“This is a refugee claimant who is seeking Canada’s protection from the Egyptian authorities, and usually those matters are private, and we would not communicate with a government that someone is alleging is persecuting them.”

Another transcript of a hearing on Oct. 25, 2017, shows the public safety minister’s counsel saying that a liaison officer was going to travel to Egypt to speak to a government minister about the Muslim Brotherhood.

The counsel said the officer was aware Elmady was a refugee claimant and would be discreet and make “limited inquiries,” according to the transcript.

Elmady authorized his translator to provide the transcripts to The Canadian Press.

Elmady said his refugee claim was rejected last October after the CBSA characterized him as a “security threat” because he is a member of the Freedom and Justice Party of Egypt that’s linked to the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Muslim Brotherhood is not listed on Canada’s list of terrorist entities.

Elmady was one of millions of Egyptians who took to the street in the 2011 Arab Spring uprising to protest against the country’s then-president, Hosni Mubarak, and demand democracy. His party came to power following the 2012 elections, a year after Mubarak’s resignation.

In 2013, Egypt’s army chief seized power in a military coup against the elected Freedom and Justice Party’s government.

Since then, the government has been arresting thousands of the party’s members and Muslim Brotherhood supporters after labelling them as “terrorists” in a campaign that Amnesty International called in 2015 a “ruthless bid to crush dissent.”

Elmady said the campaign against his party forced him to flee Egypt for Saudi Arabia before eventually landing in Canada in 2017.

Another lawyer for Elmady, Washim Ahmed, said he was detained following his landing in Vancouver for two months, and he did not have a battery for his hearing aid device that he needs.

During the interrogation, the CBSA also breached client-solicitor privilege by accessing an email exchange between him and a lawyer without his consent, Ahmed alleged.

Elmady said the CBSA assessment of his case was based on unfair procedures that put him and his family in Egypt at risk.

He said the Egyptian police are now closely watching his father, wife and two children and are intimidating them.

“My father was arrested for two days,” he said in Arabic. “My wife doesn’t know what to do.”

Mithoowani said her client is now challenging his inadmissibility decision before the Federal Court and is filing for a pre-removal risk assessment which would give him limited protection to stay in Canada if he proves that his life will be at risk if he is deported.

The CBSA said it would be inappropriate to comment on a specific case when there is ongoing litigation.

It said the removal of an individual from Canada follows a series of processes and recourse mechanisms that afford foreign nationals due process.

“It is only after such processes have been exhausted that the CBSA can remove a person from Canada,” the agency said in a statement.

“We can also tell you that the CBSA is committed to respecting private, sensitive and privileged information while also protecting the safety and security of the Canadian border.”

CBSA added that officers are instructed not to examine content clearly marked as being subject to solicitor-client privilege, nor to examine content over which a traveller asserts privilege.

In a statement earlier this month, Mary-Liz Power, then a spokeswoman for Public Safety Minister Bill Blair, said privacy legislation prevents her from commenting on specific cases but everyone deserves equal and competent treatment in their interactions with border services officers.

“(The officers) undergo mandatory anti-racism training that benefits them, the agency, and helps them better support the public they serve every day,” she said.

“We will always ensure Canada remains a welcoming country for those fleeing war and persecution.”

Justin Mohammed, a human rights law and policy campaigner at Amnesty International Canada, said Canadian officials should be informed by context if they inquire about refugee claimants to their country of origin, especially when the foreign government itself is the alleged agent of persecution.

“It would be really important to consider the possibility of harm that could come to relatives or other persons who are close to the refugee claimant,” he said.

Mithoowani said the case speaks to the need to provide a body that can oversee the actions of the border agency. There’s too much discretion left to individual agents, she said.

“What this case shows is that there’s a systemic problem of CBSA agents acting in ways that they should not act,” she said.

“There are no effective complaint mechanisms. There’s no overview of these processes, even though their actions can have such devastating consequences.”

The Liberal government tabled two pieces of legislation that would make the CBSA subject to the same civilian complaints process that applies to the RCMP, but the bills didn’t pass in Parliament.

Elmady said he doesn’t understand how, in a country such as Canada, his case has been handled the way that it has.

“I was hoping, over the last three years, that there would be justice and someone would understand my situation.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 19, 2021.

