Wednesday, 28 February 2024

Hamas urges Palestinians to march to Al-Aqsa

Hamas has urged Palestinians to march to Al-Aqsa in Jerusalem at the start of Ramadan. The call by Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh followed comments by Biden that an agreement could be reached between Israel and Hamas as soon as next week for a ceasefire during the Muslim fasting month expected to start this year on March 10.

Israel and Hamas, which both have delegations in Qatar this week hammering out details of a potential 40-day truce, have said there is still a big gulf between them, and the Qatari mediators say there is no breakthrough yet.

Al-Aqsa in Jerusalem's old city, one of the world's holiest sites for Muslims has long been a flashpoint for potential violence, particularly during religious holidays.

Haniyeh also called on the self-styled Axis of Resistance - allies of Iran including Lebanon's Hezbollah, Yemen's Houthis, and the Islamic Resistance in Iraq - as well as Arab states, to step up their support for Palestinians in Gaza suffering under Israel's assault and blockade.

"It is the duty of the Arab and Islamic nations to take the initiative to break the starvation conspiracy in Gaza," Haniyeh said.

One Palestinian official with knowledge of the ceasfire talks told Reuters mediation efforts were intensifying, but there was no certainty of success.

"Time is pressuring because Ramadan is closing in, mediators have stepped up their efforts," said the official, "It is early to say whether there will be an agreement soon, but things are not stalled," he said.

Israeli Defence Minister Gallant, asked about Biden's optimistic comments that a deal could be reached by next week, said: "Who am I to express an opinion about what the president said? I very much hope that he is right."

Food aid reaching Gaza has severely declined over the past month, and international aid agencies say residents are close to famine. Israel says its blockade on Gaza is essential in its war against Hamas and that it is allowing in humanitarian supplies.

On Wednesday, Israel said it had cooperated with the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Egypt, France and the United States in an airdrop of food aid to southern Gaza.

In Rafah, where more than half of Gaza's 2.3 million population is sheltering, several masked men armed with clubs and some with guns toured the markets in what they said was a bid to keep prices in check.

Their head scarves read 'Committee of People's Protection.' A masked spokesman told reporters they were formed to back the Hamas-led interior ministry, and make sure people weren't being exploited.

Aid agencies say the situation is most dire in the north of the Gaza Strip, which has been almost entirely cut off. Gaza's health ministry said on Wednesday that four children had died as a result of malnutrition and dehydration at northern Gaza's Kamal Adwan hospital, which had earlier said it was halting operations as it had run out of fuel.

 

 

 

Global calls for sanctions on Israel

Imposing sanctions on the Israeli regime has been a long-held demand by many in the international community over the past decades despite persistent shielding of the regime by the United States. The issue of punitive measures is being raised once more amid the devastating and indiscriminate Israeli war on Gaza.

The international rights organization, Human Rights Watch, has joined other advocacy groups, politicians and countries in calling for “sanctions on Israel”, especially to put pressure on Tel Aviv to comply with the ICJ ruling on genocide.

A month has passed since a ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found there was a plausible case to investigate the act of genocide against the Palestinian population in Gaza amid the Israeli war on the tiny coastal territory. 

Despite the ICJ’s demands that called on Tel Aviv to do everything within its power to prevent the act of genocide from taking place against the Palestinians in Gaza until the highest UN court concludes its investigation the regime has failed to do so, infuriating international rights groups. 

The United Nations Office of the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has said that fewer aid trucks have entered Gaza and fewer aid missions have been allowed to reach northern Gaza in the several weeks since the ruling than in the weeks preceding it. 

Rights groups have accused the Israeli regime of continuing to obstruct the delivery of basic services in the Gaza Strip and entry and distribution of lifesaving aid and fuel within the enclave. 

They also warned that the Israeli military is practicing other acts of collective punishment that amount to war crimes. These include the starvation of civilians as a weapon of war. 

In its latest report, Human Rights Watch has warned that “the Israeli government is starving Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians, putting them in even more peril than before the World Court’s (ICJ) binding order.”

“According to data published by OCHA and the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the daily average number of trucks entering Gaza with food, aid, and medicine dropped by more than a third in the weeks following the ICJ ruling.”

This is in clear violation of the ICJ ruling, triggering calls by rights groups and politicians to impose sanctions and other punitive measures against the Israeli government and military officials. 

“Israel’s ground forces are able to reach all parts of Gaza, so Israeli authorities clearly have the capacity to ensure that aid reaches all of Gaza,” Human Rights Watch highlighted. 

The Israeli regime is “starving Gaza’s 2.3 million population more harshly than before,” the group added.  

The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), a global human rights NGO that combines 188 organizations from 116 countries has issued a press release entitled “The European Union must sanction Israel for its crimes in Gaza”.

The FIDH called on the 27-nation bloc to prosecute Israeli officials arguing that the EU has a duty to intervene to the fullest extent against the Israeli regime. 

“The plausible risk of genocide recognized by the ICJ is a point of no return, which makes the absence of concerted sanctions and condemnations unsustainable.”

Earlier this month, Ireland and Spain jointly called for an “urgent review” of the EU’s trade agreement with Tel Aviv.

In Ireland, the upper house of the legislature unanimously passed a motion on Saturday calling on the Irish government to “impose sanctions on Israel” and to prevent “US weapons being sent to Israel passing through Irish airspace”. The motion also calls on the government to advocate for an “international arms embargo on Israel”.

The Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) has welcomed the move, saying it will now increase “pressure on the government to act”.

IPSC added “polls show that 80% of people in Ireland understand that what’s happening in Gaza is a genocide, that 70% recognize that Israel is committing the Crime of Apartheid, and that huge majorities are demanding sanctions.”

This comes as the UN Human Rights Office has called on all countries to immediately cease any arms transfers to the Israeli regime. 

Sending weapons would violate international humanitarian law, it added. 

Furthermore, UN experts have welcomed the decision of an appeals court in the Netherlands on 12 February 2024 that ordered the government to halt the export of F-35 fighter jet parts to Tel Aviv.

Meanwhile, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has once again decried the ongoing Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip despite the diplomatic spat between Brazil and the Israeli regime over his genocidal comments on Gaza. 

On Saturday, President Lula reiterated that what the Israeli government is doing is not war. It is genocide. Children and women are being murdered.

On Tuesday, the Brazilian leader maintained his position in a TV interview. 

Courtesy: Tehran Times

 

Iran oil sector annual growth doubles

Iranian oil sector has witnessed a twofold increase in its annual economic growth in autumn 2023, reports country’s Finance and Economic Affairs said.

Ehsan Khandouzi, who made the statement in a press conference, added the oil industry’s growth reached 21.8% in the season from 10.8 % registered in autumn 2022, the country has largely succeeded in overcoming sanctions.

The 13th administration has made great efforts to neutralize sanctions since it took office in August 2021, the official underlined, praising the incumbent government’s economic diplomacy and attention to foreign investment.

Last week, Iran’s Plan and Budget Organization (PBO) head, Davoud Manzour, said the country’s economic growth in autumn 2023 was reported at 5.1% including the oil sector’s growth and 2.5% without oil.

According to Khandouzi, Iran’s non-oil trade with 15 neighboring states during the 11 months of the current Iranian calendar year hit US$55 billion, 2.5% higher than the figure during the corresponding period in its preceding year.

