West Asia News and Discussions

[ramana]

I guess killing Osama didnt make a difference to ALQ

[Lilo]

Ria-Novosti reported that Russia and Iran are negotiating a possible oil-for-goods swap that would make Moscow a major importer of Iranian oil, notwithstanding concerns raised by the United States that the deal would defy Western sanctions imposed against Tehran.

Under the proposed swap worth $1.5 billion, Russia could buy up to 500,000 barrels of Iranian oil daily in exchange for Russian equipment and goods, Reuters reported last week.

Analysts say that the deal could be crucial in adding strategic cement to Moscow-Tehran ties ahead of President Putin’s upcoming visit to Iran. Iran and Russia are also trying to find a solution to the cancelled S-300 missile deal, with Moscow considering offering various alternatives that are likely to be proposed during the course of the upcoming interaction.

Observers point out that major geopolitical, security and economic considerations are shaping the positions of major global and regional powers towards the conference on Syria in Switzerland. Russia, China, Iran and Syria are working feverishly to prevent “regime change” in Damascus. After calling for the fall of Bashar al-Assad, the position of the United States and its NATO allies appear to have shifted as prospects of a blowback on account of the growing dominance of al-Qaeda affiliated groups in Syria has begun to generate considerable anxiety in Western capitals.

http://www.thehindu.com/news/internatio ... 582983.ece

[pankajs]

Reuters Top News ‏@Reuters 4m

"Syria has become the strongest magnet for terror of any place today" - @JohnKerry live remarks http://reut.rs/WorldLIVE
----------------------------------------->>
All with your support.

[brihaspati]

brihaspati ji,

ultimately, it's hard to imagine because the Northern plains are still heavily Hindu. and the Islamics do not have the sheer quantity of arms and ammunition required to mouth an offensive against the Indian State. in Syria's case, several countries came together and turned the border into a porous one, to arm the "rebels". in India's case, the border is guarded by the army/paramilitary. and so far, since 1947, the armed forces have proven they're capable of defending the borders. so, borders turning into virtual open fields of heavy enemy movement into and out of country seems out of question. do you think the Islamists inside India can mount an offensive and overturn the current govt? more importantly, do you think such overt attempts at overthrowing the State will happen without any response from the Indian State? there is Police, several different branches of paramil, and finally the Army itself. Islamists might have the capability to cause havoc through terror, but outright overturning the State seems like a tall task.

Actually the northern plains are slam-bang in the middle of the major weapons-flow routes it appears. The Hindu is no factor at all - because it is not armed and more importantly has not been allowed to build up the transnational supply systems, which the others like the jihadis and the Maoists have been allowed to.

The IA is at a disadvantage vis-a-vis the jihadis because it is "apolitical". Also perhaps the conviction that total destruction of all aspects of current Paki society in a way that would make it impossible for the state to return ever - is non-existent, at least not at the decision making levels.

I think just as with AAP as the political arm of the experiment, the militancy part of the experiment is coming. The Syrian battlefields have been used as a testing ground for applying the method and assessing potential difficulties - in applying the same technique in a wider frontier around the IOR. Over the next 2-5 years we will probably see the signs of this.

People need to closely srcutinize the battles, urban fightings, its pros-and-cons as it is emerging in Syria- and crucially how it is sourced, supplied, maintained. Its better not to depend entirely on a state+army standing to defend you especially where it is about confronting Islamists from the divided society and state attitudes in India.

[Prem]

X-post
Energy is gradually decoupling from economic growth
http://ftalphaville.ft.com/2014/01/17/1 ... ic-growth/

According to BP’s Energy Outlook, which was released this week, global energy demand will continue to grow until 2013, but that growth is set to slow, driven by emerging economies — mainly China and India.Some notable points from the presentation slides on that front:Energy consumption grows less rapidly than the global economy, with GDP growth averaging 3.5% p.a. 2012-35. As a result energy intensity, the amount of energy required per unit of GDP, declines by 36% (1.9% p.a.) between 2012 and 2035. The decline in energy intensity accelerates; the expected rate of decline post 2020 is more than double the decline rate achieved 2000-2010.
Fuel shares evolve slowly. Oil’s share continues to decline, its position as the leading fuel briefly challenged by coal. Gas gains share steadily. By 2035 all the fossil fuel shares are clustering around 27%, and for the first time since the Industrial Revolution there is no single dominant fuel. Taken together, fossil fuels lose share but they are still the dominant form of energy in 2035 with a share of 81%, compared to 86% in 2012. Among non-fossil fuels, renewables (including biofuels) gain share rapidly, from around 2% today to 7% by 2035, while hydro and nuclear remain fairly flat. Renewables overtake nuclear in 2025, and by 2035 they match hydro.In our outlook, demand growth slow s and non-OPEC supplies rise – both as a result of high prices. We assume that OPEC members cut production over the current decade. As a result, spare capacity will exceed 6 Mb/d by 2018, the highest since the late 1980s.The market requirement for OPEC crude is not expected to reach today’s levels for another decade before rebounding. While we believe that OPEC members will be able to maintain discipline despite high levels of spare capacity, cohesion of the group is a key oil market uncertainty. The challenging decade ahead for OPEC, however, is unlikely to be a repeat of the 1980s. At that time, spare capacity peaked at over 10 Mb/d and the group’s share of global supply dropped well below 30%.
The problem for Opec countries is that what they make up in prices as a result of production cuts they lose in national income revenues. Also, the higher prices stay (at the cost of Opec income revenues), the more alternative producers are encouraged to offset Opec’s production base.If Opec buckles, however, and prices collapse, this could have extremely complex implications for global growth, especially if the deflation that transpires is not recognised as a supply-side shock rather than a demand-side collapse.

[ramana]

Bandar bin Sultan's Botched Syrian Intervention
Dateline

by Hilal Khashan
Middle East Quarterly
Winter 2014

http://www.meforum.org/3683/bandar-bin-sultan-syria
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In an untypically abrasive speech, Saudi King Abdullah welcomed the ouster of Egypt's president Muhammad Morsi, stating: "Let the entire world know that the people and government of the Saudi kingdom stood and still stand today with our brothers in Egypt against terrorism, extremism, and sedition."[1] However dramatic, this apparent shift from Riyadh's traditional accommodation of perceived enemies, such as the Muslim Brotherhood and its regional affiliates, to a more daring foreign policy is too little too late to reverse the decline of its regional power. And nowhere was this weakness more starkly demonstrated than in Riyadh's botched Syrian intervention, led by its most celebrated diplomat—Prince Bandar bin Sultan.
A Broken Tradition of Cooptation

The foundations of Saudi foreign policy were laid under historical circumstances that were completely different from today's political situation. From the 1930s to the early 1950s, Western presence in the Middle East was quite strong with the region enjoying geopolitical homeostasis. The rise of radical regimes in Egypt, Syria, and Iraq, coupled with Moscow's growing involvement in the region, did not seem to threaten Riyadh's domestic and international stance, and the intensifying U.S.-Saudi relations, cemented by mutual commitment to combating communism, steered the kingdom through the region's periodic upheavals well into the late 1970s.

Saudi King Abdullah (l) meets with President Obama in Washington, June 29, 2010. Riyadh has been openly critical of U.S. policy in the Middle East and has sent unmistakable signals of its displeasure. Most Saudis worry that a vacillating and unserious commander-in-chief in Washington may leave them twisting in the region's political winds.

This self-assurance played a central role in the Saudi royal family's nonconfrontational approach and its preference for quiet diplomacy.[2] Military weakness, equilibrium, and calming situations were seemingly the three pillars of Riyadh's foreign policy orientation. The royals ruled out asserting the kingdom as a military power and, thanks to oil wealth and religious significance, chose to make it a cornerstone of the regional balance of interests.[3]

The Iranian revolution and subsequent regional developments, notably the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and the recent Arab upheavals, undermined this delicate balance of interests and made Riyadh's accommodative policy increasingly untenable. Things came to a head during the 2011 Shiite uprising in Bahrain, which the Saudis feared might spread to their own territory. Having helped to quell the restiveness in the tiny neighboring kingdom, Abdullah enlisted the services of Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the former veteran ambassador to Washington, to take Saudi foreign policy in a more assertive direction.
The Prince of Sensitive Missions

Son of the late Saudi crown prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz al-Saud (d. 2011), Bandar began his political career in 1978 as King Khaled's personal envoy to Washington bypassing Ambassador Faisal al-Hegelan.[4] He quickly impressed President Jimmy Carter by enlisting the support of Sen. James Abourezk (Democrat, S. Dakota) in the toss-up vote on the Panama Canal treaty, and his subtle diplomacy paved the way for Congress to pass the Saudi F-15 package shortly thereafter.[5] In 1986, Bandar entered the limelight as a result of his involvement in the Iran-Contra scandal and, four years later, played an instrumental role in convincing hesitant Saudi royals to invite U.S. troops into the kingdom to cope with the consequences of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Since then, he has served as a vital liaison between Washington and Riyadh. In 2005, upon the completion of Bandar's 22-year stint in Washington, King Abdullah appointed him to lead the country's National Security Council.

Bandar's advice was sought in large part due to the mounting evidence that implicated Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister, Rafiq Hariri, Riyadh's ally in Beirut. Following the July 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah and the latter's crippling of the Fouad Seniora government, Bandar convinced Abdullah to invest in creating a Sunni militia to operate under the command of Hariri's son Saad. This fateful but ill-studied decision undermined Bandar's credibility when, in 2008, Hezbollah's militiamen stormed west Beirut and effortlessly dismantled Saad's militia in a matter of hours. Bandar had evidently failed to appreciate the strength of Hezbollah or the ineptitude of Hariri's leadership.

The Saudi royal family is seriously concerned about the turn of events in the region and the possibility of demands for political reform such changes might initiate. With more than two-thirds of its tribally and religiously heterogeneous population alien to the austere Wahhabi doctrine,[6] there is very little in common between the Najd-originated ruling Wahhabi dynasty and its Shiite subjects in the oil-rich eastern province or Shafii and Maliki Sunni Muslims in Hijaz. Likewise, the kingdom's southern subjects mostly belong to Yemeni tribes where Shiite Ismailis and Zaydis proliferate.

Nevertheless, this failure did not deter Abdullah from calling on Bandar again in July 2012 to head the Saudi intelligence apparatus. The Saudi king had already become disturbed about the course of events in Syria and Bashar Assad's refusal to leave office. He may have thought that Bandar, who knew how to deal with Saddam Hussein, could work some magic with Bashar. In turn, mindful of Bandar's deep unease with regional Shiite ascendancy, Tehran's state-controlled media dubbed him the "prince of terrorists."[7]

President George W. Bush meets with Saudi ambassador to the U.S., Prince Bandar bin Sultan (r), at the Bush ranch, August 27, 2002, in Crawford, Texas. Many Americans noted at the time the seeming supplicant position of their president. In 2005, King Abdullah appointed Bandar to lead the Saudi national security council.
U.S. Indifference and the Iranian Surge

For years, the Saudis sought to accommodate Iran and Syria to no avail. They even coerced Saad Hariri to swallow his pride and forgo the truth about his father's assassins, forcing him to announce that "he had made a mistake in blaming Syria for his father's killing."[8] Yet Saudi concessions did not placate Tehran and Damascus for long: From the beginning of the Syrian uprising in 2011, the mullahs in Tehran made the decision to prevent Assad's collapse and instructed their Lebanese proxy Hezbollah to commit troops as part of its collective effort to keep the regime in power.