This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

Source: https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/lawyers-for-egyptian-asylum-seeker-facing-deportation-say-oversight-of-cbsa-needed-1.5434076

The post Lawyers for Egyptian asylum-seeker facing deportation say oversight of CBSA needed first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

It may not be news on the mainstream outlets, but we’re in the middle of an insurrection to overthrow everything to do with the United States.  Months after the fact, “protesters” are still battling police in the streets at all hours of the night and early morning.  They’ve spray-painted buildings, including federal offices and courthouses.  The coalition of antifa, black lives matter and Muslim brotherhood have banded together to battle police throwing every available projectile at them.  President Trump has sent officers from the Border Patrol and Homeland Security to protect federal property, and you undoubtedly know the response, not only from the protest groups, but from the “progressive” Mayors of Portland, Chicago and other big cities.

“Clean up the graffiti and go home!”  For at least a week most media outlets have come unglued, claiming that Trump has unleashed “federal troops” to “disappear peaceful protesters in unmarked vehicles.”  They’ve said, “This is what we’d expect of a foreign dictator.”  It looks as though we can expect this narrative to play on.  The President has just said he intends to send federal police to a list of cities, including Albuquerque?

Apparently the carnage in Minneapolis and New York was so spectacular, the media failed to even inform us about what a hotbed Portland had become.  The insanity is ongoing in Portland to this day.  It’s the sixties all over again, with a whole generation having been brainwashed instead of educated. The radical bombers and rioters of the ’60s are now esteemed professors, and they’ve turned the nation’s youth against their own parents and against the United States.

There’s no way I can’t tell you of the work Glenn Beck has done, exposing the connections between the radical professors, the “Arab Spring” protests that roiled the Middle East, the invasion of Europe by “poor refugees” and now the full-blown attempt to destroy the American culture and economy.  He’s got the goods.

Some of us have been highly suspicious of the media reporting about the Chinese virus.  Yes, we do know of a handful of people who are said to have tested positive.  But none of them died, and for some it was a matter of something like the common cold.  For others we know it was like a bad flu, but they survived it and are doing fine.  Nevertheless, every news report claims a new spike in cases, and proceeds to lecture that you must be afraid.

News anchors across the board read the “wire,” claiming that cases are “exploding” in state after state, county after county, city after city.  You must proceed with fear, assuming you proceed at all.   They express total exasperation at President Trump for not having issued a national mask order.  Meanwhile lawsuits are flying over mask “mandates.”  All the mandates we care about are the ones God-ordained.  Isn’t that the whole idea behind the American philosophy?  Laws are to maintain a peaceful, orderly society according to God’s Laws for mankind.  Beyond that, we don’t think too much of little officials who’ve had a taste of power.

Here in Texas, our governor saw fit to order a mask mandate.  He says we can all go back to living if we’ll just wear our masks, wash our hands, stay at least six feet apart and stop touching our faces.  You’d be amazed at how few pay the least bit of attention.  But businesses don’t have that luxury.  If they’re a restaurant or bar, they can have their business license or liquor license revoked if they don’t follow protocol, regardless of the soundness of whatever logic the “authorities” are pushing this week.  Credit goes to Victor Davis Hansen for coming up with this gem.  “They’re trying to save our lives by preventing us from living.”

Meanwhile, the media’s beloved protesters obviously don’t care a whit about “keeping everyone safe.”  Portland, Oregon has nightly battles between protesters and police.  These poor cops are standing around dodging rocks, bricks and frozen water bottles.  Meanwhile the President sent in some Border Patrol, U. S. Marshals, and DHS officers to protect the federal courthouse and office buildings.  And the media goes nuts.

Who knew there was trouble in Albuquerque, of all places?  It’s going to get a compliment of federal police too.  Turns out they’ve had violent confrontations in the streets resulting in shootings.  All this is over a statue of a conquistador who founded the settlement, but is accused having massacred Indians.  All that happened some 400 years ago, long before the founding of the United States.  Do you ever get the idea that radicals are just looking for an excuse to create anarchy?

