the Iraqi government’s military briefings, consistently upbeat, hint at the grim outlook: The list of accomplishments cited by the Iraqi military’s spokesman are almost entirely defensive, making it clear that the Islamic State remains on the offensive and in control of when and where fighting takes place. [Continue reading…]

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Syria’s allies are stretched by widening war

The Wall Street Journal reports: The Lebanese movement Hezbollah, facing a heavy strain on its resources, is recruiting more fighters in Syria and bringing in fresh but inexperienced forces from Lebanon to shore up Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

In the past year, Hezbollah’s battle-tested fighters helped Syrian forces retake territory around the capital Damascus and other key cities such as Homs and Aleppo, paving the way for Mr. Assad to win a third, seven-year term as president in elections last month.

But Hezbollah members and people involved in the group’s operations in Syria said the militant group is now stretched thin by two conflicts involving its Shiite allies that threaten to erode, if not undo, its successes in Syria.

A Sunni rebellion against the Shiite-dominated government in neighboring Iraq is drawing home Iraqi Shiites who have been fighting alongside Hezbollah in Syria, according to pro-government militiamen in Syria.

On Monday, Islamic State, the extremist group leading the fresh insurgency in Iraq, captured more territory in Syria by routing rival rebel factions from the city of Deir-Ezzour, according to Syrian activists and a spokesman for the rebel umbrella group known as the Free Syrian Army. The city is the seat of the resource-rich province of Deir-Ezzour bordering Iraq and the conquest gave Islamic State control of nearly 80% of the province. [Continue reading…]

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Thousands of families flee north Gaza

Al Jazeera reports: After more than 12 hours of work, the bulldozers were still clearing what was once the al-Batsh family’s three-story house in eastern Gaza City, reduced to rubble after Israeli warplanes hit it with two bombs.

The air strike took place just before midnight on Saturday, the fifth day of Israel’s aerial assault on Gaza. Eighteen people from the same extended family were killed, the highest death toll in a single attack so far in the offensive, which has claimed more than 165 Palestinian lives to date.

The bombing in the Shaaf neighbourhood was said to be targeting the local police commander, Tayseer al-Batsh, who survived the strike with serious injuries. Shortly after the house was destroyed, Israel also struck several police and security posts in Gaza City.

“There was no reason to hit the house,” said Mohammed al-Batsh, a lawyer in his 30s, as dozens of people gathered to inspect the home and examine the severe damage to nearby houses.

He added that the airstrike killed Majed al-Batsh, the police commander’s cousin, and 10 members of his family – parents, children, daughters-in-laws and grandchildren. “They posed no threat to Israel. They were not firing rockets. They were civilians, children and women.” [Continue reading…]

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Hamas lays out truce terms, says deal not close

AFP reports: The Palestinian Hamas movement said Monday that it would not end hostilities with Israel without concessions by the Jewish state and that no serious efforts towards a truce had been made.

“Talk of a ceasefire requires real and serious efforts, which we haven’t seen so far,” Hamas legislative member Mushir al-Masri told AFP in Gaza City.

Masri said Hamas would only negotiate on the basis of a set of concessions it wants to see Israel agree to.

Those include the lifting of Israel’s blockade on the Gaza Strip, the opening of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt and the release of Palestinian prisoners Israel has rearrested after freeing them in exchange for kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

“Any ceasefire must be based on the conditions we have outlined, nothing less than that will be accepted,” Masri said. [Continue reading…]

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For Netanyahu, Gaza proves why Palestinians cannot be allowed to govern themselves

In a news conference held on Friday in which Benjamin Netanyahu spoke only in Hebrew, the Israeli prime minister spelled out why he believes a two-state solution is impossible:

The priority right now, Netanyahu stressed, was to “take care of Hamas.” But the wider lesson of the current escalation was that Israel had to ensure that “we don’t get another Gaza in Judea and Samaria [the West Bank].” Amid the current conflict, he elaborated, “I think the Israeli people understand now what I always say: that there cannot be a situation, under any agreement, in which we relinquish security control of the territory west of the River Jordan.”

Not relinquishing security control west of the Jordan, it should be emphasized, means not giving a Palestinian entity full sovereignty there. It means not acceding to Mahmoud Abbas’s demands, to Barack Obama’s demands, to the international community’s demands. This is not merely demanding a demilitarized Palestine; it is insisting upon ongoing Israeli security oversight inside and at the borders of the West Bank. That sentence, quite simply, spells the end to the notion of Netanyahu consenting to the establishment of a Palestinian state. A less-than-sovereign entity? Maybe, though this will never satisfy the Palestinians or the international community. A fully sovereign Palestine? Out of the question.

He wasn’t saying that he doesn’t support a two-state solution. He was saying that it’s impossible. This was not a new, dramatic change of stance by the prime minister. It was a new, dramatic exposition of his long-held stance. [Continue reading…]

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Islamic State in Syria, back with a vengeance

Hassan Hassan writes: The Islamic State’s stunning advances in Syria over the past month defy basic military instincts. Consider, for example, the group’s remarkable turn of fortunes in the eastern province of Deir ez-Zor in recent months, where ISIS—as the group was formerly known—all but vanished in February after local rebels joined forces to batter the remaining ISIS strongholds in the province. Rebel groups elsewhere had likewise planned in May to push against ISIS’s last fortress in Raqqa, another eastern province, so as to drive the group out of the country entirely. Yet ISIS, or the Islamic State as it is now called, is now back with a vengeance.

