18 Friday Oct 2013
The Egyptian society is currently at a point of rupture of the historical cycle during which it had been de-politicized through imposed top-down policies. It is undergoing a process of re-politicization and it is gradually realizing its rights and power; and thus the refusal of the masses to accept the governance of a Muslim Brotherhood that did not meet their demands.
A Note on the Socio-Political Importance of Events in Egypt – Strategic Outlook – 10/18/2013.
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14 Monday Oct 2013
As a result of their American-enforced protections until 2003, and later as a result of the weakened central government in Baghdad after Operation Iraqi Freedom, the Iraqi Kurds were left to govern themselves for 22 years, from 1991 to present. During this period, the Kurds have literally lifted their corner of Iraq from the ashes, establishing not only one of the most prosperous polities in the region, but also by far the best approximation of secular democracy that the Middle East can currently offer.
The Plight of the Syrian Kurds | The Institute of Politics at Harvard University – n.d.
Perhaps no new war news is good news.
At least at the moment, “Syria Kurds fighting” isn’t bring up hours old reports and videos.
All may be tense on that front but, so far as the reality-to-news lag is concerned, it’s quiet, and that’s a good thing: in addition to fending off the AQTypal Out There, the Kurds in their camps and villages have a turn coming in the weather to be followed by winter.
It’s good, I’m sure, to have a few fair days ahead of what’s to come, winter being always certain.
On the theme of winter, the VOA has had a story all over the web this past week, but, deja vu, as regards the Kurdish community’s collective consciousness, the people have the memory of having been there and been through it before, war zone and all: “THE Kurds of northern Iraq are heading into winter with their political future as uncertain as ever – and with food and fuel stocks so low that even a belated international relief effort may not head off hardship” (Jim Muir, “Iraq Kurds Face Winter, Neighbors’ Discontent,” The Christian Science Monitor, November 17, 1992).
This year may be different — different zone, relief planes instead of trucks, bands of marauders instead of Saddam Hussein’s military, etc.
The web may make a difference too.
What was barely out of the laboratory in 1992 has produced its own civilization and intelligentsia. However, while the newfangled global political system may prove responsive to those in distress and more than worthy of aid, it seems not to have really kicked in yet. In fact, the Internet’s Emerging Global Order (I-EGO) has at this point only to watch the world, take it in, set up its emotions, think about what it will do when it’s a little more capable of urging its own defense and better attending to the security of those it loves — and there will be those it loves.
Iraqi Kurdistan’s chief ready to strike militants in Syria, Iraq – Alarabiya.net English | Front Page – 10/13/2013.
Son of Syrian Kurdish Leader Salih Muslim Killed in Fighting – 10/10/2013
Syria’s Refugees: The Catastrophe by Hugh Eakin and Alisa Roth | The New York Review of Books – 10/10/2013.
Syrian Kurdish Refugees Fear Harsh Winter in Northern Iraq – 10/7/2013.
Syria: Red Cross, Red Crescent workers kidnapped; 2 bombs rock capital – CNN.com 10/14/2013.
Syrians find safety for Eid al-Adha holiday in Iraq – Yahoo News – 10/4/2013.
ISIS Maps Emirate Borders In Syria – Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East – 10/3/2013.
Syrian Refugees at Erbil Camps to be Relocated for Winter – 9/26/2013.
Turkey and the Syrian Kurds: A little-noticed battle | The Economist – 9/25/2013: “A Syrian rebel fighting the Kurds told our correspondent that “Allah be praised, Turkey is giving us some weapons” though he added that the France and Saudi Arabia were “much more generous”.
Syria Crisis: Children Starving, At Risk of Malnutrition – 9/25/2013.
Syria crisis: starving children forced to survive on fruit, leaves and nuts | Global development | The Guardian – 9/23/2013.
As West blinks on Syria, jihadists begin revenge attacks on civilian population | World Tribune – 9/18/2013.
Syrian children suffering malnutrition – 9/15/2013
United Nations News Centre – UN agencies fly in urgent aid for Syrian refugees in north Iraq – 8/27/2013.
www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Backgrounder_SyrianKurds.pdf
“Syrian Kurds and the Democratic Union Party (PYD) – 12/6/2012.
