Submitted by: M Mullikin
Egypt’s Israeli-Hamas deal further shakes Jordan’s Hashemite throne...............
The Hamas activists who spearhead the radical Muslim Brotherhood opposition to Jordan’s King Abdullah were encouraged by Israel’s consent to the deal with Gaza’s Hamas rulers that was brokered by Egypt.
They concluded from Israel’s avoidance of a large-scale military operation that their Gazan brothers’ terrorist tactics had bested the IDF’s renowned military and intelligence capabilities. They are contemplating borrowing those tactics to give the already shaky Hashemite throne in Amman a final push.
On the throne for 20 years, the 57-year old monarch’s low spirits raised alarm in Western circles during his visit to Washington in early March.
King Abdullah turned down every Middle East project put before him, especially President Donald Trump’s Israel-Palestinian peace plan, when they were presented by Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the president’s special advisers Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt.
The gloomy Jordanian King told them all not to count on him for any kind of cooperation in implementing US policies in the region.
On March 29, when Gaza was on the brink of tipping over into a major clash, the Muslim Brotherhood quietly scored a victory by pushing through the Jordanian parliament for the first time a motion voiding the natural gas contract signed with Israel by the Jordanian electricity company.
In an attempt to save the deal, the royal court referred the issue to the Jordanian constitutional court for a final ruling. The Gazan Hamas’ long arm had clearly reached the Brotherhood in Jordan and succeeded in inflicting a disastrous blow to the kingdom’s economy.
King Abdullah has been trying to ward off the extremists’ threats by distancing Amman from Washington and Jerusalem. He has publicly slammed the Trump administration’s policies in the region and taken the lead in the campaign against Israel over Temple Mount and Jerusalem.
For many years, King Abdullah counted heavily on military, intelligence and economic support to keep his kingdom afloat and stable. But now, when he is more in need of a helping hand than ever before, he is separating himself from his champions.
Two big perils are becoming uncomfortably acute:
1. The deepening economic crisis and attendant shortages have made the population as a whole restive and antagonised the middle class which was one of the throne’s main props. Bedouin tribes, another important prop, have turned against the throne and are joining opposition protests against the king.
2. The evolving pact between Iran and two of Jordan’s neighbours, Iraq and Syria, isbringing large Iraqi militias under Iran’s Revolutionary Guards’ command to Jordan’s back door. Abdullah has no doubt that his throne is seen as a major obstacle in the path of Iran’s expansionist drive and is therefore dispensable. As matters stand, he is running out of defenders for his kingdom against this oncoming storm after turning away from Washington and Jerusalem.
In one of his first comments as Palestinian Authority Prime Minister, Mohammed Shtayyeh said other countries, chief among them Russia, would support Palestinian rejection of the Trump administration's "deal of the century" for Israeli-Palestinian peace.
It wasn't for nothing that Shtayyeh highlighted Russia.
In recent years, Russia has expressed an interest in getting involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, due to its own regional and global interests of restoring its status as a superpower.
Hence Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov [above] recently re-floated the idea of hosting talks between Israel and the Palestinians in Moscow. Over the years, Moscow has on multiple occasions proposed advancing a peace agreement via a Moscow summit, but Israel has preferred to let the United States spearhead the process.
The current Russian interest in the conflict is a reflection of Moscow's ambitions to establish a presence in the Middle East as a mediator, within the prism of a zero-sum game against the Americans, and amid the view that U.S. clout on the Arab street is waning.
Russia, from its perspective, assumes this activity is only beneficial: The cost, in any practical or abstract sense, is insignificant, and the expected returns of restoring Russia to prominence in the Arab and Muslim world are self-evident to the Kremlin.
Russia also illustrates its desire to be a mediator on the global stage by saying and doing certain things to paint itself as a critical cog in any peace process. This always occurs simultaneous to, or immediately after, the Americans unveil their own initiatives.
In 2017, for example, as talks were progressing over moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, Russia announced its desire, as a member of the Quartet, to advance a peace deal. At the time, Russia issued a surprise declaration that it recognizes west Jerusalem as the official capital of Israel, regardless of the establishment of a Palestinian capital in east Jerusalem.
The Kremlin also supported direct talks between Israel and the Palestinians and expressed its interest in facilitating an agreement. The declaration emphasized Russia as a key player due to its membership in the Quartet and its permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council.
Lavrov also denounced the "deal of the century" and stressed Russia's commitment to a peace deal based on U.N. resolutions and the Arab peace initiative.
In recent months, as the American "deal of the century" has gained more exposure, Moscow has intensified its efforts to advance intra-Palestinian reconciliation, including repeatedly inviting Palestinian factions for talks in Moscow.
Hamas is shunned to varying degrees by the U.S. and European Union, and Russia wants to signal it can hold dialogue with the PA and the regime in Gaza.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu discussed “pressing bilateral issues, including military contacts and the Middle East situation” in a phone conversation on Monday, the Kremlin press service reports. The two leaders last met in Moscow on February 27 2019.
Developing......
‘Please, No Proselytism’: Pope in Morocco warns Roman Catholics off converting others.....
02 April 2019
Pope Francis, celebrates a mass at the Prince Moulay Abdellah Sports Centre in the Moroccan capital Rabat on March 31,
2019. (Fadel SENNA/AFP)
RABAT, Morocco; Pope Francis on Sunday warned Catholics in Morocco against trying to convert others [we can be thankful for small mercies?] to boost their small numbers, during a rare visitby a pontiff to the North African country.
Speaking in Rabat’s cathedral on his second day in the Moroccan capital, Francis insistedtrying to convert people to one’s own belief “always leads to an impasse.”
“Please, no proselytism!” he told an audience of around 400, who greeted the pope’s arrival by ululating and applauding, while hundreds more gathered outside the cathedral.
Christians [or in this case Roman Catholics] are a tiny minority in Morocco where 99% of the population is Muslim, with sub-Saharan Africans making up a large part of the country’s 30,000-strong Roman Catholic community.
Francis is the first pontiff to visit the North African country since John Paul II in 1985 and the cathedral had been repainted for the occasion.
The need to support [illegal] migrants was mentioned again Sunday by Francis, who has made the issue a focal point of his papacy. On Saturday he visited migrants at a Caritas charity centre, where the pope criticized “collective expulsions” [returning migrants to their country of origin] and said ways for migrants to regularize their status should be encouraged.
“None of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand”. [Daniel 12;10]
No comments:
Post a Comment