Iranian Civil Society Supports Nuclear Deal with P5+1

Since his election, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has maintained an optimistic posture on possibilities of a comprehensive nuclear agreement with Iran—or as he calls it, a win-win deal for all. “I think a final settlement can be achieved … the world is tired and wants it to end, resolved through negotiations.”  A large group of Iranian civil society activists have added their voice to diplomacy for support for the nuclear deal.  A majority of Iranians support  nuclear negotiations. Similarly, in a July 2014 public opinion poll conducted by the Program for Public Consultation and the Center for International and Security Studies at the University of Maryland, 61% of Americans favored a nuclear deal with Iran.

In 2005, urged by US, Europe rejected iran offer of 500 centrifuges. Today they’re negotiating Iran having 3600

 In this article, Gary Sick argues that a bad deal with Iran is better than not having a deal at all.  So many opportunities missed, and others blocked by unwise policies and agendas.”From 2003 to 2005, when the reformist Mohammad Khatami was president, Rohani had headed Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, while Zarif had served as ambassador to the United Nations. During that time, the pair made a similar offer to negotiate limits on Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for normalization of relations, but were rebuffed by European negotiators—actively encouraged by the Bush administration—on the grounds that they could not tolerate Iran keeping a single centrifuge enriching uranium. Tehran’s offer, at that time, proposed maintaining 500 centrifuges for R&D purposes with an option to increase the number to 3,000 over time. At the time, Iran had only a few operating centrifuges, which they refused to dismantle.”

Iranians React To Republican Victory in U.S. Elections

The latest mid-term elections in the United States has led to a Republican majorities in both the Senate and the House.   Although this change of power in U.S. Senate could lead to Republicans demanding a a more hawkish foreign policy,  particularly with respect to Iran,   the current  nuclear  negotiations between Iran and the United States and the Europeans has gone too far to be reversed now.   Of course, with a Nov. 24th deadline looming on the nuclear talks between Iran and P5+1, the negotiators enter the last month of negotiations with an urgency to complete a deal before this deadline.  Both President Obama and President Rouhani have bet a huge amount on the success of a nuclear deal with Iran, and long-term engagement that will lead to normalization of relations between Iran and the United States. They have invested a lot to risk a failure, and the stakes could not have been higher for the Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.  The urgency of reaching a nuclear deal with Iran,   and the conflict with ISIS were the focus of another secret letter from President Obama to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, his fourth letter to Khamenei since 2008.

Islamic Republic 35 years after the 1979 Revolution

November 4, 2014 marks the 35th anniversary of the Hostage Crisis in Iran,  a crisis with far reaching consequences for Iran when a group of revolutionary students climbed the walls of the American Embassy to express their objection to the United States granting a medical visa to the Shah of Iran.  Instead of a short revolutionary takeover,  the Iranian government of Ayatollah Khomeini endorsed the action,  surprising the students who had initiated the takeover.    This made the takeover into a political occupation that lasted 444 days.   Iran lost a lot,   its assets were frozen in the U.S.,  Saddam Hussein saw an opportunity in September 1980 to invade Iran and start an eight war war that cost hundred of thousands of deaths,  and  since November 1979,  Iran has not been able to shake its negative public image.

But as this Special Report by the Economist points out,  “after decades of messianic fervour, Iran is becoming a more mature and modern country.”  The Rouhani government is determined to end the pariah status of the Islamic Republic because he knows the young Iranian society today is anything but revolutionary today.  They want their country to join the international community,  stop internal repression of student movements and journalists, and eliminate the painful sanctions that continue to hurt the middle class and the poor.

Signs of Greater Cooperation between Iran and the United States on ISIS & Iraq

The latest U.S. intelligence report for Iraq points to an interesting geopolitical development between Iran and the United States in Iraq. According to reports, “the elite Iranian forces backing Shia militias have been ordered not to attack the Americans.”   One official familiar with the situation in Iraq told reporters that “They [ Iranians ] are not going after Americans…They want the nuclear talks to succeed and an incident between our guys and their guys would not be good for those talks.”   Iranian special forces were on the ground fighting ISIS before the United States and its allies launched their bombing campaign.  Iran cannot afford to see Iraq fall to ISIS terrorists.  Intervening in Iraq was not a choice, but a necessity for Iran.