Terror: The Hidden Source by Malise Ruthven | The New York Review of Books 10/24/2013 (60:16).
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▶ Inside the Syrian crisis: The Needs of Children (September 13, 2013) – YouTube
Help the IRC respond to the humanitarian crisis in Syria. | International Rescue Committee (IRC)
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These two are not even remotely “on topic” but they’re telling of the type of wars being fought, i.e., two wars of annihilation and enslavement and a smaller one about democracy.
Fire fell ‘like rain’ in Syria – CNN.com – 10/12/2013.
Opinion: Syrian war’s brutality isn’t going away – CNN.com – 10/11/2013.
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14 Monday Oct 2013
Tags
Al Qaeda, AQ, civil war, Human Rights Watch, northern Syria, Syria, Turkey
What troubles Western observers is not the groups’ fighting prowess, however, but their shared vision of a jihad that extends beyond Assad’s ouster. While other rebels are fighting to remove the Syrian dictator, former and current U.S. and Middle Eastern officials say, the al-Qaeda groups are transforming the conflict into a symbolic struggle against the West and Israel, using words and images that resonate with like-minded Muslims from the Arab Peninsula to Western Europe.
Rival al-Qaeda-linked groups fortifying in Syria with mix of pragmatism and militancy – The Washington Post – 10/13/2013.
The United States has had limited success cutting off funding to the al Qaeda-linked fighters and foreign jihadists flowing into Syria — in part because of a lack of cooperation on the part of Middle Eastern allies, Intelligence and national security community sources say.
U.S. allies let funds flow to al Qaeda in Syria – Washington Times – 10/13/2013.
Less well known is the sectarian strategy pursued by Sunni extremists, particularly the ultraconservative Salafis living in the Persian Gulf, who are sending “hundreds of millions” of dollars to ensure the worst factions of the revolt are ascendant — mostly under the guise of humanitarian relief.
Gulf charities and Syrian sectarianism — By William McCants | The Middle East Channel – 9/30/2013.
Over the course of the operation, Human Rights Watch says the fighters killed 190 civilians. Residents and hospital staff in Latakia, the nearest city, spoke of burned bodies, beheaded corpses and graves being dug in backyards. Two hundred people from the area remain hostage.
The war in Syria: Rebel atrocities | The Economist – 10/13/2013.
Two opposition groups that took part in the offensive, the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham and Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar, are still holding the hostages, the vast majority women and children. The findings strongly suggest that the killings, hostage taking, and other abuses rise to the level of war crimes and crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said.
“You Can Still See Their Blood” | Human Rights Watch – 10/11/2013.
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▶ Syria: Executions, Hostage Taking by Rebels – YouTube – 10/11/2013.
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“We are collecting money to buy all these weapons, so that our brothers will be victorious,” hard-core Sunni Islamist Sheikh Shafi’ Al-Ajami announced on Kuwaiti television last month, listing the black-market prices of weapons, including heat-seeking missiles, anti-aircraft guns and rocket-propelled grenades.
Money, guns flowing from Kuwait to Syria’s most radical rebel factions | Fox News – 7/11/2013.
U.S. and Middle Eastern officials describe the money as a small portion of a vast pool of private wealth being funneled to Syria’s warring factions, mostly without strings or oversight and outside the control of governments.
Private money pours into Syrian conflict as rich donors pick sides – Washington Post – 6/15/2013.
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Excessive license and loss of boundaries and containment have long characterized the Islamic Small Wars. One may trace that back at least as far as the slaughter of the men of the Banu Quarayza who had surrendered to Muhammad expecting to keep their lives and their community intact. Instead, so goes the legend, males with even a single pubic hair for signal were beheaded and the wives, daughters, and sons taken as war booty. That Human Rights Watch should today be screaming about Al Qaeda-class war crimes comes as no surprise.
For the field, the image of the organics of the Islamist front becomes ever more clear as well as daunting as we learn that some middle east governments, as powerful and wealthy as they may be, cannot rein in their own rogues — or, perhaps, they are shielding the same from western powers. Either way, private bank accounts seem unhindered as regards collecting the kind of “charity” that becomes cash for the arms leveled at hapless and unarmed residents in the path of the coldly deranged and enraged.