Foreign investments made since the incumbent government took over have exceeded US$11 billion, adding the oil sector has attracted US$4.8 billion, the industrial sector US$3.8 billion, the services sector US$617 million, and the agricultural sector US$580 million.

 

Tuesday, 27 February 2024

Iran demands nuclear disarmament of Israel

Iran has sounded the alarm bell over Israel’s possession of deadly nuclear weapons, saying the regime’s conduct shows its nuclear arsenal poses a threat to not only Palestinians but people across the world. 

“The international community must take this threat seriously and make a decisive decision to confront the unprecedented threat posed by this occupying, apartheid, and discriminatory regime to global peace. This occupying regime has become so emboldened by the support of the United States and some Western countries that it shamelessly threatens both the oppressed people of Gaza and the countries of the region with nuclear weapons,” warned Iran’s Foreign Minister while addressing a high-level disarmament conference at the United Nations Office in Geneva, Switzerland.

The Israeli cabinet has suggested the use of nuclear weapons against Palestinians in Gaza multiple times during the past months.

That’s while since October 07, the regime has carpet-bombed the entirety of Gaza, leveling at least 70% of the strip’s infrastructure and buildings.

Its deadly military campaign has also left behind a vast carnage of over 30,000 Palestinian civilians, with the rest of the population now grappling with famine and disease. 

“The world must acknowledge that nuclear weapons in the hands of such a regime constitute the most serious and urgent threat to humanity. It is necessary to dismantle all the nuclear arsenals of this regime and subject all its nuclear installations to the inspections and mechanisms of the International Atomic Energy Agency,” Hossein Amir Abdollahian added. 

The top Iranian diplomat also criticized Washington’s untrammeled support for the regime, saying the US has been scuppering regional countries’ efforts aimed at making West Asia a nuclear-weapon-free zone. 

Israel is estimated to have at least 90 nuclear warheads, with fissile material stockpiles of over 200. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has never inspected any of the regime’s nuclear sites despite repeated calls from countries in West Asia.  

 

Monday, 26 February 2024

US duplicity and Arab cowardice facilitating genocide in Gaza

President Biden, looking somber, keeps urging Israel to avoid civilian deaths and to use targeted strikes on Hamas. Yet he keeps supplying Israel with 2,000 pound bunker buster bombs that are designed to kill indiscriminately and over a wide area. 

He reels against nuclear proliferation and vows to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Yet the United States will not even acknowledge the fact that Israel possesses over 200 nukes, let alone endorse a longstanding Arab and Iranian proposal to declare the region a nuclear-free zone, simply to facilitate Israel to threaten its neighbors of risk of a nuclear war. 

The United State says it wants an end to hostilities and civilian deaths, largely those of women and children in the Gaza war that is not a war because what we have is an army of well-equipped soldiers massacring defenseless women and children. Yet at the United Nations Security Council, the US has exercised vetoed three resolutions demanding an immediate ceasefire.

The world recognizes that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank is illegal and the US says these settlements should not be expanded, yet it is overlooking proliferation of settlements.

Lately, at the International Court of Justice, the US rushed to Israel’s defense—urging the 15-judge panel not to call for Israel’s withdrawal from occupied Palestinian territory. The American State Department lawyer in support of Israel argued that the solution was not an Israeli withdrawal but that a sovereign Palestinian state living safely and securely alongside Israel would bring about lasting peace, repeating longstanding US platitudes that Netanyahu and two of his cabinet ministers have said will never be allowed by Israel.

The US espouses these words in public in support of a Palestinian state, yet does nothing to make it a reality. 

The US officials say that they have limited power over Netanyahu and Israel. Why doesn’t Biden announce: 1) US will no longer support Israeli intransigence at the United Nations, 2) US will suspend all financial and military aid to Israel (amounting to around US$300 billion over the years), and US will no longer sell arms to Israel?

Netanyahu will do as he is told. If Netanyahu does not do as told by the US and if Israel then loses US backing, Israelis would feel so naked and vulnerable that they would demand a change of government, it is that simple.

Regrettably, no US president dares taking such a stand because of the power of the Jewish lobby. It’s time for the US citizens to wake up and demand their government treat Israel as an ally but not as the 51st state.

It will not be wrong to say that the US foreign policy toward the Middle East is in large part subservient to Israeli demands and the Jewish lobby.

Palestinians have also received little or no effective backing from their Arab and Muslim brethren. Most Arab and Muslim countries have supported South Africa’s case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and others have voiced their anger at Israel’s attack on Gaza, but there is much more that they could do if they had a little courage and compassion in the face of the massacre of innocent civilians, largely women and children. 

If Arabs and Muslims want to force a change in the US policies and create a Palestinian state forthwith, they should: 1) recall their ambassadors to Washington (and to Tel Aviv for those having relations), 2) expel all US military personnel (bases) from their territories, 3) follow up with both primary and secondary economic sanctions on Israel, and 4) bring cases at the International Criminal Court (ICC) against Israeli leaders and American and European heads of state for complicity in Israeli war crimes, ethnic cleansing and genocide.

Cognizant of the fact that Israel and the US are not members of the ICC, enforcement of the court verdicts is difficult, still a conviction would be a black mark that no one would want.

Some Arab countries would be wise to consider these steps sooner rather than later as they may face growing domestic demands for action, while may lead to unrest.

Courtesy: Tehran Times

 

Sunday, 25 February 2024

Most Palestinians Support Hamas

Joe Biden, President, United States, declared on X (formerly Twitter) on Friday, "The overwhelming majority of Palestinians are not Hamas." He elaborated, "I won't mince words. The overwhelming majority of Palestinians are not Hamas. And Hamas does not represent the Palestinian people. They're also suffering as a result of Hamas' terrorism. We need to be clear-eyed about that reality."

The Jerusalem Post writes in its editorial, “President Biden, though most Palestinians aren’t Hamas, as you claimed, a vast majority of them agree with almost any question regarding their basic ideology after October 07”.

Suppose most Palestinians, as well as most Israelis, are against a Two State Solution. In that case, you should probably speak to your advisors and ask them to think of a more practical solution - since on the ground, here in the Middle East, a two-state solution isn’t realistic if even an option.

Throughout the conflict, there has been significant debate both within Israel and internationally regarding the extent to which Hamas represents Palestinians in Gaza, the level of support for Hamas among Gazans, and the proportion of the death toll in Gaza comprising Hamas operatives.

The discussion about Gazan support for, and involvement with, Hamas has intensified recently, particularly with the looming yet uncertain ground operation expected in Rafah.

Following the president's statement, various public figures disagreed on social media. Among them, former Miss Iraq, now a human rights advocate and ally to Israel, Sarah Idan, countered with, "Tell that to the Palestinians in my inbox telling me Hamas are heroes and are freedom fighters…"

Though not all Palestinians are members of Hamas or even support it, most of them agree with its basic ideology. Several surveys, as well as monitoring of social media, found that Biden’s remarks are off.

According to a November 14 survey by the Arab World for Research and Development, most Palestinians supported the killing and kidnapping of Israelis on October 07, and just a tiny percentage supported a two-state solution.

The survey posed the question, how much do you support the military operation carried out by the Palestinian resistance led by Hamas on October 07?

The findings revealed substantial support among Palestinians for the attack.

In the West Bank, 83.1% expressed their support to varying degrees, while only 6.9% were strongly or somewhat opposed, and 8.4% remained neutral.