For Riyadh, this behavior amounted to a confrontation that required a response. After more than two years of silence, the Saudis finally decided to take sides in Syria, only to realize that their support of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) would be matched by Tehran's bolstering of Assad's military machine.

Even more dismaying to the Saudis was Washington's response—or lack thereof—to the situation. Given the supposed close relationship between the two countries, the fact that the Saudis did not have a clue about the administration's frame of mind on Syria was shocking though they were not the only ones to take President Obama's early warnings on the Syrian use of chemical weapons at face value. Exasperated by Washington's inaction, foreign minister Saud al-Faisal turned to the international community and implored it "to stop this aggression against the Syrian people."[9]

The Saudis have every reason to feel disheartened, having failed to beat sense into Assad and to engage the Iranians diplomatically. And while Riyadh's defense agreements with Washington have not become completely irrelevant, most Saudis worry that a vacillating and unserious commander-in-chief in Washington may leave them twisting in the wind.
Bandar's Botched Syrian Policy

The Saudis believe that allowing Assad to stay in office will prolong the uprising and endanger their own stability.[10] Given the weakness of the Free Syrian Army, the continuation of the armed conflict only serves to increase the presence of jihadists, notably al-Qaeda-affiliated groups such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and al-Nusra. As long as such groups remain confined to northern Syria, the Saudis need not be overly concerned, but the prospect of these groups proliferating in southwest Syria close to the Jordanian border has begun to preoccupy them. Such an intrusion might mean that the eventual march of jihadists to the Saudi frontier is a foregone conclusion.

While born of the same Salafist ideology as the kingdom's own Wahhabist brand of Islam, these jihadist groups claim a purity of motive and a deadly modus operandi that endangers the House of Saud. Muhammad ibn Saud adopted Wahhabism in the mid-eighteenth century and sought to extend his rule throughout Arabia. His great-great-great-grandson ibn Saud allied himself with the Ikhwan Wahhabi army in 1911-27 to consolidate his reign in the current boundaries of Saudi Arabia. The Ikhwan's attempts to export its jihad to Iraq and Transjordan compelled ibn Saud to crush them in the battle of Siblah in March 1929. Whereas Saudi monarchs have been content with their territorial domain, today's jihadists in Syria aspire to rejuvenate the Ikhwan's original mission.[11]

To combat the threat, King Abdullah again enlisted Bandar's services. The prince had not hidden his view that Bashar had to go because his inability to detect red lines in politics had made Assad injurious to himself, his country, and his Arab neighbors.[12] As The Wall Street Journal put it, "CIA officials knew that KSA [Kingdom of Saudi Arabia] was serious about toppling Assad when the Saudi king named prince Bandar bin Sultan to lead the effort."[13]

In an effort to convince Russia to drop its support of Assad, Bandar (r) reportedly offered President Vladimir Putin (l) a trade package comprising a $15 billion arms deal and a pledge to refrain from competing with Russia in the European gas market. But the offer also came with threats. Bandar is alleged to have said, "I can give you a guarantee to protect the Winter Olympics … The Chechen groups that threaten the security of the games are controlled by us."

In an effort to find a solution to the conflict, Bandar offered Russian president Vladimir Putin what looked like a lucrative trade package comprising a $15 billion arms deal and a pledge by the GCC to refrain from competing with Russia in the European gas market. This might have worked had Bandar dispensed with the stick that accompanied his carrot. Putin, who seems to consider himself Obama's sole rival in international politics, was infuriated when Bandar promised to rein in Chechen insurgents and prevent them from targeting the upcoming 2014 Winter Olympics to be held in Sochi, Russia.[14]

While Bandar has been described "as a pivotal figure in the struggle by America and its allies to tilt the battlefield balance against the regime in Syria,"[15] there is mounting evidence that Washington is not really looking to dislodge Assad. Despite past U.S. pronouncements that Assad "must go," there is a growing realization in Washington that the alternative to the Syrian despot might actually be worse with at least one account reporting that "the Americans informed the Russians that the Syrian regime must be present in any agreement to ensure smooth transition."[16]

Thanks to Bandar's efforts, Riyadh did supply the Free Syrian Army with a few obsolete and ineffective shoulder-mounted surface-to-air missiles in June and at least fifty Russian-made Konkurs antitank missiles.[17] But this is hardly enough to topple Assad, and there seems to be an inverse relationship between Riyadh's rhetoric and reality on the ground: The more the Saudis talk about arming the FSA, the more obvious it is that the Assad regime is still in control of the situation.[18] In fairness to Bandar, his failure to alter the military balance on the ground in Syria has less to do with his ineptitude than with U.S. restrictions on arms supplies to the FSA: Saudi military aid to the Syrian rebels goes mostly through Jordan, which in turn requires CIA authorization for passing U.S.-made arms into Syria.[19]

Given the course of events in Syria, it is highly unlikely that Bandar will prevail against Assad's regime or Iranian regional maneuverings. Damascus's promised cooperation with U.N. inspectors in dismantling its chemical weapons arsenal has won it rare praise from U.S. Secretary of State Kerry, deflecting previous criticisms and demands and giving the Assad regime a vital respite. An end to the Syrian conflict is not in sight, and the great-power agreement is unlikely to lead to an enhancement of Riyadh's status as a regional power. Bandar has failed in Syria, and the royal family is reportedly "dissatisfied with his performance there."[20]

The Worst Is Yet to Come

Bandar is in desperate need of scoring a victory in Syria to obscure mounting internal problems in Riyadh, including the split over succession and the rise of pro-Muslim Brotherhood advocates in the kingdom such as Awad al-Qani and his as-Sahwa Current.[21] Thus, recent reports of Bandar's meddling in Iraq's sectarian strife,[22] if true, may indicate a desperate ploy to deflect criticism at home from his Syrian failings. But this feint is also doomed to failure as tilting the balance of power against the Assad regime is not contingent upon destabilizing Baghdad. If anything, it is likely to increase Iraqi Shiite involvement in the Syrian armed conflict against the opponents of the regime. No less alarming, the spread of violence in areas close to Saudi Arabia carries the risk of spillover into the desert kingdom.

Saudi influence on U.S. Middle East policy, especially on issues that directly affect the kingdom's interests, is quite limited and incommensurate with the volume of the two countries' bilateral, political, security, and economic interests. Washington perceives Riyadh as a quietist player dependent on U.S. power to ensure the kingdom's safety from external threats. Thus, it is reasonable to assume that Saudi requests to shape the formulation of certain aspects of U.S. foreign policy will be disregarded. Riyadh may dislike Iran's predominance in Iraq, but Tehran and Baghdad have found a modus vivendi since Saddam's toppling in 2003, and the Obama administration is unlikely to challenge this arrangement given its expressed goal of military disengagement and its recent opening to Tehran. The administration will simply not allow Riyadh to restrict its political options even when they conflict with the kingdom's own interests.[23]

The Saudi royals at one point, especially since the recent Arab uprisings, thought that they could reassert themselves as a stabilizing regional power. But the truth of the matter is that they are actually part of the Arab strategic vacuum they hoped to be capable of redressing. Given Riyadh's seeming inherent inability to engage in meaningful political reform, promote social liberalization, and tolerate religious plurality, all it can possibly do is sit tight and hope that the regional status quo ante can be restored before too long.

Hilal Khashan is a professor of political science at the American University of Beirut.

[1] Asharq al-Awsat (London), Aug. 19, 2013.
[2] Al-Jazeera Studies (Doha), Aug. 24, 2011.
[3] Arab News (Jeddah), Oct. 12, 2012.
[4] David B. Ottaway, The King's Messenger: Prince Bandar bin Sultan and America's Tangled Relationship with Saudi Arabia (New York: Walker and Company, 2008), p. 30.
[5] William Simpson, The Prince: The Secret Story of the World's Most Intriguing Royal Prince, Bandar bin Sultan (New York: HarperCollins, 2006), p. 54-7.
[6] Al-Khabar (Algiers), May 31, 2010.
[7] Press TV (Tehran), Sept. 20, 2013.
[8] The Daily Star (Beirut), Oct. 7, 2010.
[9] Al-Jazeera News (Doha), Sept. 1, 2013.
[10] Al-Quds al-Arabi (London), Oct. 17, 2013.
[11] Ahmed Mansour, "The Origin of Terrorism in Muslim History," International Quranic Center, Falls Church, Va., accessed Oct. 23, 2013.
[12] Sabq (Riyadh), June 19, 2013.
[13] The Wall Street Journal, Aug. 25, 2013.
[14] Al-Quds (Jerusalem), Aug. 10, 2013.
[15] The Independent (London), Aug. 26, 2013.
[16] As-Safir (Beirut), Aug. 21, 2013.
[17] The Independent, June 17, 2013.
[18] Al-Manar TV (Beirut), Aug. 31, 2013.
[19] The Guardian (London), Apr. 14, 2013.
[20] Al-Akhbar (Cairo), July 10, 2013.
[21] Al-Manar TV, Aug. 29, 2013.
[22] Al-Sumaria News (Baghdad), Aug. 20, 2013.
[23] Al-Hayat (London), June 23, 2013.

Related Topics: Saudi Arabia, Syria | Hilal Khashan | Winter 2014 MEQ

This text may be reposted or forwarded so long as it is presented as an integral whole with complete and accurate information provided about its author, date, place of publication, and original URL.

[ramana]

X-Post from Off Topic Thread...

Tarek Fatah ‏@TarekFatah 29m

Everything you ever wanted to know about the conflict within Islam, but were too afraid to ask. pic.twitter.com/m8rqGTaBqA
-------------------------------------->>

Dont know why such an educamational post is hiding there.

[pankajs]

Stephen Walt ‏@StephenWalt Jan 21

What is US goal in Geneva2? Rmv Assad? Screw Iran? Weaken Islamists? End suffering? All/none of above? If forced 2choose, which goal is #1?

[pankajs]

The Syria Talks Are Doomed Without Iran

The United States won a short-term diplomatic victory over Iran this week. Under intense pressure from American officials, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon withdrew an invitation for Iranian officials to attend the Syria peace conference.

Disinviting Tehran is the latest example of the Obama administration’s continual search for easy, risk-free solutions in Syria. As the conflict destabilizes the region, however, Washington must finally face the hard choice: Either compromise with Iran, or decisively support and arm the rebels.

The lack of an Iranian presence in Switzerland this week dooms the talks’ prospects. Whether Tehran’s actions are depraved or not, its comprehensive efforts to supply troops, munitions, and funding to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad makes the Iranian government the key foreign player in the conflict.

