Middle East Press On Amy Coney Barrett, Kamala Harris And Saudi Arabia’s Image-Building: New Age Islam's Selection, 11 November 2020
By New Age Islam Edit
Desk
11 November
2020
• If (Only) Amy Coney Barrett Was A Muslim
By Azeezah Kanji
• The Symbolism Of Kamala Harris’ Election
Viewed From The Gulf
By Dr. Abdel Aziz Aluwaisheg
• Saudi
Arabia’s Image-Building Efforts Suffer Another Setback
By Julia Legner
• Why Does The Media Fail To Hold Violent Men
To Account?
By David Challen
• Israel Approves Normalization With Bahrain,
Advances Ties With Sudan
By Rina Bassist
• Trump Is Gone, Netanyahu Is Next
By Marwan Bishara
• Palestinians Cautiously Optimistic After
Biden Win
By Daoud Kuttab
-----
If (Only) Amy Coney Barrett Was A Muslim
By Azeezah Kanji
9 Nov 2020
From
beginning to end, Donald Trump’s presidency exposed and exploited structural
flaws deeply embedded in the world’s self-proclaimed “oldest democracy” (more
accurately classified as a “plutocracy,” according to some academic studies).
Such flaws
include, for instance, the organisation of the electoral college with the
original aim of upholding the interests of slaveholding states; the
concentration of power in the hands of White propertied men (whose property
derived in the first place from anti-Indigenous dispossession and genocide);
the extension of abusive executive powers without judicial check; and the
vulnerability of the courts to political manipulation and control.
Yet in the
dysfunctional system that produced the spectacle of the Trump presidency, it is
Islam and Muslims that continue to be upheld as the paradigm of illegitimate
politics. Once again, in the opposition against new Supreme Court Justice Amy
Coney Barrett, a popular rhetorical tactic was put on display: Condemning her
extremely conservative ideology by likening her to a Muslim.
Since the
18th century, comparisons to Muslims and Islam have been treated as the
ultimate insult in American political discourse. In law, judicial despotism is
often emblematised by the trope of “kadi justice” – the image of a “kadi
[Muslim judge] under a tree” dispensing judgements according to individual
whim, an Orientalist figment plucked not from reality but directly from the
pages of 1001 Nights.
Founding
Father Benjamin Franklin went so far as to wonder in 1741 whether it was
considered “worse to believe in Mahomet [Muhammad] or the Devil?” Of course,
the fixation on “Mahomet” conveniently distracts from the “devils” embedded in
the US’s own nationalist ideology, founded on church-sanctioned colonial
genocide and enslavement.
The
continuing replication of centuries-old modes of thinking would, in Muslims, be
cited as a sign of stunted historical growth, one more piece of evidence that
Islam remains “trapped in the past”. Yet in American politics, the demonising
invocations of Islam persist, even among ostensible progressives – indicating
the deep entrenchment of Islamophobic structures of thought.
Incensed
about the legal assault on abortion rights? Call it “Christian sharia”; never
mind that actual Islamic law was less oppressive and provided greater access to
abortion.
Outraged
about Donald Trump’s unchecked abuses of power? Denounce him as a “caliph” and
his officials as “mullahs”; forget that the caliph, in Islamic legal theory, was
not considered above the rule of law.
Infuriated
by Trump’s regressive policies? Accuse him of waging a “jihad,” on everything
from clean energy to immigration to Obamacare to absentee ballots. Funnily
enough, the word crusade – which unlike “jihad” actually does mean “holy war” –
is frequently used to connote something commendable; while the suggestion that
“jihad”, literally “struggle,” might have any positive meaning elicits outrage.
To label
these as caricatures of Islam would be a misnomer since caricature suggests a
core of truth that is exaggerated. Rather, they are projections: Displacements
of one’s own negative features and anxieties onto a denigrated other.
As the
confirmation of Justice Barrett to the Supreme Court affirms, the
characteristics commonly attributed to the Islamic legal tradition – its
alleged irrationality, ideological rigidity, and subservience to authoritarian
power – are in fact reflective of the American system itself.
While
Muslim jurists were historically independent of the state, judges in the US are
political appointees – a reality emphasised by the nakedly partisan political
turf war of Supreme Court placements. Justice Barrett has been rammed through
onto the bench with 52 Republican votes but zero Democratic votes; previous
Trump-nominated Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch were backed by
similarly one-sided Republican support.
The result
is a court deeply polarised along ideological lines. Justices increasingly
engage in “forms of judicial behaviour [that] constitute advocacy, rather than
judging”, according to a 2019 study from Northwestern and Loyola Law Schools.
