What US 2020 Elections tell us about Americans’ values systems

What US 2020 Elections tell us about Americans’ values systems

    Monday, November 09, 2020   No comments

 

Trump: “This fucking virus, what does it have to do with me getting reelected?”

~  Inside Donald Trump’s 2020 undoing

Let’s not forget what US presidential elections tone and results confirm: The rude and candid discourse that elevates personal interests above all else; the power of those who consider themselves better and superior and more deserving; and their view that everyone else should be grateful that they can serve them and be thankful for the opportunity to exist in the same space they exist even as servants… just under half of the American public approved of such tone and character. And from what data reveal, the standard bearer of the supremacist discourse lost not because, nationally, just 3% of the voters 3% more people rejected his supremacist discourse and value system, but because 3% of the voters disapproved of his mismanagement of a pandemic crisis that killed quarter million people in less than eight months. This reality cannot be covered by the veneer of deliberately selected photos of some Americans celebrating the win by the less openly supremacist candidate.

 News story: ~  Inside Donald Trump’s 2020 undoing

'Islam is in a transformative process'

'Islam is in a transformative process'

    Thursday, August 10, 2017   No comments

Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im

Muslims feel conflicted about certain aspects of historical Islam, says the Islamic scholar Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im. How does the notion of Sharia fit within the idea of a secular state?

Sharia in a secular state -  isn't that a contradiction in terms?
Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im: The question is: what does one mean by Sharia? People tend to think of the legal end of it, as if that is the whole principle of Sharia. But Sharia consists of the whole normative system of Islam founded in the Koran, the Sunna and the hadith, or tradition of the Prophet. So it is not possible - even in a secular state - to deny Muslims the right to turn to Sharia to answer questions such as how to pray or how to fast.   

Sharia cannot be enforced by the state anywhere. There is absolutely no possibility to enact Sharia as a law of the state whether it be in a so-called "Muslim majority country" or a tiny Muslim minority anywhere. The nature of Sharia defies codification. It is about the interpretation that people choose through their own conviction.

So what is Sharia for you?
Sharia provides moral guidance for Muslim individuals. State and religion should be clearly separated. For me, as a Muslim, I need the state to be secular so that I can practice Islam through conviction and choice. The need of the state to be secular derives from an Islamic point of view; it has nothing to do with the European Enlightenment. The state has nothing to do with my being a believer or an atheist.

If state and religion are to be clearly separated, what role can religion play in public discourse?

I make a distinction between the state and politics. The state has nothing to do with Islam, but politics is a field where religion is always relevant. You cannot keep religion out of politics. Just like the CDU [editor's note: Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats] in Germany believes that its political platform is inspired by Christianity, believers - whatever their religion - act politically out of their conviction as believers. Whether you ban Sharia from politics or not, Muslims will continue to act in ways that are consistent with their understanding of Sharia. You cannot prevent that possibility unless you disenfranchise Muslims. source...

Dissent is haram in Gulf Nations: Sympathizing with Qatar will cost people living in UAE up to 15 years in prison

Dissent is haram in Gulf Nations: Sympathizing with Qatar will cost people living in UAE up to 15 years in prison

    Wednesday, June 07, 2017   No comments

The United Arab Emirates tightened the squeeze on fellow Gulf state Qatar on Wednesday, threatening anyone publishing expressions of sympathy towards Doha with up to 15 years in prison and barring entry to Qataris.
...
The UAE-based newspaper Gulf News and pan-Arab channel Al-Arabiya reported the crackdown on expressions of sympathy with Qatar.

"Strict and firm action will be taken against anyone who shows sympathy or any form of bias towards Qatar, or against anyone who objects to the position of the United Arab Emirates, whether it be through the means of social media, or any type of written, visual or verbal form," Gulf News quoted UAE Attorney-General Hamad Saif al-Shamsi as saying.

On top of a possible jail term, offenders could also be hit with a fine of at least 500,000 dirhams ($136,000), the newspaper said, citing a statement to Arabic-language media.