Negotiations with Iran, Rouhani’s UN Diplomacy

In an exclusive interview with Voice of America (VOA), the lead US negotiator Wendy Sherman expressed hope that a nuclear deal with Iran is within reach.  This is after President Hassan Rouhani’s speech at the UN expressing optimism about the nuclear deal.  There is no question that this nuclear deal will significantly change the political environment between Iran and the United States.  It will also have a major impact on sanctions,  as Wendy Sherman stated, “I have to tell you as soon as we suspend our major sanctions – which will happen very early in the agreement – the world will flood into Iran,” she said. “Many international delegations have already been to Iran and so they will begin to see what they can do. It will be important to show that the agreement is durable, that it will last over a period of many years because we have a long history here that we are trying to solve.”   Still,  we cannot ignore the domestic pressures on both Rouhani and Obama.  They have their own enemies in their political systems, and need to walk the trigger points very carefully.

Dinner Diplomacy: Rouhani and America

Reflecting a greater flexibility and movement by Iranian officials to interact with American officials during visits to New York,  President Hassan Rouhani held an unprecedented dinner meeting with  "twenty former American officials—including a secretary of state, three national-security advisers, and a chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—from all six Administrations since the 1979 revolution....Among his guests were the former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, the former national-security advisers Stephen Hadley, Samuel Berger, and Brent Scowcroft, the former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen, and the former congresswoman Jane Harman, who served on the House Intelligence, Homeland Security, and Armed Services Committees."

Huffington Post Article

Sport Diplomacy with Iran: Breaking Barriers, Bridging Differences

Sport Diplomacy with Iran: Breaking Barriers, Bridging differences

Bahman Baktiari

The Huffington Post. September 5, 2014

As diplomats from Iran and the United States work to end decades-long nuclear tensions,sports exchanges between Iran and the United States provide a unique opportunity to dispel stereotypes and prejudices and improve relations between the peoples of the United States and Iran. This can expedite the process of the eventual normalization of relations with Iran.

Sports have a universal language through which people can find a medium to express their affinity and communicate. No one is against sports, and athletes are respected around the world irrespective of their nationality or religion. Moreover, sports exchanges bring administrators, coaches, medical staff, trainers, athletes and diplomats together. They all have to work together to bring the best representation for their teams. It is a collective effort that cultivates cooperation, competition and even friendship. Sports exchanges break down barriers, cultivates shared interest and commonality, and eliminate the sense of “You are different” or “We are different.”

Iran and the United States may have a political cold war between them, but Iranians and Americans share a strong affinity for sports, appreciate vigorous competition, and seem uninfluenced by political trends. Even at the height of tensions between Iran and the United States, teams from both countries engaged each other, demonstrating incredible and unprecedented collegiality.

For example, U.S.-Iran wrestling federations participated in dozens of competitions in Iran and in the United States since 1998. In July 2008, the national basketball team of Iran held practice sessions in Salt Lake City with NBA players. In May 2013, Iran, Russia and United States held a historic wrestling event in New York’s Grand Central Station. In March 2014, Iran participated in the wrestling World Cup competition in Los Angeles. In all of these visits, American athletes received star and warm treatment in Iran, and the Iranian teams visiting the United States were received warmly by Americans and the large Iranian-American community in the United States.

The best example of this cooperation was the USA Volleyball’s invitation by the Iranian Volleyball Federation to participate in a series of friendship games in Los Angeles, Anaheim, San Diego, and Irvine in August 2014. Organizing four major games in four different cities required resources, time, coordination, and communication with several bodies and agencies, including with the U.S. Department of State for visa facilitation and arrival logistics for the visiting Iranian team. This volleyball diplomacy broke several major barriers between Iran and the United States.

