Viva la revolucion and almost nine years for what?

Finally done with all the work for this semester.  Phew.  With the twenty page first half of my research paper about the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, I finished off my last assignment and can now relax a little before the last semester starts.  Too bad that the cold is going around and I am so congested that my head feels like it is about to explode.  Anyways, I wish you all happy holidays as we move towards the end of the year.

Today I am talking about the continued violence in Cairo, and the (final) withdrawal of US troops from Iraq. Keeping it sweet and short for the sake of my head.

Oh yeah and Kim Jong-Il just died.. Hopefully that'll change some things in North Korea.

Revolutionaries that act like counter-revolutionaries

For a third day in a row violence continues at Tahrir Square and its surrounding streets in Cairo.  Ten people have been reported dead and many more injured as police moved into the square to evacuate protesters and to burn down tents (sounds a little like Occupy Wall Street in NYC to me). The government claims that the protesters in Tahrir are counter-revolutionaries and do not belong to the same group that brought about Mubarak’s fall. The protesters claim to demonstrate against the military council that still has much of Egyptian politics under its control.

How can you define a revolutionary versus a counter-revolutionary in a country in which there is no status quo to revolt against?  To move in violently, and even shoot at protesters (see the Al-Jazeera link above) is certainly not a proportional response to non-violent protesters. However, to burn down the Institute of Egypt like the protesters did is not right either. The current government should allow the right for peaceful protest and should address the concern voiced by the population about the power that the military still has in the current power structure.  If the government and the military council do not do so soon, there will be protests well into next year until a parliament is finally elected and the drafting of a new constitution can begin.

"Aaaaaand they’re gone (finally)"

After more than eight years the last US troops finally crossed the border into Kuwait where they closed a metaphorical gate behind them and shook hands with the Kuwaitis for some pictures.  The mission in Iraq cost the US 1 trillion dollars.  According Gary Younge, a columnist for The Guardian, it is a shame that the United States probably won’t learn much from their time in Iraq.  The deed is done, the mission is over, it was a failure, and therefore most will try to forget the sacrifices that were made for eight years to achieve close to nothing.  Meanwhile, Iraq is still stuck in its sectarian quagmire that shows no sign of resolution.  Even in the highest echelons of power there are bomb threats against the Shia minority that forms part of the coalition that rules the country. 

The Iraqi government has been busy collecting data on Iraqis that worked with the Americans while they were still in the country.  Now that the American soldiers are gone there is little protection offered to those who “betrayed” their country.  Many have waited for their visa to the US for months, but most of them are still pending.  Most of the Iraqis that are affected fear that the information gathered by the government will leak to armed groups that will then assassinate all those that collaborated with the foreigners.

Personally, I hope that the money that is saved by leaving Iraq will ultimately help the United States to recuperate from its own economic problems.  Now that we have left the country it is important to convince the PM of Iraq to view Iran as an intruding power that wishes to heavily influence Iraqi politics to solidify its position as a regional power against Saudi Arabia.  The sectarian violence seems to be a constant problem that cannot be solved.  A national campaign to engage in cross sectarian dialogue would help to alleviate some of the strains that threaten to rip the young democracy apart.  To put a bit of a positive spin on Iraq, I would say that at least they have a head start on their democratic project.  They have had years to set up their parliament and constitution whereas Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt are just starting to create their first “real” democracies.

Other Links

Tunisia unveils Bouazizi cart statue in Sidi Bouzid

Hamas moves away from violence in deal with Palestinian Authority

Eyewitness: tear gas at West Bank protest

Syria 'set to' sign Arab League plan

In Pictures: Tahrir Square burns

Why Iran Is going for Nukes and Why Regional Exclusion matters

 “A citizen of America will cross the ocean to fight for democracy, but won’t cross the street to vote in a national election.” – American saying.

This week was national Election Day, and unfortunately as usual the voter turnout was most likely less than 50% of the voting-eligible population.  Judging from the above saying you can probably see how I feel about the low voter turnout.  As a citizen of Germany, the right to vote was apparently brought back to my fellow countrymen and me by the American forces that defeated the fascist Third Reich.  Imagine how it must feel to see that democracy lacks the active support of the majority of American people.  To vote on the future of the most powerful nation of the world is a privilege that I would love to have.  So do your nation (and me) a favor and use the privilege that was given to you by our troops.  On that note, I hope you thanked a veteran on Veterans Day!

This week I will discuss how a nuclear Iran would impact the United States and Iran’s neighbors, and the fact that Syrian was suspended from the Arab League and what this might mean for the future of Bashar Al-Assad’s regime.