Slogans against and in support of Qatar have dominated Twitter in Arabic. Newspapers and television channels in the region have also been engaged in a war of words.

source: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-gulf-qatar-idUSKBN18Y0DH

A simple question about Saudi Arabia and Democracy causes brain-freeze of Senior State Department official

A simple question about Saudi Arabia and Democracy causes brain-freeze of Senior State Department official

    Wednesday, May 31, 2017   No comments

Acting Assistant Secretary of State Stuart Jones, who accompanied President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to Saudi Arabia last week, was holding a press briefing about the trip’s achievements. Then he was asked a simple question:

While you were over there, the secretary criticized the conduct of the Iranian elections and Iran’s record on democracy. He did so standing next to Saudi officials. How do you characterize Saudi Arabia’s commitment to democracy? And does the administration believe that democracy is a buffer or barrier against extremism?

Jones paused for 20 long seconds to collect his thoughts, then he answered:

I think what we would say is, that at this meeting, we were able to make significant progress with Saudi and GCC [Persian Gulf Cooperation Council] partners in both making a strong statement against extremism and also putting in place certain measures through this GCC mechanism where we can combat extremism. Clearly one source of extremism – one terrorism threat – is coming from Iran. And that’s coming from a part of the Iranian apparatus that is not at all responsive to its electorate.

The moment spells out the difficulty US officials face when they try to explain their alliances with regimes that have no respect for representative governance--such as the Saudi regime.

Watch the clip:

German international magazine, der spiegel, publishes a dossier about Trump's presidency, the illustrative image is astounding

German international magazine, der spiegel, publishes a dossier about Trump's presidency, the illustrative image is astounding

    Saturday, February 04, 2017   No comments

 ISR comment: The image illustrating the cover dossier of “Der Spiegel,” a leading magazine out of Germany, a country that knows firsthand the consequences of being ruled by populist authoritarians, is astounding. It speaks to the power of art in capturing the moment. Its selection for the cover of the magazine underscores the role of the media and journalism in society during challenging times.
__________________

Donald Trump has now been president of the United States for two weeks. It literally pains me to write about all that has happened in these first days. The president of the U.S. is a racist. He is attempting a coup from the top; he wants to establish an illiberal democracy, or worse; he wants to undermine the balance of power.

With his style of rule -- his decrees, his appointments and his firings -- he is dividing Washington and the rest of the country. Our cover story this week, which will be published in English on Monday, describes how Trump's inner circle works and how insecurity has grown among government officials. It sheds light on the role of Stephen Bannon, the former head of the right-wing news portal Breitbart News, who has become Trump's Faust, his chief ideologue and the man pulling the strings in the White House. Bannon is also a man who loves wars -- he sees them as being thoroughly advantageous.


During the course of his reporting on the cover story, SPIEGEL Washington correspondent Gordon Repinski met with government officials who spoke of their worries and their pangs of guilt. "They are considering whether the right thing to do would be to leave the government or to put up resistance from within," says Repinski. In London, my colleague Peter Müller spoke with Ted Malloch, who is considered Trump's favorite for the post of ambassador to the European Union -- a man who has praised Brexit and predicted the collapse of the euro.

  

The problem will not resolve itself. German business is the opponent of American trade policy, the German democracy is the ideological opponent of Donald Trump, but even here, in the middle of Germany, right-wing extremists are trying to give him a helping hand. It is high time that we stand up for what is important: democracy, freedom, the West and its alliances. Germany, of all countries, the economically and politically dominant democracy in Europe, will have to form the alliance against Trump, because it won't otherwise take shape. It is, however, absolutely necessary.


  

The image for this week's cover was created by the artist Edel Rodriguez. Edel was nine years old when, in 1980, he came to the U.S. with his mother -- two refugees, like so many others. "I remember it well, and I remember the feelings and how little kids feel when they are leaving their country," he told the Washington Post on Friday night.

The newspaper wrote: "This DER SPIEGEL Trump cover is stunning." It wasn't the first time Edel has drawn Trump. He usually portrays him without eyes -- you just see his angry, gaping mouth and, of course, the hair. "I don't want to live in a dictatorship," he says. "If I wanted to live in a dictatorship, I'd live in Cuba, where it's much warmer."

In other vital coverage this week, New York correspondent Philipp Oehmke met up with Dave Eggers and Wolfgang Höbel interviewed T.C. Boyle. Both American authors spoke about the issue gripping the entire world right now: Trump's America. "The world must be shaking," says Boyle.

