AFP, Syria’s Alawites are closely associated with Bashar al-Assad (R) and his late father Hafez (L)
‘Muslim quality’
In part from BBC: The Alawites emerged in the 10th Century in neighbouring Iraq.
Little has been confirmed about their beliefs and practices since then because, according to the leaders, they had to be hidden to avoid persecution.
However, most sources say the name “Alawite” refers to their veneration of the first Shia imam, Ali, the son-in-law and cousin of the Prophet Muhammad.
AFP: Shia power Iran and Lebanon’s Shia Hezbollah movement are assisting the Assad regime
For full comprehensive summary by the BBC, go here.
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al-Arabiya: The most significant development coming from Syria in the last few days is not the killing of Al-Qaeda spokesperson in Idlib or the US-Russian chatter denying a plan to oust Bashar Al-Assad. It was a document leaked to the Western media and dubbed as the “declaration of identity reform” signaling signs of discontent from elders in the Alawite community towards the Syrian regime.
Alawite discontent
“The declaration from the Alawite leaders is a watershed moment in how the minority is publicly untying itself from Assad family, and attempting to pursue a pact of coexistence in Syria”, Joyce Karam.
Assurances from Region and Russia
WSJ: GENEVA—Talks aimed at ending the five-year war in Syria ground to a halt with the government and opposition divided over fundamental issues, including whether President Bashar al-Assad’s political fate even belongs on the agenda.
The regime insists that Mr. Assad remain in power, and the opposition demands that he step down. With an August United Nations deadline looming to form a new government and the peace process floundering, participants in the talks have floated alternatives aimed at breaking the deadlock that appease some parties but anger others.
Among the ideas are to transfer Mr. Assad’s powers to a handful of deputies; to form a new ruling council comprised of Syrian military officials and moderate rebel leaders; and to coalesce around a new Syrian leader who feuding camps could support.
None of the alternatives has gained traction, and each would face serious, possibly insurmountable, obstacles even if they garnered support in the Geneva talks. The discussions around them are a sign of the lengths to which negotiators are going in an effort to maintain some form of dialogue.
“Geneva is a process without content,” a senior Western diplomat said. Much more here.
Category Archives: Presidential campaign
General Dunford: No Fair Fight
Secretary Carter’s Opening Remarks
No Fair Fights for U.S. Troops, Chairman Says
DefenseDept: WASHINGTON, April 27, 2016 — The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff repeated to the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee what has become a mantra to him: he doesn’t believe the United States should ever send American service members into a fair fight.
“Rather, we have to maintain a joint force that has the capability and credibility to assure our allies and partners, deter aggression and overmatch any potential adversary,” Marine Corps Gen. Joe Dunford, who was joined by Defense Secretary Ash Carter, told the committee members.
Carter and Dunford provided testimony on Defense Department’s fiscal year 2017 budget request.
Improving current capabilities, restoring full-spectrum readiness and developing leaders for the future are key to maintaining the greatest advantage the U.S. military has over any rival — its people, the chairman said.
No Shortage of Challengers
The United States has no shortage of challengers from state adversaries to non-traditional foes. The five challenges the Defense Department’s fiscal year 2017 budget request focuses on are Russia, China, Iran, North Korea and violent extremism.
Russia, China, North Korea and Iran continue to invest in military capabilities that look for the soft spot in American defenses, Dunford said. “They are also advancing their interests through competition with a military dimension that falls short of traditional armed conflict and the threshold for a traditional military response,” he said.
The actions of Russia in Ukraine, China in the South China Sea and Iran throughout the Middle East are examples of the challenges the DoD must address, he said.
But the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and al-Qaida still pose dangers to the homeland, the American people and friends, allies and partners, the general said. “Given the opportunity, such extremist groups would fundamentally change our way of life,” he said.
Nuclear Capabilities
Added to these challenges is the priority to modernize the nuclear capabilities of the United States, Dunford said.
The nuclear triad underpins deterrence in the world, but new domains also must be considered, the chairman said. Space and cyberspace are now realms of combat, and the nation must develop and maintain credible capabilities in these realms as well, he said.
Underlying all these threats is the reality of the fiscal environment, Dunford added.
“Despite partial relief from Congress on sequester-level funding, the department has absorbed $800 billion in cuts and faces an additional $100 billion of sequestration-induced risk through fiscal 2021,” he said. “Absorbing significant cuts over the past five years has resulted in our under-investing in critical capabilities. Unless we reverse sequestration, we will be unable to execute the current defense strategy.”
Right Trajectory
Overall, he told the senators, DoD’s FY 17 budget request “puts us on the right trajectory, but it will require your support to ensure the joint force has the depth, flexibility, readiness and responsiveness that ensures our men and women will never face a fair fight.”