Republican
presidents select ever-more-radical conservative judges, and Democratic
presidents more centrist-to-liberal judges (although the frequent categorisation
of Obama, droner- and deporter-in-chief, as a “liberal” indicates how hollow
that descriptor has become). Muslim rulers like 13th-century Mamluk Sultan
Baybars, in contrast, ensured space for the operation of multiple schools of
law – legal pluralism being understood as valuable in and of itself, to offset
the inescapable fallibility and contingency of human reasoning.
The
combination of juridicial independence and pluralism enabled Muslims and
non-Muslims to exert some agency in choosing the school of legal thought that
best met their needs – a form of “sharia” development from below. That is until
colonial powers codified monolithic law and imposed draconian interpretations,
such as Wahhabism, originally rejected by Muslim scholars and communities. As
on the US Supreme Court, retrograde ideologies have been entrenched not by
popular will but by sheer political force.
Even before
Barrett’s appointment, the Court’s pattern of prostration at the altar of
corporate and political power was blatantly apparent. Since 2006, the Chamber
of Commerce – the US’s largest business lobby group – has prevailed in 70
percent of Supreme Court cases in which it has filed a brief.
Constitutional
provisions meant to guarantee legal equality for the formerly enslaved have
been twisted to enshrine corporate “personhood” instead. The court has made it
easier for corporations to influence elections, but more difficult for the
marginalised to vote; easier to criminalise peaceful speech as “terrorism”, but
more difficult to hold cops who kill to account; easier for the White House to
wield war powers, but more difficult for the victims of US war crimes to access
the courts. It has shielded corporations from legal consequences for
international human rights violations while permitting migrants to be
indefinitely detained.
Judges like
Barrett’s mentor Justice Antonin Scalia have cloaked oppressive decisions in
the mantle of “textualism” and “originalism”, claiming they were bound by the
original meaning of legal texts. Except, notably, when the original meaning
conflicts with the desired outcome – whether eviscerating anti-racism measures,
expanding gun rights, or ensuring their party’s candidate is declared the
election winner – in which case their originalist and textualist methodologies
have been inconsistently applied or quietly discarded.
However, as
Islamic legal history shows, textualism is not necessarily synonymous with
regressivism. The Zahiri and Hanbali schools often characterised as the most
textualist adopted certain positions that would today be considered more
“liberal” or “progressive”. For example, Zahiris like 11th-century jurist Ibn
Hazm rejected harsh punishments for “sodomy” since they were not specified in
the Quran, and Hanbali jurists provided women with greater contractual freedom
in marriage and prevented the powerful from escaping criminal sanction.
Perhaps
“kadi justice” should instead be called “Scalia justice”.
Justice
Barrett now joins the cadre of conservative Supreme Court judges anointed by
the Federalist Society, the ultra-right-wing legal organisation on a crusade –
not a “jihad” – to remake the US judicial landscape.
Hiding
behind the unravelling fiction of the separation of law and politics, Barrett
adamantly refused to answer questions about her legal positions during her
Senate confirmation hearings. But her judicial record speaks for itself: 76
percent in favour of corporations, 86 percent in favour of police, 85 percent
against victims claiming discrimination, and 88 percent against immigrants.
The
millions of dollars of “dark money” pumped by the Federalist Society into
influencing judicial nominations and subverting state judicial elections have
been paying off. With Barrett, six of the nine sitting justices on the Supreme
Court are members of the Society, and all but eight of Trump’s 51 appellate
court appointments have connections to it. Many of these judges will still be
on the bench decades after Trump’s presidency is a distant American nightmare.
The effects are already evident: Trump-appointed judges proved themselves
instrumental in exacerbating voter suppression leading up to the election.
Yet
according to the Federalist Society, it is the supposed “spread of sharia law”
– not the spread of Federalist Society law – that is imperilling “democracy,
economic justice, and security”.
In the
Federalist Society’s legal journal, it is asserted that “the Islamic law of the
Middle East is the antithesis of Western law”, a quote attributed to former US
Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson. But by de-contextualising Justice
Jackson’s words, his original meaning – that it is precisely because the
Islamic legal tradition differs from America’s that it should be a source of
insight and inspiration – is completely reversed. (So much for the Society’s
stated commitment to originalism.)
“We should
abandon the smug belief that the Muslim experience has nothing to teach us,”
Justice Jackson wrote. “We may find divergence in legal experience as
instructive as parallelism.”
Instead of
reducing Islam to an object of derision, we should be anxious to learn from its
history of legal pluralism and independence of jurists from the state.
Instead of
fearing that Amy Coney Barrett is like a Muslim, we might hope she will be more
like a Muslim – specifically, like the pre-modern Muslim jurists who fiercely
refused to serve as pawns of political rulers and issued legal opinions
checking power’s abuse.
