This could be good news. Apparently, the cease-fire that has been in the workings is close to success. The article states that there have been several key players to already sign the truce. This hopefully means less death and more success against ISIS, but we will have to wait and see.
This could be good news. Apparently, the cease-fire that has been in the workings is close to success. The article states that there have been several key players to already sign the truce. This hopefully means less death and more success against ISIS, but we will have to wait and see.
This Article explain how Saudi Arabia is moving toward Political succession and also talks about that Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud has passed away after nearly 10 years as the country's top leader. "King Abdullah isn't a reformer but a modernist. There's a difference," Ali Alyami, director of the Centre for Democracy and Human Rights in Saudi Arabia, told Al Jazeera. He has empower saudi's women in so many ways. which is illustrated in toward the end of the article .
For the sixth time since Saudi Arabia's founder, Abdulaziz Ibn Saud, died in 1953, one of his sons has ascended to the throne, and it took place Friday without a hitch. When King Abdullah died early Friday at age 90, his half-brother, Salman, was named the new monarch within an hour.
Under King Abdullah, Saudi Arabia has modernized key aspects of the Saudi justice system and also other aspects. so this article talks about the crisis might happened when king Abdullah dies.
"The Saudis have initiated a major campaign to undermine Iran's ally Hezbollah, which they believe is vulnerable today. Riyadh is likely to have considerable but not complete success. It's a characteristically risky strategy.
The Saudis branded Hezbollah a terrorist organization earlier this year and then persuaded their Gulf Cooperation Council allies to do the same on March 2. Then Crown Prince Muhammad bin Nayef pressed a summit of Arab interior ministers to join in lambasting Hezbollah in Tunis in early March. The Arab League formally agreed to label Hezbollah a terrorist group at a Foreign Ministerial in Cairo later in the month. Only Iraq and Lebanon abstained.
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More successful attempts to disrupt the established territories of ISIS. This is news that another prominent member of the group was killed. Again, this was a US airstrike, showing that US involvement in the area is becoming more effective.
This source reports the third day of a successful blockade of an Israeli ship in the port of Oakland. The organization blocking the ability to dock wishes to voice their disapproval with the relationship between the U.S. and Israel, and bring exposure to the partnership formed between the two countries which they believe resulted in the current militarization of police forces in the United States.
US Secretary of State John Kerry is on a tour of the Middle East rallying support for the fight against the IS. Egypt is part of a 10 state Middle Eastern coalition dedicated to eradicating the IS. Kerry said Egypt has a, "Key role," in defeating the IS due to their success in dealing with Sinai jihadists, he also acknowledged that Egypt is the cultural and intellectual capitol of the Middle East implying that they can resist IS's influence.
This article describes the position and demands of the Socialist Popular Alliance Party of Egypt. The relationship of the youth protesters with the Egyptian Left was solidified when the Left provided the youth with the political power to make their revolution successful. The Socialist Popular Alliance demands a new constitution and a new government structure that is based on democracy, human rights, and freedoms. Their political position and ideal social structure are very similar to typical American ideals, especially those of the American left political parties. However, the Public Alliance seems very angered over Mubarak's previous friendly relations with Israel. This population feels as though they were forced to abandon the Arab people and support Israel instead of Palestine. This is interesting because Egypt's relations with Israel has garnered tremendous political and economic support from the United States. Having an Arab ally has been an advantageous point of negotiation for Israel and the US. With the Popular Alliance in severe opposition to this position of Israeli sympathy, it is a surprise that they seem to embrace "Americanized" ideas. In addition, it is worth noting that the youth finds a great identity with the Arab culture, although not so much with a specific religion.
The rise of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant is caused by the world's failure to support democracy in the Middle East,
" ISIL now exists because we did not properly support the democratic transition processes in 2012, not becauseISIL is so strong or the Syrian and Iraqi people are aligned to ISIL-like radical acts."
"We welcomed the Arab Spring when it first began to flourish as we thought the EU and the U.S. would support and finance the Middle East just as they did for the wind of democracy in the Balkans,"
Davutoglu said countries like Poland and Romania now enjoy democracy due to finance from the EU but, he added, "no state came up to finance democracy in the Middle East."
Syria faces a terrorist threat instead of democracy is because the world abandonedSyria.
"Islamic communities that have a deep-rooted culture of politics have the capacity, like any other nation and religion, to both keep democracy alive and improve it,” he added. “Neither Islam nor the world of Islam can be correlated with entities like ISIL."
Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu spoke at the World Economic Forum about the world's lack of assistance in the transition to democracy in the Middle East and how that ultimately facilitated the birth of ISIL. He explains how a number of EU states were able to maneuver into the democratic realm with the assistance and guidance of the EU, illuminating the idea that the Middle East should be no different. Davutoglu condemns the west for abandoning Middle Eastern states in their dire time of need. While countries around the world supported the Arab Spring, they did nothing to support or finance it to success. He says it would be wrong to correlate the birth of ISIL with Islam, explaining how Islamic communities are perfectly capable of embracing democratic systems. However, assistance in its implementation is vital.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to Egypt on Feb. 9-10 signals a “new phase” in Russian diplomacy in the Middle East.
