Category Archives: Middle East

ISIS-Held Hostages Return to Turkey – Two Observations

20 Saturday Sep 2014

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Iraq, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Turkey

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Turkish broadcaster NTV said Turkey did not pay a ransom for the hostages who were held for three months by ISIS militants.

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2014/09/20/Turkish-hostages-seized-in-northern-Iraq-are-free.html – 9/20/2014.

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is struggling to cut off the millions of dollars in oil revenue that has made the Islamic State one of the wealthiest terror groups in history but has been unable to persuade Turkey, the NATO ally where much of the oil is traded on the black market, to crack down on an extensive sales network.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/world/2014/09/13/seeks-turkey-help-starve-islamic-state-oil-revenue/IQIx3EPqamJ4iMfwEhQ7wI/story.html – 9/14/2014.

In relation to “hoping the crocodile eats you last”, the definite-maybe “crocodiles” of the Islamic Small Wars may be ambivalent about whether their role is to be crocodile or the prey of one.

We’ll have to imagine the degree of leverage or rollover, either, involved in securing the 49 hostages taken by ISIS in their sweep into Mosul, Iraq.

Davutoglu said their release was the result of the Turkish intelligence agency’s “own methods”, and not a “point operation” involving special forces. He gave no further details.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/20/isis-releases-hostages-turkish-consulate-mosul – 9/20/2014..

Additional Reference

http://www.thetower.org/1057-sale-of-smuggled-oil-to-turkey-boosting-isis-coffers/ – 9/12/2014.

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/perspective/analysis/2014/08/28/Experts-ISIS-makes-up-to-3-million-daily-in-oil-sales.html – 8/28/2014.

http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/tr/business/2014/06/turkey-syria-isis-selling-smuggled-oil.html – 8/13/2014.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/isis-makes-million-day-selling-oil-analysts/story?id=24814359 – 8/2/2014.

Update

While the details of the hostage deal are still unclear, Ankara has had interlocutors with IS — from Arab tribes to former Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, who sought refuge in Turkey — who could have been instrumental in reaching it. Such a deal, however, may include a promise of continued non-involvement in the campaign against the jihadist group, with the soldiers stationed at Suleyman Shah serving as an insurance policy for the jihadists.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/09/21/islamic_state_turkey_hostage – 9/21/2014.

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FTAC – Syria – A Note on Beyond the Burning

12 Friday Sep 2014

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Middle East, Syria

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The foundations of the invisible wall surrounding Assad start about here:

“In a gloomy interrogation room the children were beaten and bloodied, burned and had their fingernails pulled out by grown men working for a regime whose unchecked brutality appears increasingly to be sowing the seeds of its undoing.”

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/110423/syria-assad-protests-daraa

And then it builds to about here:

“But there is something legitimately scary about the weapon’s do-it-yourself ethos and its new systematic deployment against the neighborhoods of Aleppo. It speaks to the regime’s single-minded focus on finding new ways to kill, its narrow and obsessive pursuit of mayhem and destruction as seemingly official strategy in the conflict that has run for nearly three years now.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/12/24/what-makes-syrias-barrel-bombs-so-scary/

Being a merely “bloody dictator” in a conflict cauldron that has in it argument over despotism, democracy, egotism, goodness, God, morality, and narcissism (finally) is not merely a bad position.

The condemnation backed by astounding imagery and numbers to match may not be overcome with exigent maneuvering.

I know: faced with Hitler, one might be eager to bargain with Stalin.

Call that yesterday.

This day with Assad having produced a war that has brought al-Qaeda affiliates and such to his doorstep and that has incubated and loosed ISIS on the world, may be different.

How happy should one be to be led by Assad today?

That’s not my question to answer.  It’s a question for Syrians to answer for themselves in whatever condition and place the war now finds them.

If “Assad or Burn It” was the slogan, it has been working a long time, and once burned — in whatever portion — what then?

What now?

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Orphaned Gaza

12 Friday Sep 2014

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Gaza, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Regions

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“In the end you are left with 1.7 million people in Gaza, and you don’t really want that.”

Responsibility.

Ehud Yaari‘s remark at The Washington Institute’s two-person panel “Sept. 11 – Gaza and Beyond: The Arab-Israeli Arena in the Wake of the Hamas War,” may tell how Israel’s latest response to Gaza rocket fire (and assault tunnel building) reached completion without changing much.

Indeed, Robert Satloff, the second speaker, would go on to characterize the incursion as “urgent, not very important.”

When asked in the Q&A that followed, “What does Israel want?”  Yaari suggested that what Israel wants is to “let Hamas rot in the Gaza Strip.”