“Iran is the sine qua non of the solution,” said an American analyst, who closely follows Syria and spoke on condition of anonymity. “They have to feel comfortable with the outcome—if there is going to be a solution.”

As fighting enters its third year, the dynamics in Syria increasingly resemble those of Afghanistan in the 1980s. During the Cold War, the United States, the Soviet Union, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan each backed various factions in Afghanistan for its own gain. The result? Thirty years of proxy war that killed an estimated 1 million Afghans and created one of the world’s most impoverished, fragmented, and radicalized societies.

..
The analyst was, of course, referring to Afghanistan, where the United States and Saudi Arabia armed and trained anti-Soviet jihadists—including a young Saudi fighter named Osama bin Laden. The unintended consequences continue to be felt today.

Unless Iran is negotiated with or confronted militarily in Syria, the Geneva talks of 2014 are likely to be as insignificant as those of 1988. Yes, the Assad government is engaging in unspeakable brutality. Hard-line jihadists in the opposition are also carrying out horrific acts. But foreign powers are exacerbating this conflict by pursuing their own rivalries in the region.

[ramana]

WSJ weekend edition said the talks collapsed without Iran before they started!!!

[ramana]

Hindu has a good op-ed on Indian interests in Syria

India's Syria venture

Dont know about the title for so far there is no sign of India's venture or adventure in Syria!

India’s Syria venture
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Tanvi Ratna


India must determine what the Syrian conflict would mean to it

After three years of a brutal civil war in Syria, the world is watching the Geneva-II talks, where for the first time, the regime and the opposition are to negotiate. Also, for the first time, India has been invited to this important forum to deliberate on Syria’s future.

In popular debate, India is cursorily grouped with either the American or Russian camps, but India’s own assessment of the conflict is little discussed. While India has an official position for the negotiations, it has largely viewed the conflict from a global perspective.

However, the negotiations and the conflict will continue for a while as both are stalemated. It might now be time for India, as one of the players on the table, to look closely at the conflict, to determine where the tide is turning and what it would mean for the country.

The narratives of the conflict are many and muddled. However, this is no simple fight for democracy; the problem is religious, ethnic and economic as much as it is political. The democracy narrative traces the roots of the conflict to the March 2011 military crackdown of pro-democracy protesters in Daraa which triggered widespread rebellion in Syria. However, the demands for political reform were limited; instead, what drove many was economic frustration. Syria had faced a four-year drought which reduced two-million people to extreme poverty, unemployment and starvation. Overlaid was the long-simmering tension of religious and national identity; many in Syria’s Sunni majority could not accept the rule of Bashar al-Assad with his Alawite, Shiite and Christian associations.

Over two years, all these motivations have spawned a large “opposition” to the Assad regime, which is in reality a tremendously fragmented entity comprising multiple, mutually hostile groups. The opposition also carries out brutal, armed attacks on civilians and rival groups, meaning they are not quite “the good guys.”

For the United States, bringing down Mr. Assad would champion its pro-democracy record, dispose of an anti-U.S. regime and constrict Iranian and Russian influence in the Middle East. It would also appease its ally, Israel. For Russia and Iran, Syria is the last foothold in the Middle East; almost every other regime supports America.

In joining the diplomacy on this issue, India faced an impossible balancing act, given its friendly relations with every rival — the U.S., Russia, Iran, Israel, Syria — a fact that amazes observers. Adroitly manoeuvring out of the tight spot of having to pick a side, India took a position in alliance with BRICS which eventually sided with Russia, an apt choice given Indian priorities.

Syria is home to few Indian expatriates, nor does India source any oil from Syria; the impact of the war on those issues is indirect. An important Indian priority that is commonly discussed is the opportunity for India to conduct itself as a responsible global power, fit for a seat at the U.N. Security Council.

Ironically, what should be a chief concern, but remains undiscussed, is the fact that Syria is coming close to shifting from an India-friendly regime to a possibly hostile, Islamist regime. For all his flaws, Bashar al-Assad runs one of the few secular regimes in the Middle East. India supports Syria’s right to the Golan Heights, and in exchange, Syria endorses India’s position that Kashmir is a bilateral issue.

Such support is rare in the Arab world; while officially the Arab League does not take a stance on Kashmir, it tends to empathise with Pakistan. Mr. Assad also supports India’s bid for a Security Council seat. Islamic fundamentalism has grown rapidly among the rebels over the last two years. Fuelled by international support, al-Qaeda offshoots Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIL grew in rank and were joined by several others — the Islamist Front, the Syrian Revolutionaries Front and Al-Mujahideen. While moderate forces like the Free Syrian Army exist, the conflict has quite definitively become about religion for the rebels. Some experts estimate that if the status quo continues, rebels will control about two-thirds of territory and oil resources. Syria’s slide into a religiously driven conflict and a possibly radical regime is not good news for India.

The atrocities and destruction from the war must stop, and India has to do its part. However, can it afford to let Bashar al-Assad go?

(Tanvi Ratna is a foreign-policy analyst and member of the Citizens for Accountable Governance.)

I had earlier speculated if the new Sunni Wahabandi push will meet its wall in Syria and roll it back to their makers?

It was the Syrian Governor Muwaiyya that stopped the four rightly guided Caliphs.

[Prem]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-0 ... roach.html
Kerry Tells Senators That Obama Syria Policy Is Collapsing

prominent Republican senators say that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry told them -- along with 13 other members of a bipartisan congressional delegation -- that President Barack Obama's administration is in need of a new, more assertive, Syria policy; that al-Qaeda-affiliated groups in Syria pose a direct terrorist threat to the U.S. homeland; that Russia is arming the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and is generally subverting chances for a peaceful settlement; that Assad is violating his promise to expeditiously part with his massive stores of chemical weapons; and that, in Kerry's view, it may be time to consider more dramatic arming of moderate Syrian rebel factions.

Kerry is said to have made these blunt assertions Sunday morning behind the closed doors of a cramped meeting room in the Bayerischer Hof hotel in Munich, as the 50th annual Munich Security Conference was coming to a close in a ballroom two floors below. A day earlier, Kerry, in a joint appearance with U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on the ballroom stage, gave an uncompromising defense of the Obama administration’s level of foreign engagement: saying that, “I can’t think of a place in the world where we’re retreating.”According to participants in the meeting, Kerry spent a good deal of time sounding out the members about their constituents’ tolerance for greater engagement in Syria. He was told, almost uniformly, that there is little appetite for deeper involvement at home. One congressman, Adam Kinzinger, a Republican from Illinois, told Kerry that his August speech on the need to confront Assad was powerful, but that the president subsequently “dropped the ball.”
According to Graham, Kerry gave the clear impression that Syria is slipping out of control. He said Kerry told the delegation that, “the al-Qaeda threat is real, it is getting out of hand.” The secretary, he said, raised the threat of al-Qaeda unprompted. “He acknowledged that the chemical weapons [delivery] is being slow-rolled; the Russians continue to supply arms [and that] we are at a point now where we are going to have to change our strategy. He openly talked about supporting arming the rebels. He openly talked about forming a coalition against al-Qaeda because it’s a direct threat.”The impotence of the West, as evidenced by the failure of Geneva II talks, and by continued reports of mass murder committed by Assad’s forces, prompted former State Department official Anne-Marie Slaughter to publicly compare the situation of Syrian citizens today to that of Jews in World War II Europe. “In the United States, we often ask, ‘Why didn’t Roosevelt bomb the trains?' We aren’t very different,” she said. ( She is same lady who was told India is too Big to Be UQ to US)
But the main impetus for a dramatic new approach might be the claim made last week by James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, that one of the main jihadi groups fighting in Syria, the Nusra Front, “does have aspirations for attacks on the homeland.” Clapper compared parts of Syria today to the tribal areas of Pakistan, which have long been havens for jihadi terror groups.
If it is indeed true that the al-Qaeda-oriented Nusra Front is seeking targets in the U.S., then the Syria conflict must become, by necessity, a paramount national security concern for the U.S. The impact of Clapper’s testimony could be profound: If parts of Syria are becoming, in essence, al-Qaeda havens, and if jihadis are plotting attacks on American targets from those havens, then the Obama administration, which has made the fight against al-Qaeda the centerpiece of its national security strategy, will have to engage in Syria in ways it has so far tried to avoid. Such engagement would be terribly complicated, because the U.S. would essentially be facing two despicable adversaries in Syria that are battling each other: Assad’s forces (and its Hezbollah and Iranian helpers) on the one hand, and the al-Qaeda-inspired and affiliated foes of Assad, on the other.
Obama has never believed the more moderate rebel factions would be capable of defeating the Assad regime (and it should be noted that these rebel groups, despite McCain’s beliefs, are particularly weak today). McCain opposed Graham’s suggestion that the administration begin using drone strikes against al-Qaeda-affiliated militants in Syria. “Eventually you’ve got to confront them, so to me, it’s a choice of, do we hit them after they hit us, or do we hit them before they hit us?" Graham said. "Because eventually we are going to engage these guys, and it seems to me there’s an appetite growing among the Arab countries and even a little bit [with] Russia quite frankly that we’ve got to change the momentum when it comes to the al-Qaeda presence.”

[Philip]

Al-Q has morphed into a global plague,exactly as its founder Osama intended.From Yemen,Iraq,Af-Pak,clones across SE Asia,either offshoots or copycat jihadi networks have sprouted like parthenium weed.The aims and objectives are very clear,a fundamentalist Islamic empire to rule the world,starting of with the M-East,overthrow of the rule of ancien Arab despots,monarchies and "democracies".It is astonishing that in Syria,the US and its fellow travellers like the Saudis,Qataris,etc.,have ended funding by default the very entities who wish to overthrow their regimes.As Islamist fights Islamist ,the US/West's grand strategy of exporting the Arab Spring to Syria is falling apart like a pack of cards.Assad remains entrenched,millions of refugees are fleeing the country,with the potential to destabilise their host nations like Jordan too.The big Q is why aren't the Saudis,leading the anti-regime war taking in the refugees in large numbers? In the ultimate analysis,the Shia-Sunni rivalry being played out in the M-East has yet to run its course. Fighting will cease only when and if the Saudis and Iranians smoke the hubble-bubble together.

[RoyG]

Qatar wanted to build their pipeline through Syria which would've led to huge losses for Gazprom and destroy Russia's hold over EU.

Russia put pressure on Syria and the deal was shot down.

The "secular" opposition began their revolution a few days later.

Country in the middle of proxy war between Islamists backed by West and Iran + Russia + China.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Libya wanted Africa to trade oil for non-dollar currency like gold.

Revolution started and Gaddafi got knifed up the a** (literally)

Country has fallen to Islamists.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Iraq started to trade oil in Euro.

Euro appreciated $.60 to the dollar.

Saddam was hung and country is now in the middle of proxy war between Islamists and Iran.