As Justice
Jackson urged, “It is time that we stopped thinking of ourselves as the only
peoples in the world who love justice or who understand what justice is.” But
the toxic combination of American exceptionalism and legal Orientalism ensures
Islam is seen as a benchmark of barbarism, never a model to be emulated – to
the detriment of Islamic and American legal traditions alike.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/11/9/if-only-amy-coney-barrett-was-a-muslim/
-----
The Symbolism Of Kamala Harris’ Election Viewed
From The Gulf
By Dr. Abdel Aziz Aluwaisheg
November
10, 2020
It was
noticeable that when Saudi leaders congratulated President-elect Joe Biden on
winning the US election, they also sent formal letters of congratulations to
Kamala Harris, his vice president-elect. In addition to her evident personal
qualifications for the post, there was important symbolism in her win, not only
as the first woman to claim the position but also for being the daughter of
immigrants from Jamaica and India. That symbolism was not lost in this region,
where women and minorities still face an uphill battle to achieve such visible
recognition.
On Sunday,
a day after US media called the election for Biden and Harris, King Salman and
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman sent congratulatory letters to both. In his
letter to Harris, the crown prince said that he was looking forward to
“continuing the joint cooperation between the two friendly nations.”
Harris is
not the first woman in the world to gain such high office. There have been
women presidents and prime ministers in many countries, but the high visibility
of US politicians and their personal styles have made Harris an instant
celebrity and as such she may make greater impact with young people, especially
young women who would be undoubtedly inspired by her success.
Women in
the US got the vote nationally in 1920. Since then, they have made great
strides in public life, but not as much in elected office. In local
governments, women represent about 32 percent of mayors and council members of
the largest 100 cities. In state legislatures, their share of the seats has
grown fivefold since 1970, but is still under 30 percent. The inequality is
most pronounced in the US Congress, where less than 24 percent of the lawmakers
are women, largely from the Democratic Party (83 percent), indicating the
considerable resistance women still face among US conservatives 100 years after
gaining the vote.
American
women vote in greater numbers than men — 63 percent of women vote on average
compared with 59 percent of men. Yet, it took the US 100 years to get a woman
to the second-highest office in the country. It is an important milestone, with
women making the difference. According to US media, 56 percent of female voters
chose the Biden/Harris ticket as opposed to 43 percent who chose Trump and
Pence. Most likely having a woman on the ticket contributed to this tilt. Among
men, the two tickets were tied.
On
Saturday, Harris dressed in suffragette white to deliver her first speech as
vice president-elect. Her message to young girls was clear: “While I may be the
first woman in this office, I won’t be the last. Because every little girl
watching tonight sees that this is a country of possibilities.”
In addition
to empowering women, Harris’ election is important for another reason. Her
immigrant heritage resonates with many in this region, and has led to
inevitable comparisons, mostly favorable to the US. Xenophobia in the US is,
relatively speaking, not as strident or widespread as it is in Europe or for
that matter the Middle East and North Africa. It is true that there are pockets
of dangerous antipathy toward immigrants and foreigners in general. It is also
true that many in the US are indifferent to the injustices that African
Americans endured in the past and still suffer today. However, the fact that
Americans previously have elected Barack Obama for president and now Harris for
vice president speaks volumes on the difference between the US and the Old
World of Europe and the Middle East, where it is rare to see an immigrant
assuming such high positions.
Starting in
the 1960s, the civil rights movement contributed greatly to the cohesion of US
society by calling out discrimination, both systemic and social, and created a
healthy awareness of the need to address inequalities. As a result, US
legislation targeting discrimination is robust and effective. The new
administration will need to build on those foundations to restore that social
cohesion.
Europe has
not had a similar awakening toward more inclusion, and the Middle East and
North Africa are light years away on this issue. In the MENA region, including
the Gulf, there are growing signs of the opposite — exclusion, antipathy and
conflict, usually riding on the back of religious, ethnic, national or regional
differences. In Iraq, Lebanon, Libya and Yemen, armed conflicts are fed and
sustained by those differences. When women demand equal rights, they are
accused of breaking social or religious norms, or blindly following occidental
ways. Guest workers have few avenues for social inclusion or political office.
Social media have accentuated tribal and other social differences, and singled
out immigrants for special abuse.
In a region
ravaged by division and turmoil, much of it related to identity, the choice of
Harris appears exotic to some but inspiring to others. The idea that a child of
immigrants could reach high office in one generation is beyond belief to many.
That she is also a woman makes it more far-fetched. But the fact that it has
happened in the most powerful country in the world, through a most visible
election, should make it less implausible.