It’s “marshal law” say all the networks.  They’re “stormtroopers.”  It’s the gestapo!  Anchors and “experts” on all the cable channels claim that this is merely a dry run for when Trump refuses to leave the White House after losing the upcoming election.  They wedge that in between calling the President a racist, xenophobe, narcissist, dictator, claiming he values his political fortunes more than he cares about the people of the United States.  Just guessing, but it’s doubtful many would have given up the luxury and freedom of his billionaire lifestyle to become the target of lowlife communists, the darlings of network anchors.

The Church of God has a history of preaching that the end of the age is at hand.  It made the mistake of predicting that the church would flee to a place of safety, even naming that place, as the tribulation of Matthew 24 and the book of Revelation began destroying western culture.  That was fifty and more years ago.  Since then, some of these guys who led away splinter groups have called themselves prophets and apostles and claim they are administering the “government of God” among their flocks and will lead them to a place of safety.  That is, after their people have given everything they have to the “church.”

If somebody knows what they’re saying or doing now, please keep it to yourself.  We don’t even want to know.  It’s a huge embarrassment that they took some of the most bizarre claims of Herbert W. Armstrong very late in his life, when he was suffering severe health problems and under the smothering influence of his “advisor,” and applied those claims to themselves.  Suddenly they are apostles and prophets with God’s infallibility, and people just wait for their instructions.  If you’ve ever been under such dictatorial authority, our hearts go out to you.

Ours is a work of watching and warning, not issuing and enforcing “orders.”  Things are getting mighty dicey of late.  We’ve got a communist insurrection underway that is wealthy and has the tacit approval of most mainstream corporations and media.  Sports used to be a way of escaping the nonsense.  Not any more.  The franchises are all going to rub our faces in their racist nonsense.  Professional baseball, basketball and football have gone out of their way to let us know they side with the mob.  Most TV networks are not only on board, but airing ads about how they stand for diversity, inclusion, equality and justice.  In fact, they’re hoping they don’t get burned to the ground.

When you look at the bravery and the dignity with which our founders conducted themselves in the business of winning our freedom, this stuff looks like tiddlywinks.  But only in terms of its actual importance.  Some of us believe the racists are the people trying to rile everybody up about racism.  The rest of us are hoping the anarchists and the violent masked masses find something productive to do with their lives.

The United States has been a great blessing to all mankind.  We’ve got real concerns, and no time to be drawn aside by a bunch of thugs yearning to loot expensive retailers.  We want the police to do their jobs and return peace and order to cities and public places.  We’re not about to take a knee, or join some movement of appeasement.  If they’re bent out of shape about some historical injustice, they can write a letter.  But attacking police has got to stop.  Rioting, burning, looting is not protest.  The protests are NOT peaceful.  They are cover for a movement that seeks to destroy Western culture.

In my neighborhood, two houses have lawn signs that say God is in control.  Certainly God has intervened at critical times in history, and you’d have to be blind to ignore the miracles He wrought, several in the war that won our independence.  But the idea that He’s “controlling” the lies, the deceptions and the violence we see playing out around us seems a stretch.  My Dad believed that God allowed humanity to do what it would, intervening only when He saw fit.  Will He see fit to intervene and save the Western world?  Does the Western world deserve His intervention and continued blessings?

God is in control whenever He wants to be.  Otherwise, he’s allowing events to unfold here on Earth.  He hears the prayers of the righteous, but how many are there?  It seems that there are many upright people trying to do what’s right, but have been deceived by their own families and churches about God’s Sabbaths and commanded observances that commemorate historical events of all our forefathers.  There are things they don’t understand and cannot accept, but they are living otherwise honorable lives.

Evil has descended upon the United States, Canada, Britain, Australia, and Europe.  All have been consumed by the deception we call fake news.  Every one of those nations has already fallen victim to an ideology of evil, contrary to the Bible and contrary to the founding principles that allowed for the peace and prosperity foretold and promised to Abraham by God.  He made good on His promises, but our societies have long since abandoned our responsibilities that were part of the covenant.  In essence, we’ve nationally reneged on respecting His Word and obeying His Laws.