This was the first visit of the Iranian volleyball team to the United States since 1979 revolution, but even more significant, the games were held in Los Angeles area, a location with a large number of anti-Iranian regime organizations and media organizations. In August 1984, the Iranian government boycotted the Summer Olympics in Los Angeles fearing defections of its athletes and negative publicity. In August 2014, the Iranian government correctly calculated that the benefits outweigh the dangers, and allowed the Iranian volleyball team to travel to Los Angeles. For the first time in its history, the Voice of America Persian Service broadcast all the games live into Iran. In another unprecedented development, the Los Angeles City Council issued Proclamations of Friendships for both Iranian and American volleyball teams.

This is the same council that in February 2013 voted for stronger sanctions against Iran. In 2015, USA Volleyball will hold two world competition games in Tehran, and Iran will do the same in the United States.

The soft power of sport has clearly had a positive impact on US-Iran relations. With sport exchanges we can build lasting bridges with the Iranian people and strengthen people-to-people relations. Any first time American visitor to Iran sees the apparent paradox of how the government expresses anti-American views while a large majority of Iranians are pro-American and do not shy from expressing their positive feelings toward American visitors.

In the United States, however, most Americans have a negative image of Iran and cannot think of anything positive happening inside Iran. We need to inform Americans about positive changes taking place inside Iran, particularly in Iran’s remarkably vibrant civil society.

Organizing more sporting events in the United States will help change this misleading perception. Since over 60 percent of the Iranian population is under 24 years old, sports exchanges with Iran should also include exchanges with youth clubs and teams. Just like the way visiting American teams in Iran become the only contact with the U.S. for Iranians inside Iran, visiting Iranian teams to the United States are a major contact point with Iran for the large American-Iranian community.

It would not easy to reverse 35 years of a Cold War, even if the world powers sign a nuclear accord with Iran. Although sports exchanges by themselves cannot resolve all of our problems with Iran, with sports diplomacy we can lay the foundation for a lasting relationship between Iran and the United States. As Nelson Mandela put it:

“Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand. Sport can create hope where once there was only despair.”

LA City Council issues Proclamations of Friendship for USA Volleyball and Iran Volleyball Federation

Presenting Gifts of Friendship to USA Volleyball & Iran's Volleyball Federation

Bahman Baktiari, Executive Director, International Foundation for Civil Society,  presents gifts to USA Volleyball and Iran Volleyball Federation.

Netanyahu Bragged He Has America Wrapped Around His Finger

The Rise of Rightwing Forces in Israel

Religion, Sports Exchanges Bring Iranians and Americans Closer

 

“While U.S. and Iranian negotiators labor to reach a long-term nuclear agreement, other Americans and Iranians are stepping up contacts in a new wave of people-to-people diplomacy.
In recent months, three American religious delegations have visited Iran while the first group of female Iranian seminary students came to the United States.”  Read Full Article Here.

More lies from Israel exposed

"Israel blames Gaza death toll on Palestinians for deliberately putting people in line of fire. But can strikes ever be targeted to minimize civilian casualties in such a densely populated area?" Read ARTICLE

Watch this video on Gaza

Sports and Women in Iran: Why they should not be able to attend sporting events ?

US Greco-Roman Team Leader Talks about her trip to Iran

110 tonnes of bombs in one neighbourhood alone ..

Gaza neighborhood destroyed

Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian arrested in Iran

 

Iranian government undermines its international image by arresting a good reporter like Jason Rezaian. Arresting reporters like Rezaian reveals how hardliners are still in control of the intelligence apparatus in Iran.  He went to Iran on his own, and has provided one of the most insightful coverage of Iranian politics, society and economy.  Hopefully,   President Rouhani can use his influence to rectify the situation.

Amira Hass explains the conflict in Gaza in one sentence:Israel's attack on Gaza is revenge for the Palestinians' refusal to accept occupation

"There is method in madness, and the Israeli insanity, which refuses to grasp the extent of its revenge in Gaza, has very good reasons for being the way it is. The entire nation is the army, the army is the nation, and both are represented by a Jewish-democratic government and a loyal press, and the four of them work together to stave off the great betrayal: the Palestinians’ refusal to recognize the normalcy of the situation."  Read Full Article HERE

Destruction of Life and a Nation

Gaza after Israeli bombardment

A picture is worth a thousand words.

War brings destruction and misery.  Occupying Gaza will not make Israel secure. Only a two-state solution  that provides  security for BOTH Israelis and Palestinians is the solution.