Finally, in a SPIEGEL interview, my colleagues Horand Knaup, Markus Feldenkirchen and I asked Martin Schulz, the center-left Social Democratic Party's candidate challenging Angela Merkel in this year's chancellor race, what he thought of Trump. "Contemptible. He crosses the boundaries of every basic consensus that a democracy needs! It's staggering."

 A selection of stories from the issue will be published in English this week at
Spiegel.de/international.

 

170 new prisons will be built in Turkey to accommodate more than 100,000 inmates

170 new prisons will be built in Turkey to accommodate more than 100,000 inmates

    Thursday, September 15, 2016   No comments

Erdogan claims high-ground  when questioned about his support for armed groups fighting to overthrow the Syrian government: It is shameful to negotiate with the Syrian president who is responsible for hundreds of thousands of lives lost, he argues. But he shrugs off any criticism that he is authoritarian or dictator. Yet, the numbers that his own ministers are making public proves that he is just as cruel: since the failed coup, thousands of soldiers, teachers, professors, doctors, lawyers, students, and anyone suspected of being a follower of Gulen were arrested. It is estimated that nearly 200,000 people were arrested. To accommodate this large number of inmates, the government released thousands of criminals. Signaling the large number of arrests, the government revealed that it will build new prisons, not schools or research centers, prisons, 170 of them, in the next five years. 
 

More than 170 jails will be built over the next five years in Turkey, according to a statement from the Justice Ministry. The ministry’s move comes after the overcrowding in jails caused by the arrests linked to the July 15 failed coup attempt, believed to have been masterminded by the Fethullahist Terror Organization (FETÖ). Source

One could understand that soldiers who take part in a coup to overthrow an elected government should be arrested and punished. But arresting teachers, professionals, and ordinary citizens because they are suspected of being follower of Gulen is what dictators so. When these hundreds of thousands of inmates are added to tens of thousands of Kurdish people killed and tens of thousands imprisoned, Erdogan will be indistinguishable from the dictators he likes to criticizes.

Slow progress: Legacy of racism claims new victims in the U.S.

Slow progress: Legacy of racism claims new victims in the U.S.

    Friday, February 13, 2015   No comments

U.S. gunman kills three young Muslims; motive disputed

A gunman who had posted anti-religious messages on Facebook and quarreled with neighbors was charged with killing three young Muslims in what police said on Wednesday was a dispute over parking and possibly a hate crime.

Craig Stephen Hicks, 46, a full-time paralegal student from Chapel Hill, was charged with first-degree murder in Tuesday's shootings around 5 p.m. two miles (three km) from the University of North Carolina campus.

The victims were newlyweds Deah Shaddy Barakat, 23, a University of North Carolina dental student, and his wife Yusor Mohammad, 21, and Yusor's sister, Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha, 19.

All were involved in humanitarian aid programs.

Students at UNC, where Yusor Mohammad was going to join her husband as a student later this year, were gathering on Wednesday for an evening vigil and prayer service.

The suspect, in handcuffs and orange jail garb, appeared briefly on Wednesday before a Durham County judge who ordered him held without bail pending a March 4 probable cause hearing.

Police said a preliminary investigation showed the motive to be a parking dispute. They said Hicks, who has no criminal history in Chapel Hill, turned himself in and was cooperating.

The killings drew international condemnation. The shooting sparked the hashtag #MuslimLivesMatter on social media with many posters assailing what they called a lack of news coverage.

red more >>

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Judge Carlton Reeves: Resurrecting the Nightmarish Specter of Lynchings in Mississippi

Late one summer night in 2011 in Jackson, Mississippi, James Craig Anderson, an African-American, was set upon in a parking lot by ten white teenagers, beaten and murdered. The gruesome killing was recorded by security cameras, and all ten teenagers, now adults, have pled guilty to various charges. In their pleas they told the court that this incident was one of many trips into Jackson, which they called “Jafrica,” to beat up black people.

Yesterday in Jackson, the first three of the defendants to be sentenced in federal court received prison terms ranging from 5 to 50 years.

The three — Deryl Dedmon, Dylan Butler and John Rice — were sentenced by Federal district court judge Carlton Reeves. In his remarks from the bench, Reeves gave a unflinching account of the state’s violent past: “Mississippi has expressed its savagery in a number of ways throughout its history — slavery being the cruelest example, but a close second being Mississippi’s infatuation with lynchings.”