Society has demanded that we acquiesce to some of the most heinous sins ever invented.  They are celebrated with parades and debauchery, you must applaud lest “society” destroy your life.  Our nation needs the prayers of people God respects.  We’re in the middle of a big deal, and it’s starting to look as if there’s no going back.  Not only with the communists that want to destroy freedom and capitalism, but with communist China. If we want God to intervene and save Western civilization one more time, it will take repentance for having broken His Laws.  No, there is not yet a ten-nation beast power.  Jerusalem is not surrounded with armies.  We can still buy and sell, sort of.  The abomination of desolation has not been set up, and there is yet no temple.  But Western civilization is in grave trouble.  We suspect that the author of evil is directing the deception and the destruction, and we know where the only hope lies.

Mark

PS  It looks as though we’ll still be able to keep all our Feast sites running. Of particular concern was the one at Land Between the Lakes.  But that was a false alarm and we are secure in that location.  Any questions can be directed to our Coordinator Mike Partridge (812) 867-9835.

Source: http://www.intercontinentalcog.org/fridayupdates.php

The post Weekly Update by Mark Armstrong – 24 July 2020 first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Demonstrators take part in ongoing anti-government protests in Tahrir Square, Baghdad, on Tuesday.Ahmed Jadallah / Reuters

Nearly 17 years ago, the United States invaded Iraq and toppled the government of Saddam Hussein. That created a power vacuum partly filled — and exploited — by Iran. The U.S. has been trying, with limited success, to dampen its regional arch enemy’s influence over Iraq ever since. In recent weeks, assistance has come from an unlikely source: the Iraqi people.

In early October, the Arab Spring finally arrived in Iraq. Large-scale demonstrations broke out against the government, pitting thousands of young protesters against a government they believe has failed them economically and politically and want it to step aside. Demands for jobs, respect for human rights, an end to corruption and better public services are at the heart of protesters’ grievances. But so is anger at Iran for trying to use Iraq’s political class for its own ends.

Tehran has tried to build influence in Iraq for well over a decade in a not-so-subtle effort to turn Iraq into a subservient vassal state, provoking deep resentment among many ordinary Iraqis. In fact, the protests were touched off by outrage at the reassignment of a popular Iraqi counter-terrorism official who had been trying to rein in pro-Iran armed militias. And the volume of anti-Iran rhetoric is only growing; a few days ago, Iran’s consulate in the southern city of Karbala was attacked.

In a region with few signs of hope, this popular uprising against political and economic corruption, with anger toward Iran at its center, is both a serious challenge and a beacon of possibility for the United States. It is a ground-up movement that threatens not only the Iranian grip on an important regional ally but Iran as well. The United States has a strong interest in helping Iraq navigate these tough challenges — both to help Iraq itself, which could fall victim once again to a resurgent Islamic State militant group if not shored up, and to counter Iran’s ambitions.

Iran is under growing duress from the Trump administration’s campaign of “maximum pressure,” which has ratcheted up sanctions and moved additional forces to the Persian Gulf to confront Iran’s nuclear ambitions and counter its destabilizing regional policies. In this context, Iran’s leaders see Iraq’s political turmoil in conspiratorial terms, blaming it on “foreign hands” (read: the U.S. and Israel). They know the damage that “losing” Iraq would do to their strategy for attaining regional supremacy.

And they are all too aware of the possibility that Iraq’s mass demonstrations could inspire a similar popular uprising in their own country, having been buffeted by the massive demonstrations of 2009’s “Green Movement” as well as countrywide protests early last year against the government’s economic policies and repressive theocratic rule.

That’s why Iranian security officials have advised Iraqi counterparts to get tougher on the protesters. Militia forces aligned with Iran have been suspected of involvement in the killings of demonstrators, and there have been allegations that Iranians took part. New reports suggest that Iran may be preparing to intervene on a larger scale.

The United States has a strong interest in helping Iraq chart a different course in dealing with the protesters. Beyond neutralizing Iran, Iraqi stability is vital to many U.S. interests, including minimizing the threat posed by ISIS and maintaining security in the Persian Gulf. Perhaps most important, a stable Iraq can show that an electoral democracy can take root in a volatile region and that there is a middle path between autocracy and chaos.

Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi has issued a 13-point reform plan in response to the criticism of the protesters, but he acknowledges there is no quick and easy fix and has offered to resign, a prospect the Iranians abhor as they see him as a political ally. President Barham Salih pledges to hold new elections eventually, but the process of forming another government would take months. Iraq, a country awash in weapons, needs to see conciliatory rhetoric and promises of change backed up by quick and decisive action rather than talk of change months down the road, or the situation could deteriorate dramatically.

