Egypt's Tragedy: This Is Not Just Soccer Violence

By Mohamed El Dahshan

74 people dead.

It doesn't add up. Port Said's Masry soccer team won 3-1 against its long-time rival Ahly. In Port Said. It was a tough victory, one that Masry won with the support of its fans. The logical question would be, then, "Why would the Masry fans attack the minority of Ahly fans among them?"

From there on, the questions just don't stop. "Why did neither the governor of Port Said nor its security chief attend a game they both normally attend?" asked parliamentarian Mohamed Abou Hamed on live television earlier tonight. "Why were security forces barely present despite knowing that the long rivalry between the two teams had a potential for violence?"

It's true that the team rivalry is old, and that the most dedicated fans -- the Ultras, as they are known in Egypt -- don't shy from confrontation. Years ago, for instance, Ahly fans once broke into the Masry club and stole some of their trophies.

I say all this because many of the first media reports ended with a variation of the statement "soccer in Egypt has a high potential of violence." Only it doesn't. There has been the occasional violent incident, but even championship games normally end without a hiccup, or else with the most hot-headed supporters exchanging insults or, at worst, throwing things at each other. I'm not trying to defend any of that behavior, of course. But my point is -- they don't kill 74 people. Again, something just doesn't add up.

Especially when you learn that the Ultras, those organized and ultra-motivated fans, had proved since January 25 that they were the stuff revolutions were made of. The mostly Cairo-based Ahly Ultras teamed up with their counterparts from their main crosstown rivals -- Zamalek's Ultras White Knights -- and, well, gave Mubarak's goons hell. Their presence -- with the moral support they provided through their loud, sometimes funny and occasionally obscene anti-government chants, but also their courage when it came to fending off violent policemen -- could make or break a protest.

It is those same police goons who were supposed to guarantee order in the stadium tonight. (It should be noted that there has been absolutely no reform of the police since the revolution.)

Like I said. Something really doesn't add up.

The immediate flow of information proved it. Normally the stadium managers carefully control how the teams and the visiting fans are let out. This time, though, the gates were opened immediately after the game ended, and supporters were also allowed to invade the pitch -- something that almost never happens. The very scarce policemen who were present did not attempt to break up the fights.

74 dead. That's 74 families that will not sleep tonight. Or the night after that. That's 74 bodies on a morgue table. Some, the autopsy will reveal, were trampled or died of asphyxiation. Others -- those with injuries to the face or chest or elsewhere -- will probably have "fatal trauma," that horribly vague phrase, printed on their death certificates. Assuming, of course, that the death certificates are issued properly. As I write this, I'm getting reports that some bodies have been taken to a state hospital amid fears that the doctors may be pressured by the police to alter their report. (That has certainly happened before in Cairo.) Most of the dead, again from what we gather from witness accounts, were Ahly fans, some of them Ultras. Many were also Port-Saidis who took the former's defense. One policeman also lost his life.

And Egypt is on fire, but through the tears one can still see clearly.

On the streets and on the web, blame is put squarely on the police. Once again it failed miserably, as it has for the past year. Blame is also being put on the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, the SCAF, as the head of the executive branch.

Now thousands of people -- many Ahly Ultras but not only them -- are marching to the Cairo police station, awaiting the train carrying team supporters and the bodies of those who were killed. And, just as they always do, in joy or adversity, they are chanting. Against SCAF, against the Ministry of Interior, against the sluggish SCAF-appointed prime minister who (as someone quipped on Twitter) is probably still looking for his slippers so that he can get out of bed and go see what the fuss is about. We're not out of the woods yet. Risks of retaliation against Port Saidis are limited but real. Images of queues, until midnight, of the Port Saidis lining up in front of hospitals to donate blood for the injured have been heartwarming, and the resignation of the board of the Masry team was the honorable thing to do. Nevertheless, anti-Port Said chants have been heard in Cairo, and tension needs to be monitored and observed.

Parliamentarians have been unequivocal in their condemnation of the security failure. Another MP, Ziad El Elaimy, said that a mistake of these proportions could only be deliberate. In this he shares the opinion of many Egyptians who believe that the security shortcoming was intended, and that the police, with SCAF's blessing, had sent saboteurs into the midst of the fans to teach the Ahly Ultras a lesson.

The head of the military junta, field Marshall Hussein Tantawi, opted to put the blame on unidentified "citizens." Even more importantly, he seemed to be asking people to take the law into their own hands, declaring that, "we hope that all the Egyptian people will come together... Those who committed those acts are Egyptian citizens, aren't they? How come Egyptians are allowing them to remain, are not stopping them?"

"Them" invariably refers to "activists." "Them." This wouldn't be the first time that the army has exhorted people to do its bidding. Back in October, during the infamous Maspero protest that left 24 people dead, state television asked "honorable citizens" to "go out and defend the army" against protesters.

Tomorrow will be a defining day. First there's the young parliament. If it takes a forceful stand and demands accountability from the executive branch, from the Port Said police all the way up to Tantawi, it will indeed prove itself to be the "Revolution's Parliament." But there's the chance that the Ministry of the Interior will get its way by managing to push through a new emergency law that would give it sweeping powers under the guise of "battling chaos." (It made a case along precisely these lines to Parliament last week.)