Noting that Hamas had seen fail it’s “Gaza Fortress” approach to assaulting Israel, the journalist said the Hamas would “try to make a leap to the West Bank . . . a whole new opera” with the contemplation of its terrorism reaching everywhere in Israel.

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Not only Hamas may rot in Gaza, for no powerful or key element seems to want even to approach taking responsibility for 1.7 million Gazans.

Egypt, having with decision made the Muslim Brotherhood its problem, certainly does not want Gaza’s most egregious problem, except to keep the same exactly where it is.

Israel and Israelis: ditto, Egypt.

If there’s a transition plan for Gaza from Hamas sanctuary to, say, protectorate or suzerain in enthused and lasting peace (with the Jews and the Jewish State), I should like to hear of it.

The highly experienced and now octogenarian Mahmoud Abbas, who, anti-Semite that he may be, has been promoted as representing the Next Best Government, has looked over the nest and, so suggests Yaari, hasn’t the wish to run Gaza while Hamas, aspiring to ape Hezbollah, maintains its own army.  While Hamas planners in Turkey pass thoughts to the West Bank Committee in Gaza, with interest in unseating Abbas, Abbas would have to address the massive screening of old staff, the mustering of troops sufficient to overwhelm Hamas, and that’s not happening.

Gaza appears to be stuck with Hamas.

Even worse for Hamas, Hamas appears to be stuck with Gaza.

While Hamas stews over Gaza as well as in it, Israel and the Arab World, so suggests Satloff, may be experiencing some convergence of perception of regional states of affairs.

Perhaps such as ISIS helps with that.

While Hamas may be isolated in Gaza — imho, it sure looks that way — and both Egypt and Israel control the boundaries and crossings containing the same and the Global Jew-Hate Commune emphasizes hate over help (most often) and the UNRWA remains deeply compromised (as a Hamas helper), Gaza may have one partner for peace after all: Gazans.

It’s what we all have, isn’t it?

Ourselves when it’s us.

Themselves when it’s them.

Some friends convince me that Gazans love Hamas, vote for Hamas, die for Hamas.

Happily.

Proudly.

And some friends convince me otherwise.

Except through the Hamas filter — media controlling, politically intimidating, image obsessed — one cannot “see” Gazans (politically) otherwise, or, perhaps simply not yet.

Reference

http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/gaza-and-beyond-the-arab-israeli-arena-in-the-wake-of-the-hamas-war – 9/11/2014

Blogger’s Note

It’s true I may now scribble notes at a desktop two hours away from the event location — but can I read them afterward?  🙂  And did I get words down right in the first place?  And can I do a better job of differentiating between what someone else said and what I happen to think?  Of course.  With practice.

Every day online brings with it a slightly updated dawn that changes even the most remote soul’s intellectual ecology.

Yesterday’s live event, which I watched, is now a recorded event at the URL noted in reference.  I may give it another listen, and if I must update here, I will.  Internally, there’s an art in play — listen, notate, reflect, report, opine — and each step is its own dimension.

Update

http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/from-gaza-to-isis-a-trip-report-assessing-the-arab-israeli-arena — “From Gaza to ISIS: A Trip Report Assessing the Arab-Israeli Arena”, Robert Satloff, September 12, 2014

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Link

31 Sunday Aug 2014

Posted by in Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Middle East, Political Psychology, Regions

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Using the UK as a case study, Ms. Phillips addressed the prejudiced attitudes towards Israel from both Muslims and left-wingers and so-called liberals before criticizing the UK Jewish community for failing to respond adequately and preferring to keep their heads down.

She also criticized Israel’s failure “to grasp that information is a strategy of war on the battleground of the mind, and a strategy that has been used to enormous effect against Israel, and against which it doesn’t even seem to know that it is fighting.”

http://honestreporting.com/melanie-phillips-calls-for-new-strategy-to-present-israels-case/ – 8/31/2014.

Addendum to “United Nazis Workers Relief Agency (UNRWA)”

31 Sunday Aug 2014

Posted by in Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Gaza, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Middle East, Politics, Regions

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“Rather than falsely accusing Israel,” the letter continued, “one might have expected that as the executive head of the UN, you would have admitted responsibility of the UN for such abuse of its facilities, and instituted a thorough inquiry as to how and why UNRWA facilities were placed at the disposal of the Hamas terror organization, how and why the UN officials responsible for such facilities permitted this situation to occur, and why those rockets and other weapons that were discovered in such facilities were transferred to Hamas, for their continued use against Israel’s citizens.

“In permitting the storage of weapons, and in transferring such weapons into the hands of Hamas,” the letter asserted, “the UN has in fact permitted itself to become accessory to the commission of war crimes.”

http://www.breakingisraelnews.com/20841/unrwa-aiding-terrorism/#MxaSrOKRGtDwAy43.99 – 8/31/2014.