It’s bad enough right now. Protests have turned steadily more deadly as government forces have turned their weapons on the demonstrators. At least 260 people have been killed and 10,000 wounded since the protests began in October, according to Iraq’s High Commission for Human Rights., and daily clashes between security forces and demonstrators are escalating in number and ferocity. A massive crackdown failed to tamp down the unrest.

As if the mounting challenge to Iraq’s political order were not worrying enough, chaos in neighboring Syria following the sudden withdrawal of most U.S. troops has opened the door for the re-emergence of ISIS. Since 2016, the group has transformed itself into a covert network with as many as 20,000 fighters in northern Syria and Iraq, where the United Nations believes it is preparing for an “eventual resurgence” to re-establish its “caliphate,” the quasi-state that once controlled an area the size of the U.K. Iraqi officials are clearly worried that the return of ISIS could exponentially magnify their internal crisis.

What’s taking place in Iraq is similar to the Arab Spring protest movements that toppled autocrats in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya beginning in 2011. They came close to overthrowing Syria’s dictator, Bashar al-Assad, too, before Russia and Iran intervened to prop him up. And they find echoes in the protests that have taken place recently in Lebanon, Egypt, Sudan, Algeria, and Morocco. Events in Iraq show that it, too, is vulnerable to the same discontent that brought down authoritarian, unresponsive governments elsewhere.

Ultimately, only Iraqis can fix Iraq. But Washington incurred a responsibility when it invaded the country in 2003. The United States must now do what it can to help provide the economic tools Iraq needs to address its problems, particularly by doing more to organize international efforts in support of long-neglected reconstruction projects in the hardest-hit provinces.

The U.S. should provide strong diplomatic backing for Iraqi leaders as they strive to implement the bold political plans and compromises they need and insist on respect for the human rights and civil liberties of the protesters. And Washington should make clear its commitment to Iraq’s security by increasing training, logistical support and equipment transfers to the Iraqi Security Forces.

American leadership on Iraq can begin to undo the damage the Trump administration’s chaotic policy in Syria has done to perceptions of U.S. regional leadership and put Iran on notice that it cannot have a free hand in the Middle East. These are tough challenges indeed, but challenges the U.S. cannot afford to ignore.

Source: https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/iraq-protests-against-iran-government-corruption-are-rare-sign-hope-ncna1078746

The post Iraq protests against Iran and government corruption are a rare sign of hope in the Mideast first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

This is an opportunity for Israel and Turkey to recognize a new alignment of interests.

As the brutal eight-year Syrian Civil War winds down, uncertainty over what the future holds for the country is prompting new alliances while testing established ties. Both Israel and Turkey border Syria and have a strategic interest in the postwar settlement that emerges there. While there has been no shortage of disagreements between Israel and Turkey over the past decade, both share a desire to see stability across their Syrian borders. However, each holds a different set of priorities informed by distinct geopolitical and national security exigencies. How this plays out may have far-reaching consequences for stability in post-war Syria and should be of close interest to the United States—a long time strategic ally of both Israel and Turkey.

Through key military cooperation agreements, Israel and Turkey were historically allied since the 1990s in pursuit of a shared goal: to deter the Syrian regime from hostile actions against them by creating a bulwark on its southwest and northern borders. Israel’s limited direct participation in the Syrian Civil War focused on thwarting the Islamic State (or ISIS) threat and the Hezbollah-Iranian presence near its frontier with the Golan and Lebanon. Turkey has been intertwined with the theatre of war at a greater cost. The Turkish Armed Forces conducted two major cross-border ground operations into northern Syria within the span of two years: Operation Euphrates Shield and Operation Olive Branch. Turkey controls Syrian territory in Afrin and its surrounding areas, and has amassed troops along the 566-mile border. Turkey received over 3.6 million Syrian war refugees since 2011, placing a burden on its already overstretched economy and sparking irreversible demographic changes. Israel received none, although it has been concerned that the refuge issue is destabilizing the regime in Jordan. Despite diverging wartime experiences, both Turkey and Israel share overlapping concerns about future stability in Syria.