And he connected Anderson’s murder directly to that bloody history:

    A toxic mix of alcohol, foolishness and unadulterated hatred caused these young people to resurrect the nightmarish specter of lynchings and lynch mobs from the Mississippi we long to forget. Like the marauders of ages past, these young folk conspired, planned, and coordinated a plan of attack on certain neighborhoods in the City of Jackson for the sole purpose of harassing, terrorizing, physically assaulting and causing bodily injury to black folk. They punched and kicked them about their bodies — their heads, their faces. They prowled. They came ready to hurt. They used dangerous weapons; they targeted the weak; they recruited and encouraged others to join in the coordinated chaos; and they boasted about their shameful activity. This was a 2011 version of the Nigger hunts.

Reeves went on to contrast the state’s current criminal justice system with the past, when the system “operated with ruthless efficiency in upholding what these defendants would call WHITE POWER.”

    Today we take another step away from Mississippi’s tortured past . . . we move farther away from the abyss. . . . Mississippi has a present and a future. That present and future has promise. As demonstrated by the work of the officers within these state and federal agencies — black and white; male and female, in this Mississippi, they work together to advance the rule of law. Having learned from Mississippi’s inglorious past, these officials know that in advancing the rule of law, the criminal justice system must operate without regard to race, creed or color. This is the strongest way Mississippi can reject those notions — those ideas which brought us here today.

He closed with hopes for the victim’s mother and the defendants:

    These sentences will not bring back James Craig Anderson. . . . The Court knows that James Anderson’s mother, who is now 89 years old, lived through the horrors of the Old Mississippi, and the Court hopes that she and her family can find peace in knowing that with these sentences, in the New Mississippi, Justice is truly blind. Justice, however, will not be complete unless these defendants use the remainder of their lives to learn from this experience and fully commit to making a positive difference in the New Mississippi. And, finally, the Court wishes that the defendants also can find peace.

Reeves was appointed to the federal bench by Obama in 2010. He is the second African-American federal judge from Mississippi.

Below is his full statement, as prepared:

read more >>

Over 60% of Tunisians able to vote voted; 56% of them voted for Beji Caid Essebsi, 44% voted for Mohamed Moncef Marzouki

Over 60% of Tunisians able to vote voted; 56% of them voted for Beji Caid Essebsi, 44% voted for Mohamed Moncef Marzouki

    Monday, December 22, 2014   No comments

Over 60% of Tunisians able to vote voted; 56% of them voted for Beji Caid Essebsi, 44% voted for Mohammed Mouncef Marzouki. 

Essebsi, 88, appeared before 2,000 supporters who gathered outside his campaign headquarters in the capital Tunis shouting “Long live Tunisia!” and thanked the voters.

“Tunisia needs all its children. We must work hand in hand,” he said as supporters cheered.

Marzouki dismissed the declaration as unfounded and refused to concede defeat. His camp said the result was too close to call and accused the Essebsi of election “violations”.

It is the first time Tunisians have freely elected their president since independence from France in 1956.

Authorities had urged a big turnout to consolidate democracy following a chaotic four-year transition. Election organisers said turnout was at 59.04%.

Just hours before polling began on Sunday morning, troops guarding ballot papers in the central region of Kairouan came under attack and shot dead one assailant and captured three, the defence ministry said.

read more >>

Nidaa Tounes wins 38% of the seats in the Tunisian parliament

Nidaa Tounes wins 38% of the seats in the Tunisian parliament

    Monday, October 27, 2014   No comments

Tunisia's Ennahda party, the first Islamist movement to secure power after the 2011 "Arab Spring" revolts, conceded defeat on Monday in elections that are set to make its main secular rival the strongest force in parliament.
Official results from Sunday's elections - the second parliamentary vote since Tunisians set off uprisings across much of the Arab World by overthrowing autocrat Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali - were still to be announced.

But a senior official at Ennahda, which ruled in a coalition until it was forced to make way for a caretaker government during a political crisis at the start of this year, acknowledged defeat by the secular Nidaa Tounes party.