Then there is the possibility of fresh street protests. A demonstration is planned for tomorrow that will leave Ahly and head to the Ministry of Interior. The symbolism is enormous, needless to say -- and it is only compounded by the fact that tomorrow, February 2, is the anniversary of last year's "Battle of the Camels." That was when government-paid, police-armed, army-approved thugs attacked the protesters in Tahrir square on horse- and camelback in one of the longest and bloodiest battles of the 2011 revolution.

A little while ago a train from Port Said arrived at Cairo station. The live reports are heartbreaking. Boys are looking for their friends. Families are calling for their children. Mothers are crying as they realize they might never see their kids again.

How much hope can Egyptians dare to have?

In the meantime, Egypt has declared three days of national mourning. The revolution continues, one day at a time.

This commentary was published in Foreign Policy on 01/02/2012

Why The Arab Spring Passed By Contested Kirkuk

By Wladimir van Wilgenburg

                                            Kurdish peshmerga troops

Kirkuk’s Sunni Arab parties are not happy over the recent decisions of the Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki and the Iraqi cabinet to turn the U.S. military base at Kirkuk into a civilian airport, to approve 1,400 new police officers requested by the Kurdish head of Kirkuk police, and the cancellation of agricultural contracts that were granted to Sunni Arabs by the Ba’ath regime to increase the number of Arabs in the province (Kirkuk Now, January 4; AKnews [Kurdistan News Agency], January 17; Sumaria News, January 24). They also expressed dissatisfaction over the continued Kurdish security dominance of Kirkuk, the on-going arrests of prominent Sunni Arabs by security forces from Baghdad and the assassination of Sunni Arabs in Kirkuk. [1]

Members of the Sunni Arab-dominated “Sahwa” militias in the Kirkuk region of northern Iraq have also been under steady attack this month in the ethnically divided district where Kurds and Arabs struggle for control. A Sahwa commander was killed and his three guards injured during a January 23 attack on the commander’s vehicle, a bomb exploded in front of the house of two brothers who are Sahwa members on January 20 while another Sahwa member was shot dead by unknown gunmen on January 7 (Aswat al-Iraq, January 23; January 20; January 7).  Despite the pressure being applied to the Sunni Arab population of Kirkuk, the community’s political leaders and movements have failed to mobilize Kirkuk’s Arabs against the desire of many Kurds to bring the oil-rich district under full Kurdish control.

There were expectations a year ago that the Arab population of Kirkuk would engage in a Tunisia-like uprising or engage in mass protests against Kurdish control of the province in response to calls from the Arab Political Council (APC) in Kirkuk (Sumaria TV, January 21, 2011). Headed by politicians from the Jibour and Obeidi tribes, the APC is an Arab nationalist council uniting various Arab politicians in Kirkuk that supported the secular Iraqiya list during the 2010 elections. 

Despite expectations, there have been few examples of political mobilization on the part of Kirkuk’s Arab community. An APC effort last year to make February 25 a “day of wrath” by calling for massive protests by Arab demonstrators was averted by the deployment of Kurdish troops outside Kirkuk and the enforcement of a curfew by the Kurdish-controlled police within the city (See Terrorism Monitor, April 1, 2011). APC calls for protests and sit-ins last summer brought few Arabs into the streets and failed to create any significant unrest (Rudaw.net, August 26 2011). Some of the February 25 protests in Arab-dominated districts of Kirkuk like Hawija and Rashaad actually called for the removal of Arab politicians and the elimination of corruption. As a result Arab politicians called the Arab youth of Kirkuk “disloyal” and claimed they were influenced by Kurds [1].

In fact, the APC does not have the financial resources, organizational capacity or popular support for their efforts to initiate a Tunisian-style uprising or even mass protests against the Kurdish-controlled authorities in Kirkuk. Shaykh Abd al-Rahman al-Assi, head of the APC, has threatened to conduct sit-ins and protests against the Kurdish security forces several times, but in reality he is unable to follow up on such threats.

Election results and surveys from 2005 to 2011 show consistently that the majority of Kirkuk’s Arabs oppose the ambition of Kurdish nationalists to annex the province to the Kurdistan Region through Article 140 of the Iraqi constitution, which calls for normalization of Kirkuk’s disputed status through an overdue census and referendum (see Terrorism Focus, February 25, 2009). Such data also confirms widespread support for some of the claims of popular support made by Arab nationalist politicians in Kirkuk. [2] However, data collected from the police and local press show that between 2004 and 2011 there were only around 30 demonstrations against Kurdish claims to Kirkuk. The majority of the demonstrations carried out in Kirkuk by Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen focused on a lack of services, jobs and electricity [3].

Surveys and interviews show there is widespread frustration in Kirkuk and the rest of Iraq regarding the effectiveness of the nation’s politicians [4]. Iraqis see their politicians as corrupt, ineffective and more involved with their own personal squabbles than with running the country (AKnews, July 18, 2011). One survey shows that 81% of Kirkuk’s population support calls for more democracy and government responsiveness in both their own province and the rest of the Arab world [5].

The results show that there is a great gap between the Arab politicians’ focus on ethnic-related demands and the daily needs of the population of Kirkuk. Therefore, it was not surprising that the APC withdrew their support for the February 25 demonstrations days after they found out the protesters would call for the removal of Arab politicians.

The Arab nationalists’ lack of organizational skills and resources in is in stark contrast to Kirkuk’s more experienced, more organized and better funded Kurdish political parties. These groups dominate most of the official institutions and maintain their own telecommunication networks, satellite channels, newspapers and a large number of NGOS in Kirkuk. The Kurdish parties have even succeeded in running NGOs and projecting their security influence in Arab-dominated districts of Kirkuk, while the APC lack television stations and newspapers while failing to operate a single NGO.