First, a key shared goal is curbing the maneuverability space of armed non-state actors and militia groups. Indeed, in a Facebook post in March 2013, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu explained that one motivation behind his apology to Turkey’s President Recep Erdogan over the Mavi Marmara incident was the situation in Syria: “Syria is disintegrating, and the huge advanced weapons stockpiles are beginning to fall into the hands of different forces…it is important that Turkey and Israel can communicate with each other.”

According to Gallia Lindenstrauss, a senior research fellow at the Israel-based Institute for National Security Studies, while Syria has not developed into an area for cooperation between Turkey and Israel, neither has it become an area of competition between the two states. This is due mainly to diverging immediate priorities: Israel is focused on conflict triggers in southern Syria while Turkey is interested in the future of northern Syria.

Turkey views the establishment of an autonomous Kurdish region in northeastern Syria as an existential threat and seeks guarantees of the territorial integrity of the Syrian state. Turkey seeks to halt the territorial gains made by the American-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, which is dominated by the People’s Protection Units (YPG), a Syrian militia linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), an insurgent group the United States and Turkey list as a terrorist organization.

Israel’s support for the independence referendum held in Iraqi Kurdistan on September 30, 2017 put it at odds with Turkey. According to a Turkish foreign-policy expert that I spoke with, Ankara understands the Israeli approach to be “smaller is better” when it comes to its neighbors, meaning that the fragmentation of Syria into statelets or autonomous territories would serve Israel’s national security over a unified and stronger Syrian state.

Turkey’s fears may be exaggerated. Israel’s own experience with cross-border terror attacks means it can fully understand the challenges facing Turkey in Syria. Lindenstrauss adds that given the United States decision to withdraw from Syria, it is unlikely that Israel will take a strong position on the issue of Kurdish autonomy there.

Israel’s priority is dismantling the threat of Hezbollah on its northern border, making it paramount that steps are taken to oust Iranian forces and Shia militias out of Syria. With the winding down of the Syrian conflict, the fear is that eyes will invariably turn back to the group’s stated enemy of Israel. Moreover, as its engagement within Syria diminishes, Hezbollah will likely augment its position in Lebanon.

A related second goal is that Turkey and Israel both wish to limit Iran’s influence in Syria. Israel’s recent raids in Syria, including a September 2018 strike on ammunition depots in western Syria, were a clear signal of Israel’s intention to maintain its military dominance in the region, ignoring fears of backlash from Russia. After an attack on an Iranian arms depot near Damascus International Airport in January, Netanyahu announced that Israeli forces had attacked “Iranian and Hezbollah targets hundreds of times.”

Although Turkey is part of a coalition that supports Iran, it is weary of protracted Iranian influence over Syria, as well as its hegemonic aspirations over the wider region. Turkey has sought to place itself as a check on Iranian expansionism but has encountered setbacks after failing to oust the Assad regime.

The Israeli leadership perceives itself to have few allies in its bid to counter the entrenchment of Iranian-Hezbollah power in Syria. But this is an area where Turkey and Israel share a common interest. According to Nimrod Goren, the head of Mitvim (The Israeli Institute for Regional Foreign Policies), “Israelis tend to overestimate Turkey’s relations with Iran, and Turks tend to overestimate Israel’s relations with the Kurds in northern Syria.” Overcoming misperceptions and building mutual trust—however difficult that may seem in the short-term—will benefit both states as the security architecture of Syria takes shape.

Third, both states support a process of political transition to a postwar settlement. Applying a common pragmatic lens, both Israel and Turkey recognize that Bashar al-Assad has reconsolidated regime authority in territories lost to opposition forces in most of the country and that there are no alternatives to his leadership.

Obstacles to Realigning Cooperation

Despite complex shared interests on the future of Syria, as well as cooperation on natural resources, investment and trade, a number of factors at the regional and domestic levels complicate short-term realignment between Israel and Turkey.

The current situation is highly dependent on what Russia has in store for the beleaguered country of Syria. Despite public rhetoric to the contrary, Turkey maintains an uneasy relationship with its Arab neighbors and long-standing rivalries create a historic check on Turkey’s influence. Turkey has tilted toward Russia in recent years in a bid to re-calibrate its foreign-policy isolation that spiked due to its policy missteps during the Arab Spring. To regain strategic relevance over the future of its Syrian neighbor, Turkey continues to edge toward Moscow, a relationship that has tested its longstanding status as a NATO member.