Despite deteriorating ties with the United States and NATO countries over Ukraine, Maxim Suchkov writes, "Russia is anything but isolated, while Europe is no longer the promised land for the state that seeks recognition of its global influence."
Egypt and Russia have “shared positions on a number of regional issues; closely aligned interests (particularly on fighting international terrorism); a successful track record of bilateral cooperation on various fronts; and a strong personal bond of trust between respective leaders.”
Egypt’s leadership has grown frustrated with US admonitions and criticisms of its governance record, and from Cairo’s perspective, bewildering discussions of conditions on US military aid
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is hardly ready to ditch his country’s long-standing ties to the United States, the prospect of Russian arms and assistance could prove a useful complement to what some in Cairo consider more uncertain US support, especially as Egypt faces an ongoing terrorist insurgency in the Sinai Peninsula.
Naumkin adds th
Russia also considers Egypt an ally in its efforts to broker a political settlement in Syria
as a result of the Russian president’s visit to Cairo, the parties might agree to pool their forces in the context of a Syrian settlement.
It might be understandable for some analysts to dismiss the Moscow conference, given the diplomatic false starts over four years in a conflict that has left more than 150,000 dead, 7.6 million displaced, 3.2 million refugees, 12.2 million in need of humanitarian assistance and at least 680,000 injured, according to the United Nations.
Syrian opposition figures were not allowed to participate in the Jan. 26-29 Moscow conference as representatives of opposition parties, such as the National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces (SOC), the leading umbrella group based in Turkey
The absence of the SOC and other representatives of the external opposition no doubt limited the potential impact of the conference,
Participants agreed to an 11-point list of “Moscow Principles” and a four-point “Appeal to the International Community” affirming the need to fight terrorist organizations such as the Islamic State (IS), rejecting outside interference and calling for increased humanitarian aid, while agreeing to meet again in a month’s time.
acknowledged the possibility for other organizations to play a role in future talks
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has vigorously supported the law, claiming its passage is essential in defending democracy
“Success tempted the AKP, prompting it to revert back to its Islamism and initiate a much more ambitious narrative of building a new regional order, and even a new global order. Meanwhile, Erdogan turned into an unquestionable leader who is not limited by facts and creates his own facts, as envisioned by his Islamist ideology and extraordinary intuition. In the eyes of his hard-core supporters, he is not a mere political leader who formulates pragmatic policies. He is a total leader who redefines everything.”
“Libya is a reminder that sometimes it is possible to use military tools to advance humanitarian causes.”
intervention was a matter of upholding “universal values,” which itself advanced America’s strategic goals. In justifying the war to Americans (more than a week after it started), President Obama decreed: “Some nations may be able to turn a blind eye to atrocities in other countries. The United States of America is different.”
But “turning a blind eye” to the ongoing – and now far worse – atrocities in Libya is exactly what the U.S., its war allies, and most of the humanitarian war advocates are now doing.
“this was a rare military intervention for humanitarian reasons, and it has succeeded” and that “on rare occasions military force can advance human rights. Libya has so far been a model of such an intervention.”
But the most compelling reason to oppose such wars is that – even if it all could work perfectly in an ideal world and as tempting as it is to believe – humanitarianism is not what motivates the U.S. or most other governments to deploy its military in other nations.
As the country spun into chaos, violence, militia rule and anarchy as a direct result of the NATO intervention, they exhibited no interest whatsoever in doing anything to arrest or reverse that collapse. What happened to their deeply felt humanitarianism? Where did it go?
What’s most notable here isn’t how everything in Libya has gone so terribly and tragically wrong. That was painfully predictable: anyone paying even casual attention now knows that killing the Bad Dictator of the Moment (usually one the U.S. spent years supporting) achieves nothing good for the people of that country unless it’s backed by years of sustained support for rebuilding its civil institutions.
If there were any authenticity to the claimed humanitarianism, wouldn’t there be movements to spend large amounts of money not just to bomb Libya but also to stabilize and rebuild it? Wouldn’t there be just as much horror over the plight of Libyans now: when the needed solution is large-scale economic aid and assistance programs rather than drone deployments, blowing up buildings, and playful, sociopathic chuckling over how we came, conquered, and made The Villain die?
The way most war advocates instantly forgot Libya existed once that fun part was over is the strongest argument imaginable about what really motivates these actions. In the victory parade he threw for himself, Kristof said the question of “humanitarian intervention” will “arise again” and “the next time it does, let’s remember a lesson of Libya.”
This article basically lays out the faults in US intervention in Libya during the fall of Gaddafi and condemns the US officials for their lack of hindsight in their agenda. The US claimed that they could not "turn a blind eye" to atrocities and human right violations in other countries and to intervene in Libya was a matter of upholding "universal values." After the successful ousting of Gaddafi, the US hypocritically turned their back on the country as a whole, leaving them to pick up the pieces and re-build themselves in the midst of socio-political and economic chaos. The US claims that military intervention is sometimes necessary to address human right violations, but in the case of Libya more violations have occurred as a result of a fallen regime rather than because of its reign. The author basically says that the US should have predicted that short-term intervention strategies achieves nothing without years of sustained support for rebuilding the civil institutions.