[ramana]

Turkish financial crisis adds to region's chaos

by David P. Goldman
Asia Times
February 5, 2014

http://www.meforum.org/3738/turkey-financial-crisis


More than coincidence accounts for the visit to Iran by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on January 28, the same day that his economic policy collapsed in a most humiliating way.

As the Turkish lira collapsed to levels that threatened to bankrupt many Turkish companies, the country's central bank raised interest rates, ignoring Erdogan's longstanding pledge to keep interest rates low and his almost-daily denunciation of an "interest rate lobby" that sought to bring down the Turkish economy. Erdogan's prestige was founded on Turkey's supposed economic miracle.

Hailed as"the next superpower" by John Feffer of the Institute for Policy Studies, and as "Europe's BRIC" by The Economist, Turkey has become the Sick Man of the Middle East. It now appears as a stock character in the comic-opera of Third World economics: a corrupt dictatorship that bought popularity through debt accumulation and cronyism, and now is suffering the same kind of economic hangover that hit Latin America during the 1980s.

That is not how Erdogan sees the matter, to be sure: for months he has denounced the "interest rate lobby". Writes the Hurriyet Daily News columnist Emre Deliveli, "He did not specify who the members of this lobby were, so I had to resort to pro-government newspapers. According to articles in a daily owned by the conglomerate where the PM's son-in-law is CEO, the lobby is a coalition of Jewish financiers associated with both Opus Dei and Illuminati. It seems the two sworn enemies have put aside their differences to ruin Turkey."

US President Barack Obama told an interviewer in 2012 that Erdogan was one of his five closest overseas friends, on par with the leaders of Britain, Germany, South Korea and India. Full disclosure: as the Jewish banker who has been most aggressive in forecasting Turkey's crisis during the past two years, I have had no contact with Opus Dei on this matter, much less the mythical Illuminati.

Erdogan was always a loose cannon. Now he has become unmoored. Paranoia is endemic in Turkish politics because so much of it is founded on conspiracy. The expression "paranoid Turk" is a pleonasm. Islamist followers of the self-styled prophet Fetullah Gulen infiltrated the security services and helped Erdogan jail some of the country's top military commanders on dubious allegations of a coup plot. Last August a Turkish court sentenced some 275 alleged members of the "Ergenekon" coup plot, including dozens of military officers, journalists, and secular leaders of civil society.

Now Gulen has broken with Erdogan and his security apparatus has uncovered massive documentation of corruption in the Erdogan administration. Erdogan is firing police and security officials as fast as they arrest his cronies.

There is a world difference, though, between a prosperous paranoid and an impecunious one. Turkey cannot fund its enormous current borrowing needs without offering interest rates so high that they will pop the construction-and-consumer bubble that masqueraded for a Turkish economic miracle during the past few years.

The conspiracy of international bankers, Opus Dei and Illuminati that rages in Erdogan's Anatolian imagination has triumphed, and the aggrieved prime minister will not go quietly. As Erdogan abhors old allies who in his imagined betrayed him and seeks new ones, the situation will get worse.

One of the worst ideas that ever occurred to Western planners was the hope that Turkey would provide a pillar of stability in an otherwise chaotic region, a prosperous Muslim democracy that would set an example to anti-authoritarian movements. The opposite has occurred: Erdogan's Turkey is not a source of stability but a spoiler allied to the most destructive and anti-Western forces in the region.

It seems unlikely that the central bank's belated rate increase will forestall further devaluation of the lira. With inflation at 7.4% and rising, the central bank's 10% reference rate offers only a modest premium above the inflation rate. About two-fifths of Turkey's corporate debt is denominated in foreign currency, and the lira's decline translates into higher debt service costs. Turkey is likely to get the worst of both worlds, namely higher local interest rate and a weaker currency.

Source: Turkish Central Bank

Now Erdogan's Cave of Wonders has sunk back into the sand. Few analysts asked how Turkey managed to sustain a current account deficit that ranged between 8% and 10% of gross domestic product during the past three years, as bad as the Greek deficit during the years before its financial collapse in 2011.

The likely answer is that Turkey drew on vast amounts of credit from Saudi and other Gulf state banks, with strategic as well as financial motives. Data from the Bank for International Settlements show that Turkey financed a large part of its enormous deficit through the interbank market, that is, through short-term loans to Turkish banks from other banks.

Western banks report no such exposure to Turkey; the Gulf banks do not report regional exposure, and anecdotal evidence suggests that Sunni solidarity had something to do with the Gulf states' willingness to take on Turkish exposure.

Relations between Turkey and the Gulf States are now in shambles. Saudi Arabia abhors the Muslim Brotherhood, which wants to replace the old Arab monarchies with Islamist regimes founded on modern totalitarian parties, while Erdogan embraced the Brotherhood. The Saudis are the main source of financial support for Egypt's military government, while Ankara has denounced the military's suppression of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Whether the Gulf States simply ran out of patience or resources to support Erdogan's credit binge, or whether their displeasure at Turkey's misbehavior persuaded them to withdraw support, is hard to discern. Both factors probably were at work. In either case, Erdogan's rancor at Saudi Arabia has brought him closer to Teheran.

Turkey should have restricted credit growth and raised interest rates to reduce its current account deficit while it still had time. Erdogan, though, did the opposite: Turkish banks increased their rate of lending while reducing interest rates to businesses and consumers.

Given the country's enormous current account deficit, this constituted irresponsibility in the extreme. Erdogan evidently thought that his mandate depended on cheap and abundant credit. The credit bubble fed construction, where employment nearly doubled between 2009 and 2013. Construction jobs increased through 2013, after manufacturing and retail employment already had begun to shrink.

Source: Central Bank of Turkey

I predicted the end of Erdogan's supposed economic miracle in the Winter 2012 edition of Middle East Quarterly, comparing Erdogan's boomlet to the Latin American blowouts of the 1990s:

In some respects, Erdogan's bubble recalls the experiences of Argentina in 2000 and Mexico in 1994 where surging external debt produced short-lived bubbles of prosperity, followed by currency devaluations and deep slumps. Both Latin American governments bought popularity by providing cheap consumer credit as did Erdogan in the months leading up to the June 2011 national election. Argentina defaulted on its $132 billion public debt, and its economy contracted by 10 percent in real terms in 2002. Mexico ran a current account deficit equal to 8 percent of GDP in 1993, framing the 1994 peso devaluation and a subsequent 10 percent decline in consumption.


Source: BIS

In the meantime, Turkey has entered a perfect storm. As its currency plunges, import costs soar, which means that a current account of 8% of GDP will shortly turn into 10% to 12% of GDP – unless the country stops importing, which means a drastic fall in economic activity. As its currency falls, its cost of borrowing jumps, which means that the cost of servicing existing debt will compound its current financing requirements. The only cure for Erdogan's debt addiction, to borrow a phrase, is cold turkey.

The vicious cycle will end when valuations are sufficiently low and the government is sufficiently cooperative to sell assets at low prices to foreign investors, and when Turkish workers accept lower wages to produce products for export.

One might envision a viable economic future for Turkey as the terminus on the "New Silk Road" that China proposes to build across Central Asia, with high-speed rail stretching from Beijing to Istanbul. Chinese manufacturers might ship container loads of components to Turkey for assembly and transshipment to the European and Middle Eastern markets, and European as well as Asian firms might build better factors in Turkey for export to China. Contrary to conventional wisdom, Turkey's path to Europe lies not through Brussels but through Beijing.

That is Turkey's future, but as the old joke goes, it can't get there from here.

Turkey has a small but highly competent professional class trained at a handful of good universities, but the Erdogan regime – the so-called "Anatolian tigers" – have disenfranchised them in favor of Third World corruption and cronyism. The secular parties that bear the faded inheritance of Kemal Ataturk lack credibility. They are tainted by years of dirty war against the Kurds, of collusion with military repression, and their own proclivity towards a paranoid form of nationalism.

Erdogan's AKP is a patronage organization that has run out of cash and credit, and its fate is unclear. The highly influential Gulen organization has a big voice, including the Zaman media chain, but no political network on the ground.

No replacement for Erdogan stands in the wings, and the embattled prime minister will flail in all directions until the local elections on March 30.

The last thing to expect from Erdogan is a coherent policy response. On the contrary, the former Anatolian villager thrives on contradiction, the better to keep his adversaries guessing.

Turkish policy has flailed in every direction during recent weeks. Erdogan's Iran visit reportedly focused on Syria, where Turkey has been engaged in a proxy war with Iran's ally Basher al-Assad. Ankara's support for Syrian rebels dominated by al-Qaeda jihadists appears to have increased; in early January Turkish police stopped a Turkish truck headed for Syria, and Turkish intelligence agents seized it from the police. Allegedly the truck contained weapons sent by the IHH Foundation, the same group that sent the Mavi Marmara to Gaza in 2010. The Turkish opposition claims that the regime is backing al-Qaeda in Syria. One can only imagine what Erdogan discussed with his Iranian hosts.

Some 4,500 Turks reportedly are fighting alongside 14,000 Chechnyans and a total of 75,000 foreign fighters on the al-Qaeda side in Syria. Ankara's generosity to the Syrian jihadists is a threat to Russia, which has to contend with terrorists from the Caucasus, as well as Azerbaijan, where terrorists are infiltrating through Turkish territory from Syria. Russia's generally cordial relations with Turkey were premised on Turkish help in suppressing Muslim terrorism in the Caucasus. There is a substantial Chechnyan Diaspora in Turkey, aided by Turkish Islamists, and Moscow has remonstrated with Turkey on occasion about its tolerance or even encouragement of Caucasian terrorists.

I doubt that Erdogan has any grand plan in the back of his mind. On the contrary: having attempted to manipulate everyone in the region, he has no friends left. But he is in a tight spot, and in full paranoid fury about perceived plots against him. The likelihood is that he will lean increasingly on his own hard core, that is, the most extreme elements in his own movement.

Erdogan has been in what might be called a pre-apocalyptic mood for some time. The long term has looked grim for some time, on demographic grounds: a generation from now, half of all military-age men in Turkey will hail from homes where Kurdish is the first language. "If we continue the existing [fertility] trend, 2038 will mark disaster for us," he warned in a May 10, 2010, speech reported by the Daily Zaman.

But disaster already has arrived. In some ways Turkey's decline is more dangerous than the Syrian civil war, or the low-intensity civil conflict in Iraq or Egypt. Turkey held the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's eastern flank for more than six decades, and all parties in the region – including Russia – counted on Turkey to help maintain regional stability. Turkey no longer contributes to crisis management. It is another crisis to be managed.

David P. Goldman is Senior Fellow at the London Center for Policy Research and Associate Fellow at the Middle East Forum.

Related Topics: Turkey and Turks | David P. Goldman This text may be reposted or forwarded so long as it is presented as an integral whole with complete and accurate information provided about its author, date, place of publication, and original URL.