In parallel to Israel’s enhanced relationship with the United States under the Trump administration, it has also cultivated ties with Russia in a bid to check Iranian influence. Putin has significant ties with Russian expatriates and investors within Israel and Israel’s continuing favor toward the Russian Church has warmed bilateral ties. Russia has assured Israel that it will work to deter Iran or Hezbollah from opening a new front with Israel. However, the extent of Russia’s influence over the Assad regime is not straightforward, making any promises to Turkey and Israel far from given.

At the same time, Israel’s relations with the Arab Gulf states has improved considerably in the recent period, and a reduction in anti-Israel rhetoric has signaled a turning point. Israel maintains strong trading relations with many states despite a lack of formal diplomatic relations. Part of this new web of relations is Egypt, which has increasingly been vying to reinsert itself as a regional player. By acting as an interlocutor with Hamas, Egypt has effectively removed a key claim Turkey held as a candidate for peace broker in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. With Egypt in the picture, Israel has learned it can rely less on Turkey as a middleman to influence the Hamas leadership in Gaza.

Complicating matter further, obstacles to closer ties are ubiquitous at the domestic level in both states. Turkey is under increasing pressure to find ways to correct its economic downturn and recent municipal elections have underlined the divide within opinion across the country. The current AKP administration, preoccupied with domestic stability, may well be tempted to distract its disgruntled heartland through posturing against Israel. At the same time, Israel is riddled with the problems of an increasing unilateral approach to policy making buoyed by the Trump administration, which has degraded Israel’s dovish factions. It is too soon to tell whether the current post-election period in both states will relieve some of the public pressure and encourage cooperation on shared strategic interests.

A further cause of uncertainty is how regional states will react to the looming announcement of the “deal of the century” to resolve the Arab-Israeli conflict, conjured up by chief negotiator and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. Turkey will find it more difficult to work with Israel if the plan spells the end of the two-state solution.

Turkey and Israel have cooperated in the past when mutual interests superseded short-term differences. At the moment, sufficient reasons for closer relations do not appear to exist. A Turkey expert who use to work in Tel Aviv said recently, “Only God knows” what the future holds for Turkey and Israel relations.

However, according to Goren, a scenario where Israel and Turkey launch a channel of policy and strategic dialogue regarding Syria will deliver benefits for both sides that are currently “missing out due to their bilateral crisis.” The ending of the Syrian war will provide a timely opportunity for Israel and Turkey to recognize a new alignment of interests. The United States can play a productive role to bring the two states closer together to facilitate stability in Syria, particularly against growing Iranian influence. It is clear that the most likely outcome is that despite vitriolic rhetoric to the contrary, increasing normalization and cooperation between two powers at security, political and economic levels will become a necessary theme over the next period.

Burcu Ozcelik is a Leverhulme Early Career Research Fellow at the University of Cambridge. Dr. Ozcelik’s research interests involve the contemporary politics of the Middle East, focusing on Turkey, Iraq, Syria and transnational Kurdish politics. Her work has appeared in Foreign Affairs, RUSI, Government and Opposition, Sada Middle East Analysis (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace), Lebanon’s Daily Star, Syria Forward, the Cairo Review of Global Affairs and the Journal of the Center for Middle Eastern Strategic Studies.

Image: Reuters

Source: https://nationalinterest.org/feature/syrian-civil-war-changing-turkish-israeli-relationship-61327

The post The Syrian Civil War is Changing the Turkish-Israeli Relationship first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, gave a televised speech to supporters this month in Baalbek, Lebanon. Iran has used Hezbollah to project power in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon and elsewhere. CreditDiego Ibarra Sanchez for The New York Times

BEIRUT, Lebanon — After the United States toppled Iraq’s dictatorship in 2003, Iran sent arms to militias and backed political parties there, bringing Iraq into its orbit.

After the Arab Spring uprisings early this decade battered the governments of Syria and Yemen, Iran deployed fighters and supported militias. In the chaos of Syria’s long-burning civil war, Iran seized the opportunity to build a military infrastructure there.

