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Iran Faces Greater Risks than it Knows

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Paul Craig Roberts - Jun. 18 (News Analysis) - Ideological and emotional agendas result in people distancing themselves from factual and analytical information, preferring instead information that fits with their material interests and emotional disposition. The primacy of emotion over fact bids ill for the future. The extraordinary attention given to the Iranian election suggests that many American interests and emotions have a stake in the outcome.

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The Surge That Failed

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Anand Gopal - Oct. 10 (News Analysis) - A bit past midnight on a balmy night in late August, Hedayatullah awoke to a deafening blast. He stumbled out of bed and heard angry voices drawing closer. Suddenly, his bedroom doors banged open and dozens of silhouetted figures burst in, some shouting in a strange language.

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Hollow Time

Tue, 05 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Uri Avnery - Aug. 05 (Opinion) - Ehud Olmert's resignation speech reached us on our way back from a demonstration. We were protesting the death of Ahmad Moussa, aged 10, who was murdered during a demonstration against the Separation Fence at Na'ilin village - the fence that robs the village of most of its land in order to give it to the nearby settlement. A soldier aimed and shot the child with live ammunition at close range.

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Iraqis skeptical of next US president

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Ahmed Ali, Dahr Jamail - Jul. 16 (Special Report) - Iraqis seem divided on who they would like to see as the next US president, but few believe that either will end the occupation. "The US administration has committed a big mistake in Iraq," Adil Ibrahim, a local physician in Baquba, capital city of Diyala province, located 40 km northeast of Bagdhdad, told IPS. "We hope that whoever wins the election, the new administration can mend the huge mistakes of this one."

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Kuwaiti women battle against odds in election

Thu, 15 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - May. 15 (Special Report) - KUWAIT - Whether swathed in veils or dressed in suits, Kuwaiti women are campaigning hard to win parliamentary seats in Saturday's election. They failed to take any at the last vote in 2006 and once again face an uphill struggle attracting voters in a conservative and male-dominated Gulf Arab state. "There are a lot of challenges but there is also a positive wave... voters think why not try women? We tried men for years," said Rola Dashti, one of 27 women running against 246 men. An economist in her 40s, Dashti ran in 2006 and received the highest number of votes among the female candidates. She believes the experience was constructive for women, as was the appointment of women to the cabinet. Kuwait's 50-member National Assembly passed a law in 2005 granting women the right to vote and run for office for the first time since its creation in 1962. Two women have since been appointed ministers but a woman has yet to enter the assembly in a traditional Muslim country where many still believe a woman's place is in the home.

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Palestinians express outrage at Bush visit

Wed, 14 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Ezzedine Said - May. 14 (News Report) - Palestinians expressed outrage on Wednesday as US President George W. Bush began a visit to Israel on the eve of their commemoration of the "catastrophe" that followed the birth of the Jewish state. Bush will address Israel's Knesset on Thursday, the day Palestinians commemorate the Naqba, or "catastrophe," of the Jewish state's creation, the 1948 war and the expulsion or flight of more than 760,000 people. The people who fled or were driven from their homes in 1948 have since given rise to a UN-registered refugee population of 4.5 million in camps across the Middle East, including more than one million in the besieged Gaza Strip. "While we mark the Naqba, President Bush comes to join Israelis in celebrating the creation of their state, forgetting that there is a Palestinian people that is still the victim of an injustice," said Azzam Al-Ahmad, a senior official in president Mahmud Abbas's Fatah party. When Bush addresses Israel's parliament to mark the country's 60th birthday, activists plan to darken the skies over Jerusalem with over 21,000 black balloons and hold a massive demonstration in the West Bank town of Ramallah.

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Arab League bids to resolve Lebanon crisis

Wed, 14 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Jocelyne Zablit - May. 14 (News Report) - An Arab League delegation was meeting with rival leaders in Beirut on Wednesday in a bid to mediate a settlement to deadly sectarian gunbattles that have driven Lebanon close to civil war. The meetings came as US President George W. Bush accused Iran of trying to undermine Lebanese democracy through its support of the Shiite movement Hezbollah, which he said had turned on its own people. The Arab team, headed by Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani, was holding talks with members of the US-backed government and the Hezbollah-led opposition, who have been locked in a bitter political feud for 18 months.

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Saudi FM warns Iran over Lebanon 'coup'

Tue, 13 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - May. 13 (News Report) - RIYADH - Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal warned on Tuesday that Iran's relations with the Arab world would be affected if Tehran was supporting what he described as a "coup" in Lebanon. "Iran's relations with all Arab countries -- if not all Islamic (countries) -- would be affected if Iran was supporting the coup that took place in Lebanon," Faisal told reporters. His comments came after six days of deadly sectarian fighting pitting Shiite opposition groups led by the Iranian- and Syrian-backed Hezbollah against supporters of the Western-backed government.