The above passage has been added to the piece on this blog titled “United Nazis Workers Relief Agency (UNRWA)”, which appears to have been abused by Hamafia and Associates, and that to allowing its budget and facilities to abet the terrorist organization with its assaults against Israelis and, in essence by way of its tactic of putting noncombatants and civilian assets directly in the line of fire, Gazans as well.

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Gazans – A State of One’s Own

25 Monday Aug 2014

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Gaza, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Regions

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For more than 66 years, the game against the Jews of Israel hasn’t changed much. From armies to rogue political movements to terrorist gangs, the genocidal, go-nowhere, nothing-to-offer character of the anti-Semitic aspect of the Middle East Conflict has not changed.

By way of American paychecks to his security forces, Mahmoud Abbas, who has been called the number one anti-Semite in the world, has been irrevocably compromised and therefore stuck in neutral as regards the destruction of Israel and the Jews.

By way of fanaticism, greed, and stupidity — and there is nothing more stupid than abusing children and putting them in the way of an enemy’s entire army — Hamas has sabotaged its own psychotically grandiose ambitions.

I’ve mentioned suzerainty on this blog, which may be too much or too little but at least addresses Egyptian and Israeli security issues associated with the strip, its inhabitants, and its Hamas and other parasites.  What I haven’t brought into the BackChannels conversation is the power inherent in genuine local rule.

The Hamas enterprise, which has been about getting rich, offing the Jews (wow, what a combination), and aggrandizing itself beyond all measure, has never been about modern representative, responsive, and responsible local governance.

When The Occupation of Gaza By Hamas comes to an end, however it may do that, the arm twisting, conflict with Israel, deep smuggling, and plundering of the local population in the name of Islam will come also to an end.  In that, and perhaps only that, is there a new dawn for Gazans.

I repeat the three “R”s: Representative | Responsible | Responsive.

Bring those three into honest existence, and the entire of the middle east conflict, sixty-six years of not only of empty promises but of futile and wasteful ends, concludes.

Can approximately two million people rise to reclaim their lives in the place where they have settled?

We shall see.

Hamas – Human Shields

Source: Watch: IDF Soldier Reveals Extent of Hamas ‘Human Shields’ – 8/24/2014.

Related:

http://www.israellycool.com/2014/08/24/assessing-the-ocha-gaza-crisis-atlas-2014-report/ – 8/24/2014.

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2014/08/another-fake-civilian-and-another.html – 8/25/2014.

Hamas – Wealth

Meet the Hamas Billionaires – 7/24/2014.

Hamas – Popularity Contest

Yesterday’s headlines are that Hamas has just rejected Egypt’s offer of a ceasefire with Israel and instead continues to fire rockets indiscriminately at Israeli towns and cities.

Less known is a crucial fact: the people of Gaza are solidly against these Hamas policies. Indeed, by a very large majority, they oppose Hamas rule altogether.

http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/gaza-public-rejects-hamas-wants-ceasefire#When:15:54:31Z#ixzz3BQ2XSv7D – 7/17/2014.

Hamas’s biggest weakness of all is its unpopularity among Palestinians in Gaza now. A poll taken in June, before the latest fighting began, showed that 70 percent of Gazans wanted a continuing cease-fire with Israel; 57 percent wanted a Fatah-Hamas unity government to renounce violence against Israel; 73 percent thought nonviolent resistance had a positive impact, and large majority thought Hamas had failed to deal with crime and corruption.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2014/07/21/how-to-break-hamass-stranglehold-on-gaza/ – 7/21/2014.

Then as Gaza’s economy began to worsen almost as quickly as the Palestinian Authority’s corruption level grew higher, fed up Gazans finally voted the PA out – and the Islamist terrorist organization Hamas into power.

Anyone who expected Hamas to do a better job for the Gazan population was soon sadly disappointed. A Sunni Muslim Brotherhood affiliate, Hamas remains fanatically resolved to destroy Israel and to murder millions of Jews in the process.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/richard-z-chesnoff/gaza-and-palestinian-leadership_b_5589766.html – 7/23/2014.

I wonder if Gazans have the same question I do about Israel’s posture toward Hamas, a stance that seems invested in negotiating a peace with an entity that has long had all of its chips in for the annihilation of Israel and Jewry worldwide.

Related:

http://www.timesofisrael.com/with-ground-op-still-an-option-iaf-given-leeway-to-change-equation/#ixzz3BPh1VtWk – 8/25/2014.