In 2015, President Barack Obama offered Iran what might have been the biggest opportunity of all: trading its nuclear program for the lifting of sanctions that had stifled Iran’s economy, paving the way for its reintegration into the international system.

Now President Trump, Israel and the Sunni Arab monarchies of the Persian Gulf want to change all that.

Last week, Mr. Trump withdrew the United States from the international nuclear deal with Iran, reimposing onerous American sanctions and threatening more penalties to punish Iran for its regional behavior. After falling out of favor since the Iraq War, talk of regime change in Tehran has returned to Washington in a way not seen since George W. Bush branded Iran part of the “axis of evil” in 2002.

Analysts said neither side wanted to escalate into a full-fledged war, which could quickly spiral into a regionwide conflagration, and by dawn, quiet had returned. But the risk of a broader war could not be ruled out.

“We may be O.K. for the next month or so, but we have a big structural problem,” said Cliff Kupchan, chairman of the Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy in Washington. “Iran wants to build infrastructure in Syria. Israel is dead set against that. So it’s a real witches’ brew. This is a preview of a serious long-term flashpoint.”

His worry was echoed by Ryan C. Crocker, a former United States ambassador to Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and other countries.

“There is real potential for a much bigger fight than we have seen so far, led by Israel,” Mr. Crocker said. “And will anything good come of it? Not at all.”

Iran would struggle to defend itself against a direct, multifront attack by Israel, the United States and the Gulf countries.

As a Persian, Shiite-led state, it is a sectarian and ethnic minority in a predominantly Sunni Arab region. Spurned internationally since a revolutionary Islamic government seized power in 1979, it has no access to Western weapons. And Iran’s poor economy means that its regional foes have outspent it on conventional weapons.

Instead, Iran has invested where it could: in relationships with substate actors that mostly share Iran’s Shiite faith and sense of underdog status.

The prototype for that strategy was Hezbollah, which officers from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps helped create in Lebanon in the early 1980s. Supporting Hezbollah gave Iran a means to fight the Israelis near Israel’s northern border, and later gave Iran a hand in Lebanese politics. Hezbollah, which Israel and the United States have long regarded as a terrorist organization, has since grown into a regional force in its own right.

“Iran is actually not as strong as we think,” said Bassel F. Salloukh, a political-science professor at the Lebanese American University in Beirut. “Its economy is quite weak, it is surrounded, so it has to project power in order to protect itself, and that strategy has worked very well, so they are duplicating it elsewhere.”

Another element of Iran’s power is what enemies call its aspirations and ability to build a nuclear bomb — a weapon Iran always has denied it wants despite past evidence of Iranian research on nuclear bomb-making.

Under the nuclear agreement of 2015, Iran reiterated its pledge to never “seek, develop or acquire any nuclear weapons.” So far, Iran has said it intends to abide by the agreement, despite the American withdrawal.

Iran’s regional military network could not protect it from a conventional attack, but acts as a deterrent by threatening significant costs on Iran’s foes.

Iran can strike Israel directly through Hezbollah, which is believed to have more than 100,000 missiles and rockets, some capable of hitting major Israeli cities and sensitive infrastructure. And Iranian support for the Houthis in Yemen has bogged down Saudi Arabia in a costly war there and made Saudi cities vulnerable to ballistic missiles from Yemen.

Those substate actors are difficult to defeat militarily, and wars against them could exacerbate the failed-state dynamics that Iran has proved adept at exploiting.

Syria remains the most likely flashpoint, but all of the parties say they do not want a broader war and they appear to be taking steps to prevent clashes from escalating. In its airstrikes in Syria, Israel has made efforts to target weapons and not people, assuming high death tolls could put pressure on Iran and its allies to retaliate.

Iran’s response to Israeli strikes so far has also been limited. The rocket attack on Thursday was aimed at Israeli military installations, not cities.

It remains unclear how Iran will respond to the new effort to roll back its influence. While some within the Iranian hierarchy want to preserve the nuclear agreement even without the United States, some have vowed confrontation.

“Resistance is the only way to confront these enemies, not diplomacy,” Hossein Salami, the deputy head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, said last week. “Exiting the deal and their concerns over Iran’s missile work are excuses to bring our nation to its knees.”

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/13/world/middleeast/iran-nuclear-mideast-conflict.html

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