In the Gaza Strip, though support was slightly less unanimous, a majority of 63.6% still backed the attack, either strongly or to some extent. Another 14.4% were neutral, and opposition was slightly higher at 20.9%. Overall, 75% of respondents supported the October 07 attack in some capacity.

Regarding gender perspectives, the difference in support between Palestinian men and women was negligible, with 75.2% of men and 74.9% of women supporting the attack to some extent.

Only a minority, 0.9%, believed the attack aimed to halt the peace process, and 0.7% thought it was to prevent settlement. Additionally, 5.1% perceived the attack as benefiting Iran's interests.

When it came to the concept of a two-state solution, 74.7% favored a single Palestinian state "from the river to the sea," with higher support in the West Bank (77.7%) compared to Gaza (70.4%). Support for a two-state solution was 17.2%, with Gazans (22.7%) more favored than West Bank residents (13.3%). Only 5.4% backed a "one-state for two peoples" solution.

The perception of the conflict's nature varied, with only 18.6% viewing it as between Israel and Hamas. A majority, 63.6%, saw it as a conflict between Israel and the Palestinians at large, and 9.4% interpreted it as a conflict between the Western world and the Arab world.

Inquiries about the motive behind the October 07 operation revealed that 31.7% of West Bank respondents and 24.9% from Gaza identified "freeing Palestine" as the primary reason.

Additionally, 23.3% from the West Bank and 17.7% from Gaza pointed to "breaking the siege on the Gaza Strip" as the motive, while 35% overall cited "stopping the violations of Aqsa" as the reason, referring to issues surrounding the Al-Aqsa mosque's access.

 

Saturday, 24 February 2024

Would Biden like to be remembered "an enabler of genocide by Israel"

There is a growing consensus that Joe Biden, President of United States needs to take back US policy from the Israel lobby and stop backing Israel’s extremist and utterly illegal policies. Israeli leaders have shown not the slightest compunction in killing tens of thousands of innocent civilians, displacing 2 million Gazans, and calling for ethnic cleansing.

The International Court of Justice has determined that Israel may well be committing genocide, and the ICJ could make a definitive determination of genocide in the next year or two. Biden would enter history as an enabler of genocide, yet he still has the chance to be the US president who prevented genocide.

Biden needs to take back US policy from the Israel lobby. The US should stop backing Israel’s extremist and utterly illegal policies. Nor should

The US should not spend any more funds on Israel unless and until Israel lives within international law, including the Genocide Convention, and 21st century ethics.

Biden should side with the UN Security Council in calling for an immediate ceasefire and indeed in calling for an immediate move to the two-state solution, including recognition of Palestine as the 194th UN member state, a move that is more than a decade overdue since Palestine requested UN membership in 2011.

The cabinet of Prime Minister Netanyahu is filled with religious extremists who believe that Israel’s brutality in Gaza is at God’s command. According to the Book of Joshua in the Hebrew Bible, dated by scholars to the 7th century BC, God promised the land to the Jewish people and instructed them to destroy the other nations living in the Promised Land.

This text is used by extreme nationalists in Israel today, including by many of the 700,000 or so Israeli settlers living in occupied Palestinian lands in violation of international law. Netanyahu pursues the religious ideology of 7th century BC in the 21st century.

Of course, the vast majority of the world today, including the vast majority of Americans, is certainly not in line with Israel’s religious zealots. The world is far more interested in the 1948 Genocide Convention than in the genocides supposedly ordained by God in the Book of Joshua.

They don’t accept the Biblical idea that Israel should kill or expel the people of Palestine from their own land.

The two-state solution is the declared policy of the world community, as enshrined by the UN Security Council, and of the US government.

President Joe Biden is therefore caught between the powerful Israel Lobby and the opinion of American voters and of the world community.

Given the power of the Israel lobby, and the sums it expends in campaign contributions, Biden is trying to have it both ways: supporting Israel but not endorsing Israel’s extremism.

Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken hope to entice the Arab countries into yet another open-ended peace process with the two-state solution as the distant goal that is never reached.

Israeli hardliners would of course block every step of the way. Biden knows all of this but wants the fig leaf of a peace process.

Biden also hoped until recently that Saudi Arabia could be lured into normalizing relations with Israel in return for F-35 fighter jets, access to nuclear technology, and a vague commitment to an eventual two-state solution... someday, somehow.

The Saudis will have none of it. They made this clear in a declaration on February 06, stating, The Kingdom calls for the lifting of the siege on the people in Gaza; the evacuation of civilian casualties; the commitment to international laws and norms and international humanitarian law, and for moving the peace process forward in accordance with the resolutions of the Security Council and the United Nations, and the Arab Peace Initiative, which aims to find a just and comprehensive solution and establish an independent Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as capital.

Domestically, Biden confronts AIPAC (the innocuously named American Israel Public Affairs Committee), the lead organization of the Israel lobby. AIPAC’s long-running success is to turn millions of dollars of campaign contributions into billions of dollars of US aid to Israel, an amazingly high return.

Currently, AIPAC aims to turn around US$100 million of campaign funding for the November election into a US$16 billion supplemental aid package for Israel.

So far, Biden is going along with AIPAC, even as he loses younger voters. In an Economist/YouGov poll of January 21-23, 49% of those aged 19-29 held that Israel is committing a genocide against the Palestinian civilians. Only 22% said that in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, their sympathies are with Israel, versus 30% with Palestine, and the remaining 48% “about equal” or unsure. Only 21% agreed with increasing military aid to Israel. Israel has utterly alienated younger Americans.

While Biden has called for peace based on the two-state solution and a reduction of violence in Gaza, Netanyahu has brazenly brushed Biden aside, provoking Biden to call Netanyahu an asshole on several occasions.

Yet it is Netanyahu, not Biden, who still calls the shots in Washington. While Biden and Blinken wring their hands at Israel’s extreme violence, Netanyahu gets the US bombs and even Biden’s full backing for the US$16 billion with no US red lines.

To see the absurdity—and tragedy—of the situation, consider Blinken’s statement in Tel Aviv on February 07.

Rather than putting any limits on Israel’s violence, made possible by the US, Blinken declared that “it will be up to Israelis to decide what they want to do, when they want to do it, how they want to do it. No one’s going to make those decisions for them. All that we can do is to show what the possibilities are, what the options are, what the future could be, and compare it to the alternative. And the alternative right now looks like an endless cycle of violence and destruction and despair.”

Lately, the US used its veto power to kill the Algerian draft resolution in the UN Security Council calling for an immediate cease-fire, with US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield calling the effort to pass the measure "wishful" and "irresponsible."

Biden has put forward a weak alternative, calling for a ceasefire “as soon as practicable,” whatever that means. In practice, it would also surely mean that Israel would simply declare a cease-fire to be “impracticable.”

 

 

Oil slick from sinking ship in Red Sea

A cargo ship that was struck by a Houthi ballistic missile on Monday has created an 18-mile long slick in the Red Sea. It remains unclear what kind of substance is causing the slick.

Rubymar — a Belize-flagged, UK-registered, Lebanese-owned vessel — was carrying 41,000 tons of fertilizer when it was struck on Monday by one of two ballistic missiles fired from Houthi territory in Yemen.

The damage sustained by the Rubymar is potentially the most significant to a vessel caused by an attack launched by the Houthis, who have been targeting commercial shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden for months.

US Central Command said this week that the Rubymar sent out a distress call after the attack and was assisted by a coalition warship and another merchant vessel, which took the crew to a nearby port.