-----
Dr. Abdel Aziz Aluwaisheg is the GCC Assistant
Secretary-General for Political Affairs & Negotiation, and a columnist for
Arab News. The views expressed in this piece are personal and do not
necessarily represent GCC views. Twitter: @abuhamad1
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1761276
----
Saudi Arabia’s Image-Building Efforts Suffer
Another Setback
By Julia Legner
10 Nov 2020
The glory
days are over for Saudi Arabia. The announcement that the G20 summit in
November will now take place virtually will surely have disappointed Crown
Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) and the Saudi authorities. Without the coveted
photo-ops or the chance to roll out the red carpet for foreign dignitaries and
business leaders, the prince’s attempts to promote the image of Saudi Arabia as
a modernising and progressive member of the international community have
suffered yet another setback.
Human
rights supporters do not share the crown prince’s disappointment. Instead, this
shift provides another opportunity and spotlight to build on campaigns urging
G20 governments and delegates not to let the occasion distract them from the
kingdom’s long list of abuses, including the gruesome murder of journalist
Jamal Khashoggi two years ago.
The path
looked brighter when MBS was initially elevated to the position of crown prince
in 2017. Immediately, he embarked on a relentless PR offensive to “enhance the
image of the kingdom internationally”. His “Vision 2030” project, an ambitious
and costly plan aimed at diversifying the country’s economy and attracting
foreign investment, was integral to this strategy. The project has included
introducing a lavish programme of sports and entertainment – including huge
concerts with Mariah Carey, Enrique Iglesias and David Guetta, and
mega-sporting events like the Dakar Rally, the Spanish Italian Super Cup and
WWE professional wrestling – together with some superficial social reforms, to
turn attention away from the egregious human rights abuses that have taken
place under his watch.
However,
MBS’s rehabilitation project stalled when it became clear that the new gilded
sheen of Saudi Arabia was undergirded by the same (if not worse) disregard for
the most basic human rights. The war in Yemen, expected by the Saudi
authorities to last only a few months, has gone on now for more than five years
and created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis; the prince’s
“anti-corruption” drive and the Ritz-Carlton arrests of 2017 alarmed foreign
investors and led many to pull their businesses out of the country; and MBS’s
brutal crackdown on dissent, including the arrests and torture of women human
rights defenders and the shocking murder and dismemberment of Khashoggi in the
Saudi consulate in Istanbul; sparked an outcry from the international
community.
After the
murder of Khashoggi in October 2018, the kingdom’s bad press began to snowball.
In 2019, a landmark joint statement by 36 United Nation member states
addressing the regime’s blatant abuses underlined this turning of the tide,
urging the Saudi authorities to “take meaningful steps to ensure that all
members of the public, including human rights defenders and journalists, can
freely and fully exercise their rights to freedom of expression, opinion and
association, including online, without fear of reprisals”. This was soon
followed by a second UN statement, while the European Parliament passed
resolutions protesting against Khashoggi’s murder and the arbitrary detention
and torture of women’s rights activists. As a result, several countries decided
to embargo arms sales to the kingdom. The US Congress also proposed ending arms
sales, in addition to condemning the kingdom for its human rights violations in
Yemen and its abuses against Saudi dissidents and US citizens.
Last year’s
announcement that Riyadh would host the G20 this year presented another
glorious opportunity to boost the country’s image and woo international friends
and investors. But much to the crown prince’s dismay, the international
community has not embraced him. To date, more than 220 civil society organisations
from around the world have decided to boycott the G20 civil society engagement
process, and in response to the NGOs’ campaigning the mayors of London, Paris,
New York and Los Angeles pulled out of the U20 summit of global city chiefs.
Meanwhile,
the European Parliament, members of the US Congress, and national parliaments
of other G20 states have urged their representatives to boycott the meeting,
conveying the message loud and clear that we can no longer go back to business
as usual. At the UN, pressure has been increasing with a third joint statement
demanding genuine reform on human rights; and this October, Saudi Arabia lost
its bid for a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, signalling that the
international community will no longer tolerate serious rights abuses. Lastly,
the election of Joe Biden, who has promised to end arms sales to the Saudi
authorities and hold them accountable for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, also
means that the Saudi government no longer has carte blanche to act as they
please without US scrutiny.
As nations
and their stakeholders continue to press upon the dire importance of human
rights within the kingdom, Saudi Arabia must learn to understand the cost of
upholding personal freedoms.
For now,
Saudi Arabia’s presidency of the G20 is no longer the golden PR opportunity MBS
dreamed of. And thanks to the tireless efforts of advocates, elected officials
and especially Saudi dissidents, MBS and the Saudi monarchy’s calculus – that
they can disregard the human rights of Saudi citizens without consequence – may
finally be forced to change.
