Heavy snowfall and freezing temperatures are making life unbearable for tens of thousands of Syrians fleeing the violence in the country:
Brutal winter weather is making dire conditions even more unbearable in parts of the Middle East, particularly for Syrian refugees who must endure frigid temperatures in tents.
The coldest air of the season is moving in behind a heavy snowstorm that has blanketed refugee camps in Turkey and Lebanon.
And inside Syria, residents in cities pummeled by warfare are taking drastic measures to stay warm -- and alive -- through the winter.
In a video posted online, three men and two children are burning pages of school books to stay warm in the besieged city of Rastan,
"We cant use the heaters inside our residences. No fuel, no wood, no electricity," one of the men says.
Jordan:
Torrential rain and increasing snowfall are paralyzing much of the country, and most government and public offices in Jordan will be closed Wednesday, the state-run Petra new agency said.
In the next three days, temperatures in Amman will drop below freezing, Petra said, citing the Jordan Meteorological Department.
Lebanon:
More than 40 displaced Syrians in Bar Elias were trapped inside their tents Tuesday by rising floodwater from the Ghazeel River, Lebanon's National News Agency reported.
Authorities rescued those trapped and provided them with adequate housing, the NNA said.
Elsewhere in the country, the army evacuated residents trapped by torrential snowfall, according to the NNA.
Read the entire article here
Showing posts with label Middle East. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Middle East. Show all posts
Wednesday, 9 January 2013
Wednesday, 11 April 2012
Thomas Friedman: Global warming a major factor behind "Arab spring"
Columnist Thomas Friedman is again scaremongering about climate change. This time he is promoting the idea that global warming has been an major factor behind the "Arab spring":
All these tensions over land, water and food tell us something: The Arab awakening was driven not only by political and economic stresses, but, less visibly, by environmental, population and climate stresses. If we focus only on the former we will never be able to help stabilize these societies.
Take Syria. "Syria's current social unrest is, in the most direct sense, a reaction to a brutal and out-of-touch regime," write Francesco Femia and Caitlin Werrell, in a report for their Center for Climate and Security. "However, that's not the whole story."
From 2006-11, up to 60 percent of Syria's land has suffered one of the worst droughts and most severe crop failures in history.
The United Nations reported that the livelihoods of more than 800,000 Syrians were wiped out by droughts.
"If climate projections stay on their current path, the drought situation in North Africa and the Middle East is going to get progressively worse, and you will end up witnessing cycle after cycle of instability," argues Femia.
And - surprise, surprise - the "pioneer" of global warming scaremongering, Lester Brown, is the "expert" Friedman cites in his concluding warning:
Lester Brown, the president of the Earth Policy Institute and author of "World on the Edge," notes that 20 years ago, using oil-drilling technology, the Saudis tapped an aquifer far below the desert to produce wheat. Now most of that water is gone, and so is the Saudi wheat. So the Saudis are buying land in Ethiopia and Sudan, but that means they'll draw more Nile water away from Egypt.
The real threats to our security, said Brown, are climate change, population growth, water shortages and the number of failing states in the world. How many states must fail before we have a failing global civilization, he asks.
Hopefully, we won't go there. But, then, it was Leon Trotsky who said: "You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you."
You might not be interested in climate change, but climate change is interested in you.
All these tensions over land, water and food tell us something: The Arab awakening was driven not only by political and economic stresses, but, less visibly, by environmental, population and climate stresses. If we focus only on the former we will never be able to help stabilize these societies.
Take Syria. "Syria's current social unrest is, in the most direct sense, a reaction to a brutal and out-of-touch regime," write Francesco Femia and Caitlin Werrell, in a report for their Center for Climate and Security. "However, that's not the whole story."
From 2006-11, up to 60 percent of Syria's land has suffered one of the worst droughts and most severe crop failures in history.
The United Nations reported that the livelihoods of more than 800,000 Syrians were wiped out by droughts.
"If climate projections stay on their current path, the drought situation in North Africa and the Middle East is going to get progressively worse, and you will end up witnessing cycle after cycle of instability," argues Femia.