It appeared to be the first time a crew has been forced to evacuate a ship after it was hit by the Houthis. Many of the ships struck by Houthi missiles have been able to continue their voyage.

Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh said Thursday that the Rubymar was taking on water as we speak.

“It’s creating an environmental hazard with the leakage of all the fuel that it’s carrying,” Singh said. “On top of that, it was carrying, to my understanding, fertilizer. Houthis are creating an environmental hazard right in their own backyard.”

The Houthis’ attacks have been ongoing for months and despite several rounds of strikes by the US and UK on their capabilities, US officials told CNN it’s unclear how much weaponry the militia group still has.

“The US campaign against the Houthis appears to bear the hallmarks of many of these highly circumscribed, scrubbed campaigns of the past where we seek to avoid causing them actual pain,” a former US military official told CNN.

The Houthis’ attacks have increased in recent days; Singh said Thursday there has certainly been an increase in attacks from the Houthis over the last 72 hours. And while the Houthis have said they are conducting the attacks in support of the Palestinian people and targeting ships connected to Israel, many of the vessels attacked have instead been connected to other countries.

Another ship hit by the Houthis on Monday — the Sea Champion, a US-owned, Greek-flagged bulk carrier — was carrying grain to Yemen. A CENTCOM release on the attack said the Sea Champion has delivered humanitarian aid to Yemen 11 times in the past five years.”

“So, again, they’re saying that they’re conducting these attacks against ships that are connected to Israel,” Singh said Thursday. “These are ships that are literally bringing goods, services, aid to their own people, and they’re creating their own international problem.”

Egypt: Walled buffer zone along Gaza border

Egypt is building a massive miles-wide buffer zone and wall along its border with southern Gaza, new satellite images show, as fears grow over Israel’s planned ground offensive in Rafah where more than half of Gaza’s population is sheltering.

The images show a significant section of Egyptian territory between a roadway and the Gaza border has been bulldozed.

If the buffer zone — which stretches from the end of the Gaza border to the Mediterranean Sea — is completed, it will completely engulf the Egyptian-Rafah border crossing complex.

Additional satellite imagery reviewed by CNN shows that bulldozers arrived on site on February 03, and the initial excavation of the buffer zone began on February 06. There was a significant uptick in excavation over the last five days.

Videos released by the Sinai Foundation for Human Rights show construction of the border wall, which they claim is five meters (16 feet) high.

The organization, a non-governmental human rights group made up of activists, researchers and journalists, said that two local contractors told them that it was commissioned by the Egyptian armed forces.

The construction comes as fears grow that the already horrific humanitarian situation in Gaza will worsen, causing thousands of deaths and a mass exodus of Palestinians to Egypt’s border.

All eyes are on Rafah, situated along the new buffer zone, where nearly 1.5 million Palestinians are crammed into a massive tent city.

Despite international pressure, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reiterated plans for a military ground offensive in the southern Gazan city, saying it is Hamas’ “last bastion.”

Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Lt. Col. Peter Lerner told CNN earlier that the military aims to create a plan that evacuates civilians “out of harm’s way” and differentiates civilians from Hamas militants. However, it has not yet presented its evacuation plan to the government, he told CNN.

The city is the last remaining refuge in Gaza for displaced Palestinians, and panic is soaring as many decide whether to stay or leave ahead of the planned ground offensive.

Families struggling with shortages of food, water and medicine are living in tents just meters from the barbed-wire fence separating them from Egypt. Most have trekked to Rafah after being displaced by the war elsewhere in Gaza.

Rajaa Musleh, the Gaza representative for the nonprofit organization MedGlobal, currently based in Rafah, painted a vivid picture of the situation in the besieged town, saying that health workers who are still alive “may still be breathing, but we are dying inside.”

“The situation we are enduring in Rafah is horrific and getting worse every day. We do not have water to drink or food to eat, and our health care facilities can hardly operate,” Musleh said.

A growing number of countries and international organizations have called on Israel to avoid a ground operation in what is now Gaza’s most populated city, with the International Committee of the Red Cross regional director Fabrizio Carboni saying “countless lives are hanging in the balance.” The leaders of Australia, Canada and New Zealand warned on Thursday that such an incursion “would be catastrophic.”

Egypt has already condemned Israel’s move to push Palestinians southward in the enclave, suggesting it is part of a plan to expel Gazans and that it would spell the end of the Palestinian cause. Egypt has now sounded alarms again as Israel prepares for its military operation in Rafah.

Egypt began boosting its security presence at its border with Gaza as a precautionary measure ahead of the expected Israeli ground operation, Egyptian security officials told CNN. As part of its security buildup, the officials said, Egypt has deployed more troops and machinery in North Sinai, bordering Gaza.

Checkpoints leading to the Rafah border crossing on the Egyptian side were also fortified with more soldiers and the areas around the main road were being prepared for the deployment of tanks and military machinery, a witness told CNN.

It comes as Netanyahu continues to rail against Egypt for not closing the Philadelphi Corridor – the strip of land between Egypt and Gaza and the besieged enclave’s only non-Israeli-controlled border. In a press briefing on January 13, Netanyahu said that Israel would not consider the war over until it was closed.

Israel has been accused of constructing its own buffer zone, but within Gaza, which would effectively shrink the enclave’s borders. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said in a February 08 statement that the IDF had been destroying Gaza buildings that are within a kilometer of the Israel-Gaza fence, clearing the area with the objective of creating a buffer zone.

Caretakers outperform PDM in debt management

In a rare comparison before leaving portfolio on completion of about six months, caretaker Finance Minister Dr Shamshad Akhtar on Thursday claimed better debt management — domestic and external — from all aspects than her predecessor Ishaq Dar in the PDM-led coalition government.

“Borrowings in the caretaker government’s term have been lower as compared to the preceding period”, although they inherited tougher conditions, said the Ministry of Finance in a statement.

It said the bulk of the borrowings raised in the last few months of caretakers was to meet debt repayment obligations including principal and interest expense liabilities as the caretaker government focused primarily on fiscal consolidation measures including revenue mobilization and expenditure rationalization.

Shamshad added US$300 million to foreign loans as against US$3 billion by Dar.

“The caretaker government inherited a policy rate of 22pc, which was the highest ever since 1972. The average policy rate during the preceding period was almost 19.5%,” the MoF said.

The caretaker finance minister did not blame the principal accounting officer (PAO) Imdadullah Bosal for ‘inferior performance’ under Ishaq Dar, nor gave him credit for ‘better management’ under Shamshad Akhtar.

As Secretary Finance, Bosal served under Dar for four months and with Dr Akhtar for six months. As such, the comparison is left entirely between Senator Dar and Dr Akhtar.

Improved profiling

“Over a short stint, with careful debt management operations, the caretaker government has managed to improve domestic debt profile,” said the statement, adding that the three-pronged approach — extending the maturity of government securities, raising debt on margin below the policy rate and tapping non-bank and retail investors through the capital market.

It said the focus was on reducing borrowings from government securities through the banking sector. As a result, the borrowing through government securities fell by 67% in the caretaker government’s term as compared to the preceding period”.

It said that the Dar-led Ministry of Finance contracted PKR19.862 trillion worth of domestic debt through government securities and paid out PKR14.031 trillio, with a net addition of PKR5.831 trillio. As against this, Dr Shamshad-led MoF contracted slightly lower domestic debt of PKR19.83 trillio in similar coupons but paid out an amount of PKR17.934 trillio, with a net reduction of PKR1.896 trillion.