"We have accepted this result, and congratulate the winner Nidaa Tounes," the official, Lotfi Zitoun, told Reuters. However, he repeated the party's call for a new coalition including Ennahda. "We are calling once again for the formation of a unity government in the interest of the country."

Read more >>
 

Despite a New Constitution, the Fight for Gender Equality in Tunisia Continues

Despite a New Constitution, the Fight for Gender Equality in Tunisia Continues

    Friday, April 11, 2014   No comments

After more than two years of arguments and concessions between Islamic and secular parties, on January 26, the Tunisian National Constituent Assembly ratified the country’s new Constitution.

When it was signed, assembly members spontaneously started to chant the national anthem and congratulated each other for the achievement. Indeed, there was cause for celebration. Tunisians signed one of the most progressive Constitutions in the Arab world, one that includes a commitment to gender equality. Yet, the celebratory media coverage failed to mention that other Arab countries, such as Algeria and Morocco, have also committed to gender equality in their Constitution.

Article 45 of the Tunisian Constitution guarantees “equality of opportunities between women and men to have access to all levels of responsibility and in all domains” and Article 46 seeks parity “between men and women in elected assemblies.” In an interview for UN Women, Sana Ben Achour, law student and women’s rights activist, explained that the Tunisian Constitution is the first one in the Arab world to ensure equal access to the presidency. Additionally, Article 20 states: “All male and female citizens have the same rights and duties. They are equal before the law without discrimination.” This accomplishment would not have been possible without the work of feminist activists and women’s organizations that have advocated for gender equality.

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Le Pen: "Let them eat pork!"Jewish and Muslim schoolchildren will not be offered alternatives to pork dishes in towns run by National Front

Le Pen: "Let them eat pork!"Jewish and Muslim schoolchildren will not be offered alternatives to pork dishes in towns run by National Front

    Saturday, April 05, 2014   No comments

France’s far-right National Front party will prevent schools from offering Muslim and Jewish pupils pork-free lunches in the towns where it won in recent local elections, its leader Marine Le Pen announced on Friday.

She said that arrangements catering to Muslim and Jewish, pupils who cannot eat pork according to religious restrictions, contradict the country’s secular values.

“We will not accept any religious demands in school menus,” Le Pen told RTL radio. “There is no reason for religion to enter the public sphere, that's the law.”

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When anti-terrorism laws are used to harass journalists (and/or their partners)

When anti-terrorism laws are used to harass journalists (and/or their partners)

    Thursday, August 22, 2013   No comments

David Miranda, partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald who broke the NSA sruvelance story in June, was detained by British intelligence authorities to pressure the Guardian into ceasing its reporting on British and American surveillance activities.  Miranda was interrogated under a law meant to aid the pursuit of terrorists.


The Guardian has been on the front lines of exposing vast surveillance undertaken by the US and the UK -- and has been targeted by the authorities as a result. In an interview, Editor-in-Chief Alan Rusbridger talks about his confrontation with the government and why the scandal isn't making waves in Britain.

read interview >>

Egypt Brothers mix pragmatism, ideology on Israel

Egypt Brothers mix pragmatism, ideology on Israel

    Friday, January 20, 2012   No comments

The Muslim Brotherhood is trying to maneuver its way between its fierce anti-Israel ideology and the realities of governing as it ascends to leadership in Egypt for the first time in its history and faces the key question of how to deal with the country's peace treaty with the Jewish state.

The fundamentalist group's stance on the accord — opposition but not renunciation — is a telling sign of its broader style of politics. It can play down its hardline doctrine in favor of short-term pragmatism as it looks to the long term, leaves its options open and engages in a degree of double-talk to pave the way.

The stance could also reflect the group's own evolution as its new political party, whose members will be the ones actually involved in governing, gradually has to distinguish itself from the hard line of the Brotherhood itself, an 83-year-old organization whose leadership worked for decades in a hive-like secrecy because of state repression.

"The Brotherhood is in a real challenge and real crisis. For the first time, they are in power, which forces them to be rational when it comes to foreign policy because any miscalculations might blow their gains," said Khalil al-Anani, an Egyptian expert on Islamic movements.

Read more >> 

The quiet war in Saudi Arabia

The quiet war in Saudi Arabia

    Monday, January 16, 2012   No comments

by Joshua Jacobs*

Demonstrators in Qatif, eastern Saudi Arabia.