Kirkuk’s Sunni Arabs did not have any political organizations prior to 2003, unlike the Kurds, who have controlled the autonomous Kurdistan Region since 1991. As a result the Sunnis are disorganized and depend largely on the political participation of various tribes and former military officers. The dependence of the dis-unified Sunni politicians on tribes also leads to divisions and disaffection over tribal nepotism. Although Arab politicians control Sahwa (Awakening) militias and city councils outside of the city, they do not have a major influence within the provincial council of Kirkuk or the city itself.

Furthermore, the APC lacks support from independent centers of power within Iraq on a local, regional and national level. Kurdish political groups in Kirkuk have support from the KRG and dominate the city’s political and security structure, including the police and the local branch of the Asayish, the KRG security agency.  The APC’s main allies in the Iraqiya list failed to form the government and do not hold any influential posts at present as the List is boycotting the Iraqi parliament.

In August 2011, APC politicians visited prominent Sunni politicians Vice-President Tariq al-Hashimi and Deputy PM Salih al-Mutlaq to voice their demands (Rudaw.net, August 26, 2011). Now, however, Hashimi is wanted on terrorism charges and has taken refuge in Kurdistan region, while Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki wants to replace al-Mutlaq for calling him a “dictator” (al-Jazeera, December 28, 2011; Niqash.org, January 12).

Despite the fact that Kurdish political parties are stronger in Kirkuk than Arab nationalist parties, this does not change the fact that the  Kurds lack support from Baghdad, neighboring countries and the West for annexing Kirkuk to the Kurdistan region. This means that the Kurdish parties will remain in de facto control of Kirkuk in the future and that Arab politicians in Kirkuk will be unable to challenge that control without support from Baghdad and effective political mobilization.

-This report was published in  Terrorism Monitor Volume: 10 Issue: 2, on 26/01/2012
-Wladimir van Wilgenburg studied Journalism and New Media at Leiden University and is studying international relations at the University of Utrecht. Van Wilgenburg writes freelance articles on the Middle East and is an editor at the Kurdish newspaper Rudaw, based in Erbil, northern Iraq.

Notes:

1. Wladimir van Wilgenburg, "Failed (or Aborted) Arab Spring in Iraq: A Study of the Political Mobilization of Sunni Arabs in Kirkuk," MA Thesis, Utrecht University, August 12, 2011.
2. Ibid
3. Ibid
4. Ibid
5. Survey of Northern Triangle Public Opinion April 13-18, 2011: http://www.iri.org/sites/default/files/2011%20June%2016%20IRI%20Releases%20Survey%20of%20Iraqi%20Public%20Opinion,%20April%2013-18,%202011.pdf

Syria: A Soviet Hangover Turned Headache

Russia inherited its Middle East presence from the Soviet Union. Is it about to lose its last ally in a newly democratised Arab world?

The Editorial of The Guardian

                  Russian President Medvedev and Syrian President Assad

The uprisings in Libya and now Syria have pitched the Arab League, a body which had little relevance to conflicts raging on its doorstep, into the centre of the diplomatic arena. The league matters not merely because some of its member governments are becoming representative of their peoples for the first time in their recent history. Sunni monarchies like Saudi Arabia that are vulnerable to the very forces unseating Bashar al-Assad in Syria are also taking active steps. Granted, almost all of what the Saudis do in Syria can be seen as a way of rolling back Iran's influence. However, by pulling its members out of the Arab League observer mission and then making sure the mission is suspended, Riyadh has propelled itself into the frontline. It is no longer leading from behind.

The Arab League's activism on Syria put its general secretary, Nabil el-Araby, Egypt's former foreign minister, into an unusual position – proposing a plan to the UN which his own government has yet to endorse. It is encapsulated in a draft resolution to the UN security council which calls on Assad to step down and hand over to his deputy, who will oversee a political transition, or face further unspecified measures in 15 days' time. This has the potential to isolate Russia within a reshaped Arab world. Moscow has to address two questions as it prepares to wield its veto. First, as Assad's principal arms supplier, is it backing the loser? If so, it will lose not only the $550m deal it signed with Damascus for trainer aircraft, but the only base it has outside the former Soviet Union and a string of listening posts. The second question is more pressing: is it about to lose its last ally in a newly democratised Arab world, of which Syria will remain a vital hub whatever happens? Russia inherited its Middle East presence from the Soviet Union, but it did not gain any new friends. With Gaddafi gone and Assad on his way out, Russia stands to lose more than physical assets.

Russia could yet be assuaged by a clause explicitly ruling out the use of force. The current wording emphasises the need to resolve the crisis peacefully, but does not preclude future military action. Given what happened after the loosely worded UN resolution on Libya, which Russia let through, it has a point. But Russia is wrong to warn that the resolution will risk civil war. Continuing to back Assad, as it is doing, will propel a civil war. The sooner Assad sees he has no future – and even a watered-down resolution would help that – the sooner leading members of the regime will try to salvage something from the wreckage. The coming civil war will not guarantee the property of minority Alawites or the Sunni merchant class in Damascus and Aleppo. It will engulf them, and the score-settling in Libya will be as nothing to what takes place in Syria.