Likewise, the “caretaker government successfully retired short-term Treasury Bills (T-Bills) amounting to PKR1.6 trillio, contrasting with around PKR3.3 trillio raised in the preceding period” under Dar’s oversight. This helped in reducing the gross financing needs of the government.

Domestic borrowings

Moreover, the caretaker government claimed that it shifted its domestic borrowing to long-term debt securities for the financing of fiscal deficit. Out of medium to long-term instruments, major borrowing remained from floating rate securities, while fixed rates instruments were borrowed on average at 3 to 4 percent below the central bank’s policy rate during the caretaker government period, it said.

Resultantly, the average time to maturity of domestic debt has increased to around 3 years by the end of January 2024 as compared to 2.8 years at the end of June 2023. This is in line with the targets mentioned in the Medium-Term Debt Management Strategy (MTDS) FY23-FY26 and a step in the right direction to meet the end-June 2024 target of 3.1 years.

It said the Dar-led MoF borrowed PKR3.877 trillion through Pakistan Investment Bonds (PIBs) and Ijara Sukuk in six months preceding August 16, against the outflow of PKR1.353 trillion, showing net inflows of PKR2.524 trillion. In comparison, Shamshad-led MoF borrowed PKR6.017 trillion in Sukuk and PIB against an outflow of PKR2.517 trillion, showing a net inflow of PKR3.5 trillion.

External debts

On the external side, the share of external debt in total public debt was 38.3% as of end-June 2023 which was reduced to 36.7% at end December 2023. This helped to reduce the foreign currency risk of the total public debt in line with the targets defined in the MTDS FY23-FY26.

“During caretaker government, the net external debt inflows were around US$0.3 billion, which was lower as compared to (more than US$3 billion) preceding period. Furthermore, no expensive external borrowing was raised from commercial banks and international capital markets during the caretaker government,” the statement said.

Giving details, the statement said the external public debt inflows were at US$8.4 billion in the concluding six months of the previous government against US$5.4 billion outflows, leaving a net addition of US$3 billion. However, inflows during the caretaker government stood at US$3.9 billion as compared to US$3.6 billion outflow, a net increase of US$300 million.

Based on the comparison, the ministry advocated for prudent debt management including breaking the nexus with the banking sector for excessive borrowing.

“Besides fiscal and external current account sustainability and privatizing state-owned companies, it is critical to pursue prudent debt management backed by reducing sovereign-bank nexus to avoid overburdening banks with public sector debt, while reducing private sector crowding out,” the caretaker finance minister’s office concluded.

 

Thursday, 22 February 2024

Pakistan likely to sink deeper into debt trap

Despite remaining under International Monetary Fund (IMF) surveillance for decades, the successive governments in Pakistan have failed in undertaking ‘structural adjustment programs’ that could allow the country to live without entering into one after another bailout packages.

The most regrettable point is that the lender of last resort has not come up, at its own or facilitated Pakistan, in coming up with any ‘home grown plan’. Every time the country is told to undertake a slew of measures that include revising its budget (curtailing developmental expenditures and subsidies), hike in interest rate, and increases in electricity and natural gas tariffs.

Neither the IMF nor the policy planners understand that all such measures erode competitiveness of Pakistani manufacturers and push more and more people poverty the poverty line. On top of all no quantitative restrictions are imposed on the import of unnecessary/ luxury goods.

According to Bloomberg News, Pakis­tan plans to seek a new loan of at least US$6 billion from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to repay billions in debt due this year, which can be termed, borrowing more to pay off the outstanding liabilities.

The country will seek to negotiate an Extended Fund Facility with the IMF, the report said, adding that the talks with the global lender were expe­cted to start in March or April.

Although a default was averted last summer thanks to a short-term IMF bailout, but the program expires in April and the country will have to negotiate a long-term arrangement to keep pay off the outstanding loans.

The country’s vulnerable external position me­ans that securing fina­ncing from multilateral and bilateral partners will be one of the most urgent issues, Fitch said on Monday.

“A new deal is key to the country’s credit profile, and we assume one will be achieved within a few months, but an extended negotiation or failure to secure it would increase external liquidity stress and raise the probability of default,” it said.

 

Tuesday, 20 February 2024

Lula equates genocide in Gaza to Holocaust

Israel has condemned Brazil's president after he accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza, comparing its actions to the Holocaust. Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said Israel's military campaign was between a highly prepared army and women and children.

Israel accused Lula of trivializing the Holocaust and says it is fighting to destroy Hamas and return hostages taken by the militant group on October 07.

The main Jewish organization in Brazil also criticized Lula's comments.

Speaking from an African Union summit in Ethiopia, Lula said, "What is happening in the Gaza Strip with the Palestinian people has no parallel in other historical moments. In fact, it did exist when Hitler decided to kill the Jews”.

But he has since been vocally critical of Israel's retaliatory military campaign, which the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza says has killed more than 28,800 people, mainly women and children.

His latest comments come after Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to press ahead with an offensive in Rafah - the southern-most Gazan city where some 1.5 million people have fled - in the face of increasing international pressure.

Netanyahu said Lula's remarks amounted to "Holocaust trivialization and an attempt to harm the Jewish people and the right of Israel to defend itself".

"The comparison between Israel to the Holocaust of the Nazis and Hitler is crossing a red line," he said in a statement.

Six million Jewish people were systematically murdered by Hitler's Nazi regime during the 1930s and 1940s.

Israel has summoned the Brazilian ambassador for a meeting on Monday.

The Brazilian Israelite Confederation said Lula's remarks were a perverse distortion of reality which offends the memory of Holocaust victims and their descendants".

Lula endorsed South Africa's case of genocide brought against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) last year.

Judges at the ICJ ruled in January that South Africa's case against Israel could proceed.

The court instructed Israel to prevent its military from committing acts which might be considered genocidal, to prevent and punish incitement to genocide, and to enable humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.

Brazil and South Africa are members of the BRICS group of countries - an alliance of some of the world's most important developing economies brought together to challenge wealthier Western nations.

On the ground in Gaza, the World Health Organization has said the territory's Nasser hospital has ceased to function following an Israeli raid. The IDF said its operation was precise and limited and accused Hamas of cynically using hospitals for terror.

Meanwhile, efforts to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas have been taking place in Cairo, though Qatar mediators said recent progress was not very promising.

 

Israel decides to invade Rafah in Ramadan

Israeli officials appear to have set a deadline to invade Rafah, the largest refugee camp in the coastal territory, during Ramadan, which begins on March 10.

Benny Gantz, a member of the Israeli war Cabinet, delivered an ultimatum at a Sunday event with the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, an umbrella group for the American Jewish community.

“The world must know — and Hamas leaders must know — that if by Ramadan the hostages are not home, then the fighting will continue, including in Rafah,” Gantz said at the event.

Israel has argued it must move into Rafah, which hosts more than a million Palestinians sheltering from the war, to ensure the complete military defeat of the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

But the looming offensive is spurring major concerns from human rights groups and emergency responders on the ground, who warn that any invasion of Rafah could trigger a huge loss of civilian life and upend humanitarian efforts in the Gaza strip.

Rafah, which borders Egypt, is the only place where humanitarian aid is consistently entering Gaza, and Israeli military operations there could hinder what few basic necessities many Palestinian civilians have access to, including food, water and medical aid.