What a Nuclear Iran means to US

With the release of the recent IAEA report about Iran’s nuclear program it now seems clear and obvious that Iran is trying to acquire a nuclear warhead.  Understandably, Israel and other countries in the region now fear that a Shiite Iran, already standing out as stranger to its mostly Sunni neighbors, will show no remorse using a nuclear warhead. 

I think it is time for Israel and the United States to face the fact that Iran will inevitably possess nukes.  Does that make it right?  Of course not.  Yet, Iran would not be the first country to acquire nuclear warheads if one is to believe the rumors about the Israeli arsenal of weapons.  A nuclear Iran would ensure that Israel will be more considerate before striking targets outside of its borders (especially Hezbollah in southern Lebanon), since a nuclear Iran could threaten to respond disproportionally with a nuclear warhead.  The most important thing to consider now is not how to keep Iran from going nuclear, but how to make Iran fit into regional politics as a nuclear power while making sure that no one else tries to go down the nuclear road.  Other measures besides the relatively weak sanctions program of the UN will have to be considered to ensure that no one else gains the potential to annihilate human life so effectively.

Can intervention by a regional body lead to the end of a regime? (I’m sure Gaddafi would think so.)

Syria is set to be suspended from the Arab League on Wednesday after a deal that was struck between the League and Syria did not show the desired effects of ending the bloodshed perpetrated by the Syrian regime against its own people.  Syria promptly called for an emergency meeting before the suspension takes effect so that the case can be reviewed.

If the Syrian regime did not know that full membership in the Arab League mattered to its continued survival, it would not try to petition the Arab League’s decision to suspend it from the organization.  Besides another victory for the international system for being so influential on states, this shows us that Syria has just entered the murky waters that Libya was in about half a year ago.  Even though the League does not support a no-fly zone like the one that contributed to Gaddafi’s downfall, the suspension adds more pressure to Syria and makes it an even bigger outcast than it already is.  The suspension was followed by raids from Syrian civilians on the embassies of the countries that voted in favor of the suspension.  If that does not show what kind of actions the Syrian state supports than I do not know what does.

Other Links
Bahrain breaks up terror cell - state media
Iran explosion at Revolutionary Guards military base
US defense chief Panetta warns against Iran strike
Egypt closes Pyramid amid 11/11/11 rumours
In Pictures: The world in 24 hours

Defensive Rhetoric and why the International Criminal Court should sometime reconsider its jurisdiction

Happy Snowoween?  The northeast of the United States just saw several inches of snow and Halloween has not even passed yet.  Never in my life have I seen snow fall this early in the year.  Along with the snow that fell came the many arguments for the fact that global warming is true.  Facebook exploded with comments about the early snow and global warming.  My favorite was: “I told you so. #AlGore.” because it exactly summarizes what my view on this topic is.  While I might not be greatly engaged with the environmental scene, I do believe that if we do not consciously reduce our carbon output we will slowly but surely destroy the planet we live on and with it the future of humanity.  It makes me proud to see that my country of birth, Germany, is the global leader in countering current carbon dioxide levels, but it upsets me to see that so little is done by other states around the world.  If you think that global warming is a myth, then chances are that you also have a more realistic view on politics in the world.  There is a very easy way to convince you to reduce the use of carbon based fuels that is tied to the region that this blog is about.  The United States and other western powers are prone to being blackmailed by such countries as Russia, Iran and Saudi Arabia as long as we keep relying on their oil resources.  If we want to see our countries free from foreign influence we will have to start finding alternative energies that can be produced at home and not abroad.  Strategies like these will ensure that the United States and other western powers will remain crucial international players in the coming decade.

This week I will focus on Syria’s continued crackdown on its population, and on the justice that Saif al-Islam, Gaddafi’s son, can expect when he is captured.

Syria: A repeat of Libya or another Afghanistan?

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has warned the West that if it was to intervene in the country it would cause an earthquake in the region.  He further stated that if the West was to intervene, another Afghanistan would be born out of the ruins of the Syrian regime. After seven months of protests the UN estimates that 3000 have died in the mostly non-violent protests.  After the bloodiest clashes to date on Saturday, the Arab League finally issued a statement issuing its concerns about the continued killing of Syrian civilians.  Furthermore, a new group called the Free Syrian Army has formed.  The group is made up of defectors from the Syrian army and is based out of the Turkish-Syrian border region.  They could be the start of the first coordinated violent response to the continued crackdown by President al-Assad’s forces.  There have been calls for international intervention, but so far nothing has happened due to the veto of China and Russia in the Security Council about anything that has to do with Syria.