Editorial by Christian Science Monitor: Acts of Tolerance & Harmony amidst War and Conflict

“Keeping harmony between religious groups in the Middle East has never been easy. But with the region now witnessing two wars largely over faith differences, it is worth noting a few individuals bridging this divide with understanding and compassion. Three prominent leaders – two Shiite ayatollahs and a Palestinian scholar – defy religious intolerance with bold acts of understanding toward the ‘enemy.’

Five patently false claims about Gaza that most of the mainstream media are accepting as fact

The Nation magazine reveals how Israeli talking points are repeated by mainstream media without fact-checking.

Column: Religion, Sports Exchanges Bring Iranians and Americans Close

"While U.S. and Iranian negotiators labor to reach a long-term nuclear agreement, other Americans and Iranians are stepping up contacts in a new wave of people-to-people diplomacy.

In recent months, three American religious delegations have visited Iran while the first group of female Iranian seminary students came to the United States.

Sports exchanges are also on the rise again,spearheaded by American wrestlers who find far more numerous and passionate fans in Iran than in many countries, including the U.S."

Read Full Article Here.  

The American Greco-Rom.Wrestling Team & their Female Leader visit Iran

"What does it feel like to be a woman who is changing history? A woman that I am proud to call a friend can now answer this question first-hand.

Christina "Kiki" Kelley recently had the opportunity to travel to Iran as the Team Leader for the Men's Greco-Roman Olympic Wrestling team. This wasn't her first international trip as the Team Leader, but it turned out to be the most ground-breaking. She didn't have much time to prepare. In fact, to get her visa photo in on time, she fashioned a hejab out of pajamas and safety pins with the help of a Walgreen's Somali employee. They got the shot and the application went through, despite some discussion on the Iranian side about allowing Ms. Kelley to enter the wrestling arena, since no woman had done so since the Iranian Revolution."

Read the Full Article Here.

Bahman Baktiari: Can the U.S. and Iran Become Trustworthy Rivals?

 

Huffington Post
Bahman Baktiari
Charles Randall Paul

Diplomats from the P5+1 countries (China, France, Germany, Russia and the United Kingdom) and negotiators from the United States and Iran have been diligently striving to meet the July 20 deadline for signing a historic and unprecedented accord assuring that Iran will not build nuclear weapons. Although the interim agreement signed in November 2013 allows for a six-month extension, prolonging these crucial negotiations in a time of extreme turmoil in the Middle East region is not in the interest of either Iran or the U.S. It is time to end 35 years of wasteful cold war and mutual satanization with Iran. Both nations must instead focus their full diplomatic powers on stabilizing the deteriorating security conditions in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and beyond.

Both sides know that a successful settlement on the nuclear issue rests on reliable trust-but-verify protocols. For the United States and the P5+1 group, three main trust-confirming objectives are essential: continual Iranian cooperation with random inspections to verify that nuclear weapons are not being built; expansion of the IAEA’s ability to effectively monitor Iranian nuclear-power activities to allow discovery and neutralization of any breakout attempt; and voluntary adoption of verifiable legal and technical restrictions to ensure that Iran is not pursuing nuclear weapons.
To address these concerns effectively, Iran must sign the IAEA Additional Protocol, a legal document that grants the IAEA complete authority over inspection of nuclear facilities on declared and possible undeclared activities. Under the protocol, the IAEA can initiate surprise inspections with expanded rights of access to sites and pertinent information.

Because the Iranian parliament has to vote to endorse the IAEA Additional Protocol, it is vital for President Rouhani’s administration to obtain this approval even though the parliament has not been generally supportive of his win-win approach with the West. President Rouhani can still remedy this problem if he submits the Additional Protocol along with the fatwa (ruling) issued by Ayatollah Khamenei that religiously forbids the development of nuclear weapons. Submitting these together as effectively one piece of legislation will dissuade hardliners from rejecting the protocol supported by the fatwa of their Supreme Leader.