“Military operations in Rafah could lead to a slaughter in Gaza," said Martin Griffiths, the UN emergency relief coordinator, in a statement last week. “They could also leave an already fragile humanitarian operation at death’s door.”

To address those concerns, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he ordered his military to draft a plan to evacuate civilians before the invasion. Israel’s main ally, the US, has backed a move into Rafah, but only if a plan is created to keep civilians safe.

With the Rafah operation imminent, Israel is facing pressure from the Biden administration to protect civilian lives with an evacuation plan.

Meanwhile, Arab neighbors are pushing Israel not to invade the refugee camp. Egyptian officials have reportedly threatened to shatter a decades-old peace treaty with Israel if troops move into Rafah, which could send Palestinians over the border into Egypt and possibly displace them permanently.

 

Sunday, 18 February 2024

Seems no end to tyranny faced by Gazans

Now is the time for the United States, and in its wake the international community, to make a decision. Will the endless cycle of violence between Israel and the Palestinians continue, or are we going to try to put a stop to it? Will the United States continue to arm Israel and then bemoan the excessive use of these armaments, or is it finally prepared to take real steps, for the first time in its history, to change reality? And above all, will the cruelest Israeli attack on Gaza become the most pointless of all, or will the opportunity that came in its aftermath not be missed, for a change?

A Palestinian state may no longer be a viable solution because of the hundreds of thousands of settlers who ruined the chances for establishing one. But a world determined to find a solution must pose a clear choice for Israel: sanctions, or an end to the occupation; territories or weapons; settlements or international support; a democratic state or a Jewish one; apartheid, or an end to Zionism. When the world stands firm, posing these options in such a manner, Israel will have to decide. Now is the time to force Israel to make the most fateful decision of its life.

There is no point in appealing to Israel. The current government, and the one that is likely to replace it, does not and never will have the intention, courage or ability to generate change. When the prime minister responds to American talks about establishing a Palestinian state with words indicating that he “objects to coerced moves,” or that “an agreement will only be reached through negotiations,” all one can do is both laugh and cry.

Laugh, because over the years Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has done all he can to foil negotiations; cry, because Israel is the one employing coercion – the nature of its policy toward the Palestinians is coercion carried out in one big unilateral, violent, aggressive and arrogant move. All of a sudden, Israel is against acts of coercion? Irony hides its head in shame.

It is pointless to expect the current Israeli government to change its character. To expect a government led by Benny Gantz, Gadi Eisenkot or Yair Lapid to do so is also painfully futile. None of them believe in the existence of a Palestinian state that is equal in its sovereign status and rights to Israel.

The three of them together and each one separately will at most, on a really good day, agree to the establishment of a Bantustan on part of the land. A genuine solution will not be found here. It’s best to leave Israel to wallow in its refusal.

But the world cannot afford to let this opportunity pass. This is the world that will soon have to reconstruct, with its funds, the ruins of the Gaza Strip, until the next time Israel demolishes it.

It is the world whose stability is undermined as long as the occupation persists, and is further undermined every time Israel embarks on another war.

This is the world that agrees that the occupation is bad for it, but has never lifted a finger to bring it to an end. Now, an opportunity to do so has cropped up. Israel’s weakness and dependence following this war must be exploited, for Israel’s benefit as well.

Enough with words, enough with the futile rounds of talks held by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the barbed words uttered by President Joe Biden, they lead nowhere.

The last Zionist president, perhaps the last one to care about what is happening in the world, must take action. One could, as a prelude, learn something from the amazingly simple and true words of European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, who said, “Well, if you believe that too many people are being killed, maybe you should provide less arms to Israel.”

However, the issue is not just ending the war, but mainly, what will happen when it’s over. If it depended on Israel, under any government, we would return to the warm bosom of apartheid and to living by the sword.

The world cannot accept this any longer and cannot leave the choice to Israel. Israel has spoken: No. The time has come for a Dayton Accords-like solution. It was a forced and imperfect agreement reached in Bosnia-Herzegovina that put an end to one of the cruelest wars, and in contrast to all predictions, it has held for 29 years. The agreement was imposed by coercion.

 Courtesy: Information Clearing House

 

United States: Exploring impact of gas export

It is being said that the boom in the US natural gas exports comes at the expense of domestic households. It has also become a major point of contention in the heated debate over the Biden administration’s decision to halt permitting for new gas export terminals.

Proponents of the exports argue these overseas sales keep prices down for the domestic consumers by calming global markets and incentivizing US oil and gas companies to produce more fuel. 

Reportedly, US natural gas prices hit a 40-month low last week at just US$1.91 per mmBtu as the combined effect of mild weather, strongly rebounding production and sizable inventories continue to weigh on prices.

August Pfluger told The Hill that despite nearly a decade of gas exports, we have had a competitive advantage worldwide while prices have remained very, very low inside the US.”

Pfluger, who represents the Permian Basin, one of the major sources of gas being exported, sponsored a bill approved by the House on Thursday that would strip the president of the authority to approve or disapprove new gas exports.

Proponents hope the measure, which is unlikely to advance in the Democrat-controlled Senate, would open the floodgates for both terminal construction and liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports.

Export opponents, on the other hand, contend that they make the US gas supply — and the prices Americans pay for the fuel — less stable by tying them to the increasingly tumultuous world beyond the country’s borders. 

“Whether it’s a coal crisis in China, a cold snap in Asia, unrest in the Middle East, a pipeline explosion in Europe — anytime global gas markets sneeze, we’re going to catch a cold,” said Clark Williams-Derry of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.

Williams-Derry argued that the gas companies’ price gouged American consumers by tying the US to global gas markets — and thereby to the surging prices that, for example, accompanied the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

As formerly cheap US gas supplies went to suddenly gas-starved — and wealthy — European countries since 2022, total US spending on gas surged by around US$120 billion dollars, or about US$975 per American household, he wrote.

“We’ve already dug ourselves into the crazy hole,” he said. “And now we’re going to be exporting 25% or more of our gas.”

The buildout in export terminals has forced US consumers into competition with entire countries, said Paul Cicio, president of the Industrial Energy Consumers of America (IECA), a diverse trade group of factories and manufacturers united in their demand for cheap domestic gas.

According to IECA, Williams-Derry has underestimated the cost of gas exports to American households. In testimony to Congress last week, it argued that gas exports had driven up prices in 2022 alone by the equivalent of US$137 billion — and fueled inflation throughout the entire economy. 

IECA has been vehemently opposed to oil and gas exports since well before the first gas terminal was completed in 2016 in the United States. 

Before such terminals were built, Cicio said, gas producers sold to utilities or companies — while now they have the opportunity to sell to entire countries, or at least to major state-owned companies. One paused project has signed deals with Germany and China’s state-owned gas company.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s the middle of winter here — peak demand, inventories are low, prices are high — those countries will buy it away, drive up the price of gas and electricity,” Cicio said.

Since the war in Ukraine began, the IECA has argued for what it calls a “safety valve” — a congressional or administrative rule that would limit exports if the gas supplies are low in the country.

But export proponents, including oil and gas companies and congressional lawmakers who represent key gas-producing areas, contend that unlimited exports are in the public interest — and that restricting them would negatively impact American prices.

While many export terminals — those that have already received their Department of Energy permits — would still be built whatever the Biden administration decides regarding new permits, Pfluger, the Texas congressman, argued that the announcement of a coming pause would send dangerous ripples through the industry.