[Prem]

Saudi King Outlaws Religious Groups
Hazar Choohe Khhaa Kar

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia issued a royal decree which imposes prison sentences on Saudis who fight outside the country and on those who are “members of religious and extremist groups.” The decree incited different reactions on social media networks.Thousands of Saudis have joined the civil war in Syria, including young fighters, and the Saudi media has been debating who to blame. The decree also comes after Egypt has declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist group.
The official Saudi News Agency reported:Whoever participates or is involved in hostilities outside the Kingdom or joins radical religious and intellectual groups or currents, will be sentenced by no less than three years and not more than twenty years in prison. However, the punishment will be increased to no less than five years and no more than thirty years in prison for armed forces servicemen, a royal order stated here today.The Arabic decree, however, did not mention “radical religious group,” but rather “religious and extreme,” which induced criticism for the vague language that it uses. Some Twitter users even started a hashtag: “King Abdullah outlaws the Muslim Brotherhood group.”Political science academic Khalid al-Dekhayel stated that the decree does actually outlaw the Muslim Brotherhood:

[uddu]

For the first time Saudi Royals feeling the threat of Islam. The rich and luxuriously living Sheik's are the target of pure Islam which answers only to Allah.

[JE Menon]

It's fine inside the kingdom I suppose...

[Prem]

http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the ... m-s-divide
An Obama role in Islam's divide

(MMS ka Kya Hogga? Was this not Supposed to be MMS and DK's Job)

American presidents usually don’t meddle in religious feuds. Yet as President Obama tries to adjust ties to both Iran and Saudi Arabia, he is stepping into a historic feud between Shiites and Sunnis. If he can at least set the stage for these two rival nations of the Muslim world to reconcile at a state level, it could help the two main branches of Islam to bridge a great divide.Two coming events may tell. Talks begin Feb. 18 on a long-range solution for Iran’s nuclear program that might lead to a strategic shift in Iran’s role in the Middle East and with the United States. And in late March, Mr. Obama will visit Saudi Arabia and try to persuade King Abdullah that the US can denuclearize Iran and create a peaceful balance of power in the region.The time is ripe for Obama to succeed. Syria’s civil war, in which Iran sides with its Shiite proxies and Saudi Arabia with Sunni militants, has become a humanitarian disaster on a global scale. The war is spilling over to neighboring countries, threatening a regional meltdown.Iraq has also re-erupted in violence between the Iran-backed Shiite regime and the country’s Sunni minority. And as US Secretary of State John Kerry tries to negotiate an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal, he needs tactical support from Iran and Saudi Arabia to hold any deal together.
If the US eases the Saudi-Iranian contest for regional power, it may also create a path for Shiites and Sunnis to come to terms with their religious differences. That process starts with the US rebalancing its special historic relationship with the Saudis and testing Iran on its promise to be responsible player in the region.During his trip to Saudi Arabia, Obama might feel compelled to first smooth some ruffled feathers. The kingdom felt left out during the secret US-Iranian talks last year. It also wants a more aggressive US hand in Syria. And the royal family still feels threatened by the Arab Spring’s continued potency to spread democracy.Yet Obama needs to remind the Saudis of their backing of the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative. That offer spoke of a “comprehensive peace” that would bring “security for all the states of the region.”Neither Saudi Arabia or Iran can regard each other as enemies forever. The advances in war technologies, such as nuclear weapons, argues against it. So does the rising aspirations for peace and progress among each country’s young people. And ruling a country through either theocracy or monarchy is also fast reaching its limits in today’s globalized world.If Obama’s new engagement with Iran and Saudi Arabia has any traction, it will likely show up during any new round of talks between the Syrian regime and its political opposition in Geneva. Syria’s war is both a tragic outcome of Iran-Saudi/Shiite-Sunni tensions and a bellwether of its gradual resolution. Another bellwether will be Iran’s cooperation in dismantling its most threatening nuclear facilities.As such steps toward peace gather force, they can also start Sunnis and Shiites on a new path. The US can only be a nudger, not a decider in that undertaking.

[Prem]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/10/world ... ators.html
Iran Agrees to Provide Data on Its Chin-Paki Detonators

TEHRAN — Iran’s government committed to providing information on detonators for the first time on Sunday as part of a new series of confidence-building measures it agreed to with the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog.The measures include additional inspections of known nuclear sites and clarifications on questions the watchdog organization, the International Atomic Energy Agency, has asked Iran for years, the semiofficial Iranian Students’ News Agency reported.Under the agreement, Iran will provide more access to and information about uranium mines near the city of Yazd, a facility near the city of Ardakan, laser production, and its heavy-water reactor near Arak.The promise of information on detonator research is part of a dossier that has been heavily influencing Western views on Iran’s nuclear program, which Iran says is for energy purposes only, but the United States and other world powers suspect is a cover for producing a nuclear weapons program.

[Prem]

Malsi Export Karne Walo KO Chain Kanha, Aaaram Kanha!

Kuwait MP Seeks Saudi-Style Law Against Fighting Abroad

KUWAIT — Kuwaitis who fight in conflicts abroad such as Syria or encourage such actions should face up to 30 years in jail, a Kuwaiti lawmaker said in a proposed law modeled on penalties introduced in neighboring Saudi Arabia.A Saudi royal decree published last week said any citizen who fought abroad would face from three to 20 years in jail, in an apparent move to deter Saudis from joining rebels in Syria and then posing a security risk once they return home.
In his proposal, which praised the Saudi decree, Kuwaiti MP Nabeel al-Fadl said civilians should face 5-20 years behind bars. Members of the National Guard or police could face 10-30 years in jail for fighting abroad or promoting such actions.The plan would need the approval of the ruling emir, government and parliament to become law."Over the past two decades, Kuwait has suffered the loss of its sons in Afghanistan and Chechnya after instigators managed to delude them and sent them to fight under what they described as religious justifications," Fadl said in his proposal, published on the National Assembly's website on Monday.Kuwait needs to alter its penal code in the ways suggested in order to maintain the security and safety of the Gulf, "especially after the emergence of militant groups and currents with purposes far from Islamic law," the proposal said.Saudi Arabia's Interior Ministry estimates some 1,200 Saudis have joined Islamist militants involved in Syria's civil war.The Saudi decree underscores concerns of young Saudis hardened by battle coming home to target the ruling royal family - as happened after the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq.Unlike Saudi Arabia and Qatar, Kuwait has not directly supported the arming of fighters against the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and has opted instead to organize humanitarian aid.
b]Kuwaiti citizens, however, have used the Gulf state's more open political environment to collect money for arming rebel fighters in private campaigns.[/b]

[Aditya_V]

I think both Governments fear what will happen when these guys come back home, its only a matter of time.

[RoyG]

ISIL represents ideological purity. This is a huge threat to Arab regimes. When these guys come back they will take aim at the royal families. Talibani-AAP style of deconstructing countries into jelly states. What a toxic turn for the ME! This is a great opportunity for us. Right now Sunnis are at war with themselves and the Shias. We will need to implement the porcupine strategy for a while and adopt a offensive defense strategy while we focus on building up our national comprehensive strength and unite the subcontinent.

[Philip]

Sorry to say "we told you so",but "we told you so"! Israel is learning the truth the hard way.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/on-the ... aida-golan

Syria's disintegration alarms Israel
Bashar al-Assad looks like the least bad option as fears mount of growing strength of jihadi groups, writes Ian Black

Nearly three years into the war in Syria, the Israeli government is getting used to the idea that its northern neighbour is changing beyond recognition as the bloodiest chapter of the Arab spring takes its bloody course with no end in sight.

Unlike Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq, Israel – Syria's enemy for 65 years - has not been inundated with hundreds of thousands of desperate refugees fleeing the conflict. But it is increasingly alarmed about the disintegration of the country and the rise of Jihadi-type groups in the uprising against Bashar al-Assad. Eventually, the fear is, they will turn their attention to Israel.

On the occupied side of the Golan Heights, wounded Syrians are being treated by the Israeli military – which has allowed limited media coverage to advertise its humanitarian activities. Outside Israel, it was reported this week that injured fighters are being questioned about the strength, weaponry and structure of Islamist brigades – indispensable detail on these little-known "new players" in the region.

Israeli officials, including the head of military intelligence, have been warning for months of the growing strength of groups such as Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. This has fed into European fears of "blowback" from Islamist fighters returning home after being bloodied in Syria. Israel is also talking up the risk from "Global Jihad" in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip – a local "war on terror" narrative that frames its view of the region and deflects pressure to make concessions to the Palestinians.

Syria blames the Saudis, Qatar and Turkey for backing the rebels. But it has also accused Israel of involvement. Faisal Miqdad, the deputy foreign minister told me last spring that "Mossad agents" had been killed while operating in southern Syria. He gave no details. Still, it would be surprising if Israel was not trying taking at least to monitor and influence developments in border areas – perhaps by sharing intelligence or supplying arms to selected opposition fighters.

On the ground, the circumstances are similar to those in south Lebanon during the civil war in the late 1970s when Israel forged a clandestine alliance with Christian forces and armed proxies to fight the PLO. But there is no hard evidence for the claim that Israel is actively seeking Assad's overthrow. Early western enthusiasm for the uprising – translated into Barack Obama's demand that the president must step down- was not shared in Israel.

If anything the Israelis have been worried about the disappearance of a familiar figure. Assad, like his father Hafez before him, is "the devil they know." Until the 2011 uprising, the Golan ceasefire line had been a model of UN-monitored calm since 1974. The two countries negotiated for eight years over the Golan and the eastern shore of Lake Tiberias before talks ended in 1999. The Syrian opposition has often taunted Assad for fighting his own people instead of the "Zionist enemy."

Israel has benefitted militarily as the war has severely weakened the Syrian army – its main Arab enemy since the 1979 peace treaty with Egypt. Last September's US-Russian agreement robbed Syria of its chemical weapons arsenal, its answer to Israel's nuclear capability. Assad's missile stocks have also been badly depleted. Israel has cut back its armoured divisions and halted the distribution of gas masks to civilians after the CW deal. "Yes, it is to our advantage that the Syrian army has been significantly weakened," says a senior official in Jerusalem.

Israeli leaders have largely refrained from making statements about Syria since Ehud Barak, then defence minister, predicted two years ago that Assad would fall "within weeks." It was an extraordinarily bad judgement that may have reflected wishful thinking: regime change in Damascus would certainly have been a grievous blow for Iran and the Lebanese Shia militia Hizbullah – sworn enemies of Israel.

Hopes that the current regime in Damascus will be replaced by a democratic system that will preserve Syria intact have long faded. Few expect the UN-brokered Geneva peace talks to achieve anything.