It is time for the international community to act and help the Syrian people to depose of their leader.  Even if he had some kind of legitimacy before the uprising, he definitely eroded the last bit of it when he decided to roll out his tanks against his own people.  The rhetoric that Assad uses, reminds one of the same kind of talk that Gaddafi as his power started to wane.  Gaddafi talked about the “Crusaders” who had come to take Libya like in ancient times.  He attempted to mobilize his people.  Assad on the other hand uses the comparison to Afghanistan in order to deter foreign forces from intervening.  Why does he do this?  Because he knows that his own people do not stand behind him since he is the minority Shia ruler of a mostly Sunni country.  Can Russia and China really stand behind a leader that is not recognized as legitimate by his own people?  I understand that these two countries want to preserve their strong ties with the Syrian state, but in the long-run they will fail in accomplishing their goal because the victory of the people of Syria is inevitable.  When they come to power they will make sure to reconsider ties with those who spoke out against them during their revolution.  My hopes now lie with the Free Syrian Army which will hopefully gain momentum as the crackdown by Syrian forces grows more intense.

Libya: Between International and Domestic Justice

Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the son and heir apparent to Gaddafi’s Libya, was called "the last piece” in bringing Gaddafi’s Libya to an end by Colonel Ahmed Bani, the military spokesman for Libya’s interim government.  The ICC has reported that Saif has been in contact with it through intermediaries and that he wanted to prove his innocence so that the court would withdraw the warrant that was issued on him.  Meanwhile, the interim government has voiced its desire to give Saif a trial in Libya despite the warrant on his head by the ICC.  Despite the legal debacle about “the last piece” Libya seems to be well on its way towards a more liberal political system and the countries oil production is recovering far faster than the one in Iraq did after the Second Gulf War.

Despite the fact that Libya is not a member of the ICC, I would like to make an argument about the appropriateness of the ICC to intervene in cases of internal regime change.  Should the ICC in a case like Libya still have the right to prosecute criminals associated with the former regime over the new regime that more accurately presents the will of the people?  Given the cruel justice that Saif’s father received the answer might be no, but in all honesty I think that in this case the state should be allowed to exercise its sovereignty despite the commendable goals that the ICC has.  Libya could prove that it has a judicial system that is just and respectful by putting Saif on trial.  This would help to lessen the impact that Gaddafi’s killing has had on the perception of Libya abroad (as discussed last week).  And by the way, do you seriously think that Saif has any desire to proof his innocence to a relatively weak court that issued a warrant on him and his father?  I think it more likely that he will escape Libya (if he hasn’t yet) and search refuge somewhere where the ICC will never get its hands on him.  Hopefully, not too much efforts will be wasted on finding Saif as Libya should start looking towards the future.  There is no point in dwelling about the past too much.

Other Links

How Egypt's activists used social media and Cairo's taxis

Israeli air strikes kill nine militants

When Dad goes to war

Arab Spring activists win human rights award

Germany faces questions over alleged spy agency involvement in Libya

The week of falling dictators, rising Prime Ministers, and defiant Presidents.

How many weeks of the year do you see a 42-year old dictatorship toppled?  Even though not all events this week were as positive, I must still say that this is a great week to start blogging about such a dynamic region of the world.  Here is a run-down of what’s new this week by country.  And make sure to read through this post (or at least scroll down to the bottom) as I will add always try to add a humorous touch to an otherwise too serious blog with links to some of the more ridiculous reports I was able to find throughout the week.  In that section you will also find links to those articles that I found particularly interesting, but that did not fit in any of my country/topic groups.

Libya: How much news about one country can you handle?

With Gaddafi on the verge of being toppled, newspapers and magazines have been filled with reports about the many aspects that entail the downfall of a regime that lasted close to half a century.  How much news about one country can you really read before your mind stops drifting?  Here is what you need to know.

Now that Gaddafi has been ousted by the National Transitional Council (NTC) it is only a matter of time until he turns up in some kind of hole similar to the one Saddam Hussein used in 2003.  Hopefully, this will be the only overlap between Iraq and Libya as I will discuss later.  The NTC is now faced with a tremendous task.  Will it be able to stay united as a front that can lead the people of Libya to a democratic and more importantly open society? 

The failures of Iraq and Afghanistan immediately come to mind.  The page in the newspaper covering yet another act of terrorism and violence by militant Islamic organizations has sadly become about as interesting as the daily weather forecast.  Yet, can we expect for Libya to turn into another failed attempt of regime change?  Many indicators point against it.  As pointed out by Al-Jazeera, Libya actually appears to start of from a far better position.  With little to no debt outstanding and no existing (repressive) political institutions like the ones present in Egypt right after the revolution there, the NTC will be able to present change far quicker thanks to incoming oil revenues and the absence of political institutions that would need to reformed.  French and British oil companies are surely going to profit, no matter which way Libya turns politically, as a little thank you for providing the NTC forces with a UN sanctioned air force through NATO.

