Friday, August 8, 2014
Is the UN a party to the Gaza conflict between Hamas and Israel? Is there a way for the UN and UNRWA to actually foster peace and reconciliation rather than being a party to and perpetuator of the ongoing conflict?
The ongoing Gaza conflict has brought the UNRWA (the UN Relief Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees) into the spotlight, both in terms of its schools as refuges for those fleeing the fighting and its schools as storage places for the rockets used by Hamas to start the violence and also, according to some reports, as places from which to fire rockets at Israel.
With greater attention we now have more information about UNRWA and its long relationship with Hamas. Below are some excerpts from the following article:
http://online.wsj.com/articles/claudia-rosett-the-u-n-handmaiden-of-hamas-1407454401?mod=trending_now_4
With greater attention we now have more information about UNRWA and its long relationship with Hamas. Below are some excerpts from the following article:
http://online.wsj.com/articles/claudia-rosett-the-u-n-handmaiden-of-hamas-1407454401?mod=trending_now_4
"But Gaza under Hamas is a place with only two basic industries: aid and terrorism. These are much entwined, and not solely because Hamas controls Unrwa's staff unions in Gaza, where in 2012 a Hamas-affiliated slate swept 25 of 27 seats. In effect the U.N. group subsidizes Hamas. Among U.N. agencies in the Middle East, Unrwa is the largest employer, with a regular budget for 2014 of $731 million, and a total budget that, with emergency appeals, tops $1 billion.
The agency has roughly 30,000 staff on its payroll, almost all Palestinian. Some 12,500 work in Gaza, home to 1.2 million Unrwa-registered refugees, who account for about two-thirds of Gaza's population. The U.N. agency's welfare programs relieve Hamas of many of the costs of servicing the enclave it controls as its launchpad for terror."
...
"Thus unencumbered, Unrwa has ensured its own survival by transforming itself into the patron of Palestinian grievance, conferring refugee status down the generations, an unusual practice. The agency's website reports that since 1950 its roster of registered refugees has grown from an original 750,000 to 5.3 million—a sevenfold increase, all eligible for the Unrwa dole. For the Palestinians, this has been ruinous, fostering within an otherwise enterprising culture a crippling sense of entitlement and dependency."
...
"According to State Department historical data, the U.S. since Unrwa's inception has given the agency funds totaling $4.9 billion (closer to $7 billion in constant 2014 dollars).
In 2011 the agency opened an office in Washington run by two former U.S. government insiders: Matthew Reynolds, previously the State Department's assistant secretary for legislative affairs, and Chris McGrath, previously a media-events director for Sen. Harry Reid. The job descriptions include representing the U.N. agency's interests to the State Department and monitoring Congress on a daily basis to yield an "advocacy strategy dedicated to optimizing Unrwa's relations with Congress."
Thus U.S. tax dollars fund Unrwa officials now lobbying in Washington to obtain yet more money for an agency entwined with the rocket-launching, tunnel-digging rulers of Gaza. "
Is there a way for the UN and UNRWA to actually foster peace and reconciliation rather than being a party to and perpetuator of the ongoing conflict?
Thursday, August 7, 2014
Life and death in the Muslim world
The ongoing killing of Christians and other non-Muslims such as the Yazidis, and even Muslims of the "wrong" sect, has escalated in recent months throughout the Muslim world with only limited mainstream media attention. Would media attention make a difference? Would it result in action that would reduce the killing? What sort of action would be appropriate and skillful? By whom? I do not know.
Here are the excerpts from a recent review article that was sent to me:
"One of the most ancient Christian communities in the world, that of Iraq—which already had been decimated over the last decade, by Islamic forces unleashed after the ousting of Saddam Hussein—has now been wiped out entirely by the new "caliphate," the so-called Islamic State, formerly known by the acronym "ISIS."
...
http://www.meforum.org/4770/world-ignores-christian-exodus-from-islamic-world
update 8/07/14 - here are new recent reports and attention - let us see what results:
https://medium.com/war-is-boring/iraqs-refugee-crisis-just-got-worse-ed5971723cdb
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28699832
Here are the excerpts from a recent review article that was sent to me:
"One of the most ancient Christian communities in the world, that of Iraq—which already had been decimated over the last decade, by Islamic forces unleashed after the ousting of Saddam Hussein—has now been wiped out entirely by the new "caliphate," the so-called Islamic State, formerly known by the acronym "ISIS."
...
"Despite all these atrocities, exoduses, and even genocides, the mainstream media seems to spend every available moment airing images of displaced Palestinians and demonizing Israel for trying to defend itself. Yet Israel does not kill Palestinians because of their religion or any other personal aspects. It does so in the context of being rocketed and trying to defend itself from terrorism.
On the other hand, all the crimes being committed by Muslims against Christians are simply motivated by religious hate, because the Christians are Christian.
It is to the mainstream media's great shame that those who slaughter, behead, crucify, and displace people for no other reason than because they are Christian, rarely if ever get media coverage, while a nation such as Israel, which kills only in the context of self-defense, and not out of religious bigotry, is constantly demonized."http://www.meforum.org/4770/world-ignores-christian-exodus-from-islamic-world
update 8/07/14 - here are new recent reports and attention - let us see what results:
https://medium.com/war-is-boring/iraqs-refugee-crisis-just-got-worse-ed5971723cdb
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28699832
Wednesday, August 6, 2014
A second itteration of Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
In the midst of ongoing political controversy regarding net neutrality, we have new wrinkles in the internet and FCC concerns. Here are some excerpts from a recent article:
"Racial spoils are making a comeback at the Federal Communications Commission after being put mostly to rest in an important 2006 reform.