The Islamic State is now on the offensive in much of Syria, especially in the east and north. If the group manages to retake the ground it had lost after most of the rebel groups declared war against it in January and February, this is likely to indurate its staying power in Syria. And there are signs that the group might eventually consolidate its presence in the east and make inroads into the north, especially as it seems to be following new strategies during its latest push.

The group has been focusing on negotiations, rather than only brute force, which in large part explains its striking successes of late. Although the Islamic State has attacked a few cities and towns in Deir ez-Zor and forcefully displaced its residents, it tends to do so only with towns that had bled it before, such as Khisham and Shuhail (the latter was long perceived as a stronghold of al-Qaeda affiliated Jabhat al-Nusra). In other villages and towns, the Islamic State has sent envoys to negotiate a deal in which local fighters surrender, pledge allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and implement sharia, and in exchange the Islamic State spares residents from any harm. The terms of these deals vary from one area to another. [Continue reading…]

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Deadlock blocks Iraqi leadership vote as ISIS makes gains toward Baghdad

The New York Times reports: As Iraq’s deadlocked Parliament was again unable to reach a deal to name a new speaker on Sunday, Sunni militants carried out a raid near Baghdad, a symbolically significant attack signaling their intent to move closer, even if only by a few miles, toward the Iraqi capital.

Although the pretext for the delay was a severe sandstorm that prevented northern Iraq’s Kurdish lawmakers from flying to Baghdad, the real reason appeared to be that last-minute deals between the largest Shiite bloc and the Sunnis were falling apart.

“We were ready, we came with our candidates, but the others haven’t presented their candidates,” said Usama al-Nujaifi, the Sunni lawmaker, who served as speaker in the last Parliament but has agreed not to run this time.

“The country is completely collapsing and we need to unify the nation — the delay means more killing, more displaced and more emigration,” Mr. Nujaifi said. [Continue reading…]

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Bodies found north of Baghdad as Sunni insurgents turn on each other

Reuters reports: Residents of a town north of Baghdad found 12 corpses with execution-style bullet wounds on Monday, after fighting between rival Sunni insurgent groups that could eventually unravel the coalition that seized much of the north and west of the country.

The incident points to an intensification of infighting between the Islamic State and other Sunni groups, such as supporters of former dictator Saddam Hussein, which rallied behind the al Qaeda offshoot last month because of shared hatred for the Shi’ite-led government in Baghdad.

Police in Muqdadiya, a town 80 km (50 miles) northeast of the capital, said residents from the nearby town of Saadiya found the 12 corpses on Monday after intense fighting overnight between Islamic State fighters and the Naqshbandi Army, a group led by Saddam allies. [Continue reading…]

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U.S. sees risks in assisting a compromised Iraqi force

The New York Times reports: A classified military assessment of Iraq’s security forces concludes that many units are so deeply infiltrated by either Sunni extremist informants or Shiite personnel backed by Iran that any Americans assigned to advise Baghdad’s forces could face risks to their safety, according to United States officials.

The report concludes that only about half of Iraq’s operational units are capable enough for American commandos to advise them if the White House decides to help roll back the advances made by Sunni militants in northern and western Iraq over the past month.

Adding to the administration’s dilemma is the assessment’s conclusion that Iraqi forces loyal to Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki are now heavily dependent on Shiite militias — many of which were trained in Iran — as well as on advisers from Iran’s paramilitary Quds Force.

Shiite militias fought American troops after the United States invaded Iraq and might again present a danger to American advisers. But without an American-led effort to rebuild Iraq’s security forces, there may be no hope of reducing the Iraqi government’s dependence on those Iranian-backed militias, officials caution. [Continue reading…]

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Rival factions in Libyan capital battle for control of main airport

The New York Times reports: Rival militias in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, fought for control of the city’s main airport on Sunday, leaving at least six people dead and causing the cancellation of international flights, officials said.

The fighting, with rockets, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, was some of the fiercest in the capital in months and an urgent reminder of the chaos prevailing in the country: Nearly three years after the death of Libya’s dictator, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the fighters who rebelled against him remained locked in a struggle for control of territory, resources and critical facilities, sidelining the central government.

The United Nations mission in Libya, which began to withdraw staff members last week because of security concerns, accelerated that withdrawal on Sunday, said a staff member who was not authorized to speak to the news media. A United Nations spokesman did not immediately return a call.

The deadliest of Libya’s recent fighting has occurred in the eastern city of Benghazi, where troops loyal to an army general named Khalifa Hifter are battling other armed militias, as part of what Mr. Hifter says is a national campaign to eradicate Libya’s powerful Islamist politicians and fighters. The clashes have opened new divisions across the country and aggravated Libya’s violence. [Continue reading…]

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