-----
Julia Legner is Head of Advocacy for the
London-based NGO ALQST and independent human rights consultant.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/11/10/saudi-arabias-image-building-efforts-suffered-another-set-back/
-----
Why Does The Media Fail To Hold Violent Men To
Account?
By David Challen
10 Nov 2020
Claire
Parry was strangled to death by Timothy Brehmer, 41, in a UK car park in May
this year. Claire was a nurse who helped many people in a career of over 20
years. She was killed by a man who wanted to silence her. A loving family
member and a doting mother, Claire, 41, leaves behind two young children.
That is how
Claire Parry’s death should have been reported. Instead, UK headlines read:
“Woman strangled by PC lover plotted his downfall” (BBC News ); and “Accused
said he’s ‘not a bad person'” (Bournemouth Echo).
Following a
fervent public backlash, the BBC changed its headline. Public complaints about
it were reviewed by the broadcaster’s Newswatch programme, where the editors
addressed readers’ opinions, stating that the “headline included a quote that
was read out in court as evidence”.
Parry and
Brehmer – a former police officer – were having a long-term affair. On the day
of the killing, Parry took hold of his phone before sending a text message to
Brehmer’s wife revealing their relationship. Brehmer said he had strangled her
during a “kerfuffle” in his car. He admitted manslaughter, but was acquitted of
murder in October, and sentenced to 10 and a half years in prison.
This is the
latest in a string of reports in the UK this year that have led to outrage from
domestic abuse charities and campaigners like myself about how the media
reports fatal domestic abuse, where reports victim-blame dead women and skirt
the cause: male violence. The stories beneath these headlines focus on the
actions of the victim that lead to the killing and proceed to eulogise the good
character of the perpetrator who is apologetic for his actions.
Around the
world, as cities and nations have gone into lockdown to stop the spread of
COVID-19, victims of domestic abuse have been put at risk. Trapped at home with
their abusers, reports to domestic violence services have started to flood in.
Brazil, France, China and the UK reported increases in calls for help at above
60 percent. At the height of the lockdown in April, three women were being
killed each week in the UK.
The
pandemic has shone a light on the experiences of victims of domestic abuse but
also exposed the media’s long-held reluctance to name male violence as the
cause. In April, one such headline in the UK’s Daily Mail went as far as to
label the lockdown as a reason for the killing: “Retired decorator, 71,
struggling with lockdown stabbed wife to death then killed himself in
coronavirus killings.”
Ensuring
the narrative of fatal domestic abuse is reported responsibly and male violence
is named is something I have personally advocated for in my work as a domestic
abuse campaigner. Last year, I campaigned to free my mother, Sally Challen, in
a landmark court case that recognised the lifelong coercive control she had
suffered from my father. We argued that the abuse she experienced had led to a
loss of control that resulted in her killing him. Her conviction was quashed
and she was later convicted of manslaughter and released, after serving almost
a decade in prison.
Our
campaign not only sought to recognise the abuse my mother suffered but to
rewrite the false and harmful media narratives at the time of the original
trial in 2010 that depicted her as a “jealous wife”. For myself, it was
essential to name male violence as a contributing factor.
In
Bangladesh, sexual assault and rapes cases have surged in recent months to as
many as 630 recorded cases between April and August. These figures sparked
thousands to take to the streets to protest and to call on the authorities to
take action. A core issue with tackling this violence is the cultural taboo and
inability to name male violence as the cause, a problem exacerbated by a
victim-blaming culture across society that instead chooses to ask what a woman
was wearing.
The media’s
failure to responsibly recognise male violence in stories of violence against
women has a devastating effect not only on victims but their families. In 2012
Sarah Gosling, 41, was fatally stabbed with a kitchen knife by her boyfriend,
Ian Hope, 53. The UK media reporting at the time gave prominence to the
killer’s voice, something Sarah’s brother, Andrew Bernard, found difficult to
understand, looking back. Bernard, who now teaches teenagers about domestic
abuse, said: “A person who is a defendant in a murder or manslaughter trial is
already ahead because they’re here. They have the opportunity to put their side
of the case.”
This was
highlighted recently when the BBC was forced to remove and apologise for
releasing a trailer for its upcoming documentary series The Trials of Oscar
Pistorius after it failed even to name Reeva Steenkamp, the 29-year-old woman
Pistorius was convicted of killing in 2014. Instead, the two-minute trailer and
press release gave voice and focus to the killer, Pistorius, hailing his story
as “remarkable” and his achievements “inspirational”. June Steenkamp, Reeva’s
mother, expressed her upset at the film which gave him a platform and said she
was “disturbed by no one saying anything about my daughter. She was the one who
died … her life was worth everything.”