This editorial was published in The Guardian on 01/02/2012

Exclusive: Leaked Syria Observers' Report Details Failings Of Mission

By Colum Lynch

Some were too old, too ill for their task. Others quarrelled over reimbursements for hotel accommodations, or refused orders to carry out their mission.

Simply put, many of the 166 Arab observers parachuted into Syria on Dec. 24 to document the widening violence were utterly incapable of enduring the rigors of life in a country roiled by social upheaval and conflict, according to an internal account of their work.

"Regrettably, some observers thought that their visit to Syria was for pleasure," wrote Gen. Mohamed Ahmed Moustafa Al-Dabi, the chief of the Arab League monitoring mission. "In some instances, experts who were nominated were not qualified for the job, did not have prior experience, and were not able to shoulder the responsibility."

On Jan. 18, Arab League Secretary General Nabil Elaraby ordered the suspension of the organization's observer mission, its first major experiment in human rights monitoring. He claimed that the escalation of violence had undercut its ability to do its job.

But a confidential account of the organization's mission, signed by the monitor's controversial chief and obtained by Turtle Bay, shows that the Arab monitors were hobbled from the beginning by a shortage of equipment -- and by what Al-Dabi describes as a ferocious Syrian media disinformation campaign against the monitors and him personally. "The credibility of the mission has been undermined in the minds of Arab and foreign viewers," he wrote.

Still, the findings have become the focus of a diplomatic feud between Russia and the Security Council's main European powers -- which are set to debate taking more forceful position on Syria today. On Monday, Jan. 30, Russia's deputy foreign minister, Gennady Gatilov, insisted that the Security Council receive a briefing on the report's conclusions. The Europeans, meanwhile have dismissed the report out of hand, saying the Arab League's mission was effectively a failure, and their report has nothing to offer the council to chart its diplomatic course.

Mark Lyall Grant, Britain's U.N. ambassador, said Friday that the work of the monitoring group has been "overtaken" by the Arab League's diplomatic efforts to secure Security Council support for a political transition in Syria.

At issue is a single finding in the 18-page report that recommends that Arab governments not relinquish their mediating role to the international community, a likely reference to the Security Council. European diplomats say the mission had no mandate to make such an assertion, while Russian officials say it would be irresponsible to deny the Security Council the right to review the Arab League's full account of what happened on the ground.

"The mission…sensed the acute stress, injustice and oppression endured [by] Syrian citizens," Al-Dabi wrote. "Yet they are convinced that the Syrian crisis must be resolved peacefully, in the Arab context, and not internationalized so that they can live in peace securely, and achieve the desired reforms and changes." That said, he is surprisingly candid and critical of the observer mission's ability to perform well the task required of them.

He recommends that the mission be reinforced with an additional 100 observers ("preferable young with military background"), 30 armored vehicles, protective vests, vehicle mounted cameras, and night vision binoculars. "Despite all of the above, the performance of many observers was excellent and deserves to be commended and appreciated," Al-Dabi writes. "It should be stressed performance shortcomings will be addressed and remedied with further practice and guidance, God Willing."

But the Arab League mission faced trouble almost immediately after the monitors arrived in Syria last month.

Syrian officials at the Jordanian border confiscated their communications gear, leaving them with only ten Al Thurayya satellite phones, and forcing them to rely on unsecure Syrian fax and phone lines. The Chinese embassy had to intervene to give them ten walkie-talkies to address a breakdown in the monitors' capacity to communicate with each other and headquarters. The observers, who were stationed in 15 areas of the country, also lacked sufficient bullet-proof vests or armored personnel carriers. Local rental car agencies refused to rent them cars after early missions led observers into the middle of riots.

"The government put in place a tight strategy to limit access to the core areas, and keeping the mission occupied with issues of concern to the government," reads the report. "The mission resisted this approach, and reacted in a manner that guaranteed the fulfillment of its tasks as envisaged."

In the mission's early days, thousands of pro-government supporters surrounded the mission's convoy in the town of Latakya, "chanting slogans in support of the president and against the mission," reads the report. "The crowds went out of control, and the observers were attacked. Two observers sustained minor injuries. Their armored vehicle was totally destroyed."

Syria's Foreign Minister Walid Muallem submitted a formal apology for what the report characterized as "these regrettable non-deliberate acts" and the monitors continued their work. But they quickly encountered a new problem. The monitoring mission, says Al-Dabi, did not have a mandate for addressing the widening scope of the armed opposition to the regime. In Homs and Daraa, armed opposition groups used "thermal bombs and anti-armor missiles" against government forces. "The mission was witness to acts of violence against government forces and citizens leading to death and injury of many. A case in point was the attack against a civilian bus which killed eight persons and injured others, including women and children."

The mission's international standing was also diminished by the selection of its monitoring chief -- General Al-Dabi, a close advisor of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, who is wanted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court. Al-Dabi also served as a top military officer in Darfur, Sudan, at a time when the government was organizing local militia, known as the Janjaweed, that were involved in mass killings of civilians in the region. An Algerian member of the Arab team, Anwar Malek, resigned in protest, telling Al Jazeera that the mission was a "farce."

"What I saw was a humanitarian disaster. The regime is not just committing one war crime, but a series of crimes against its people," said Malek. "The snipers are everywhere shooting at civilians. People are being kidnapped. Prisoners are being tortured and none were released."

Al-Dabi has not commented on Malek's claim. But the report notes that "some observers failed to honor their commitments and the provision of the oath they took. They contacted officials in their countries…and painted a very gloomy picture. This resulted in misunderstanding and faulty assessment by those officials of the situation."