Both in Tehran and in Washington, D.C., domestic political opponents of détente are loudly criticizing the naïveté of any agreement between historically untrustworthy adversaries. Negotiators on both sides know that they can only secure a lasting accord if it is supported by a majority of their fellow citizens, who will want to feel that their nation is acting wisely, not weakly, in coming to such terms. Still, with a balanced agreement, the majority of Americans and Iranians desire the chance for a new future. Despite reservations on both sides, now is the time to complete this long-neglected work and enter a new era based on a verifiable experiment in mutual trust.

Some Americans are trying to keep sanctions in place until all substantive foreign-policy disagreements can be resolved. This is utterly overreaching and disrespects the good-faith intentions of the negotiations.

Even if we could pressure the Iranians to sign a verifiable nuclear-weapons agreement without lifting all the punishing sanctions, it would be a self-defeating diplomatic disaster not unlike what happened with the Versailles Treaty, signed 95 years ago. That treaty imposed such harsh penalties on Germany that the resentment among the German people erupted in virulent retaliation that set off a chain of violent events unlike the world had ever seen. It should matter deeply to us all how the Iranian people feel about the fairness and respectfulness of this agreement. In a real way World War I and World War II finally ended when the United States decided to reject punishments of former enemies and generously reconstruct all of Europe with the Marshall Plan. Within less than a decade, against all prior assumptions, the U.S. made friends of adversaries, with enormously positive political ramifications for the world. With that same practical spirit, fully acknowledging our rival interests and views, is it not obvious that America is better off with the Iranian people as strong and trustworthy collaborators for stability in a region of dysfunctional states and violent movements?
The Iranian leaders certainly know that if they fail to live up to their commitments, the United States and others will reimpose the sanctions. Furthermore, this time, if Iran violates the terms of the agreement, the Iranian people will clearly blame their government for such a failure, meaning uncertain consequences for the regime.

If Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Menachem Begin of Israel were able to sign a peace treaty in 1979 that has stood the test of time despite their countries’ continual differences and the tumultuous instability in the region, cannot the world powers seize this moment for a comprehensive, verifiable and respectful agreement with Iran that opens the way for normalization of the relationship between Iran and the United States?

Winning the peace based on prudent trust between countries with rival interests is never easy, but it is the summit of statesmanship. A new future based on growing mutual trust is now a real possibility, and it would be tragic to waste this opportunity. The United States and its European partners should let the Iranian people know that they desire a balanced, verifiable agreement that lifts all sanctions and launches a new relationship with Iran.

Bahman Baktiari holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Virginia. He is the executive director of the International Foundation for Civil Society in the Middle East and North Africa.
Charles Randall Paul holds a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago Committee on Social Thought. He is the president and founder of the Foundation for Religious Diplomacy.

AFGHANISTAN GAMES: ROBERT GATES, OBAMA, AND KARZAI

THE NEW YORKER

New Book: America’s Great Game: The CIA’s Secret Arabists and the Shaping of the Modern Middle East by Hugh Wilford

 A review of the book by Huge Wilford. 

Iraq’s Violence and Power Struggles

by Feurat Alani
Translated by Charles Goulden
Copyright © 2014 Le Monde diplomatique – distributed by Agence Global

How do you stop a suicide bomber? More than 10 years after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime, the Iraqi government has been asking itself this question. So the Iraqi security forces, who face deadly attacks on a daily basis, held a seminar for café owners and shopkeepers on 30 November last year. A hundred Baghdad traders listened to unconvincing advice—hire a private security guard, reduce the number of entrances—from the seemingly powerless police. The entire country is affected by bombings and attacks, which claimed more than 6,000 lives last year.

Having failed to eradicate the violence, the government is trying to live with it. “It’s always the same. When a bomb goes off at a market, the police and the army impose a curfew in the area, but they always arrive after the bombing. The government are playing at firemen putting out fires: they need to arrest the arsonists,” said Mokhlas al-Juraisy, a journalist living in Baghdad.

In the capital, every family has its own tragedy, its bitterness and its dead. “Nothing changed when the US occupation ended. We had bombings before, and we still have them now. It’s the same for unemployment and other problems facing Iraq. The Americans left us a legacy of death. At least the British built bridges and schools,” one Baghdadi said, referring to the British occupation in 1918.