But, the chairman warned, a bow wave of requirements lie ahead, including those tied to the Ohio-class submarine replacement program, continued cyber and space investment programs and the B-21 long-range bomber program
Trump: America First, Foreign Policy Presentation
Good for Donald Trump, America should be first when it comes to policy and diplomacy. Applause to the Donald for that standard. Well said.
Tell us again how to pronounce Tanzania or San Bernardino.
What was not said however is disturbing for those who have a keen interest in foreign policy. Of particular note, the Ambassador of Russia was sitting on the front row. Perhaps this is but one reason, Trump never mentioned Russia or Vladimir Putin.
Remember it was only recently that Russia has been more than provocative in reckless actions against a U.S. destroyer and U.S. military aircraft. This is a violation of the IncSea Treaty. This is not the first time either, noting Russian bombers off the West Coast and the same with our European allies. What about the Baltic States, Crimea or Ukraine? Anything?
What about the constant war in the cyber realm? Trump did mention artificial intelligence, does he know what that is? What about electronic or economic warfare?
al Qaeda, Boko Harem, Haqqani, Jabhat al-Nusra, Houthis? Nah….the plight of Jews and Christians, Yazidis, Peshmerga? Standing with France on their recent attacks? Nothing about China’s aggression with the new islands and fighter jets there?
Well said Donald on the destruction of Islamic State, high marks for that. Additional high marks for the IRGC and kidnapping our sailors.
Trump made a mere simple reference to Iran and their nuclear program, stating they will never have a nuclear weapon and the Joint Plan of Action was a bad deal. How come no reference to Iran being a violator of conventions, a rogue state sponsor of terror? Nothing about the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp or Hezbollah or IED’s made by Iran that killed and maimed our soldiers? What about Iran’s collusion with North Korea? Anything on that? No…
Does Trump approve of John Kerry’s work as the current Secretary of State? Humm, perhaps as Trump never mentioned Kerry.
Syria unleashed Islamic State? Really? Trump blames China for North Korea. Does Donald think that China is fully, exclusively responsible and accountable for Kim Jung Un?
Why no mention of foreign aid? There is likely a bailout coming for Puerto Rico. Does Trump have a clue on that? When it comes to NATO, Trump backed off and merely mentioned that only four member countries pay the 2% of GDP. Never a mention that countries do pay the United States for bases and protection like Philippines and Japan. Did Trump slight Israel by not stating nurturing and restoring the relationship or is he still in a neutral position when it comes to the Palestinians? Hamas? Anything on human rights violations? What about the corruption of the United Nations?
When referencing Cuba, Trump correctly stated that Obama was slighted at the airport with no Cuban official being on the formal reception. Is Trump cool with normalizing relations with Cuba considering the treatment of dissidents or U.S. criminals that have receive safe haven on the island or the debt Cuba owes to U.S. domestic corporations for nationalizing them? What about Guantanamo as a whole?
Forgotten is a war we are currently fighting against the Taliban in Afghanistan…not a word at all by Trump.
Trump did layout his policy on foreign matters stating diplomacy, caution and restraint. That is always the standard. Did Trump mention he was going to revisit or retool those approaches? No….
Most disturbing, included in Trump’s foreign policy speech was the feeble condition of our own nuclear program and the military as a whole. Why explain any weakness at all where adversaries are listening with a keen ear? The U.S. military is still today the most advanced power on the globe while new technologies and weapons systems are in the future pipelines. Hey Donald, how about making a positive declaration about the military condition and the work of the Pentagon and the military collaboration with allies that does demonstrate strength?
Well, here is the text of his speech for your reference.
For additional reference, those included on Trump’s foreign policy team are:
Zalmay Khalilzad, the former Ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan. He is under investigation. Trump only met Khalilzad earlier in the day. Further, the Ambassador stated that if Hillary had asked him to be part of her team, he would gladly do so.
Walid Phares, a Lebanese Christian and commentator on Middle East Affairs.
George Papadopoulos, energy consultant
Carter Page, energy consultant and lobbyist for Gazprom, a Russian energy company
Joe Schmitz, fired as former Inspector General, Department of Defense, formerly of Blackwater and his sister is Mary Kay Letourneau gained infamy after having a sexual relationship with her 12-year-old student, to whom she is now married.
LTG Keith Kellogg (ret), Chief Operating Officer of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad, Iraq
A New Scheme for Syrian Refugees?
Related: Obama pledge to welcome 10,000 Syrian refugees far behind schedule
Read more from the White House directly:
Infographic: The screening process for refugee entry into the U.S.
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“Alternative Safe Pathways” for Syrian Refugees – Resettlement in Disguise?