Israel's principal involvement in the Syrian crisis has been to use its air power to prevent weapons transfers to Hizbullah – a "red line" Binyamin Netanyahu has maintained. Half a dozen attacks – none of them avowed – have been in defence of Israel's strategic dominance, not direct intervention in the war. In theory - at least according to the old Middle Eastern doctrine of "my enemy's enemy is my friend" - Israel should want to see Assad go. In practice, the alternative now looks worse.
Daily Email

[Philip]

The vicious schism between Sunni and Shia has been poisoning Islam for 1,400 years - and it's getting worse
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 39525.html

The war in Syria began much earlier than is generally recognised. The conflict actually began in the year 632 with the death of the Prophet Mohamed. The same is true of the violence, tension or oppression currently gripping the Muslim world from Iraq and Iran, though Egypt, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia to Yemen, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

A single problem lies behind all that friction and hostility. On Tuesday, Britain's leading Muslim politician, the Foreign Office minister Baroness Warsi, obliquely addressed it in a speech she made in Oman, the Arab state at the south-east corner of the Arabian Peninsula strategically positioned at the mouth of the Persian Gulf. The religious tolerance of the Sultanate, she suggested, offered a model for the whole of the Islamic world. It certainly needs such an exemplar of openness and acceptance.

What most of the crucibles of conflict in the Middle East have in common is that Sunni Muslims are on one side of the disagreement and Shia Muslims on the other. Oman is unusual because its Sunni and Shia residents are outnumbered by a third sect, the Ibadis, who constitute more than half the population. In many countries, the Sunni and the Shia are today head-to-head.

The rift between the two great Islamic denominations runs like a tectonic fault-line along what is known as the Shia Crescent, starting in Lebanon in the north and curving through Syria and Iraq to the Gulf and to Iran and further east.

The division between Sunni and Shia Muslims is the oldest in the Middle East – and yet it is one which seems increasingly to be shaping the destiny of this troubled region as thousands of devotees from both sides pour into Syria. Jihadist al-Qa'ida volunteers on the Sunni side and Hezbollah militants on the Shia, are joining what is fast becoming a transnational civil war between the two factions.

There are around one and a half billion Muslims in the world. Of these, somewhere between 10 and 20 per cent – estimates vary considerably – are Shia. In most countries these Shia are minorities in a Sunni homeland. But in Iraq, Iran, Bahrain and Azerbaijan they outnumber their co-religionists.

A painting of the Battle of Karbala in 680AD, in present day Iraq, which is remembered by both Sunnis and Shias (Corbis) A painting of the Battle of Karbala in 680AD, in present day Iraq, which is remembered by both Sunnis and Shias (Corbis)
What makes Syria different is that there a Sunni majority is ruled by a Shia minority. The Alawites, the sect to which President Bashar al-Assad and much of his army officer elite belong, are Shia. That situation is the mirror opposite of Iraq under Saddam, where a Sunni strongman lorded it over a Shia majority – until the invasion of Iraq, when elections put the Shia in charge, insofar as anyone can be said to be running that chaotic country.

The division between the two factions is older and deeper even than the tensions between Protestants and Catholics which bedevilled Europe for centuries. The two Christian denominations had a shared history for 1500 years. By contrast the rift between the two biggest Muslim factions goes right back to the beginning – and a row over who should succeed the Prophet Mohamed as leader of the emerging Islamic community when he died in the early 7th century.

In the last 10 years of his life Mohamed inflicted total defeat on the pagan tribes of Mecca and by doing so united the entire Arabian peninsula. Around 100,000 people had submitted to the rule of Mohamed and of Allah. Tribal alliances in Arabia in those days usually disintegrated on the death of the leader, or after the short-term military objectives had been met and the spoils divided. Often succession would pass to the leader' s son. But Mohamed had no son, only a daughter. And his inheritance was spiritual as well as political.

The majority of his followers thought his closest associate, Abu Bakr, should take over. They became the Sunnis. But a minority thought the Prophet's closest relative, his son-in-law and nephew Ali, should succeed.

Shia is an abbreviation of Shiat Ali "the party of Ali". Intrigues and violence followed, with Mohamed's widow Aisha (who was also the daughter of Abu Bakr) leading troops against Ali. Eventually Ali was killed, as was his son Hussein, and persecution and martyrdom became ingrained in the Shia psyche. As the years passed rift hardened into schism. The seeds of civil war had been sown.

The two sides agreed on the Quran but had different views on hadith, the traditions recorded by Mohamed's followers about what he had said and done in his life. Diverging traditions of ritual, law and practice soon emerged. A clerical hierarchy, topped by imams and ayatollahs, became crucial in Shi'ism. By contrast, Sunni Muslims felt no need of intermediaries in their relationship with God – an approach which has abetted the rise of extremist zealots like al-Qa'ida. The Sunnis became happy to depend upon the state, which their adherents mostly controlled.

The chief Shia religious festival became Ashura when devotees would beat themselves to commemorate the death of the Prophet's grandson Hussein at the Battle of Karbala in 680. Various Shia sub-sects formed, including the fanatical Assassins, the Alawites in Syria and the Ismailis, whose leader is the Aga Khan. Some mystical sufi movements created a bridge between Sunni and Shia but hardline Sunnis regard the Shia practice of venerating saints and visiting shrines as heretical – which is why Sunni extremists bomb Shias on pilgrimage in places like Karbala in Iraq today.
Read more: Syria conflict: Enemies cross the front lines in Damascus. But will the truce hold?

Yet for much of the 1,400 years since the death of the Prophet the majority of Sunni and Shia Muslims have not routinely allowed their theological differences to create hostility. Some Sunnis included ritual denunciations of Ali in their prayers, but in many times and places the two sects have co-existed peacefully.

From time to time, however, violence has flared in which the Shia, in the main, have been brutally and even genocidally persecuted. In 1514 an Ottoman sultan ordered the massacre of 40,000 Shia. Mughal emperors in India between the 15th and 19th centuries routinely executed Shia scholars, burned their libraries and desecrated their sacred sites. Inter-communal violence has recurred in Pakistan.

There have been periods and places of concord. In 1959 the most influential centre of Sunni scholarship, al-Azhar University in Cairo, admitted Shia jurisprudence to its curriculum. In Azerbaijan, where the Shias are in the majority, there are mixed mosques where both sects pray together. But early in the 20th century the Saudi royal family made discrimination against the Shia official and destroyed most of the Shia holy places. With the rise there of the Sunni fundamentalism known as Wahhabism, severe restrictions have been placed on Shia practice and its leaders jailed. Some Saudi scholars brand Shi'ism as a heresy "worse than Christianity or Judaism".

The fanatics of al-Qa'ida have been nurtured in this Wahhabi ideology. Some of them consider the Shia to be not merely heretics but apostates – and the punishment for apostasy, they say, is death.

Over the years the division has been exploited by outsiders. British colonialists in Iraq in the 1920s used an elite of Sunni army officers to suppress a Shia rebellion, paving the way for Saddam's Sunni minority rule, in which Shia clerics were regularly executed. The legacy has been that most of the 6,000 killings over the past year in Baghdad are Sunni on Shia and vice-versa. Now this ruthless sectarianism has spread to Syria.

Two major developments have triggered the escalation of tension between Sunni and Shia in recent years. The first was the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979 when the rule of the pro-Western Shah was overthrown and replaced with a Shia theocracy with Ayatollah Khomeini at the head. Khomeini did his best to build good relations between Shia and Sunni inside Iran but other leaders, religious and secular, have since been more divisive. And Khomeini was from the outset adversarial to the Sunni aristocrats who led Saudi Arabia – calling them American lackeys as well as "unpopular and corrupt" dictators.

Division: Forces of Syria's Alawite (Shia) regime (Reuters) Division: Forces of Syria's Alawite (Shia) regime (Reuters)
The Iranians and Saudis have been fighting a proxy war in the Middle East ever since.

Today in Iran, though Christian churches are tolerated, the million Sunnis in Tehran have no mosque of their own. There are no Sunnis in top government. Sunni businessmen have difficulty getting import and export licences. Huge numbers of ordinary Sunnis are unemployed. The situation in Saudi Arabia is the exact reverse, with Shia on the receiving end of the discrimination.

From time to time there are attempts to insist that the tensions between Iran and Saudi Arabia are not religious. In 2007 King Abdullah of the House of Saud met the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and, with public hugs, spoke of a thaw in relations between the two regional powers – and condemned those who were trying to fuel the fire of strife between Sunni and Shia.

But it changed nothing in the realpolitik. Each oil-producing giant sees the other as a huge obstacle to its national interests. Geopolitics is the reality but religious vision is the tribal badge it wears.

The invasion of Iraq instigated by George Bush and Tony Blair in 2003 was the second big factor in the deterioration of Sunni-Shia relations. Saddam Hussein led a Sunni elite which governed Iraq's Shia majority with a reign of state terror. The US had backed Saddam in Iraq's war with Iran throughout the 1980s, in which half a million troops died.

But after 9/11 the US changed its mind about Saddam, overthrew him and brought democracy to Iraq. The resulting election placed in power leaders from the Shia majority who have excluded the Sunni minority – who have responded with the car bombs which are killing thousands in Baghdad and elsewhere. Al-Qa'ida jihadists have flooded into the country to join Sunni terrorists in attacking the Shia government. And now the polarised sectarian conflict has spilled over into Syria.

When the Arab Spring reached Syria in 2011 it began as a protest against the corruption, nepotism and human rights abuses of the Assad government. But within two years the armed uprising against the regime was transformed.

Rebels motivated by political indignation, who received limited backing from Western governments, slowly became outnumbered by rebel groups with extreme Islamist motivation fighting to create what they call the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

These jihadists have come from across the Islamic world but they are backed by Saudi cash. More recently Shia militants from the Lebanese paramilitary group Hezbollah have arrived to support the Alawite-led army of the Assad regime. Full-blown civil war is the result.

What all this means is that Sunni and Shia are locked in conflict all across the Shia Crescent. As each side steps up its activities, the other feels more threatened and hardens its response in turn.

Sunni-Shia tensions are increasing across the world as a result. They are on the rise in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkey, Kuwait, Lebanon, Bahrain, Libya, Tunisia, Malaysia, Egypt, and even in London as issues of identity, rights, interests and enfranchisement find sectarian expression.

The tensions are deep-rooted in wider economic and geopolitical concerns. But the risk – given the long history of division and tension – is that predictions of a transnational civil war between Sunni and Shia could become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

[brihaspati]

Why is it "poisoning"? Where do these columnists get there history from?!! Its in a way the continuing fight between Eastern Med imperialism versus Persian imperialism. They have either conveniently forgotten the real start of the problem at the murderous and deceptive attack led by Ali on tesyphon/tisphun - the outpost/military capital of the Parthians. Ali's "marriage" with a child-bride abducted/captive of war/negotiated handover/ princess who happened to be there when tesyphon fell - started off the whole chain of factional politics through which the western parts of the Parthian imperial setup tried to stem the Arab tide.

Shia-Sunni covers Byzantine/Roman eastwards thrust versus east of fertile crescent thrust westwards. Just as Islam then represented the ideological legatees of the iconoclastic zeal of Byzantine Christian imperialism - as now Sunni Arabs function as extensions of European/American proxy imperialism - Shias represented Persian adaptation within a then victorious Arab thrust, to survive and resist the Arab.