“When you signal to the industry that there could be some political instability or turbulence, then that leads to more volatility in the price than anything else,” Pfluger said.

By suggesting that gas exports would be bottlenecked and even decline, he said, the administration was signaling drillers and pipeline builders to begin slowing down as well — thereby driving up prices.

“These projects don’t happen overnight,” Pfluger said. “You can’t turn them on and off like a light switch.”

Supporters of unlimited exports argue that if gas producers in regions like the Texas Permian or the Marcellus Shale of Pennsylvania don’t have ready access to foreign markets, they won’t produce as much gas for Americans either.

Benjamin Leibowicz, who teaches energy policy and mathematics at the University of Texas at Austin, pushed back on the idea that that exports lead to cheaper domestic prices, however, saying it doesn’t make sense in the short term.

“If there are more gas consumers and higher demand, that translates to higher prices,” he told The Hill — though he emphasized that he, too, thought this would spur more drilling.

Gas export terminals open American gas production to a globe full of potential consumers, most of them live in regions where gas is far more expensive than it is in the US. 

In both Europe and Asia, for example, gas prices in December were nearly about five times what they were in the US 

That represents an opportunity for American gas producers who would like to get more money for their fuel. 

But it also puts American consumers accustomed to paying US$2.50 per unit of gas in competition with Europeans willing to pay US$11.5, or East Asians willing to pay US$13. 

As early as 2009 — seven years before the first tanker of LNG set sail from the Gulf Coast to Europe — economists predicted a “strengthening relationship” between European and American gas prices if LNG trade picked up. 

That’s essentially what happened, the U.S. Energy Information Agency concluded in 2023. The agency found that higher LNG exports decreased domestic supplies of natural gas, “increasing domestic natural gas prices.”

That finding, in addition to climate concerns, was a major reason why Democrats called on the administration to halt the expansion of gas exports — or at least, that expansion’s long tail.

“I’m just seeing record profits for LNG, but I don’t see the benefits coming into Americans in my community,” Catherine Cortez Masto told David Turk, deputy secretary of the Energy Department, in a hearing last week.

Saturday, 17 February 2024

Israel belongs to Palestinians living in Gaza

Many professing solidarity with Palestinians say they have nowhere to go. It’s not true. They do, somewhere they actually should go, their homes in what is now Israel. The majority of families of Palestinians in Gaza were forced there by Israel in 1948.

The great thread by Hanine Hassan, “Who told you that the 1.5 million displaced Palestinians sheltering in Rafah have nowhere left to go? My family, now in Rafah, has a home in Jaffa, from which we were expelled by a fascist German family. The majority of our people in Gaza have homes to go to, all over Palestine.”

Prof. John Quigley has noted, “They are entitled to repatriation under international law, including the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination which Israel has signed and ratified.”

There’s UN Resolution 194 dated December 11, 1948, “Resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return…”

The extremely pro-Israel Harry Truman said if Israel continues to reject the basic principles set forth in that UN resolution, the US government will regretfully be forced to the conclusion that a revision of its attitude toward Israel has become unavoidable.

UN mediator Count Folke Bernadotte reported on September 18, 1948, “It would be an offence against the principles of elemental justice if these innocent victims of the conflict were denied the right to return to their homes, while Jewish immigrants flow into Palestine, and, indeed, at least offer the threat of permanent replacement of the Arab refugees, who have been rooted in the land for centuries.”

Bernadotte was shot six times the day before his report was to be issued. They shot his French assistant no less than 17 times. No one was ever brought to justice for killing the mediator.

The prospect of Palestinians going back to their homes continues to bring out the most murderous impulses in Israeli officials.

AntiWar.com reports, “Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir said on Sunday that Israeli forces should shoot Palestinian women and children in Gaza if they get too close to the Israeli border. … ‘We cannot have women and children getting close to the border… anyone who gets near must get a bullet, in his head,’ Ben-Gvir said during an argument with Israeli Defense Forces Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi about the IDF’s open fire policies, according to The Jerusalem Post.

“After his comments leaked to the press, Ben Gvir doubled down. In a post on X, the Israeli minister said he ‘does not stutter and does not intend to apologize. All those who endanger our citizens by getting near the border must be shot. This is what they do in any normal state.’”

Indeed, in 2018 the “Great March of Return” began, as Palestinians in Gaza tried to simply walk back to their homes. On August 31, 2023, The Palestine Chronicle reported: “Gaza to Resume Great March of Return Protests.”  Maureen Clare Murphy at the Electronic Intifada noted, Protests along the Gaza-Israel boundary resumed in August. Massive demonstrations dubbed the Great March of Return were held on a regular basis for nearly two years beginning in early 2018.

The protests were aimed at ending the Israeli siege on Gaza and allowing Palestinian refugees to exercise their right of return as enshrined in international law. Some two-third of Gaza’s population of more than two million people are refugees from lands just beyond the boundary fence.

More than 215 Palestinian civilians, including more than 40 children, were killed during those demonstrations, and thousands more wounded by live fire during those protests between March 2018 and December 2019.

A UN commission of inquiry found that Israel’s use of lethal force against protesters warrants criminal investigation and prosecution and may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Excessive use of force against Great March of Return protests is expected to be a major focus of the International Criminal Court’s Palestine investigation, should it move forward.

The recently slain Palestinian writer Refaat Alareer noted on October 08, 2023, “The very Israeli snipers that gunned down hundreds of Palestinian marchers in the Great Return March in 2018/19 were neutralized by Palestinian freedom fighters.”

In a recent piece in the New York Review of Books — “Gaza: Two Rights of Return — Most Palestinians in Gaza are now displaced at least twice over. They have a right to choose where to return” — Sari Bashi from Human Rights Watch writes as a Jewish woman married to a Palestinian man whose family was forced from their homes in 1948 and again during the current assault, “I’ll be relieved if my in-laws are merely allowed to return to northern Gaza and receive support to rebuild a house there.”

Courtesy: Information Clearing House

 

Palestinian state must for Mideast stability

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan said on Saturday that the only pathway towards security and stability in the Middle East, including Israel, was through the establishment of a Palestinian state, reports the Saudi Gazette.

Addressing a panel discussion at the Munich Security Conference about normalization of ties with Israel, Prince Faisal underscored the need to ensure a safe path to a two-state solution, saying, the greater the consensus in the international community on the two-state solution, the closer we will get to it.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry and Belgian Foreign Minister Hadja Lahbib also attended the discussion.

The foreign minister said that Saudi Arabia has no relations with Israel. “Normalization of relations with Israel depends on the implementation of the Arab Peace Treaty. We do not talk to them directly,” he said.

Prince Faisal stressed that Saudi Arabia was now concentrating on a truce in the Gaza war. “We are focused on a ceasefire and on an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and we are focused on humanitarian access for the people of Gaza”.

“What Israel is doing in Gaza will not make it safer, but rather will push a new generation towards extremism,” he said while calling for all those, who obstruct the two-state solution, to be held accountable.

For his part, Sameh Shoukry said that Cairo confirmed to Tel Aviv that removing the displaced Palestinians from Rafah poses a threat to Egypt’s national security, saying that there are catastrophic consequences of displacing the people of Gaza.

He considered that the lack of will of the international community is what has been obstructing the two-state solution for years.

On her part, Hadja Lahbib called for bringing out a comprehensive plan to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, stressing that the current crisis in Gaza cannot be resolved militarily.