CIS.org: With the Syrian crisis entering its sixth year, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is thinking of “innovative approaches” to organize Syrian admissions, alongside the refugee resettlement program, to countries willing to welcome them. UNHCR’s target for resettlement is 480,000 places over the next three years; it is not sure how many additional admissions into the U.S. and elsewhere these new “alternative safe pathways” will ensure. Refugees who are not resettled could be “legally admitted” using various routes described below.
The legitimacy and transparency of these new “alternative pathways,” aimed at admitting increasing numbers of Syrian refugees into the United States without calling them “refugees,” remain to be seen. They might even amount to convenient admissions detours at a time when the U.S. refugee resettlement program is under tight scrutiny.
In a panel discussion on The Global Refugee Crisis: Moral Dimensions and Practical Solutions organized by the Brookings Institution earlier this year, Beth Ferris, Research Professor at Georgetown University and adviser to the United Nations Secretary General on humanitarian refugee policy, talked about the need to find different solutions to the ongoing humanitarian Syrian crisis. The refugee resettlement program was no longer sufficient to admit Syrian refugees she said; “alternative safe pathways” are needed:
Refugees and government officials are expecting this crisis to last 10 or 15 years. It’s time that we no longer work as business as usual … UNHCR next month [March 2016] is convening a meeting to look at what are being called “alternative safe pathways” for Syrian refugees. Maybe it’s hard for the U.S. to go from 2,000 to 200,000 refugees resettled in a year, but maybe there are ways we can ask our universities to offer scholarships to Syrian students. Maybe we can tweak some of our immigration policies to enable Syrian-Americans who have lived here to bring not only their kids and spouses but their uncles and their grandmothers. There may be ways that we could encourage Syrians to come to the U.S. without going through this laborious, time-consuming process of refugee resettlement.” (Emphasis added.)
The UNHCR conference Ferris was referring to took place in Geneva this March 30. It is one of a series of initiatives aimed at comprehensively addressing the Syrian crisis in 2016. The Geneva “High-level meeting on global responsibility sharing through pathways for admission of Syrian refugees” focused on the need for a substantial increase in resettlement numbers and for “innovative approaches” to admit Syrian refugees. It followed February’s London Conference on Syria, which stressed the financial aspect of this humanitarian crisis ($12 billion pledged in humanitarian aid) and precedes a September 2016 high-level plenary meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. Worthy of note here, President Obama will host a global refugee summit this September 20 on the margins of this upcoming General Assembly meeting.
The focus of the Geneva meeting was to introduce “other forms of humanitarian admissions” since “[r]esettlement is not the only aim”, explained UNHCR’s spokesperson. UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi appealed to the international community in his opening statement, calling for “alternative avenues” for the admission of Syrian refugees:
These pathways can take many forms: not only resettlement, but also more flexible mechanisms for family reunification, including extended family members, labour mobility schemes, student visa and scholarships, as well as visa for medical reasons. Resettlement needs vastly outstrip the places that have been made available so far… But humanitarian and student visa, job permits and family reunification would represent safe avenues of admission for many other refugees as well.
At the end of the meeting, Grandi highlighted several commitments made by a number of participants in his closing remarks. Promises were made to:
- Increase the number of resettlement and humanitarian admission places.
- Ease family reunification and increase possibilities for family reunion.
- Give scholarships and student visas for Syrian refugees.
- Remove administrative barriers and simplify processes to facilitate and expedite the admission of Syrian refugees.
- Use resources provided by the private sector in order to create labor mobility schemes for Syrian refugees.
The Geneva meeting was attended by representatives of 92 countries, including the United States. Heather Higginbottom, Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources, reiterated in her remarks the U.S. commitment to refugees: “President Obama has made assisting displaced people a top priority for the U.S. government.” Last year alone the U.S. contributed more than $6 billion to humanitarian causes. So far this year, the United States has provided nearly $2.3 billion in humanitarian assistance worldwide. She also announced additional measures: “We are further increasing our support of Syrian refugees, and we will make additional contributions to the global displacement effort through September, and beyond”, while reminding the participants of President Obama’s role in hosting a high-level refugee summit this September.
The U.S. State Department released a Media Note following the Geneva meeting. It confirmed the goal of resettling at least 10,000 Syrians in FY 2016 and of 100,000 refugees from around the world by the end of FY 2017 – an increase of more that 40 percent since FY 2015. It also announced the following:
- “The United States pledged an additional $10 million to UNHCR to strengthen its efforts to identify and refer vulnerable refugees, including Syrians, for resettlement.”
- “The United States joins UNHCR in calling for new ways nations, civil society, the private sector, and individuals can together address the global refugee challenge.”
- “Additionally, the United States has created a program to allow U.S. citizens and permanent residents to file refugee applications for their Syrian family member.” [Emphasis added.]