The real politics and poison was the vicious contest between Aisha and Fatima on the one hand, and between Aisha and Ali on the other that spilled over even around Umar - after the founders passing away. As far as I remember the formal dispute was Aisha and Fatima's respective failure to get certain orchards as their "haq". But the real conflict between Ali and Aisha was the infamous story early in Aisha's married life when she had straggled behind or fallen behind on a journey, and a young Muslim also fell behind to be her guard. When they caught up in the evening with the rest of group including her husband, Ali had openly accused her of "haram" behaviour. The founder cut it short by intervening in favour of Aisha.

Most commentators indicate that Aisha never forgave Ali for this, and this was what started off one of the real chain of politics within the hot, murderous and vicious inter-personal inter-group rivalries within early Islamic followers of the founder. It was a Sunni-Arab conflict in which Ali later on simply became an iconic weapon of fighting back by remnant Persian/Parthian sublayered identity.

If there was any poison, it was the vicious sexual politics of early Islam, that often showed through predictable rivalries.

[Prem]

Saudi, Iranian leaders involve India in regional peace
Saeed Naqvi
Haram Link

visits to New Delhi by leaders of Saudi Arabia and Iran in quick succession would seem to suggest something new is happening in West Asia to which Indian attention is required.
Some historic changes have already placed the region on a path of hope: the election of President Hassan Rouhani, his historic telephonic “hullo” with President Barack Obama and positive movement of the Geneva process on Iran’s nuclear programme.Negative propaganda was not sticking on Tehran which, with every passing week, looked more statesmanlike, above the mess in the rest of the Middle East.Well, the Saudis are on their way to restoring the balance.Well, Prince Bandar has been relieved of his duties to arm and fund Syrian rebels. The change holds promise of slow descent of peace on the war-torn country. The change also promises a return to smoother relations between Riyadh and Washington. With Bandar’s theatrical diplomacy now in the past, Riyadh can settle down to sketching a comprehensive agenda for the visit next month of Obama.Bandar is being replaced by Interior Minister Prince Muhammad bin Nayef. The world’s longest serving foreign minister, Prince Saud al Faisal too is being asked to go. His slot will be filled by the King’s son, Prince Mutaib bin Abdullah.
It is against this elaborate background that the Saudi Crown Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud’s visit to New Delhi is being assessed.Even though, External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid’s one-day visit to Kandahar had been arranged well in advance, he must have taken into account the themes that his Saudi and Iranian guests will dwell on.

( IMHO, Its dawning on many players that they have been ditched by big powers thus apprehensions out there that Bunnies, Looneis and Poaqonnies will be let loose on them after 14 under religious pretext. Banning of war promoting religious organizations was the first act)

[Philip]

The Pakis getting into the Syrian conflict!

http://www.defensenews.com/article/2014 ... y=nav|head

Russia Warns Saudis Against Giving Syria Rebels Missiles
Feb. 25, 2014 -

MOSCOW — Russia on Tuesday warned Saudi Arabia against supplying Syrian rebels with shoulder-launched missile launchers, saying such a move would endanger security across the Middle East and beyond.

The Russian foreign ministry said in a statement that it was “deeply concerned” by news reports that Saudi Arabia was planning to buy Pakistani-made shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles and anti-tank systems for armed Syrian rebels based in Jordan.

It said that the aim was to alter the balance of power in a planned spring offensive by rebels on the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

“If this sensitive weapon falls into the hands of extremists and terrorists who have flooded Syria, there is a great probability that in the end it will be used far from the borders of this Middle Eastern country,” the foreign ministry said.

Long-existing tensions between Russia and Saudi Arabia have intensified further as a result of the Syria conflict, with Moscow standing by Assad but Riyadh offering open support for the rebels.

Russia is widely seen as Assad’s last remaining major ally in a conflict that has left an estimated 140,000 people dead since it began as a peaceful uprising in March 2011.

[member_19686]

‘We buried five workers alive’

DAMMAM: SULTAN AL-SUGHAIR
Published — Thursday 27 February 2014

Three men confessed in the Qatif General Court on Wednesday to torturing five Asian workers for hours and then burying them alive, according to local media.
The decomposing bodies of the five Asian workers, believed to be Indian nationals, were found on a farm in Safwa, Qatif, earlier this month. They were killed in 2010.
The Eastern Province police have arrested 25 people in connection with the killing of the five Asian workers, a source said on Wednesday.
The suspects include expatriates and citizens. They are being held at Safwa police station.
One man, describing events four years ago, said he was driving around with a friend using drugs and alcohol when he received a call from another friend at around 10 p.m. who asked to see him immediately at a farm.
“We had alcohol with us when we arrived at the farm,” he said.
“We saw five workers with their hands tied in the seating area. When the friend with me asked why they were tied, our host said that one of them had sexually harassed his sponsor’s daughter and other women,” the man told the court.
“I saw that the five Indian workers were tied and unconscious, just before we went to another room to drink alcohol and smoke hashish. While we were drinking, I heard one of them screaming so I went out and slapped him in the face,” he said.
“Later the friend who came with me left the room with a stick and hit the worker until he bled. We then took them all into another room,” he said.
“The three of us continued beating the workers on different parts of their bodies while continuing to drink and smoke,” the man said.
“We kept drinking, smoking and beating them,” he said.
“Our host suggested we bury them alive in a hole behind the entrance gate of the farm,” he said.
“We tied them again with ropes and adhesive tape so they could not move,” he said.
The man said their host brought his pickup truck and the three loaded the workers onto it. They then dumped them into a 2.5-meter-deep hole, he said.
“We buried them alive with all their identity cards. At the time for the dawn prayer my friend and I left the farm, while our host remained there alone.”
Police have concluded that the five people were killed in 2010, the source said.
The discovery of the human remains happened by chance. A man, Ali Habib, who had rented the land from its elderly woman owner, was clearing it to start farming when he made the grisly discovery. The woman had rented the land to another person before Habib.
Investigators then found an engraved gold ring and residence cards that helped them to identify some of the victims and several suspects.
The decomposed bodies were found with ropes around their arms and legs and their mouths filled with cotton and covered with duct tape.
Habib, who rented the 20,000-square-meter farm east of Safwa two years ago, said it was deserted and contained a lot of waste. He had first dug up a human thighbone, and eventually found the first body after digging further.
Habib initially thought the remains were those of a dead animal, but discovered undergarments next to the body.

http://www.arabnews.com/news/532066

[Philip]

It is pathetic how our govt. belittles the life of an Indian worker abroad.The GOI and babudom in general care a fig.Look at how other countries look after the interests of their citizens,the Italians and the Marines a case in point.We should demand an explanation from the various Gulf govts. where our workers have been used and abused .Don't their families at home matter at all? In most cases these poor workers,actually modern day slaves,were perhaps the only breadwinners for their families.

[Rajagopal]

This photo captures the depth of desperation and failure in the Islamic world.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-26365256

sidenote: That has to be one amazing camera to capture this level of detail and depth. I wonder what model of camera was used.

Rajagopal.

[JE Menon]

BTW Yarmouk is contiguous with Damascus, you can't really tell when you depart one and enter the other unless you can read the signs and/or are a resident. There's even a Yarmouk Street in Damascus IIRC which eventually leads to the camp or something like that. Was in Damascus and Yarmouk in 2010 (or 2011) can't remember and the place was bustling with business energy... Tragic to see what has been done to Syria. A local there, and old friend, had the surname "Al Hindi" (the Indian)... and he looked like one of us SDREs; he believed he had some Indian heritage, and was proud of it too. Damascus was a relatively sane place in that neck of the woods.

[habal]

even with the few vermin around, can make life miserable for the natives. So what can a professional army do ? Well, they keep at the pest control. And doing that, they sometimes get lucky.



http://electronicresistance.net/feature ... an-border/

On Wednesday morning, Syrians woke up to the surprising news that well over one hundred Jabhat al-Nusra and Jabhat al-Islam insurgents were killed by the Syrian Arab Army near the Jordanian border. Syrian state news agencies began reporting at 6 A.M. (Damascus Time) about the massive operation conducted by the SAA in the East Ghouta city of Al-Utayba – where, 192 confirmed insurgents were killed and 58 were wounded by mines and mortar shells. The news began to spread quickly, as most media outlets began to report on the developments that took place on that frigid, Wednesday morning. Perhaps, nobody was more surprised by this news than the militants of Jabhat al-Nusra and Jabhat al-Islam.

The SAA operation began two weeks ago, when Syrian Military Intelligence intercepted communications between Jabhat al-Nusra officers in Jordan and the Qalamoun Mountains. Jabhat al-Nusra’s commander, Abu Muhammad Al-Joulani, planned for a contingent of over 250 men to travel from the Qalamoun Mountains to the Jordanian city of Al-Mafraq. The plan was to travel during nightfall to avoid being spotted by the enemy combatants and to avoid any congestion on the roads. After intercepting this correspondence, the SAA began to fortify the area and plant mines along the perimeter of the town and Al-Utayba Lake.

At approximately 12:00 A.M., the insurgents from Jabhat al-Nusra and Jabhat al-Islam began their arduous journey to the Jordanian border; however, they were unaware of the fate that awaited them in Al-Utayba. The convoy of vehicles halted before entering the East Ghouta; this was due to orders passed down from Al-Joulani that required the men to move on foot. Around 2:45 A.M., the insurgents arrived in Al-Utayba. All that was left to do was to cross a desolate plot of land and enter safely into Jordan. The militants – unaware they just entered a hundred yard minefield – began to pick up the pace towards the border. Suddenly, the mines began to explode and the horrific chaos ensued. The militants attempted to flee the minefield, but the darkness made it difficult to avoid the mines. Once it became quiet, the SAA began to fire mortar shells at the insurgents, leaving them helpless against the hell raining down on them.

Syrian state news agencies began to display a video showing the insurgents perishing in unison, while marching at night. The original SAA body count was 175 insurgents killed – later, the number changed to 192 dead and 58 wounded and/or captured. After the commencement of this planned attack, the media poured into Al-Utayba to videotape the carnage. Bulldozers began to pickup the body parts that were splattered all over the ground, while the SAA medics helped the wounded onto stretchers. The aftermath from this planned attack created a shockwave around Syria. Over the coming days, more information will be provided, including statements from the Syrian Opposition and the Syrian Government.

[Philip]

Mapping chaos: How the colonial powers messed up the Middle East

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/com ... 63596.html

Robert Fisk: Were it not for the French, Hezbollah would all be Syrians fighting on their own government’s side inside their own country

And you thought the Middle East was a difficult place to understand. Try living here

Borders are becoming a bit odd in the Middle East. They always have been, of course. Ever since Mark Sykes and François Georges Picot – the latter a former French consul in Beirut, by the way, who cost a lot of brave Lebanese their lives by his carelessness in sealing their anti-Ottoman letters behind an embassy wall – divvied up the Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Palestine, etc, one lot of Arabs (or their grandchildren) found themselves living as hated refugees not many miles from their original homes, cursed and spat at and sometimes killed by another lot of Arabs who turned out to be – much to their own surprise, in some cases – Lebanese or Syrians.