And - surprise, surprise - the "pioneer" of global warming scaremongering, Lester Brown, is the "expert" Friedman cites in his concluding warning:
Lester Brown, the president of the Earth Policy Institute and author of "World on the Edge," notes that 20 years ago, using oil-drilling technology, the Saudis tapped an aquifer far below the desert to produce wheat. Now most of that water is gone, and so is the Saudi wheat. So the Saudis are buying land in Ethiopia and Sudan, but that means they'll draw more Nile water away from Egypt.
The real threats to our security, said Brown, are climate change, population growth, water shortages and the number of failing states in the world. How many states must fail before we have a failing global civilization, he asks.
Hopefully, we won't go there. But, then, it was Leon Trotsky who said: "You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you."
You might not be interested in climate change, but climate change is interested in you.
Monday, 22 August 2011
The end of the Gaddafi regime
Today the world has witnessed the end of the Gaddafi era in Libya. Nobody knows how things will develop in Libya, Egypt or the other countries swept by the popular uprisings during the Arab spring. But at least there is hope now for the peoples who for such a long time have been oppressed by unscrupulous dictators.
On a day like this, it is good to remember that these popular uprisings almost certainly would not have taken place without the much maligned policies of president George W. Bush and the Iraq war.
In a speech at the American Enterprise Institute in Frebruary 2003, president Bush had the following to say about freedom in the Arab world:
The world has a clear interest in the spread of democratic values, because stable and free nations do not breed the ideologies of murder. They encourage the peaceful pursuit of a better life. And there are hopeful signs of a desire for freedom in the Middle East. Arab intellectuals have called on Arab governments to address the "freedom gap" so their peoples can fully share in the progress of our times. Leaders in the region speak of a new Arab charter that champions internal reform, greater politics participation, economic openness, and free trade. And from Morocco to Bahrain and beyond, nations are taking genuine steps toward politics reform. A new regime in Iraq would serve as a dramatic and inspiring example of freedom for other nations in the region.
It is presumptuous and insulting to suggest that a whole region of the world -- or the one-fifth of humanity that is Muslim -- is somehow untouched by the most basic aspirations of life. Human cultures can be vastly different. Yet the human heart desires the same good things, everywhere on Earth. In our desire to be safe from brutal and bullying oppression, human beings are the same. In our desire to care for our children and give them a better life, we are the same. For these fundamental reasons, freedom and democracy will always and everywhere have greater appeal than the slogans of hatred and the tactics of terror.
But, as columnist Ralp Peters recently pointed out, left-leaning American and European liberals, and Arab leaders will not admit the importance of the Bush "freedom doctrine" any time soon (that will be done later by historians):
Over the past week, we’ve seen Egypt’s deposed dictator face charges in a court of law; the tanks of Syria’s dictator killing—but not deterring—unarmed freedom protesters; and ill-armed-but-determined Libyan rebels gnawing their way into the strongholds of the man responsible for more American deaths than any other terrorist but Osama bin Laden. While plenty of problems will plague the Middle East for decades to come, the pace of largely positive change has been swifter than anyone (not least, the Arabs themselves) imagined possible.
For all the dangers and difficulties ahead, there’s real hope in the Middle East for the first time in over a half-century. And the man who made it possible is George W. Bush.
Oh, Bush will continue to be vilified by our own spiteful left, by Euro-snobs, and by Arabs unable to admit that the American destruction of Saddam Hussein’s regime awakened them to the realization that dictators don’t have to be forever. But the endless calumny doesn’t matter much in the face of Bush’s historic achievement. Future historians will get it: The occupation of Iraq may have been clumsy, but there’s nonetheless a direct line from the image of a grubby, confused Saddam Hussein emerging from his hole in the ground to the sight of Egypt’s former president, Hosni Mubarak, in a court-room cage.
Bush and the neo-conservatives who drove the invasion of Iraq got many of the details wrong—not least, their assumption that they were smarter than any mere generals—but their great insight was that the Middle East had to change, but couldn’t change on its own. Something had to break the cycle of failure and oppression, or the region would continue to produce Islamist fanatics and crises without end.