Perpetrators’
voices have overwhelmingly become the commanding voice in stories of male
violence, something newsroom editors must recognise and stop giving prominence
to.
In an
effort to tackle this, UK feminist organisation Level Up successfully developed
media guidelines to help combat undignified reports of fatal domestic abuse.
Adopted last year by the UK’s two leading press regulators, IPSO and IMPRESS,
they have offered an important framework for responsible reporting on fatal
domestic abuse. Janey Starling, campaign director of Level Up, now offers hope
to the media who have the power to responsibly report male violence.
“Journalists
have the power to drastically reduce the number of women killed, but only if
they start changing the framing of these deaths,” she said. “Dignity for the
victim must be central to any reporting on fatal domestic abuse, and
perpetrators should be held accountable for their actions. Don’t seek to frame
a murder based on a woman’s actions that supposedly triggered it.”
----
David Challen successfully campaigned to free
his mother Sally Challen in a landmark appeal recognising the lifetime of
coercive control she suffered in February 2019. He continues to speak out
against violence against women, coercive control and recognising women’s
experiences in the criminal justice system. He is a Prison Advice and Care
Ambassador (PACT) and a Freedom Programme Ambassador.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/11/10/the-media-has-failed-to-hold-violent-men-to-account/
----
Israel Approves Normalization With Bahrain,
Advances Ties With Sudan
By Rina Bassist
Nov 10,
2020
Israel’s
parliament approved by an overwhelming majority tonight the normalization of
ties with Bahrain. Sixty-two Knesset members voted in favor of normalization,
while 14 from the Arab Joint List opposed. Almost 80 speakers took the podium
prior to the vote. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that "A strong
Israeli brings other Arabs states closer to it. There will be more countries
that will join the peace circle." Netanyahu hailed the US-mediated Abraham
Accords and said that "Together we will stand as a wall opposite
Iranian-led radical Islam." Hinting at more normalization deals with other
Arab countries, Netanyahu said that members of the Joint List would get another
chance to rectify their negative votes.
Also
addressing the Knesset, Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi said that his Bahraini
counterpart, Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid al-Zayani, is planning to visit
Israel in the near future. He will be the first minister of his country to
visit Israel publicly.
The
agreement will now return to the Cabinet to be validated.
In a
parallel development, a first official business delegation of heads of business
organizations in Israel is set to leave this week for Dubai. The delegation
will include the president of the Association of Chambers of Commerce, the
president of the Manufacturers’ Association and chairman of the Israel Agricultural
Association. Its goal is to lay the groundwork for cooperation between the
business sectors of the two countries.
Israeli
carrier Israir Airlines announced yesterday it will launch direct flights to
Bahrain starting Jan. 31. At first, the company will operate two flights a
week. The announcement came a few weeks after Israel and Bahrain signed an
aviation agreement.
While
advancing ties with Manama, Israel is also advancing ties with Khartoum.
According to a report by Reuters, a first Israeli official delegation is set to
arrive in Sudan on Sunday to discuss the normalization of ties between the two
countries.
On Oct. 23,
leaders of the United States, Israel and Sudan announced in a joint statement
that Khartoum and Jerusalem had reached an agreement to normalize relations
between them. Shortly after the announcement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
said that an Israeli delegation will head to Khartoum, but he did not specify a
date. An Israeli, non-official delegation had already visited Khartoum in
October, ahead of the Oct. 23 announcement, to discuss rapprochement between
the two countries.
Israeli
media said that in addition to the small official delegation that will head to
Khartoum on Sunday, a second, larger professional delegation, will travel to
Sudan in the coming weeks. The second delegation would focus on possible
bilateral cooperation in the fields of water management and agriculture. Some
agreements in these domains could also be signed in the near future.
Other
reports said that Israeli authorities have submitted a request to Sudanese
authorities for enabling Israeli planes to regularly pass through the country’s
airspace. On Nov. 6, El Al Israel Airlines announced that its first commercial
flight through Sudanese airspace will depart from Tel Aviv on Sunday. The
flight was set to depart empty toward Uganda’s international airport, bringing
on its way back to Tel Aviv 153 Ugandan nationals invited by the Foreign
Ministry to learn about Israeli smart agriculture.
https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2020/11/israel-bahrain-sudan-us-benjamin-netanyahu-gabi-ashkenazi.html
-----
Trump Is Gone, Netanyahu Is Next
By Marwan Bishara
9 Nov 2020
No one is
as devastated by President Donald Trump’s defeat as Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu. Not even the crown princes of the United Arab Emirates and Saudi
Arabia.
These Gulf
leaders may have been dependent on Trump for pursuing regional mischief and are
sad to see him go, but compared to them, Netanyahu has lost much more than a
partner in crime: he lost his soul mate, his American alter ego.