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“We often see buses around with all their curtains drawn. I have no doubt that their passengers are Islamists on the road to Paradise,” says Mehmet with a sad smile. He criticizes the “silence of the Turkish media on Ankara’s dark moves,” as he puts it.
“Here it’s not about rebels fighting [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad, it’s Jabhat al-Nusra – an armed group close to al Qaeda – and Syrian Kurdish fighters engaging in brutal clashes.”
Al Qaeda’s Turkish base? | World | DW.DE | 18.09.2013
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Tuesday said “Turkey has never supported any units which have connections with Al Qaeda and never let them use our borders with Syria”, Anadolu Agency reported.
FM: Turkey never supports any units linked with Al Qaeda – Trend.Az – 10/8/2013
Remember: lies are told to hide something or to get something.
It was the first face-to-face between Mr. Erdogan and President Barack Obama in almost a year. Mr. Obama delivered what U.S. officials describe as an unusually blunt message: The U.S. believed Turkey was letting arms and fighters flow into Syria indiscriminately and sometimes to the wrong rebels, including anti-Western jihadists.
Seated at Mr. Erdogan’s side was the man at the center of what caused the U.S.’s unease, Hakan Fidan, Turkey’s powerful spymaster and a driving force behind its efforts to supply the rebels and topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
Turkey’s Spymaster Plots Own Course on Syria – WSJ.com – 10/10/2013
Later, however, Muslim accused Turkey of facilitating the jihadists’ cross-border movements by clearing passages through minefields and removing barbed wire. During our September interview, he had strong words for Turkey. He said he wanted to continue the dialogue with Ankara, but could not understand Ankara’s support of extreme religious elements.
Syrian Kurdish Leader Urges Turkey To End Support for Salafists – Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East – 10/9/2013.
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Whatever Syria was three years ago, it’s either gone today or is missing parts of its once constituted sovereignty. Death has taken more than 100,000 of its constituents; fighting has displaced more than three million once settled residents; the same has “forced” autonomy on the Kurdish community — ten percent of Syria’s population overall; entire cities lay in ruin; borders, checkpoints, and roads have been overrun but by God only knows what.
The worst thing may be the latent Somali-like sub-state anarchy evident in the transfers of arms, cash, and Al Qaeda-type fighters from one location to another across numerous borders and boundaries. Rather than running their separate parts of the show in Syria, it appears that governments and their intelligence agencies have been reduced to searching for ways to benefit from or leverage the activities of a largely unremarked class of private persons with the connections and wherewithal to exert their own will through young proxies.
Related: Qatar-funded Syrian rebel brigade backs al Qaeda groups in Syria – Threat Matrix 7/26/2013.
Moscow’s and Washington’s posturing around chemical weapons and peace talks would seem to gloss over the anarchy and the prospect, which one may as well interpret as the reality, that all civil and responsible government has fled northern Syria and what remains are armed bands in various stages of collusion and contest left to mayhem, murder, and making themselves comfortable.
Al-Qaeda-linked Groups Taking Root in Syria – 10/13/2013.
7 Red Cross Workers Kidnapped By Gunmen In Syria – 10/13/2013; 4 of 7 kidnapped aid workers freed in Syria – Yahoo News – 10/14/2013.
Syrian Arab Village Welcomes Kurdish Fighters – Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East – 10/13/2013.
Danish Salafist leader said to have been killed in Syria – The Long War Journal – 10/4/2013.
Syria: Political Detainees Tortured, Killed | Human Rights Watch – 10/3/2013.
Insight: Saudi Arabia boosts Salafist rivals to al Qaeda in Syria | Reuters – 10/1/2013.
Al Qaeda, Kurdish militia clash on Syrian border with Turkey | Reuters – 9/25/2013.
Rebel-on-Rebel Violence Seizes Syria – WSJ.com – 9/18/2013: “ISIS fighters recently raided a council arms depot filled with lights weapons and ammunition, funded by the Gulf states and funneled to the council with the guidance of the Central Intelligence Agency, council members said.”