Then we come to the question of a state called Israel which exists in a land that was called Palestine, 22 per cent of which – and the percentage is growing smaller by the day – is supposed to be called “Palestine”. Well, maybe.

Which brings me to the point. For last week, the Strategic Affairs Minister – is there any other nation on earth which has such a ministry, I ask myself? – of Israel, warned Lebanon that it must prevent Hezbollah (Iranian-armed, Syrian-supported, you know the usual and true clichés) from attacking Israel in reprisal for Israel’s attack on a weapons convoy – an attack which, as is often the case, Israel didn’t actually admit to having carried out.

So let’s get this straight. And I start with a weird quotation from the Reuters news agency. “Israel warned Lebanon Friday to prevent a Hezbollah [sic] retaliation for an alleged [sic] Israeli air strike on a site used by the party on [sic] the Syrian border.” What? Reuters editors had hit a factual problem, of course. The Israelis didn’t actually admit that they had bombed the weapons inside Lebanon, so the agency had to fudge the strike which Israel had not admitted to staging – Israel’s confirmation being needed for any statement of fact in the Middle East – while at the same time referring to the air strike which hundreds of Lebanese in the Bekaa Valley had actually witnessed as “alleged”. Oddly, even Hezbollah didn’t admit this in the beginning. No problem, I suppose, if the air raid had been staged inside the Syrian border – like another three such attacks, also unconfirmed by the Israelis.

But let’s get back to Yuval Steinitz – the aforesaid Israeli minister – who claimed that “it is self-evident that we see Lebanon as responsible for any attack on Israel from the territory of Lebanon”. Israel, according to the same Reuters report, has promised to destroy “thousands” of residential buildings that it claims Hezbollah uses as bases. This is even more odd. For many years – and I have been a witness to five of these wars, although Israel claims only to have fought three of them – I have seen thousands and thousands of “residential” buildings blown to bits by Israel which were not Hezbollah bases. So is Mr Steinitz actually being more restrained than his predecessors? Is he saying that Israel may attack only those residential buildings that Hezbollah is using – and not any other residential buildings that may be in the area? If, of course, Hezbollah retaliates for the Israeli air raid that may – or may not – have happened? And just to finish with the crazed editors at Reuters, the agency report has one more wonderful line which I must share with you. “Israel is technically at war with Lebanon and Syria.” Well, blow me down!

A picture taken from the Lebanese village of Adaysseh shows Israeli soldiers patrolling along the Israeli-Lebanese border on January 20, 2014. (Getty ImageS)
So back to borders. There were, many decades ago, several villages in Lebanon which the French handed over to the Brits – when the Brits ran “Palestine” and the French controlled Lebanon and Syria (Lebanon being a part of Syria until the French chopped it off as a useful ally for future years). A lot of Lebanese, born into the Ottoman Empire, therefore woke up one morning and found they were no longer Lebanese – but Palestinian. And when the Israelis arrived in Galilee and did a spot of ethnic cleansing (see the work of that fine Israeli historian Ilan Pappe, among others), some of these former Lebanese – but now Palestinian – folk were murdered. The rest were thrown out of Israel (formerly Palestine) and into Lebanon – where most of them were born – as refugee Palestinians. A few years ago, they were actually given Lebanese passports – so they knew at last that they were no longer Palestinians.

There can’t be many still alive, although – if they had driven a few miles north of their present homes in Lebanon last week – they might have witnessed the air raid on Lebanon which was only “alleged” to have happened, thus observing an attack by a country which expelled them from “Palestine” to a country they had actually been born in, an air assault which may not have actually happened because the country they were not born in did not claim that it had actually attacked the country of which they are now (again) citizens.

And you, Readers, thought the Middle East was a difficult place to understand. Try living here.

Well, let’s get back to Syria for a moment. As you know, there’s been a civil war going on there for more than two years. Hezbollah is fighting on the side of Bashar al-Assad’s government – a heinous offence in the eyes of the Western governments which allowed France to chop Lebanon off from Syria after the First World War. Had the French not done so, of course, Hezbollah would all be Syrians fighting on their own government’s side inside their own country and would thus not have offended us by crossing the border which we Westerners created against the wishes of their grandfathers. And in which case, the Israelis would not have to warn Lebanon about Hezbollah reprisals for an air raid which might – or might not – have been made on Lebanon by Israel but which would – if we hadn’t created Lebanon – have been the fourth attack of its kind by Israel on Syria, always supposing that Israel “acknowledged” that it had attacked Syria in the first place.

Over to you, folks!
The good guys and the bad guys are interchangeable

Dictators go on forever. Let’s start with Abdelaziz Bouteflika who plans to stand for his fourth presidency of Algeria. Jolly good, too. The latest edition of Jeune Afrique – which you absolutely must read if you want to understand the Maghreb – carries a fascinating interview with a much younger man who calls himself “Nabil”, who was, so he says, a member of the revolutionary Islamists who fought the regime during the 1990s war.

Under a government amnesty, he ate “couscous” with his intelligence officer enemies, persuaded his former comrades to surrender – but then discovered that some of them were billionaires.

Funny how wars end with the good guys becoming the bad guys (or vice-versa, depending on your point of view).

“Nabil”, I have to add, ended his struggle with “empty pockets”.

Bouteflika, they say in Algiers, doesn’t know which day of the week it is. Which would you prefer?

[Singha]

It is pathetic how our govt. belittles the life of an Indian worker abroad.The GOI and babudom in general care a fig.Look at how other countries look after the interests of their citizens,the Italians and the Marines a case in point.We should demand an explanation from the various Gulf govts. where our workers have been used and abused .Don't their families at home matter at all? In most cases these poor workers,actually modern day slaves,were perhaps the only breadwinners for their families.

surely the families of these workers must have attempted to locate their fate through police and MEA channels. its amazing that 5 people vanished nearly 4 years ago and there is no record of india govt demanding a proper investigation into their fate....their sponsors were known in the record...police could have caught some of these sponsors or contacted their friends to get some clues if they were serious.

[Agnimitra]

Cross over from TSP thread:

quote="SSridhar" - X-post from 'Pakistan arms, ops thread'
Pak set to get Chinese submarines - ToI
/quote
Pertinent to Iran-Oman-India undersea pipeline.

Agni garu,
What is the nature of Ibadis (of Oman) vs Shia Sunni ?
Any aspects wrt historical experience or cultural outlook which may predispose them to ally with Indian interests in longterm as opposed to say Saudi Arabics and other assorted Pakis ?
Maybe you can put it as post in West Asia thread if your time permits...

Lilo ji, technically Ibadis are separate from both Shi'a and Sunni. But here's why they have historically been politically closer to the Shi'a. In the very beginning, at the time of the internecine warfare between the different factions of the newborn ummah in the aftermath of the Prophet's death, there was a very powerful and aggressive faction now called the Khaariji (pl. khawaarij) - those who kept claiming that others were corrupting the pure word of Allah and his Prophet, and only they were preserving true Islam. The Kharijites became notorious for extreme violence and fanaticism, even by the standards of the warring Islamic ummah itself. Now there are a lot of grey areas between the different factions who were against the newborn Caliphate's early "rightly-guided" Khalifas. Obviously, the faction of 'Ali is one of them. But so were most Kharijites. In fact, the great Imam Ghazali who is considered a major milestone in the history of Sunni Islam would often compare the Shi'a with the Kharijites (this was centuries later). So, at the very beginning, the Ibadis were among those factions that didn't quite agree with the way the new ummah was shaping up, and how well it was keeping to the actual teachings of Allah and Muhammad (pbuh). The Sunnis say they were basically Kharijites, but the Ibadis themselves say they were not, and that some of their leaders at that time had distanced themselves from some of the excessive violence of the Kharijites. In some ways they even accepted the authority of the first 2 Sunni Caliphs. But not the 3rd one, the real testing case - Othman (Osman). Rather, they seemed to support 'Ali over Othman, but later condemned 'Ali also for some of his political expediency. So this is the background of their emergence. In terms of fiqh they are again closer to the Shi'a than the Sunni, and like the Shi'a they also reject a lot of Sunni ahadith as fabricated nonsense. So to put it in a nutshell, the Ibadis - like the Shi'a - were rebellious against what they saw as the adulterated takeover of Islam. And like the Shi'a, they have been an underdog against Sunni-dominated ummah. Some of their leaders, like contemporary Sultan Qaboos, also remained unmarried, which is atypical in Islamic sunna. Lastly and significantly, Ibadis do not believe that there must be a single Khalifat / Caliphate, and they are quite comfortable with a multi-polar set of leaders of different sections of the ummah. This is their reading of Qur'anic requirements, which goes against the unipolar aspirations of both the Sunnis and Shi'a.

[Lilo]

^
Thanks a bunch Agni garu. Looks like they are independent minded at least.
Will chew on your post further.
------------------------

Saudi King Outlaws Religious Groups
Hazar Choohe Khhaa Kar

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia issued a royal decree which imposes prison sentences on Saudis who fight outside the country and on those who are “members of religious and extremist groups

Till now Saudis , Kuwaitis and assorted emiraiti's were insuring their behinds from the ire of the Jihadis by allowing them to Jeehard as much as they want to -outside their home cuntries
Now does the new policy signal a paradigm shift or is it just make believe show for Obama et al currently twisting balls in private over Eyeran and mess in Syria ?

I believe its just the latter , and past policies will be retained in sophisticated ways employing massan sourced finessments if required.

Further I guess any rule changes informally don't apply to turd world theaters like Sooth Asia. And money backed IEDology will continually be churned out and propagated by "non-state" individuals to recruit for jihard in turd world.

[Mukesh.Kumar]

Agnimitra: Just a nitpick. The Sultan is not unmarried. He is reported to have been married but then his wife disappeared. There are all alternate theories about his tastes. Also, there is a subsurface schism between Ibadi's and Shia's. If it were not for the way the current government has managed things this part of the world would see the same sectarian violence as Syria.

[Agnimitra]

^^^ Mukesh.Kumar ji, sure. But I was contrasting Qaboos' and other Ibadi auliyas' comparitively austere marital patterns with the polygamous richness of their neighboring Sunni brothers, or the temporary marriage dalliances of the overdressed Shi'a akhund gigolos next door. There is at least the appearance of austere abstinence among the Ibadi, just as there was among the Kharijis. Regarding Ibadi-Shi'a schism, of course, many differences. But they have endured the shared pain of Sunni persecution, and so they have been politically closer.

[Mukesh.Kumar]

Dear AM,

Let me post something later on this. While there is influence of sect, however, the mostly monogamous situation in Oman is a feature of let's say social and economic forces. Been living in Oman for some time, and I would almost stick out my neck and say that even a year ago Oman looked to have the potential to be the first women dominated Arab society. It's interesting, but Oman is at the moment at a fork- Women's empowerment or Wahabization.

It's worth discussion because of it's geostrategic location, Oman maybe the beachhead for Indian influence in the Gulf. Would be interesting to share perspectives.

For interested momeen's I would recommend this blogwhich gives a sneak-peek into what is happening in Oman.