If the conditions
remain unchallenged and, hence, unchanged, it will turn into another Syria
or Iraq.
Nowhere is this
threat more profound than with the rise of radical Islam in Libya
The ongoing low-level insurgency in Benghazi is driven by two factors. The
first is the radical Islamist ideology of certain groups that refuse to
recognise the modern state and its institutions. For example, according to
the leader of AS’s Benghazi branch, Mohammed al-Zahawi, his group will not
disarm and demobilise until its version of sharia is imposed. The
realisation of such an Islamic state constitutes the group’s main aim. In
other words, it is the nature of their Jihad.
The second reason is the Islamists’ history with the state security forces.
During the 1990s, Muammar Gaddafi unleashed a crackdown on all expressions
of Islamism, which saw thousands of youths arrested and jailed as political
prisoners. Many were incarcerated in the notorious Abu-Saleem prison.
Today’s rejection of state institutions has its roots in that brutality.
However, Benghazi is not the only Islamist stronghold in Libya: the city of
Derna, which has historically been a strong recruiting ground for Jihadi
fighters to Afghanistan, Iraq, and more recently Syria, is of serious
concern
Derna’s
Shura Council of Islamic Youth and Ansar al-Sharia have decided to declare
Derna an “Islamic emirate” and publicly announce their allegiance to ISIL
and its leader and so called “Caliphate” of Abu Baker al-Baghdadi. This
means that ISIL now has its terrorist tentacles in Libya.
If the international community continues to overlook the current Libyan
crisis, the country is likely to become an incubator of militant Islamist
groups.
In addition to a military
response, however, we need a holistic and proactive approach that focuses on
achieving reconciliation and stability. This involves forcing all rival
political parties to the negotiation table to agree that a newly elected
parliament is the sole representative body in the country.
This article basically accentuates the driving factors to the ongoing insurgency of ISIL in Libya and how the threat is even more extreme than that of Iraq and Syria. One is the Islamist ideology in itself, rejecting any form of a modern state and the institutions that accompany its success. For example in Libya the leader of the AS branch declares that his militants will not disarm or demobilize until sharia law is imposed. Second, during Gaddafi's rule he unleashed a crackdown on all Islamic expression. The brutality shown towards Islamic groups during this time has fueled their resentment towards sectarian rule and has urged them to push for the rejection of state institutions even more so. The article explains how Islamic groups have claimed power in both Benghazi and Derna, the latter being the historic recruiting ground for Jihad fighters to Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. The author makes it clear that both military and diplomatic force from the international community is crucial for the reconciliation of security.
Tunisia kicked off investor meetings for a Eurobond without US guarantees. Tunisia's stock market has already shown political stability. Tunis index rose more than 16 percent in 2014 and trades 10 percent below record highs hit before the Arab Spring. Tunisia has potential to reform but it is in need of foreign direct investment to drive economic growth and job creation. Tunisia signed a two year deal with the international Monetary Fund in 2013, agreeing to follow certain economic policies; keeping its deficit under control, making the foreign exchange market more flexible and structural reforms.
Suleiman al-Hout was refused a license for his food cart in 2007. In retaliation, Hout acted the opposite of Mohammed Bouazizi in Tunisia. He went directly to Mubarak's former party headquarters and told them they had an opportunity to gain his vote by helping him on his food cart license. Since then, Hout was a proud supporter of the National Democratic Party and spent many years growing his business network and promoting the party. Through these tactics, Hout gained political clout and support. He did not benefit from the youth revolution because he was still unable to gain employment and a livelihood. The way Hout runs his political campaign is similar to Mubarak-era tactics. Although Hout was an early supporter of Sisi, he quickly changed his position when he was not given a job in the regime and did not gain any other employment. Now he is running for a seat in parliament, and because of his business connections, he may be successful.
Fours years after the Arab Spring, Tunisia is arguably the region's strongest democratic success story. Economic growth is still slow to develop, recognizing this lag, Tunisia has announced it will launch an emergency economic plan. Tunisia is moving in the right direction but for a long-term guide they should look to their neighboring democracy, Turkey. There is two lessons Tunisia should take away from Turkey: integration into the global economy and inclusion of the rich and poor.
The question asked is, "Does the March 18 Tunis attack signal that Tunisia will be the next Arab Spring state to be swallowed by violence and repression?" The answer is no. The attack was shocking and like I said in the article it has damaged the country's tourism industry which is a huge part of Tunisia's economy. The bigger picture of this article is the neighboring states of Tunisia. Libya is in a worse state where a lot of terrorist attacks are going on or the terrorists are coming from Libya into Tunisia. Tunisia can never have true security until Libya's situation is addressed.
More hope for successful peace talks shown in this article. This concerns a clash between the Kurds and the rebels in the northern part of Syria. It is interesting to follow these conflicts as the US have shown support for the Kurds despite Turkey's complaints. Now, I am unsure what the response will be to the clash with the rebels.