Syria: nearly half rebel fighters are jihadists or hardline Islamists, says IHS Jane’s report – Telegraph – 9/15/2013: “Opposition forces battling Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria now number around 100,000 fighters, but after more than two years of fighting they are fragmented into as many as 1,000 bands.”
Syrian rebels claim receipt of major weapons shipment | World news | The Guardian – 8/25/2013.
Attacks of Al-Qaeda affiliated groups against Kurds in Northern Syria or Rojava – an appeal – The Kurdistan Tribune – 8/15/2013.
Kuwait pulls cleric from TV for sectarian comments | The National – 8/14/2013.
Jordan captures arms smugglers from Syria – 8/3/2013.
Kuwait, ‘the back office of logistical support’ for Syria’s rebels | The National – 2/5/2013.
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10 Thursday Oct 2013
Tags
Live – Yair Lapid – Israel Minister of Finance – Middle East Conflict
“The problem is not technical — the problems is about fear, mistrust, hatred and pain and dealing with past memories . . . .” Webcast, live at posting – 10/10/2013/1305EDT.
09 Wednesday Oct 2013
Tags
Al Qaeda, Islam, islamic humanism, Islamists, Kurdish community, northern Syria, political Islam, terrorism
By labeling the acts of radical Islamists as mere “terrorism” we imply that there is an Achilles heel to expose — a political demand or a territorial gain with which they might barter, with which we might naively appease.
The reality is completely different. Their goals are nihilistic and non-negotiable: they want the total elimination of all who are not with them. Nairobi was possibly the most explicit demonstration of such.
Qanta Ahmed – The new jihad — a violent, intrusive and dangerous threat to world order | Fox News – 10/9/2013.
Someone raised expectations, perhaps; someone provided explicit instruction; someone’s words were received amplified, heightened, deified, perhaps; and someone challenged The Wisdom, saying in effect, “Prove it – it is either of the stars or not.”
Along the line of the Christian anti-Jihad, there is no way away from elements of scripture delivered in practical and literal terms. Their experience of what on this blog I call “shimmer” starts with their examination of the Quran plus impression from history plus, finally, an acquaintance with Hadith. None of that ends well, and less for Christian pride than its basis in Jewish thought after Hillel.
For the Jews, the noise starts somewhere beyond the arguments and themes inspired by — but seldom stated explicitly in — the Torah. Even with something as simple as “The Binding of Isaac”, the reader is never told whether the test is of Abraham’s obedience, which is the common interpretation, or one given to children by their parents, or of conscience, which is a little bit more incisive and likely to arrive as epiphany with sufficient fascination and reflection.
The Jews long ago formed a culture apart and have learned a great deal about themselves and others. Credit the Torah for that. Or credit the necessity of separation given the humanity that must have gathered in the ancient desert appalled with the world, and, later, with Pharaoh. Muslims, by comparison, have formed of the seduced or the conquered of the world, and whatever spirit predated Muhammad would seem to persist in expression now conflated with Islam.
Whether what is in Qanta Ahmed to grasp as a modern Muslim woman a progressive and humanist Islam is actually in Islam, I don’t know, for there are many forces in the Ummah — the “Islamists” but a facet, the “sword verses” another, the conflations with child marriages and honor killings producing yet additional self-slander and fuel for critics, and the history of conquest (start with the wholesale slaughter of the men and rape of daughters and wives of the Banu Qurayza) — that would belie the assertion.
For the Kurds fighting Al Qaeda today in northern Syria, nothing has changed: they know their old enemy.
Concerns with terrorist atrocities in Christian or western states may overlook the inkblot spread of Al Qaeda-defined conflict in ungoverned or autonomously governed spaces. That context tells of a format in warfare as familiar to the 7th Century as it is to the morning news sifted by foreign affairs wonks.
The Kurdish community in northern Syria hasn’t to care about the modern humanist assertion, reformation, or survival of Islam: a Muslim army, self-appointed, self-defined, has arrived on their doorstep to convert or annihilate them, and they know it and have taken up defensive positions and initiated diplomatic efforts congruent with that.
Syrian Kurdish Leader Urges Turkey to End Support for Salafists – Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East – 10/9/2013.
Syria: Al-Qaeda wants to control Iraq and Turkey border zones | News | World | Mail & Guardian – 10/5/2013.