While western powers have been happy to use Saudi Arabia as an ally to ratchet up the pressure on Assad's beleaguered regime in Syria, it has not caught a whiff of the silent crackdown occurring within the kingdom. Since late November the protest movement which was largely snuffed out last spring has returned to the streets in force, largely centered on the oil rich and largely Shia Eastern Province.

The Saudi response was both brutal and predictable. Security forces shot and killed three protesters and wounded many more over several days of crackdowns in the eastern city of Qatif. Clashes continued throughout December as demonstrators battled security forces who routinely utilized live ammunition. In a series of retaliatory raids on the homes and districts of protest sympathizers hundreds were arrested and wounded. The killings along with the continued discrimination and mistreatment of the Shia of the Eastern Province has formed the basis of the current protest movement - a protest movement that has suffered heavily like its neighbour in Bahrain, but with little in the way of a headline.

Today, while attention was focused on the Strait of Hormuz, on Syria, and on the rising tensions in Bahrain, Saudi security forces launched an assault on the city of Awamiyah killing at least one and wounding half a dozen more. Eye witnesses have stated that soldiers on trucks opened fire on demonstrators, hitting many as they fled. The attack bears all the hallmarks of a planned operation with electricity being cut to the area prior to the assault. The area at the time of writing is apparently still under military lock-down and reflects a state of siege with clashes continuing to occur and gunfire being heard.

This attack was almost certainly condoned by the royal family and comes on the heels of a series of indictments against demonstrators and high profile invectives against the protest movement. Despite this attack and others like it, the rumblings and tremors of protest and crackdown show no sign of abatement. Indeed in the past few months they have once again reared their head in the south west in Najran and Jazan, compounded with protests over women’s rights in Riyadh and Buraydah.

These protests bear all the hallmarks of a movement which could coalesce and burst anew from the ashes of the disjointed and largely suppressed protests of last spring. They also come at an extremely troubling time for the kingdom. The death of Crown Prince Sultan highlighted the geriatric character of the upper echelons of the ruling family, and the potential uncertainty and disquiet surrounding the issue of succession. Meanwhile, continuing tensions in the Strait of Hormuz and rising furor on the streets of Bahrain open up the risk of unrest spreading to the kingdom in a domino effect. Indeed the extremely aggressive Saudi position on Bahrain and the continued quartering of troops in the tiny island monarchy has a direct relationship to their fears of domestic instability. The possibility of Saudi Shia rallying on behalf of their co-religionists in Bahrain, or vice versa is a looming threat that the Saudis are taking great pains to neutralize.

Though the protests currently centre on a single province, the Eastern Province is home to the majority of Saudi energy reserves, terminals, and processing facilities. Disruption and upheaval in this province has a disproportionate impact on Saudi Arabia. A protracted and visible uprising would not only weaken the Saudi government internally but could have a tumultuous impact on the global energy market. This is all the more reason for not only the media, but for western governments to begin taking an active interest in the ongoing street conflict.

Saudi rulers certainly understand the threat posed by the protesters and the risk of an expanding movement: their actions are a testament to that fact. So why is the world’s media apparently incapable of recognizing the same thing? Arab media has been noticeably silent, with the two largest Arab media entities the Saudi-owned al-Arabiya and the Qatari-owned al-Jazeera having said almost nothing. However there is little excuse for western media. Saudi Arabia is probably America's most important Arab ally, the world’s most important single energy node, and one of the most influential countries in the region. It's also experiencing its worst domestic upheavals since its rebellions of the early 1980's. Taken in a vacuum this is a significant news story. When set against the context of the unfolding drama in the Gulf and the wider contours of the Arab Spring, it is incredible.

The past year was a bad one for Saudi Arabia: the coming year augurs to be even worse. The time has come to slice through the veil Saudi Arabia has kept around its crackdown and recognize that the Arab Spring at least in limited form has hit the kingdom. What comes next is difficult to say, but with the rapidity of change that the Arab Spring has introduced us to, it would be wise to pay close attention to the warning signs as they appear. It is entirely possible that we will see a very, very, warm spring in Saudi Arabia.

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*Joshua Jacobs is a Gulf Policy Analyst and published columnist at the Institute for Gulf Affairs.