When Hitler finally committed murder and suicide in his Berlin bunker, Germany had been already overrun by the military machinery it inspired and brought to life to do exactly that.  There were no questions about leaving the Nazis in power or negotiating anything less with them than unconditional surrender.  Has Hamas, which has grown fat off the people of Gaza, given them nothing, and brought heartache to their doors — the angered weeping of war is the province of all mankind — any different?

Addendum

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/184410#.U_vE08VdV8E – 8/25/2014.

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As Regards ISIS: On Video — TWI’s Michael Knights and Michael Eisenstadt

22 Friday Aug 2014

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Iraq, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Regions, Syria

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“In this new video series, Washington Institute experts assess the current state of military operations in Iraq and evaluate Abadi’s ability to extricate his country from deadlock, defeat, and disintegration.”

http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/confronting-isis-and-the-future-of-iraq-video-series – 8/21/2014.

From the looks and sound of the productions, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy (TWI) has launched a DIY-AH (do-it-yourself-at-home) effort to promote its fellows’ analyses.  May the TWI powers that be give them an upgrade in audio-visual recording technology.

What follows is an incomplete relay of the series, but in the way of the web, whether the viewer starts out with e-mail (as I did) or on TWI’s web page or YouTube, all routers lead back to some kind of primary media content.

Of course, if you heard it from me first — after I’ve heard it from them — in the older fashioned way of news, good!

“They are very good at using psychological operations to very quickly establish the sense that they control areas, putting up their flags on all key administrative buildings, cross-roads, wide visibility locations, and they’re very good at pursuing what they want in the mergers and acquisitions model of growth whereby they ruck into an area and immediately try to recruit the most like-minded insurgent group in the area to become part of ISIS.”  (1:28 – 1:59).

“First, you can’t address the ISIS threat in Iraq, without addressing the ISIS threat in Syria. Secondly, you can’t address the ISIS threat in Iraq and Syria without addressing the foreign fighter problem. And third, the U.S. really cannot “solve” the region’s problems, because they are rooted in issues of religious and political identity and legitimacy, and this is a problem that can only be worked out among Muslims themselves. ” (2:18 – 2:41)

My “big picture” thought, which might make sense of an $11 billion arms sale): what ISIS scours Qatar will devour.

One day.

However, there are many days between this day and that one, and the Ummah, bloodied from Afghanistan to Yemen, has been pushed by the ambitions and behaviors of its own subscription into a larger global conversation about rightful power, despotism, barbarism, and democracy.

Related on BackChannels

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2014/08/21/qatar-terrorist-refuge-and-financial-platform/ – 8/21/2014.

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Hamas – Bad Faith – No Ceasefire – Never Was – Will Not Be – Stop Dreaming

19 Tuesday Aug 2014

Posted by in Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Gaza, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Middle East, Politics, Regions

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According to Marc Schulman writing for Newsweek, it was the ceasefire that wasn’t:

It turns out that last night the representatives of the Palestinian Authority were putting forth a patently untrue story as to what Israeli and Hamas had agreed, when neither had. Unfortunately, all of the press (both Israeli and worldwide) reported the story as true.

Israel has recalled its negotiating team.

The latest at ABC reports more than 50 rockets fired on Israel this afternoon, some reaching as far as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

Is the reader perhaps looking for the Hamas “off-button”?

Stop looking.

It doesn’t exist.

The Hamas program script plan vision has no curtain, no final act.

In fact, the doctrine is explicit:

. . . even if the obstacles erected by those who revolve in the Zionist orbit, aiming at obstructing the road before the Jihad fighters, have rendered the pursuance of Jihad impossible; nevertheless, the Hamas has been looking forward to implement Allah’s promise whatever time it might take.

Hear,  oh Israel (and all others): with Hamas and what drives it — that deeply malignant narcissism that lends to each his own indulged and grandiose center of the universe — there is nothing to negotiate.

So Hamas does not negotiate in good faith, neither for peace and prosperity to be shared by Gazans nor for considerations having much to do, after all, with The All.

Know the character of the commanders: Ayatollah Khamenei, Khaled Mashaal, Ismail Haniyeh, and others.

Why should Hamas or any other Jihad Joe group come equipped with an “off button”?

The enterprise clearly cons the public, makes a lot of money (which with “terror tunnels” and all would seem not to reach intended deserving recipients), and harms the principles not at all (although, perhaps, after all, Allah knows what they do — and, for now, has them getting away with it).

Related Reference

http://www.jpost.com/Diplomacy-and-Politics/President-Peres-accuses-Qatar-for-financing-Hamas-terrorism-368579 – 7/23/2014.

http://www.thejc.com/comment-and-debate/analysis/121018/hamass-biggest-backer-it-has-entire-westin-palm-its-hand – 7/31/2014.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/arab-bank-trial-allegedly-financing-hamas-article-1.1904694 – 8/15/2014.

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