Read the entire article here
Friday, 20 May 2011
Barack Obama (neocon)
The newly converted "neocon" president speaking
Politics is sometimes fascinating. Who would e.g. have believed that Barack Obama would transform himself to a virtual neocon, adopting the Bush democracy agenda? But that´s what he appears to have done, according to Power Line´s John Hinderaker - and columnist Charles Krauthammer, who both analyse Obama´s Middle East speech :
John Hinderaker:
Barack Obama, Neocon?
President Obama delivered a speech on the Middle East at the State Department today. If one takes it seriously, it signified--with one key exception--Obama's transformation into a virtual clone of his predecessor. President Bush's democracy agenda, which Obama once scornfully rejected, has now been adopted as Obama's own:
The status quo is not sustainable. Societies held together by fear and repression may offer the illusion of stability for a time, but they are built upon fault lines that will eventually tear asunder. ...So Obama finds himself announcing principles that are indistinguishable from those advanced by President Bush in 2003. Obama even credited Iraq as an exemplar of Middle Eastern democracy:
The United States supports a set of universal rights. And these rights include free speech, the freedom of peaceful assembly, the freedom of religion, equality for men and women under the rule of law, and the right to choose your own leaders -- whether you live in Baghdad or Damascus, Sanaa or Tehran.
And we support political and economic reform in the Middle East and North Africa that can meet the legitimate aspirations of ordinary people throughout the region. ...
it will be the policy of the United States to promote reform across the region, and to support transitions to democracy.
[O]ne of the broader lessons to be drawn from this period is that sectarian divides need not lead to conflict. In Iraq, we see the promise of a multiethnic, multisectarian democracy. The Iraqi people have rejected the perils of political violence in favor of a democratic process, even as they've taken full responsibility for their own security. Of course, like all new democracies, they will face setbacks. But Iraq is poised to play a key role in the region if it continues its peaceful progress. And as they do, we will be proud to stand with them as a steadfast partner.
Read the entire post here
Charles Krauthammer:
Herewith, President Obama´s May 19 Middle East speech, annotated:
"It will be the policy of the United States to promote reform across the region, and to support transitions to democracy."
With this Obama openly, unreservedly and without a trace of irony or self-reflection adopts the Bush Doctrine, which made the spread of democracy the key U.S. objective in the Middle East.
"Too many leaders in the region tried to direct their people's grievances elsewhere. The West was blamed as the source of all ills."
Note how even Obama's rationale matches Bush's. Bush argued that because the roots of 9/11 were to be found in the deflected anger of repressed Middle Eastern peoples, our response would require a democratic transformation of the region.
"We have a stake not just in the stability of nations, but in the self-determination of individuals."
A fine critique of exactly the kind of "realism" the Obama administration prided itself for having practiced in its first two years.
How far did this concession to Bush go? Note Obama's example of the democratization we're aiming for. He actually said:
"In Iraq, we see the promise of a multiethnic, multisectarian democracy. There, the Iraqi people have rejected the perils of political violence for a democratic process ... Iraq is poised to play a key role in the region."
Hail the Bush-Obama doctrine.
Read the entire column here
Friday, 25 February 2011
Europeans busy peddling arms to North Africa and the Middle East
EU countries have been busy peddling arms to North Africa and the Middle East in recent years. According to Kaye Stearman of British arms control group Campaign Against Arms Trade EU arms sales between 2008 and 2009, in North Africa alone, went from just under one billion euros to two million euros.
A recently published EU document outlines the figures for 2009:
The EU document, which refers to annual figures in 2009, says the bloc's member states granted export licenses worth 343 million euros ($470 million) to Libya. Italy was shown to have approved exports worth 112 million euros, the most taken up by military aircraft. It was followed by Malta which authorized the sale of an 80-million-euro consignment of small arms.
Germany was third on the list, with 53 million euros of licenses, mostly for electronic jamming equipment used to disrupt mobile phone, Internet and GPS communication.