European diplomats, meanwhile, have questioned Al-Dabi's accounts of events unfolding in Syria, including the observer mission's report on the killing of a French television journalist. Al-Dabi writes simply that the "reports of the mission already indicate that the French journalist died, and a Belgian reporter injured, as a result of mortar attacks fired by the opposition." But one European official said the report fails to mention testimony by other journalists traveling in the area that the reporter had been forced into the line of fire by pro-government supporters. "The account we received is that they were exposed to enemy fire deliberately," said one European diplomat.

As for the monitors, the official said it was clear they were being used and manipulated by the Syrian government to gain time to crush anti-government protesters and armed opposition elements.

Al-Dabi disagreed, arguing that despite its shortcomings the monitoring mission was vital to the country's stability.

"Any termination of the work of the mission after this short term will undermine the positive results -- even if incomplete -- that have been achieved so far. This may result in complete chaos on the ground given that [the] parties are neither qualified nor ready for the political process which aims at resolving the Syrian crisis."

-This commentary was published in Foreign Policy on 31/01/2012
-Longtime Washington Post correspondent Colum Lynch reports on all things United Nations for Turtle Bay

Iran Is Running Out Of Steam

Its strategic retreat is most visible at regional level. Tehran is in a perpetual conflict with its neighbours

By Abdulkhaleq Abdullah

After nearly a decade of regional expansion, Iran is in for a strategic retreat. This time last year Tehran was counting its numerous regional and international gains. But from now on it seems that Iran will have to take stock of its regional and global losses, which are piling up by the day.

The setbacks start at home. Politically, Iran, which is gearing up for crucial parliamentary elections due on March 2, is badly polarised. The political division in Iran is at an all-time high and is eating into its domestic legitimacy and stability. The stimulus for this political polarisation is the simmering power struggle in the confusing, multi-layered Iranian decision-making strata. The battle between the regime's hardline clerics headed by the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the dogmatic clique around the handicapped President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is serious and paralysing.

Iran is also looking very feeble economically. The financial strain is so dire that the rial has already lost more than 40 per cent of its value. As the economy flounders, business is being held back and investments are drying up. The European Union implemented last week a total ban on the import of Iranian crude oil and blocked trade in precious metals, among other steps. These measures, in addition to the unilateral sanctions already imposed by the US and the UN, are taking a big toll on Iran's lifeblood — its oil revenue.

The usually bombastic Ahmadinejad has admitted that the current sanctions are "the heaviest economic onslaught on Iran in history ... every day, all our banking and trade activities and our agreements are being monitored and blocked". The economic sanctions and boycotts are crippling and Iran can do nothing about them except make counterproductive threats.

Such irrational reactions have increased the country's international isolation, which reached new heights at the start of 2012, when Brazil's new President Dilma Rousseff refused to meet with Ahmadinejad during his visit to Latin America earlier this month. This comes on top of China's growing frustration with Tehran's latest threats to close the vital Strait of Hormuz. Losing close allies and old friends while making new enemies is becoming Iran's new favourite game.

The announcement by the US Department of Justice on October 11, 2011, that two men had been charged in connection with an alleged Iranian Quds force plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States, Adel Al Jubeir, consolidated Iran's exclusion and its reputation as an ostracised nation.

Irreparable damage

Yet Iran's strategic retreat is most visible at the regional level. Tehran is mired in a perpetual conflict with its immediate neighbours, the six Arab Gulf states. They have an inflated view of Iran as a deeply destabilising force in the neighbourhood. On the top of their endless concerns is Tehran's presumed meddling in their internal affairs, i.e. Bahrain, and its "invisible hand" in agitating the sectarian divide in the Arab Gulf and throughout the region. Iraq is also suddenly feeling the same and is equally getting irritated by Iran's flagrant interference in its domestic politics.

Most immediately, Tehran stands utterly hopeless as its strategic ally in the Arab world, the brutal Bashar Al Assad regime in Syria, enters an imminent danger zone. A politically weak Syria translates into a politically weak Iran and if the Al Assad regime collapses the whole resistance axis, which Iran invested in so heavily for the past two decades, will disappear too.

Revolutionary Iran is seen to stand on the wrong side of history. Many in the Arab world are now saying out loud ‘shame on you Iran' for standing by a regime that has killed on average 20 of its people on a daily basis for the past 10 months. To those and other old admirers, Iran is now viewed as a counter-revolutionary force. This is causing an irreparable damage to its revolutionary credentials, which had been until now the biggest source of its soft power in the Arab world.

Few if any are thinking of Iran as role model. No one is inspired by its Islamic republic viewed as a theocratic regime run by a clerical hierarchy. In fact many Islamists are adamant about not wanting to associate themselves with the 1979 revolution.

Clearly all these setbacks amount to what Mustafa Alani has aptly described by saying ‘the party is over for Iran'. Surely these are not the best of times for Iran. The Iran of 2012 is a shrinking Iran that has already seen its golden days and is running out of steam and luck. If 2011 was a tough year for Iran, 2012 is bound to be even tougher for the typically defiant nation. Iran is a destabilising force and it is time for it to be downsized.

The process of downsizing Iran is in the best interests of regional and global peace and stability. Sanctions, covert actions and further international isolation are the way to do it. This is the duty of the entire world community and 2012 is the year to do it.