There are many reasons for the violence. To understand them, we must go back to 2003, shortly after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’athist regime. Paul Bremer, the US administrator, took the decision to dismantle Iraq’s security apparatus and de-Ba’athify the political system. This arbitrary and damaging policy excluded nearly a million qualified and experienced men from Iraqi society and, in the space of a few days, turned Iraq into an administrative desert. This political purge targeting anyone who had collaborated to any extent with the previous regime goes some way to explaining the country’s vulnerability.

The weakening of the state almost inevitably exacerbated sectarian tensions between Sunnis and Shias. These reached a peak after the bombing of the al-Askari mosque in Samarra, a Shia holy site, on 21 February 2006. Shias saw the incident as a declaration of war. Despite appeals for calm from all religious authorities, Shia militants took their revenge by bombing Sunni mosques. “It was our 9/11,” said a Samarra resident whose brother had been killed by a militia fighter during the reprisals.

For more than two years, Shia militias—especially the two best known, the Sadrist movement’s Mahdi Army and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq’s Badr Corps—kidnapped Sunnis, whom they usually tortured and executed. Sunni militias retaliated with car bombs in Shia areas of Baghdad. Every day, there would be 100 or so bodies on the streets or in the Tigris. Although tardily, and clearly motivated in part by political rivalry, the prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, launched a major offensive in Sadr City in March 2008, aiming to disarm the Mahdi Army led by Muqtada al-Sadr. The violence on the ground has gradually diminished, but it has fuelled rivalries among the political class. Violence remains the focus of al-Maliki’s rhetoric. He uses a simplistic vocabulary, in which the words “terrorist” and “Ba’athist” both refer to the Sunnis.

Another factor in the security crisis since the US withdrawal is the Sahwa (“awakening”) militia, made up of members of Sunni tribes who allied themselves with the United States to fight Al-Qaida in Iraq. Under the strategy set out by General Petraeus, the “surge” relied on the collaboration of Sunni tribes, symbolised by the charismatic Abdul Sattar Abu Risha, killed in September 2007 by an Al-Qaida commando.

The 100,000-strong Sahwa militia achieved significant successes by expelling the Iraq branch of Al-Qaida from the cities. The members of Sahwa were supposed to become part of the regular army, but al-Maliki failed to deliver on this undertaking and only 20% were integrated. The rest have been left to their own devices and al-Maliki has been publicly voicing his suspicion of them.

Iraq has changed. Baghdad is no longer the heterogeneous city where all the provinces were represented. With rare exceptions, Sunnis live in Sunni areas, Shias in Shia areas. Elsewhere, Joe Biden’s “soft partition” of Iraq into a Kurdish north, Sunni centre and Shia south is already a reality.

The fall of Iraq could still have been prevented if al-Maliki had made good on his electoral promise of national reconciliation, especially as many Sunni tribal councils had offered him their allegiance after he came to power. But he continued to feed the standoffs between Sunni and Shia and between Arabs and Kurds, and sidelined anyone who disagreed with his policies. Al-Maliki’s isolation started in 2011 with the removal of the Sunni vice president Tariq al-Hashemi, accused of terrorism. The following year, it was another Sunni, the deputy prime minister and finance minister Rafi al-Issawi, also accused of terrorism.

In December 2012, a year after the US withdrawal, a huge demonstration began in Fallujah’s “Dignity Square” and spread throughout Sunni territory. An alliance between al-Maliki and the tribes was no longer possible.

During the demonstrations, the leaders of important Sunni tribes, including the Dulaim, Jumaila and Mahamda, demanded al-Maliki’s resignation. Some called him a puppet of Iran or a “Safavid,” a pejorative term for Iranian conservatives. From the start, this popular movement expressed its solidarity with the Syrian rebellion, comparing al-Maliki with Bashar al-Assad. Amidst the crowds brandishing Iraqi flags, the emblem of the Free Syrian Army was clearly visible. The Iraqi Sunni struggle has gone beyond national borders: The enemy is no longer just al-Maliki, but the Shia axis of Damascus, Baghdad and Tehran.