The latest sign is a quiet, nonpublic vote by Chairman Tom Wheeler and his two fellow Democrats to approve a waiver for minority entrepreneur David Grain, allowing him a 25% discount in this fall's spectrum auction—a nice windfall."
...
"From the moment Bloomberg News reported the David Grain waiver two weeks ago, the focus has been on Mr. Grain's political giving. He was a big Obama bundler and lately has been generous to South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn, whose daughter is the FCC's Ms. Clyburn. The importance of donations can be overstated, though Mr. Grain would have been a poor businessman not to start writing checks long ago to prepare to greet any goodies that might venture his way.
In any case, he may be a fine person (everybody says so), but his windfall is coming straight from the taxpayer's pocket. The episode also adds a perverse luster to Mr. Wheeler's record of finding new ways to bring unflattering attention to his agency. He came to his job with rare technological and business chops, and knowing his industry's Washington landscape inside-out. Like a lot of appointees who look good on paper, he turns out to be a clumsy politician whose clumsiness now threatens to metastasize into a full-blown scandal."
For the full article see:
Tuesday, August 5, 2014
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
The title's Latin phrase is often translated as "who watches the watchman?" or "who guards the guardians?"
What happens if no one is able to watch the watchmen? What if the watchmen are resisted and actively fought against?
See the following cautionary report.
"Forty-seven independent inspectors general who oversee the Obama administration are accusing officials of blocking their access to government documents, warning of “potentially serious challenges” to their authority.
What happens if no one is able to watch the watchmen? What if the watchmen are resisted and actively fought against?
See the following cautionary report.
"Forty-seven independent inspectors general who oversee the Obama administration are accusing officials of blocking their access to government documents, warning of “potentially serious challenges” to their authority.
"Refusing, restricting, or delaying an Inspector General’s access to documents leads to incomplete, inaccurate, or significantly delayed findings or recommendations, which in turn may prevent the agency from promptly correcting serious problems and deprive Congress of timely information regarding the agency’s performance," the inspectors general wrote in a letter 
to the House and Senate Oversight Committee chairmen and ranking members."
to the House and Senate Oversight Committee chairmen and ranking members."Interestingly, at the same time as this is being reported to Congress, "On Monday, Vice President Biden touted inspector generals as a crucial tool to fight corruption in a speech to African heads of state in Washington.
“There is also a need to have in every government agency what we in the United States call, and it could be different in every country, we call it an inspector general,” said Biden.
“Someone who is able to roam through every department, like here in the United States, the Defense Department, the IRS, the Treasury Department writ large, the Department of Interior, to be able to look at the books, to be able to look at everything that's transpired with independent eyes. People who cannot be fired,” he continued. "
Does Vice President Biden know not of what he speaks, does he assume that no one knows what is so or, worst of all, does he simply have no shame?
For the full details see this article:
Interesting recent history - coalitions of the left, right and political islamists
An interesting analysis of the recent history of political coalitions, and the potential ideological dilemmas and conflicts posed by these in the US and UK is found in
Double Bind: The Muslim Right, the Anglo-American Left, and Universal Human Rights by Meredith Tax.
There is an extended excerpt from this book at
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/180759/double-bind/3
Below are 2 quotes from that excerpt.
Double Bind: The Muslim Right, the Anglo-American Left, and Universal Human Rights
by Meredith Tax.There is an extended excerpt from this book at
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/180759/double-bind/3
Below are 2 quotes from that excerpt.
"Historically, the left has stood for certain values—at least in principle: separation between religion and the state; social equality; an end to discrimination against women and minorities; economic justice; opposition to imperialist and racist wars. In the last ten years, however, some groups on the far left have allied with conservative Muslim organizations that stand for religious discrimination, advocate death for those they consider apostates, oppose gay rights, subordinate women, and seek to impose their views on others through violence. This support of the Muslim Right has undermined struggles for secular democracy in the Global South and has spread from the far left to feminists, the human rights movement and progressive donors.
The far left’s embrace of Islamic fundamentalism mirrors distortions about Islam put about by anti-immigrant conservatives—the far right talks as if all Muslims were potential terrorists, while the far left talks as if salafi-jihadis represented all Muslims. Both ignore the fact that the vast majority of Muslims are like everybody else; they just want to survive and live their lives in peace. Very few of them support the interpretations and actions of salafi-jihadis, who no more represent all Muslims than the American Nazi Party or English Defence League represent all Christians."
...
"If solidarity with feminists and progressives in the South is essential for any hopeful political project in the North, so is defence of secular space. Since the end of the Cold War, secular spaces all over the world have come under siege by various forms of fundamentalism, and the instrumentalization of religion for political gain has become a problem in regions as varied as Eastern Europe, Central Asia, South Asia, Africa, South America, Western Europe and North America. In all these places, religious identity politics has muddied discussion of class, racism and discrimination against women and sexual minorities. Democratic governance is based on the idea that the authority of the state is delegated by the people rather than coming from God, and separation of the state from religion is essential to democracy because gender, religious minority and sexual rights are issues whenever human rights are limited by religion, culture, or political expediency.
In order to cut through the double binds described above—so we can defend ourselves and others against terrorism and counter-terrorism, empower civil society, promote universal human rights and strengthen democracy—we must think about both solidarity and secularism. These are not the only social remedies needed in a world torn by conflict and poised on the brink of ecological disaster, but both are essential to our ability to move forward."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)