Externally, Libya appears to be well placed, but what about internal issues?  Iraq and Afghanistan both feature a very heterogeneous population as opposed to Libya.  Mostly populated by Sunni Muslims, a danger Libya might face is tribal clashes over the power vacuum that might follow, if the transition is carried out without taking into consideration Libya’s very detailed tribal culture. 

Remember that call for donations for the ongoing famine in the Horn of Africa?  Somalia had a government once too, even though it might have been twenty years since that was the case.  That government was brought down by tribal clashes which were fought because the Somali tribes could not agree on how to fill the political vacuum left behind by the former dictator of Somalia, Siad Barre.  Will Libya follow the example of infighting that has been taking place in Somalia in the past two decades?  I most certainly do not hope so.

As much as it pains me to look at Libya through the rather over-used lens of post-9/11 security interests, it is necessary to consider Libya as a safe heaven for militant Islamist organizations like Al-Qaeda.  According to Deutsche Welle the threat emanating from Libyan, militant Islamists remains minimal.  There is a small core group of militant Islamists, called the Salafis, which embrace a purer and more archaic Islam.  Yet, 600 Salafis in a country of 6.5 million are not going to cause any tremendous change to a political structure.  And after all every country has its religious extremists.  The key is to keep arms out of their hands, which should prove difficult given the amount of weapons that have been circulating in Libya in the past months.

A final point that I wanted to stress is (yet again) the difficult integration that the NTC will have to deal with once peace is restored to the country.  It will be crucial to not only find a durable solution to any kind of tribal clashes that might break out, but it will also be crucial to include such minority groups politically that have previously been repressed (i.e. the Berber ethnic group), and to normalize ties with Libya’s African neighbors which still have refused to recognize the NTC as Libya’s official representative.  This may prove extremely difficult given the fact that many of the mercenaries that fought in Gaddafi’s militia stem from the 54 member-states in the African Union (AU).

Turkey: A Rising Regional Player

Turkey probably wins the award for being the most politically direct state of the week.  Besides bombing ‘Kurdish rebels’ from the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) in Northern Iraq (infringing on international, territorial borders), it has just severed its diplomatic ties with Israel.  No big deal.  The sudden deterioration of ties came with the release of a UN report that deemed Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip legal, but carried out with unreasonable force.  Turkey’s foreign minister, Mr. Ahmet Davutoglu, was swift to downgrade ties with Israel after the country’s regime refused to apologize for the bloody Gaza flotilla raid in 2010.  Mr Davutoglu, further said that Turkey will take Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over the legality of the blockade on the Gaza Strip.

A question that remains in my head is how far Turkey under Prime Minister Erdogan can keep playing both the pro-Western and pro-Palestinian side?  If it manages to do both however, become a member of the European Union (EU), and herald the cause of the Palestinian s successfully, it will become one of the leading regional powers in the MENA.

Syria: The next Libya?

The Economist had a great article discussing why Syrian protesters are willing to go out on the streets against their government despite the continued repression against them.  The answer is quite simple: dignity.  By killing more and more of Syrian citizens, President Bashar al-Assad slowly digs him-self a deeper and deeper grave.  Every Syrian that dies by the hands of his forces will only increase the feeling of robbed dignity experienced by the people in the streets.  Also, how much legitimacy does a government have that even right after the celebration of the end of the holy month Ramadan goes out and kills people? 

There is hope for the Syrian people though, as the EU has finally decided to impose sanctions on Syrian oil imports.  The realists among us might argue: “well, but economic sanctions are no hard solution to government repression.”  And yes, they might be right, if the EU member states did not buy up 95% of Syrian oil exports.  Syrian’s are faithful that this new sanction will slowly drive President al-Assad into dire financial straights, and for the sake of a freer and more importantly less bloody Syria, I hope so too.

Other Links

• American college kid joins Libya rebels for 'vacation'
• Chinese-made Qur'ans full of errors, warns Iranian official 
• Dutch gameshow for failed asylum seekers 
• Will Sarkozy get a statue in Tripoli?

And with these few links I say Good bye and until next week.  Please make sure to stop in next Monday for my next update on happenings in MENA.  I will try to be a little more detailed next week.  It’s almost 3am here and moving back to college has kind of kept me from writing a whole ton.  Please leave any comments either here on my blog or send me an email to the address listed in my profile!