On this last note, why create a family reunification program for Syrian refugees when refugees in the U.S. are already entitled to ask for their spouse and unmarried children under 21 to join them? Unless of course, the aim is to widen family circles to include aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters, grandmothers and grandfathers.
Let’s see if we got this right: More Syrian refugees are to be resettled in the United States; administrative barriers (including security checks?) are to be removed to expedite admissions. Come to think of it, this is exactly what we witnessed with the “Surge Operation” in Jordan, where refugee resettlement processes were reduced from 18-24 months to three months in order to meet the target of 10,000 Syrian refugees this year.
Moreover, the United States government, by its own admission, “joins UNHCR in calling for new ways” to move more Syrians to other countries. With the U.S. Refugee Resettlement program under close scrutiny, other routes for “legal admissions” (not “resettlement”) of Syrian refugees into the United States seem more appropriate. Those routes may vary from private sponsorships, labor schemes, expanded family reunification programs, humanitarian visas, medical evacuation, to academic scholarships and apprenticeships, etc.
What remains to be determined is how transparent these “alternative pathways” will be. Will we be given details about numbers, profiles, locations, screening, or costs? Also, what additional measures are we to expect from this administration as it prepares to host a Global Refugee Summit this September 20?
Meanwhile, we are left to wonder: aren’t these “pathways” for refugees nothing more than disguised resettlement routes? Akin to “pathways to citizenship” in lieu of amnesty…
Classified Obamacare Documents?
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, filed the subpoenas in 2013, see the announcement here. In part:
The Committee initially requested information on the CO-OP program in October 2012 and again in March 2013. A June 7, 2013 letter to Secretary Sebelius stated, “[T]his delay is unacceptable and your lack of transparency is troubling.”
The Obamacare CO-OP program used taxpayer money to loan $2 billion to companies establishing non-profit health insurance issuers. However, the Office of Management and Budget estimated the taxpayer losses for the loans at 43.2 percent. Moreover, several companies have experienced legal or financial troubles. For instance, the Vermont Health Co-op, which received a $34 million taxpayer-backed loan, was last month denied an insurance license by the state of Vermont. In letters to HHS, the Committee expressed concern that the process used to select loan recipients was flawed and lacked transparency.
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The Obamacare co-ops are tax-funded non-profit entities that were supposed to compete with private insurance companies. In this, they have failed spectacularly. In the last couple of years, 12 of the co-ops have shut their doors, costing doctors and hospitals million of dollars in losses. This year, some experts are predicting that up to 8 of the 11 remaining co-ops will go under as well. More here from AmericanThinker.
****IBD: Being the “most transparent administration” in history apparently doesn’t mean complying with a congressional subpoena to find out why more than half of the ObamaCare co-ops have failed.
That’s what the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is learning, at least. It has subpoenaed information relating to the 23 nonprofit co-op insurance companies that ObamaCare established with $2.5 billion in government loans.
The co-ops were supposed to provide price competition against commercial insurers, but last year many pushed for and got huge, double-digit rate hikes. Even so, more than half of the 23 set up have failed already, and it’s likely that eight more will collapse this year.
Given that taxpayers are on the hook for billions in loans that might never get repaid, it is only fitting that Congress should find out what went wrong and why.
But instead of providing answers, the Obama administration is stonewalling.
Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz said at a hearing this week, “Health and Human Services has not provided any valid legal reason for withholding information from this committee.”
The committee demanded documents back in November that would shed light on how the administration picked these co-ops, how much money has been spent and what plans the administration has to get federal loan money back from failed co-ops.
Chaffetz says that Obama officials merely “assert that if certain information was released publicly, it could cause consumers to think twice before enrolling in co-op insurance plans.”
That makes absolutely no sense. If other co-ops are likely to fail, then consumers should be aware of it, so they can avoid having their coverage disrupted midyear, which could mean changing doctors, paying higher out-of-pocket costs and so on.
This is hardly the first time that the administration has stonewalled congressional inquiries. If anything, it seems to be the unstated policy of the Obama administration.
In addition to the ObamaCare documents, for example, the Oversight Committee is battling to get documents related to the EPA’s massively expensive water regulations, the Department of Homeland Security’s policy on airport credentialing, the massive hack of government employee records and so on.
Obama officials get away with concealing anything and everything that might prove embarrassing or controversial because the “speaking truth to power” mainstream press largely ignores the stonewalling. So the White House doesn’t suffer any consequences or feel any pressure to change.
You can bet the media’s lackadaisical attitude about government transparency will suddenly change if a Republican ends up in the White House next year. But in the meantime, we may never get a clear answer to why the Obama administration flushed $2.5 billion in taxpayer money down the drain.