Russia has been the biggest arms supplier to Libya, but French, Italian and German defense companies have been steadily increasing their business ties with Libya. It is interesting to note that US companies have largely kept out:
"As opposed to Europe, the general perception in the US is to take a much harder line on Gadhafi," David Hartwell, Middle East analyst at UK-based IHS Jane's told Deutsche Welle. "There's a lot of political pressure within Congress not to do big business with Gadhafi after the Lockerbie bombing," he said.
It certainly looks like European arms technology has been used by at least the regimes in Bahrein and Libya to silence their own citizens:
Analysts say that's hard to prove but reports that governments both in Bahrain and Libya may have done just that have sparked angry debates and accusations of double standards in some European countries.
"Only if we stop selling arms to these countries, then their governments have much less chance of repressing their populations," Kaye Stearman said.
She added however that there's little sign of that happening.
British Premier David Cameron who was on a tour of the Middle East this week paid a visit to the International Defense Exhibition (IDEX) in Abu Dhabi with more than 1,000 companies showing their military equipment and services. Cameron was accompanied by eight leading British arms industry executives.
"That sends an absolutely disastrous signal to pro-democracy movements in the Arab world," Stearman said.
Read the entire Deutsche Welle article here.
It certainly does not look like Britain would be planning to cut its arms sales to undemocratic Gulf regimes any time soon.
This from the IDEX 2011 home page:
Gerald Howarth MP, UK Minister for International Security Strategy, delivered his vision for greater international cooperation and highlighted the enduring connection between Britain and the UAE during the second keynote address: "We in Britain want to build strong, reliable, and enduring strategic partnerships throughout the Gulf region – strengthening existing alliances, and promoting alliances with new, important allies...The United Kingdom has a long historical connection with the UAE, and with the Arabian Gulf more generally. Over many years, our bonds of friendship, understanding, and respect have grown and endured – through good times and bad."
A recently published EU document outlines the figures for 2009:
The EU document, which refers to annual figures in 2009, says the bloc's member states granted export licenses worth 343 million euros ($470 million) to Libya. Italy was shown to have approved exports worth 112 million euros, the most taken up by military aircraft. It was followed by Malta which authorized the sale of an 80-million-euro consignment of small arms.
Germany was third on the list, with 53 million euros of licenses, mostly for electronic jamming equipment used to disrupt mobile phone, Internet and GPS communication.
Russia has been the biggest arms supplier to Libya, but French, Italian and German defense companies have been steadily increasing their business ties with Libya. It is interesting to note that US companies have largely kept out:
"As opposed to Europe, the general perception in the US is to take a much harder line on Gadhafi," David Hartwell, Middle East analyst at UK-based IHS Jane's told Deutsche Welle. "There's a lot of political pressure within Congress not to do big business with Gadhafi after the Lockerbie bombing," he said.
It certainly looks like European arms technology has been used by at least the regimes in Bahrein and Libya to silence their own citizens:
Analysts say that's hard to prove but reports that governments both in Bahrain and Libya may have done just that have sparked angry debates and accusations of double standards in some European countries.
"Only if we stop selling arms to these countries, then their governments have much less chance of repressing their populations," Kaye Stearman said.
She added however that there's little sign of that happening.
British Premier David Cameron who was on a tour of the Middle East this week paid a visit to the International Defense Exhibition (IDEX) in Abu Dhabi with more than 1,000 companies showing their military equipment and services. Cameron was accompanied by eight leading British arms industry executives.
"That sends an absolutely disastrous signal to pro-democracy movements in the Arab world," Stearman said.
Read the entire Deutsche Welle article here.
It certainly does not look like Britain would be planning to cut its arms sales to undemocratic Gulf regimes any time soon.
This from the IDEX 2011 home page:
Gerald Howarth MP, UK Minister for International Security Strategy, delivered his vision for greater international cooperation and highlighted the enduring connection between Britain and the UAE during the second keynote address: "We in Britain want to build strong, reliable, and enduring strategic partnerships throughout the Gulf region – strengthening existing alliances, and promoting alliances with new, important allies...The United Kingdom has a long historical connection with the UAE, and with the Arabian Gulf more generally. Over many years, our bonds of friendship, understanding, and respect have grown and endured – through good times and bad."
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