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Scores flee Lebanon violence by boat to Cyprus

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - May. 12 (News Report) - NICOSIA - Around 200 people fleeing the violence in Lebanon, including the Saudi ambassador in Beirut, have arrived in the nearby island of Cyprus, officials said on Monday. Since Saturday, 18 private yachts or speed boats have docked at Larnaca marina on the island's south coast while more people are expected if the conflict worsens. At least 59 people have died in six days of violence across Lebanon between government and opposition supporters in the worst sectarian fighting since the 1975-90 civil war. Back then, Cyprus became a second home to many Lebanese refugees. "It seems these people are abandoning Lebanon for their own personal reasons, some are transferring to other countries or planning to stay here temporarily until the situation normalises," Larnaca marina's general manager Michalis Filis told reporters. He said some of the boats were dropping people off before going back for more, while other people were docking at the marina for a short period in their luxury yachts. "Those who choose to come to Cyprus are doing so with speed boats and yachts transporting around 10 people each and taking only five to six hours to reach the island," said Filis.

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When Will Arab Oil Translate into Political Power?

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Patrick Seale - May. 12 (Opinion) - Arab oil producers are awash in wealth. They have never been so rich. But the paradox is that, in spite of their great and growing wealth, their political weight in the world remains small, even derisory. They have not -- or at least not yet -- converted their wealth into political influence on a global scale. This is particularly striking in the Arabs' own Middle East region. Why, one wonders, have the Arabs not been able to resolve the grave crises in Iraq and Lebanon, which are tearing their region apart? Why have they allowed the United States to neglect Arab interests in the festering Arab-Israeli conflict, and tilt so decisively in Israel's favour? Why have the Arabs not intervened to defuse the dangerous confrontation between the West and Iran, which if it were to escalate into a military clash would be utterly disastrous for the Gulf? Why do the Arabs seem to focus all their attention and all their energies on business -- on getting rich and richer still -- while leaving their political and strategic destinies very largely in the hands of foreigners? Some would argue that the problem lies in ancient inter-Arab rivalries, in the sectarian divide between Sunnis and Shi'a, in the absence of an Arab-wide consensus, in autocratic leadership, in the crippling influence of intelligence and security agencies, in the lack of vigorous democratic debate. Whatever the reasons -- and they are undoubtedly many and deep-seated -- the Arab world projects an image of impotence, even where its own vital interests are concerned.

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Lebanon's Christians watch clashes warily

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By Rana Moussaoui - May. 12 (News Report) - Lebanon's once prominent Christian community is watching anxiously as deadly clashes rage between Muslim rival factions, amid fears that any move to join the fray would further fracture its ranks. "Both Christian camps (in the opposition and the ruling majority) are convinced that they should not pay the price of the coup led by the Hezbollah," said pro-government figure George Adwan. He was referring to the seizure of mainly Muslim west Beirut by the powerful Shiite militant group whose fighters overran pro-government forces in fighting that has left almost 60 people dead in six days and fanned fears for the future of the already divided nation. "Christians are not at all keen to be drawn into the fighting and what happened in west Beirut cannot be repeated in (predominantly Christian) east Beirut," said Adwan, deputy leader of the Christian Lebanese Forces party.

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What 'Progress' in Iraq Really Means

Mon, 13 Aug 2007 08:58:32 -0700

Middle East Online - By Tom Engelhardt - Aug. 13 (News Analysis) - Someday, we will undoubtedly discover that, in the term "surge" -- as in the President's "surge" plan (or "new way forward") announced to the nation in January -- was the urge to avoid the language (and experience) of the Vietnam era. As there were to be no "body bags" (or cameras to film them as the dead came home), as there were to be no "body counts" ("We have made a conscious effort not to be a body-count team" was the way the President put it), as there were to be no "quagmires," nor the need to search for that "light at the end of the tunnel," so, surely, there were to be no "escalations." The escalations of the Vietnam era, which left more than 500,000 American soldiers and vast bases and massive air and naval power in and around Vietnam (Laos, and Cambodia), had been thoroughly discredited. Each intensification in the delivery of troops, or simply in ever-widening bombing campaigns, led only to more misery and death for the Vietnamese and disaster for the U.S. And yet, not surprisingly, the American experience in Iraq -- another attempted occupation of a foreign country and culture -- has been like a heat-seeking missile heading for the still-burning American memories of Vietnam.

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Turkey's Quest for Modernity

Thu, 10 May 2007 15:21:57 -0700

Middle East Online - By Rami G. Khouri - May. 10 (Opinion) - Turkey's tempestuous current events are historic in their implications for this country and the entire Middle East, but they are about much more than a tug-of-war between Islamism and secularism. The constitutional stand-off concerning the election of the next president - pitting the ruling, mild Islamist, Justice and Development Party (AKP) against the largely secular opposition backed by the armed forces - is just the pivot of a historic, ongoing Turkish attempt to balance seven different phenomena that have never been fully synthesized into a single state identity. These are: the Islamic religion, Turkish nationalism, political secularism, democratic governance, citizenship rights, pluralism in a multi-ethnic society, and the role of the military vis-à-vis the previous six items in this list.

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Middle East Online

Sat, 24 Mar 2007 00:00:00 -0700

Middle East Online - By generic - Mar. 24 (News Report) - Iraqi women take up arms, join insurgency to avenge killings of loved ones amid general sense of desperation.

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New US sanctions bill targets Iran's partners

Sat, 30 Sep 2006 03:27:03 -0700

Middle East Online - By Maxim Kniazkov - Sep. 30 (News Report) - The US Congress early Saturday gave its final approval to a new set of sanctions targeting foreign countries that continue nuclear cooperation with Iran and sell it advanced weaponry. But mindful of the situation in Iraq, lawmakers warned that nothing in this document should be "construed as authorizing the use of force against Iran."

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