 -This commentary was published in The Gulf News on 31/01/2012
-Dr Abdulkhaleq Abdullah is a Professor of Political Science. You can follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/Abdulkhaleq_uae

Al Qaeda In Iran

Why Tehran is Accommodating the Terrorist Group

By Seth G. Jones

               
                                              The Iran-Pakistan border. (snotch / flickr)

Virtually unnoticed, since late 2001, Iran has held some of al Qaeda's most senior leaders. Several of these operatives, such as Yasin al-Suri, an al Qaeda facilitator, have moved recruits and money from the Middle East to central al Qaeda in Pakistan. Others, such as Saif al-Adel, an Egyptian that served as head of al Qaeda's security committee, and Abu Muhammad al-Masri, one of the masterminds of the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in East Africa, have provided strategic and operational assistance to central al Qaeda. The Iranian government has held most of them under house arrest, limited their freedom of movement, and closely monitored their activities. Yet the organization's presence in Iran means that, contrary to optimistic assessments that have become the norm in Washington, al Qaeda's demise is not imminent.

Perhaps more disturbing, Iran appears willing to expand its limited relationship with al Qaeda. Just as with its other surrogate, Hezbollah, the country could turn to al Qaeda to mount a retaliation to any U.S. or Israeli attack. To be sure, the organization is no Iranian puppet. And the two have sometimes been antagonistic, as illustrated by al Qaeda in Iraq's recent attacks against Shias. But both share a hatred of the United States. U.S. policymakers should think twice about provoking a closer relationship between them and should draw greater public attention to Iran's limited, but still unacceptable, cooperation with al Qaeda.

Evidence of the Iranian-al Qaeda partnership abounds -- and much of it is public. This past year, I culled through hundreds of documents from the Harmony database at West Point; perused hundreds more open-source and declassified documents, such as the U.S. Department of Treasury's sanctions against al Qaeda leaders in Iran; and interviewed government officials from the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and South Asia.

Through that research, the history of al Qaeda in Iran emerges as follows: over the past several years, al Qaeda has taken a beating in Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, the Horn of Africa, and North Africa. In particular, an ongoing campaign of drone strikes has weakened -- although not eliminated -- al Qaeda's leadership cadre in Pakistan. But the group's outpost in Iran has remained almost untouched for the past decade. In late 2001, as the Taliban regime collapsed, most al Qaeda operatives fled Afghanistan. Many of the leaders, including Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's deputy and future successor, headed for Pakistan. But some did not, choosing instead to go west. And Iran was apparently more than willing to accept them. Around October 2001, the government dispatched a delegation to Afghanistan to guarantee the safe travel of operatives and their families to Iran.

Initially, Iran's Quds Force -- the division of the Revolutionary Guard Corps whose mission is to organize, train, equip, and finance foreign Islamic revolutionary movements -- took the lead. Between 2001 and 2002, it helped transport several hundred al Qaeda-linked individuals. By 2002, al Qaeda had established in Iran its "management council," a body that bin Laden reportedly tasked with providing strategic support to the organization's leaders in Pakistan. Key members of the council included Adel, Sulayman Abu Ghayth, Abu al-Khayr al-Masri, Abu Muhammad al-Masri, and Abu Hafs al-Mauritani. All five remained influential over the next several years and retained close ties to bin Laden. Among the most active of the council, Adel even helped organize groups of fighters to overthrow Hamid Karzai's regime in Afghanistan and provided support for the May 2003 terrorist attacks in Riyadh.

According to U.S. government officials involved in discussions with Iran, over time, the growing cadre of al Qaeda leaders on Iranian soil apparently triggered a debate among senior officials in Tehran. Some worried that the United States would eventually use the terrorist group's presence as a casus belli. Indeed, in late 2002 and early 2003, U.S. government officials held face-to-face discussions with Iranian officials demanding the regime deport al Qaeda leaders to their countries of origin. Iran refused, but around the same time, the country's Ministry of Intelligence took control of relations with the group. It set to work rounding up al Qaeda members and their families.

By early 2003, Tehran had detained all the members of the management council and their subordinates who remained in the country. It is not entirely clear what conditions were like for al Qaeda detainees. Some apparently suffered through harsh prison confinement, while others enjoyed informal house arrest with freedom to communicate, travel, and fundraise. Over the next several years, bin Laden, Zawahiri, and other leaders apparently sent messages to Tehran threatening to retaliate if al Qaeda personnel and members of bin Laden's family were not released. Iran did not comply. Bin Laden did not follow through.

After that, the details of al Qaeda's relationship with the Iranian government are hazy. It seems that many of the operatives under house arrest petitioned for release. In 2009 and 2010, Iran did begin to free some detainees and their family members, including members of bin Laden's family. And the management council remained in Iran, still under limited house arrest. Tehran appears to have drawn several red lines for the council: Refrain from plotting terrorist attacks from Iranian soil, abstain from targeting the Iranian government, and keep a low profile. As long as it did so, the Iranian government would permit al Qaeda operatives some freedom to fundraise, communicate with al Qaeda central in Pakistan and other affiliates, and funnel foreign fighters through Iran.

Today, Iran is still an important al Qaeda hub. Suri, who was born in 1982 in al-Qamishli, Syria, is a key operative. According to U.S. Treasury Department accounts, Tehran has permitted Suri to operate discretely within Iran since at least 2005. He has collected money from donors and transferred it to al Qaeda's leadership in Pakistan and other locations; facilitated the travel of extremist recruits from the Gulf to Pakistan and Afghanistan; and according to U.S. State Department accounts, "arranges the release of al-Qaeda personnel from Iranian prisons."