Syria: Al-Qaeda Branch Battles Kurds, Threatens Ankara | Al Akhbar English – 10/1/2013.
Al-Qaida claims rare attacks in northern Iraq Republican American – 10/8/2013.
Abdul Hakim Quick – a preacher from the Islamic Education and Research Academy, who has called upon God to “clean and purify Al-Aqsa from the filth of the Yahood [Jews]” and to “clean all of the lands from the filth of the Kafirun [non-believers].” He has also stated: “They said ‘what is the Islamic position [on homosexuality]?’ And I told them. Put my name in the paper. The punishment is death. And I’m not going to change this religion.”
UK Charity Commission Permits Hamas Charity :: Gatestone Institute – 10/4/2013.
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06 Sunday Oct 2013
“It’s a tragedy,” he said. “These innocent children were here to study. What sins did these children commit?”
Iraq: Children Killed In Playground Bombing – 10/6/2013.
Baghdad, 1 October 2013 – According to casualty figures released today by UNAMI, a total of 979 Iraqis were killed and another 2,133 were wounded in acts of terrorism and violence in September.
UN Releases Casualty Figures for September | ReliefWeb – 10/6/2013.
Related: Sectarian violence kills dozens in Iraq – CNN.com – 10/6/2013.
But a little over a year after it was suspended, the death penalty was reinstated by the new Shiite-led central government. A year later, in 2005, the executions, usually by hanging, resumed.
Since then, around 500 people have been executed, according to records kept by human rights observers including Amnesty International. During the first four months of this year alone at least 50 people were hanged.
In Iraq, executions rise as deadly attacks escalate | Al Jazeera America – 10/5/2013.
Iraq is one of the world’s most prolific executioners, as the government continues to battle against a high level of violence by armed groups. Hundreds of prisoners are currently held on death row. In 2012 a sharp rise in executions was recorded in Iraq making it the country with the third highest number of executions in the world, after China and Iran. At least 129 people were executed in 2012, almost twice the known total of 201 since the beginning of 2013 at least 83 people, including two women, have been executed.
The civil war in neighboring Syria — itself a volatile, sectarian conflict — has spilled across the border, and Sunni jihadi factions are operating in both countries. Now, four months before the next parliamentary elections, Iraq increasingly appears to be spiraling toward a civil war.
Iraq’s Months of Sectarian Violence May Lead to a Civil War | TIME.com 10/1/2013.
The Iraqi government plans to form a division comprised of Iraqi Shi’a militia members. This planned division will be deployed in Baghdad. This development is recognition by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that current security measures are ineffective. While the formation of this division may appeal to the Iraqi Shi’a, it may lead to further discontent by the Iraqi Sunnis. Al-Qaeda in Iraq will capitalize on the formation of this division and seek new opportunities to escalate sectarian violence in Iraq. The formation of the division will damage Maliki’s credentials and likely lead to further instability.
For those who may take a special interest in Iraq. Stephen Wicken‘s blog on which the above quoted piece by Ahmed Ali appears, updates weekly.
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“Two mad wasps in a bell jar” — my analogy for Shia vs Sunni fighting in Syria would seem to hold up as well for Iraq, which looks to me to be dissolving into a purely retributive bloodbath of a civil war.
The UN’s count approaching 1,000 dead in Iraq in September appears in brief overview a reliable monthly rate with sources reporting 5,000 dead by way of political violence in the land since April of this year.
Related: Bullet-riddled corpses echo brutal Iraqi sectarian war | ReliefWeb 9/19/2013.
Saturday 5 October: 100 killed
Baghdad: 55 in bomb attacks.
Mosul: 5 by gunfire.
Balad: 15 by car bomb.
Baquba: 11 in separate bombings.
Yusufiya: 3 Sahwa members by IED.
Hawija: 3 Sahwa members by gunfire.
Muqdadiya: 1 by IED.
Tikrit: 3 (women and child) killed during clashes.
Falluja: 4 by gunfire, IED.October casualties so far: 183 civilians killed.
Recent Events :: Iraq Body Count
The month is yet young.