The connections between the Sunnis of Anbar Province and the Syrian rebels on the other side of the border partly explain the rise in violence in Iraq. The struggle for power has an increasingly sectarian dimension, and, according to Sheikh Rafeh al-Jumaily, many Iraqis want a Syrian-type scenario, “to rebalance the power relationship in the region.” He believes Tehran will lose an important ally if the Assad regime falls. “If the Sunnis take power in Syria, we will be in a stronger position against the rise of Shiism in Baghdad.”

The Iraqi equivalent of the Free Syrian Army was created six months before the Sunni demonstrations, though it is rarely mentioned in the media. In an official statement issued on 19 July 2012, it set out three objectives: “to counter the Iranian invasion of Iraq, support the people of Syria and the Free Syrian Army, and unite Sunni fighters in Iraq under a single banner.”

Who is behind this new organisation, and has it had a real influence? It’s too early to tell. It posted videos of its attacks on the regular Iraqi army on the Internet, then gradually vanished from the radar until the arrest of its leader—whose identity is unknown—last February, near Kirkuk.

The alliance between Al-Qaida in Iraq and Al-Qaida in Syria is more proof of the “natural” links between Syrian and Iraqi Sunnis. United under the banner of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), their fighters can move freely across the Iraqi-Syrian border, held by the Syrian rebels. Formed in Iraq in 2006, as a platform for a number of jihadist groups, ISIS has become a powerful force in the war in Syria. It enjoys freedom of movement and has no problems in supplying itself. In this border region, tribal alliances are old, and inhabitants of Fallujah or al-Qaim are always welcome in Abu Kamal in Syria.

The Syrian conflict really did spill over into Iraq in March last year. Forty Syrian soldiers and civil servants were killed in Iraq’s Anbar Province, to which they had fled after a rebel attack. Seven Iraqi soldiers also died.

The crises in Iraq and Syria may have different causes, but they share a sectarian aspect. The Syrian civil war is between mainly Sunni rebels and a coalition of ethnic and religious minorities supporting the Assad government. In Iraq, a mainly Shia government faces sometimes political and sometimes armed opposition from Sunnis.

So it is probably no coincidence that, as the Syrian civil war has intensified, sectarian conflicts have been revived in Iraq. Even the US government attributes an important role to Iraq in the Syrian crisis. During al-Maliki’s visit to Washington in October, Barack Obama apparently asked the Iraqi premier to use his good relations with Iran to persuade al-Assad to go quietly. Iraq is also under increasing pressure from Iran, the major Shia power in the region, as well as Saudi Arabia and Turkey, two major Sunni countries, which are the chief backers of the anti-Assad rebellion.

After a decade of unprecedented violence, Iraq is caught in a maelstrom of power struggles between Sunnis and Shias, feeding off the Syrian conflict. The Maliki government is trying to ignore the new regional alliances. The new electoral law, which sets the date for the next legislative elections at 30 April this year, is seen as a joke. Voters laugh at Iraq’s MPs —at the ease with which they pass laws favourable to their personal interests and the difficulty they have in agreeing on major issues.

Iraqi sociologist Amir Ahmed likens the elections to absurdist theatre, and Iraqi politics to Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot: “Every time there’s an election, the politicians announce the arrival of a man who promises change. But he never comes. They keep us busy and distract us, while we wait. The Iraqi people are waiting for Godot.”

“The existing Iranian presence in Iraq has increased mistrust and fear in the Arab region,” said Ahmed. “It is the sudden change in regional politics that has provoked all these tensions. And we must not forget that Iraq is an oil-rich country and this arouses the greed of international forces, which try to fuel the violence rather than stabilise the situation, since it’s easier to make a profit from a weak, unstable country than a strong and stable one.” Oil may be Iraq’s real problem.

 

Copyright © 2014 Le Monde diplomatique – distributed by Agence Global

The mathematics of NSA surveillance discussed by Professor Edward Frenkel from University of Califronia at Berkeley

Lecture by Professor Edward Frenkel

The Second Arab Awakening: And the Battle for Pluralism

Tom Friedman of New York Times takes a look at a new book by Marwan Muasher, The Battle for Pluralism in the Arab World.