On the surface, the relationship between Shia Iran and Sunni al Qaeda is puzzling. Their religious views do differ, but they share a more important common interest: countering the United States and its allies, including Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the United Kingdom. Iran's rationale might be compared to that of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who declared, "If Hitler invaded Hell, I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons."

Iran is likely holding al Qaeda leaders on its territory first as an act of defense. So long as Tehran has several leaders under its control, the group will likely refrain from attacking Iran. But the strategy also has an offensive component. If the United States or Israel undertook a bombing campaign against Iran, Tehran could employ al Qaeda in a response. Tehran has long used proxies to pursue its foreign policy interests, especially Hezbollah in Lebanon, and it has a history of reaching out to Sunni groups. In Afghanistan, for example, Iran has provided limited support to the Taliban to keep the United States tied down. Al Qaeda's proven willingness and ability to strike the United States make it an attractive partner.

Al Qaeda is probably making similar calculations. To be sure, some revile the Ayatollahs. Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi, the now-deceased head of al Qaeda in Iraq, actively targeted Shias there. In a 2004 letter, Zarqawi explained that they are "the insurmountable obstacle, the lurking snake, the crafty and malicious scorpion." Yet, in a sign of Churchill-esque pragmatism, Zawahiri chastised Zarqawi in 2005, writing that the Shias were not the primary enemy -- at least not for the moment. It was crucial, Zawahiri explained, to understand that success hinged on support from the Muslim masses. One of Zarqawi's most significant mistakes, Zawahiri chided him, was targeting Shia communities, because such a strategy would cripple al Qaeda's support among the broader Muslim community. And most al Qaeda operatives since the debacle in Iraq have cautiously followed Zawahiri's lead. 

Moreover, Iran is in many ways a safer territory from which al Qaeda can operate. The United States has targeted al Qaeda in Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, and other countries, but it has limited operational reach in Iran. In addition, Iran borders the Persian Gulf, Iraq, Turkey, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, making it centrally located for most al Qaeda affiliates. No wonder that Suri has been able to move money and recruits through Iran to various theaters, including al Qaeda central in Pakistan. Although most governments in the region have clamped down on al Qaeda, Iran's willingness to allow some activity sets it apart.

Management council still under limited house arrest, Iran and al Qaeda remain at arm's length. But that could change if Washington's relationship with Tehran does. So far, the conflict between Iran and the West has been limited to diplomatic pressure and economic sanctions. It has also occasionally deteriorated into cyber attacks, sabotage, assassinations, kidnappings, and support to proxy organizations. But much like the struggle between the U.S. and Soviet Union during the Cold War, it has not spilled into overt conflict. Should an increase of those activities cause a broad deterioration in relations, however, or should the United States or Israel decide to attack Iranian nuclear facilities, Iran and al Qaeda could come closer together.

For one, Iran would likely respond to an attack by targeting the United States and its allies through proxies in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other countries. The regime might increase its logistical support to al Qaeda by providing money, weapons, housing, travel documents, and transit to operatives -- some of which it is already doing. In a worse scenario, Tehran might even allow al Qaeda officials in Iran to go to Pakistan to replenish the group's depleted leadership there, or else open its borders to additional al Qaeda higher-ups. Several of the operatives already in Iran, including Adel and Abu Hafs al-Mauritani, would be especially valuable in this regard, because of their prestige, experience in paramilitary and external operations, and religious credentials. In an even more extreme scenario, Iran could support an al Qaeda attack against the United States or one of its allies, although the regime would surely attempt to hide its role in any plotting. Based on Iran's cautious approach over the past decade, Tehran's most likely strategy would be to gradually increase its support to al Qaeda in response to U.S. actions. That way it could go slowly, and back away at any time, rather than choosing an all-or-nothing approach from the start.

It would be unwise to overestimate the leverage Tehran has over al Qaeda's leadership. The terrorist organization would almost certainly refuse Iranian direction. But given the group's current challenges, any support or tentative permission to plot on Iran's soil would be helpful. It could set about restoring its depleted senior ranks in Pakistan and other countries, or else rebuild within Iran itself. The organization might thus be amenable to working within Iranian constraints, such as seeking permission before planning attacks in the West from Iranian soil, as long as the taps were flowing.

It is true that the United States has limited leverage with Iran, but it still has several options. The first, and perhaps easiest, is to better expose the existence and activities of al Qaeda leaders in Iran. Al Qaeda has killed tens of thousands of Sunnis, Shias, and non-Muslims over the past two decades and has unified virtually all governments in the world against it. Iran, too, has become an international pariah. Its limited aid to al Qaeda is worthy of further public condemnation. But Iran has largely escaped such scrutiny.

The United States could encourage more countries to prohibit citizens and companies from engaging in commercial and financial transactions with al Qaeda leaders and their networks in Iran. The U.S. Treasury and State Departments have taken steps against some al Qaeda operatives and their supporters in Iran, including against Suri and his circle. But those efforts have not been coupled with robust diplomatic efforts to encourage other countries to do the same. Nor have they been successful in eliminating al Qaeda's sanctuary in Iran.