Presuming that those remote to the fighting are nonetheless getting an accurate impression of Iraq’s fully functioning if entirely off-kilter slaughterhouse, one begs to ask about motivation on the part of killers, and never mind their affiliation.
“At the root of these attacks – said Msgr. Sako – is a strong tension between the Shiite majority and the Sunni faction and this violence is clearly sectarian and confessional in nature.” In Kirkuk alone, the archbishop continued, there were four targeted killings of innocent people. “The aim – says the prelate – is to destabilize the country” because “the central government lacks unity and political force even within the same Shiite majority. There is great tension, there is no dialogue between groups and greater barriers are emerging “.
IRAQ Archbishop of Kirkuk: sectarian violence in Iraq “politically motivated” – Asia News – 9/10/2012.
Note the date!
Such explanations prove so good and useful that one may live with them for years . . . .
Related: Iraq will not become another Syria, says government, as car bombs kill 34 | Reuters – 8/15/2013; Sunni-Shi’ite Jihad in Iraq | FrontPage Magazine – 9/26/2013.
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It appears in Iraq that even such things as wanton destruction and murder may become habits, first of mind in excessively perceived oppressive, anxiety-ridden, paranoid, and infernal atmospheres, i.e., the bizarre, surreal, and untrustworthy atmosphere of a war zone, and then habits in activity and action: some population has long been accustomed to the presence of firearms, ammo, explosives and, this perhaps spelling the difference between a predominantly peaceful “gun ownership” and a restless one prone to violence, a mise en scene of explosions and shootings overlaying thousands of smaller but vicious acts of intimidation and suggestion.
There’s the madness of the wasps in the bell jar in that.
The state’s monopoly on violence, as in Hussain’s day, may suppress and reduce violence in the streets, but imposed along sectarian lines, or perceived as such, it will fail.
The battle that looks like Shiite vs Sunni may turn out an unformed middle — about to be called into being out necessity — against an habituated cast of aimless, mindless, morally bankrupt and vengeful war zombies today reduced to blowing themselves up among pilgrims and school children.
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Attacks Across Iraq Leave 66 Dead – YouTube – Rudaw English – 10/6/2013.
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No one who has retained either an ounce of their own courage or humanity can fail to see the inchoate and lost qualities in these deluded monsters who walk around with death their only real meaning.
While Robert Spencer noted recently, “. . . the idea that the Sunni-Shi’ite divide, which is 1,400 years old and goes all the way back to the murky origins of Islam, is something that can without undue difficulty be “overcome” is a sterling manifestation of the general superficiality of Washington’s analysis of the Middle East, during both the Bush and the Obama Administrations,” I would ask who is not fighting that fight today for the good reason they had on one day or another in this lifetime found the world changed when they opened their eyes.
Their numbers needs must dwarf these others.
Where are they?
Do they not understand what is killing them?
Habits of mind are like any other: one foregoes the behavior for a while, whether some form of gluttony or excessive passivity, and then, so one may hope, moves on to better thoughts and brighter days.
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Related: Iraq: Attacks Amount to Crimes Against Humanity | Human Rights Watch – 8/11/2013.
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03 Thursday Oct 2013
In 2013, so far there has been an average of 68 car bombings a month and a multiple-location strike every 10 days.
The UN says 5,740 civilians have been killed since January – almost double the figure it reported for the whole of 2010.
Michael Knights – BBC News – Analysis: Iraq’s never-ending security crisis – 10/3/2013
Commander of al-Qaeda in Iraq and Syria has been killed – Alarabiya.net English | Front Page – 9/22/2013.
Ashish Kumar Sen – Al Qaeda pushing Iraq toward civil war, ambassador says – Washington Times – 9/18/2013.
Paul Mirengoff – Al Qaeda in Iraq is resurgent | Power Line – 9/16/2013.
The new face of al Qaeda in Iraq – IRAQ – FRANCE 24 – 8/30/2013.
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01 Tuesday Oct 2013
Posted in Israel, Jordan, Middle East, Politics
Tags
The Muslim Brotherhood if it takes control of Jordan will be much stronger than the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt.
▶ כנס שתי מדינות לשני עמים משני עברי הירדן (חלק 11) – YouTube
Mudar Zahran promoted the above via social networks about 50 minutes ago: whom he addressed, where, and when was not provided.