So what
made their relationship so special and what does the future hold for Netanyahu
now that Trump is passé?
A match
made in hell
Trump and
Netanyahu saw eye to eye on almost everything, starting with their hatred for
Barack Obama and the Obama-Biden administration, which they expressed with much
venom.
For four
years, they did everything possible to undo all that Obama left behind,
starting with reversing his decoupling of the US and Israeli regional
strategies and exiting the Iran nuclear deal.
They
demonised the Iranian leadership, praised Arab dictators, and worked diligently
to establish a new strategic partnership between these autocrats and Israel in
order to confront the Arab people and Iran.
Trump and
Netanyahu criticised and even humiliated Europe for upholding its liberal
values and honouring its foreign policy commitments, especially for abiding by
the Iran nuclear agreement.
And they
held similar contemptuous and hostile views towards the United Nations and its
various international agencies.
Most
outrageously, they ganged up on the Palestinians, who have been suffering under
Israeli occupation for decades, blackmailing their leaders and stripping them
of all aid and stature to force them to submit to their dictates.
In this,
they were aided by Trump’s son-in-law and Netanyahu’s family friend, Jared
Kushner, the sneaky arriviste who made sure that both egocentric leaders remain
on good terms.
A Zionist
extremist, Kushner is the architect of Trump’s infamous “deal of the century”,
which adopted Netanyahu’s racist colonial logic in Palestine.
But that is
not all that made the Trump-Netanyahu bromance so eerie. As I wrote earlier
this year, there are other more disturbing personal similarities between the
two cynics.
Both are
known to be serial liars; both have a history of adultery and have been
divorced twice; and both have faced charges of misuse of public office for
personal and political gain.
And still,
both have been able to command the support of religious fanatics who have come
to consider the two morally challenged sinners as God’s vessels, serving,
albeit unintentionally, a divine purpose.
Indeed,
Trump has embraced the same ultra-nationalist, even racist, agendas that Netanyahu
has long championed in Israel and the Middle East.
Both men
are populist showmen, rallying their right-wing constituencies around their
populist personas even when they proved incompetent in managing their
countries’ worst crises, including the coronavirus pandemic.
Netanyahu
in Trump’s footsteps
After
driving itself to the edge, America gazed into the abyss and decided to pull
back last week.
The
majority has rejected four more years of Tsunami Trump, fearing he would end up
destroying their democracy and national unity.
Instead,
they voted for the restoration of the country’s democratic and liberal
institutions, and for healing the nation’s wounds.
But just as
Trump has tried to undo everything Obama, Biden is about to reverse Trump’s
reversals, and perhaps more.
He is set
to rejoin the Paris Agreement on climate change, the Iran nuclear deal, the
World Health Organization and probably UNESCO, among other agreements and
institutions Trump has challenged or abandoned. He has also vowed to end the
travel ban from Muslim-majority countries.
And he
seems set to bring relations with the Palestinians back to their Obama-era
level, resuming aid, reinstating the Palestinian Liberation Organization office
in Washington, rejecting annexation, pursuing a two-state solution, etc.
This will
not be enough to change the situation in Palestine, let alone end the
occupation and bring about an independent Palestinian state.
Biden, who
once boasted of being a non-Jewish Zionist, is not about to project his
hostility to the Trump-Netanyahu axis onto US relations with Israel.
He will not
veer too far from traditional US policy on Israel, regurgitating the old
mantras about preserving Israeli security and regional military superiority.
But there are things Biden can and should do to put Netanyahu in a bind.
Time for a
reset
Biden could
deny the embattled Israeli premier any of the customary support and courtesy
afforded to Israeli leaders. And he may not tolerate any of the prime
minister’s humiliating outbursts or hostile criticisms, which became his habit
during the Obama era.
Likewise,
Biden could reject Netanyahu’s unilateral moves in Palestine, or in the region,
if they are illegal and are made without prior coordination with Washington.
So, in
short, Biden could make the coming months debilitating, inhibiting, and
outright humiliating for the Israeli prime minister.
He may even
turn his back on Netanyahu and make him persona non grata at the White House.
Bibi, as
the prime minister is called in Israel, is already facing trial on three
charges of corruption that carry prison sentences, making it a matter of time
before his coalition or party turns on him.
That is why
Biden needs to go beyond Netanyahu and deliver a clear message to the Israeli
right.
He needs to
back his verbal opposition to Israel’s settlement and annexation policy with
action, notably by leveraging US aid to pressure the Israeli government into
doing the right thing.
This is
indispensable to reset the US-Israel relationship that has gone awry during the
Trump administration.