Finally, the United States should think twice about actions that would push Iran and al Qaeda closer together -- especially a preemptive attack on the country's nuclear program. Thus far, Iran and al Qaeda have mutually limited their relationship. It would be a travesty to push the two closer together at the very moment that central al Qaeda in Pakistan has been severely weakened.

Thankfully, there is still time to deal with the problem. But the stakes are too high for the United States to remain quiet any longer.

-This commentary was published in Foreign Affairs on 29/01/2012

In The Gulf, Allegiance Is The Issue For Muslim Brotherhood

The Muslim Brotherhood has a long and busy, but not very successful, history in the Gulf region.

By Hassan Hassan

Much has been made of the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt since the fall of Hosni Mubarak. After decades of marginalisation, the Brotherhood is back, stronger than ever. Beyond Egypt, and in the Gulf in particular, however, it is a much different story.

There is no single explanation of the Brotherhood’s history in the Gulf because each country has had different experiences and different ways of dealing with it. But any examination begins with Saudi Arabia, which has gone through a cycle of pragmatic, mutually beneficial relations with the Brotherhood punctuated by periods of hostility.

In the mid-1930s, the Brotherhood’s founder, Hassan Al Banna, made a Haj visit to the kingdom, marking the beginning of relatively close relations with King Abdulaziz. But 12 years later, that relationship imploded when a Brotherhood-affiliated group assassinated Yemen’s Imam Yahya Hamidaddin.

Where the Brotherhood saw an opportunity in a new Yemen to spread their movement across the region, Saudi Arabia saw a threat. The kingdom cut ties with the organisation, but not with individual members. The Yemeni uprising, which failed after 26 days, also brought the house of Al Saud closer to the monarchs in Egypt.

The relationship changed again with the rise of Gamal Abdel Nasser and pan-Arabism. From the mid-1950s to the early 1970s, the rivalry between Riyadh and Cairo, as each sought regime change in the other, saw a resumption of the Saudi-Brotherhood alliance against the Egyptian military regime.

At the same time, the forces of communism, pan-Arabism and religious extremism were starting to take root within Saudi society. The kingdom used the Muslim Brotherhood, whose members had experience debating communists and pan-Arabists while offering a less extreme religious discourse, as a counterweight.

During this period, the Brotherhood flourished in the kingdom and began to spread its ideology across the wider Gulf, particularly through its presence in Mecca during the Haj season. By the early 1960s, students from the Gulf who had joined the organisation while at university in Egypt were starting to return to their home countries.

These former students, as well as Egyptians who came to the Gulf as teachers, spread the ideology in the educational institutions. By the early 1970s, the organisation had branches in almost every Gulf state and had become increasingly more active and outspoken, especially after the 1979 revolution in Iran.

There were sporadic purges of education systems, but it was not until the mid-1990s when there was a systematic shift against Brotherhood-related groups. In 1994, Omani authorities arrested more than 300 people, eventually trying 131 for their alleged membership in a “subversive group”, conspiracy to subvert national unity, and the misuse of Islam. Two defendants were sentenced to death, although those sentences were later commuted to prison terms, while the others received three to 15 years in prison.

In the UAE, Brotherhood members, particularly in the education sector, were given a choice of either renouncing the group, or finding jobs outside the Education Ministry and refraining from promoting the ideology.

A policy of “de-Ikhwanification” (from the word Ikhwan for Brotherhood) of the education system has been in force since 1994. In the process, hundreds of expatriate Brotherhood members or sympathisers have been deported. Just last month, UAE authorities revoked the citizenship of six members of a Muslim Brotherhood-linked organisation for their involvement in “acts threatening the national security of the UAE through their connection with suspicious regional and international organisations and personalities”.

The Muslim Brotherhood in Qatar dissolved its organisation in 1999 and advised its counterpart in the UAE to do the same. In the UAE, many have since renounced their membership although others still remain in conflict with the state. Meanwhile in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, the Brotherhood’s presence has been undermined by Salafis.

Two issues have made confrontation with the Gulf states inevitable. The first is the Brotherhood’s influence within education institutions and its opposition to “westernised” education. In the UAE, for example, the group campaigned successfully to impose gender segregation in universities. They also unsuccessfully opposed a plan to teach English and maths during students’ foundation year.

The second point is the requirement for Gulf members to pledge allegiance to a figurehead in Egypt, currently the eighth general guide and nominal leader of the Brotherhood, Mohammed Badi. This pledge is seen as disloyal to their countries of citizenship. According to Al Mesbar Studies and Research Centre, authorities are unclear about the nature of this allegiance and members also give inconsistent accounts.

Despite alliances with powerful individuals in Gulf countries, alliances that survived the crackdown since the 1990s, the Muslim Brotherhood has not established an unfettered presence in the region. Experience has created a deep distrust between the Gulf states and the organisation.

In Kuwait, where the group has a relatively strong presence, Sheikh Soud Al Nasser Al Sabah accused it of conspiring with Saddam Hussein after the Iraqi invasion. In 2004, Saudi Arabia’s Prince Nayef bin Abdulaziz (now the crown prince) described the organisation as the “source of all problems”. Many Gulf intellectuals have also been critical of the organisation for its shifting relations with countries in the region.

The organisation is witnessing a sharp decline in the Gulf as countries follow more systematic regulations to prevent its spread and to monitor financial flows. But its political presence in Egypt may lead the Brotherhood to seek better relations for pragmatic reasons rather than attempting to spread its ideology.

-This commentary was published in The National on 30/01/2012