Addendum: Mudar Zahran speaking at the Menachem Begin Heritage Center, “Two States for Two Peoples on Two Banks of the Jordan River,” Dr. Arieh Eldad, Chair, Jerusalem, August 25, 2013.
Palestinian State in Jordan ‘Inevitable’ – Middle East – News – Israel National News – 8/26/2013.
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In reference, I’ve provided links to Zahrans writings and related material as well as items focusing on Jordanian stability.
In addition, Zahran has noted the landing of a shell in Ramtha, Jordan within the past three hours. Such mortar shell “spillover” (who knows with what intent it traveled?) has been a regular occurrence in Ramtha this past year.
Displaced Syrians in Jordan: ‘Syria Smells of Death’ – Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East – 7/17/2012
Stray shells from Syria causing ‘sleepless nights’ for Ramtha residents | The Jordan Times – 4/30/2013.
Ramtha residents ‘on edge’ as Syria war rages | The Jordan Times – 8/26/2013.
Gov’t protests Syrian shell inside Jordan | The Jordan Times – 9/29/2013.
Additional Reference
Jordan Is Palestinian :: Middle East Quarterly – by Mudar Zahran – Winter 2012.
The Jewish Press » » Mudar Zahran – 8/29/2013.
The Jewish Press » » Mudar Zahran on why Jordan is Already a Palestinian State – 9/2/2013.
Writings by Mudar Zahran :: Gatestone Institute
The Modern King in the Arab Spring – Jeffrey Goldberg – The Atlantic – 3/18/2013:
The king was flying himself to Karak, which is one of the poorer cities in a distressingly poor country, to have lunch with the leaders of Jordan’s largest tribes, which form the spine of Jordan’s military and political elite. More than half of all Jordanians are of Palestinian origin, with roots on the West Bank of the Jordan River, but the tribal leaders are from the East Bank, and the Hashemite kings have depended on East Bankers to defend the throne since the Hashemites first came to what was then called Transjordan from Mecca almost 100 years ago.
Jordan’s king, Assad and Iran | JPost | Israel News – 4/3/2013.
In A Rough Neighborhood, Jordan Clings To Its Stability : Parallels : NPR – 7/1/2013:
Jordan shares the region’s troubles: a faltering economy; rampant unemployment, especially among the young; and a popular demand for a say in how the country is governed.
“Jordan is stable, but you feel what is so unstable,” says Labib Kamhawi, describing the contradictions. He is the head of the National Front for Reform, a coalition of political groups and civil society organizations. “The decision-making process is without any input from the people.”
US military to boost Jordan defences amid Syria unrest – MIDDLE EAST – FRANCE 24 6/4/2013.
Jordan’s Stability Threatened by Syrian Refugee Crisis – US News and World Report – 7/16/2013:
Almost 2 million people have fled Syria since the civil war began in early 2011, according to U.N. numbers. By some estimates 800,000 of these poured into neighboring Jordan, a traditional safe haven for refugees from previously war-stricken regions such as Iraq and Palestine. This influx is taking a heavy toll on the Arab nation which by the end of the year may host as many as a million refugees.
Jordanian jihadists in Syria ‘could challenge Jordan’s stability’ | The Jordan Times – 9/10/2013:
Hassan Abu Hanieh, political analyst and expert on Islamic groups, said earlier this week that Jordanians are considered among the most prominent foreign nationalities fighting alongside Islamist forces in the anti-Assad rebellion, as hundreds have allegedly joined the radical and ultraconservative Salafist jihadist groups of Jabhat Al Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, both Al Qaeda-affiliated, he said.
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Rural poverty in Jordan – Rural Poverty Portal, n.d.
www.ifad.org/pub/other/jordan.pdf
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Should Jordan Be a Palestinian State? :: Gatestone Institute – 3/19/2012.
Jordan is Palestine: Arieh Eldad’s Two-State Solution | FrontPage Magazine – 9/30/2011.
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“Mudar Zahran on Michael Coren” – Posted by JordanIsPalestine – April 27, 2012.
Related: “Professor Eldad: ‘There is a Third Way'”. American for a Safe Israel, August 28, 2013.
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