It will
also be an important lesson for the next prime minister of Israel who, judging
from the list of potential candidates, may be as bad as, if not worse than,
Netanyahu.
It is
indeed high time that the president of the US abandons appeasement, which has
long proven counterproductive, even destructive, in favour of pressure or
“tough love”, as they like to say in Washington, which by contrast has proven
effective with Israel and beneficial for peace and security.
Netanyahu
has spent a lifetime in politics telling Israelis not to worry about US
reactions because he knows how to deal with Washington.
It is time
he is proven wrong.
Biden has
already defeated America’s Netanyahu; it is time he takes on Israel’s Trump.
Goodbye
Donald, bye Jared, and bye-bye Bibi.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/11/9/after-trump-the-end-of/
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Palestinians Cautiously Optimistic After Biden
Win
By Daoud Kuttab
Nov 10,
2020
While the
Palestinian leadership was slow in congratulating the declared winner of the US
presidential elections, the press has been eager to acknowledge him. The
largest-selling daily, Al-Quds, announced on Nov. 7, “Biden at the steps of the
White House,” with a stock photo of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and
former US Vice President Joe Biden.
A source in
the Palestinian presidency told Al-Monitor that the official hesitation was out
of fear that an unstable electoral loser could do further harm to Palestinians.
The silence
was broken on Nov. 8 with a two-paragraph report on the Wafa news site that
Abbas has offered his congratulations to Biden. “President Abbas said he was
looking forward to working with the president-elect and his administration to
strengthen the Palestinian-American relations and to achieve freedom, independence,
justice and dignity for our people, as well as to work for peace, stability and
security for all in our region and the world.”
Ziad Abu
Zayyad, a Jerusalem-based attorney and former Palestinian legislator, told
Al-Monitor that he hopes for a resumption of Palestinian contacts with the
elected US leadership. He said, “Palestinians need to resume contacts with the
new administration and bring it to recognize the State of Palestine and call on
the president-elect to stand by his promise to reopen the US Consulate in east
Jerusalem and recognize east Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine.”
Abu Zayyad,
who is also the publisher and co-editor of Palestine Israel Journal, wrote in
his weekly Al Quds column on Nov. 9 that Biden's victory gives the Palestinian
leadership the opportunity to ease off. “There is no doubt that the Biden
victory will extend the life of the Palestinian Authority for a short period,
because it was on the verge of collapse if Trump had stayed in power. Hope for
a solution that will end the occupation and establish a Palestinian state is
the only justification for the continuation of the [PA] in power,” he wrote.
While some
high hopes for Biden, Hamadeh Faraneh, a member of the Palestinian National
Council (PNC), explained another reason for Palestinian elation. “Joy has
spread in Palestine because of the loss of Trump, who had been a fierce enemy
of the Palestinian people, insulting Palestinians and attempting to deny their
legitimate national rights,” he wrote in his column for Ad Dustour Nov. 10.
Faraneh
also wrote that the re-election of Palestinian-American Rashida Tlaib and a
number of local state representatives of Palestinian origins was also a source
of pride and expectations that the tide is turning in the United States.
Former
Bethlehem mayor and PNC member Vera Baboun told Arab News Nov. 8 that with
Biden's win, the international conference suggested by Abbas will now have a
chance to become reality.
Along with
Palestinian official's caution and the public's elation, there have also been
voices of concern. Jamal Dajani, former spokesman of Prime Minister Rami
Hamdallah, was among those who cautioned against high expectations. Dajani said
in late October that Palestinians must look inward and get their house in
order. “I am not sure if Biden as president will be able to undo the damage
done by Trump,” Dajani said while calling on the Palestinian leadership to
“stop banking on the United States.”
Many
Palestinians are hoping that the Biden win can help produce a solution to the
stalemate over the Palestinian taxes collected by Israel and not delivered in
full to the Palestinians. Israeli and Palestinian media reports are talking
about potential solutions to the problem, which would have been compounded by
Israeli annexation of 30% of the West Bank. Sources in the Palestinian
government were quoted in the Israeli media as saying that it is likely that a
solution will be found soon that will lead to the delivery of some three
billion shekels (nearly $900 million) to the Palestinian coffers. Returning to
security coordination may be palatable to the Palestinians now that the danger
of annexation appears to have receded with Trump soon to be out of power.
There
appears to be cautious optimism that under a Biden administration, Washington
will return to internationally accepted norms. In addition to the possibility
of opening a Palestinian diplomatic mission in Washington and a US mission in
east Jerusalem, Palestinians are hoping that Biden will abide by the
anti-settlement UN Security Council Resolution 2334 approved in the last days
of the Barack Obama administration.
https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2020/11/palestinian-official-caution-welcome-biden-win-us-elections.html
-----
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