The Belgian minister said that Israel must offer an alternative solution as long as it rejects the two-state solution, stressing that the two-state solution is capable of defusing the conflict in the Middle East.

Meanwhile, Josep Borrell, high representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, said on Saturday that he discussed with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan the catastrophic situation in the Gaza Strip.

In a statement on his X account, Borrell stated that he also discussed with the Saudi minister the need for regional security and the practical steps that can be taken within the framework of our joint work on the two-state solution.

On Friday, Prince Faisal discussed with his British counterpart David Cameron the developments on the Gaza situation and the international efforts being made in this regard. Their meeting was held on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference.

Friday, 16 February 2024

Maulana's revelations bring no surprises

To some, JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rahman triggered a political earthquake late Thursday when, during a television interview, he revealed that former army chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa and spy chief Lt Gen Faiz Hameed had organized and orchestrated the 2022 vote of no-confidence that resulted in Imran Khan’s ouster.

A day later, he corrected himself in a different interview, saying he had taken the ex-spy chief’s name by mistake, and that it was his successor that he had, in fact, been referring to.

“They were in contact with all political parties regarding the no-confidence motion, and they told us the way of going about it,” he had initially said.

The PDM parties went along with the plan, but they were merely rubber-stamping the move, the JUI-F chief claimed.

Maulana’s confession ended up causing quite a stir on social media, with most PTI sympathizers describing it as confirmation of their party’s long-held stance on the cipher conspiracy, under which they believe that army generals acted to topple the PTI’s elected government in collusion with/ or on the instructions of officials from the Biden administration.

On the other hand, the Maulana’s detractors were quick to dismiss him, with many speculating that he had only made a statement to secure a few positions in the next government for himself or one of his family members.

It certainly seemed hypocritical of him to claim that he never wanted a role in the no-trust vote and that he only went along due to peer pressure. He had, after all, been heading the PDM at the time.

Regardless, to those familiar with the security establishment’s behind-the-scenes machinations, this revelation outlined another link in the larger scheme of interference and control ongoing for the past many years.

From the ouster of Nawaz Sharif in 2017, to the pre-poll rigging before the July 2018 elections to keep him out; the post-poll creation of the PTI government with the help of independents; Gen Bajwa’s service extension; the subjugation of the media; and, finally, the ouster of Imran Khan’s government — Gen Bajwa remained active throughout, supported in his political adventures for most of that period by Gen Hameed, who served first as DGC and then as DG ISI.

It is time for both gentlemen’s actions during this extended period to be investigated thoroughly and, if their misconduct is proven, for them to be appropriately punished on each count. It ought to be noted that this current cycle of instability started with Nawaz Sharif’s ouster in 2017, and has only gotten worse since then.

It may be too late to rectify the original sin, but it is never too late to stop repeating mistakes. Recognizing this will put the country on a path to recovery.

Courtesy: Dawn

Pakistan: PTI decides to sit in opposition

According to Dawn, Pakistan Teheek-e-Insaf (PTI) of Imran Khan has finally decided to sit on the opposition benches in national and provincial assemblies. It also announced to launch countrywide protests against alleged rigging in the February 08 general elections.

A PTI source also told Dawn that the party’s incarcerated founder, Imran Khan, has tasked former National Assembly speaker Asad Qaiser with engaging political parties to muster support for the protest drive.

The party, which also issued a white paper against alleged rigging on Friday, has decided to kick off its demonstrations from Saturday.

A PTI delegation led by Qaisar met the leader of Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) and Qaumi Watan Party (QWP) on Friday, while a meeting with Pashtoonkhwa Milli Awami Party’s Mehmood Khan Achakzai is also scheduled to take place on Saturday.

Addressing a news conference after meeting with Aftab Sherpao, PTI leader Barrister Saif confirmed the decision to sit on the opposition benches in the Centre and Punjab Assembly.

In the second phase, these parties could form an alliance in the centre and provinces, including Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where PTI -backed independents are in a position to form the government with a two-thirds majority.

The PTI source added that even though the party has categorically announced it would not engage with the PPP and PML-N, efforts were underway for back-channel contacts with the former. If they do become allies, the PPP and PTI would have enough seats in the NA to form the government.

 

Pakistan Election Results, USIP Perspective

Days after Pakistan’s February 08 general election, the Election Commission of Pakistan released the official results confirming a major political upset. Contrary to what most political pundits and observers had predicted, independents aligned with former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) won the most seats at the national level, followed by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM). No party won an absolute majority needed to form a government on its own, says a report released by the United States Institute of Peace (USIP).

The resultant uncertainty means the United States may have to contend with a government that is more focused on navigating internal politics and less so on addressing strategic challenges.

On the one hand, the most likely scenario appears to be a coalition government that may struggle to muster the political strength to push through much-needed economic reforms and take on serious governance and security challenges.

On the other hand, several contenders have raised allegations of vote tampering that will call into question the credibility of a future government.

PTI-aligned candidates in particular claim that the delays in the final announcement of results are evidence of irregularities. Even before the election, it was clear that the electoral playing field was being tilted against the PTI.

The US State Department has noted allegations of interference in the electoral process and called for a full investigation. In its preliminary report, Pakistan’s polling watchdog, Free and Fair Election Network, noted that there was transparency at the polling stations, but it was compromised at the vote counting and tabulation stage.

Despite not winning the most seats, the PML-N is now trying to cobble together a coalition government with the PPP and MQM — as these parties together have a near majority of seats, which is required to form a government.

It has also nominated former Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif — Nawaz Sharif’s brother — to lead the coalition as the new prime minister.

For its part, the PTI has announced intent to form a government at the center as well as in the provinces of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, but it is unclear who it will ally with to get the majority required to form a government.

It is more likely that PTI-aligned candidates will sit in the opposition in the national assembly, as the party has made clear it will not ally with either the PML-N or PPP.

The victory of PTI-backed candidates defies the expectations of political pundits in Pakistan. It was widely anticipated that the PML-N would win and the PTI would lose the election.

At the heart of this projection was the state of the relationship between Khan and Pakistan’s powerful military establishment, which was seen to be backing the PML-N’s return to power and blocking Khan and his PTI.

Khan fell out with the military when his government was deposed in a vote of no confidence in 2022, which he charged was a regime-change operation orchestrated by the military with the United States.

His party has been in the line of fire since May 09, 2023, when its supporters attacked military establishments across the country. Khan himself has been in prison since last year due to several cases charging him with graft and improper handling of classified information, which meant he was unable to campaign for his party in the election.

Perhaps most significantly, leading up to the election, the PTI was also denied its election symbol (a cricket bat) by the Pakistani Supreme Court, which was widely seen as part of a broader campaign to tilt the electoral playing field against the party.

The fact that despite all these measures, PTI-backed candidates won such a large share is a remarkable outcome, making the 2024 election one of the most significant elections in contemporary Pakistani history.

One way to read the vote is that the Pakistani people have rejected the two traditional, dynastic parties — the PML-N and PPP — and embraced Khan’s aspirational, populist political platform.

Another way to read the outcome is that it is also a rejection of the military establishment’s role in politics, in particular its opposition to the PTI and the clampdown against the party since last year.

The results also point to Pakistanis’ discontent with the country’s overall trajectory and the electoral process being a solution to the challenges facing the country.

According to Gallup, Pakistanis are deeply pessimistic about the country’s economic future and they also question the fairness of the electoral process — before the election, seven in 10 Pakistanis said they lacked confidence in the honesty of the elections.