Trump’s envoys enable Israel’s worst extremists

US embassy claimed Ambassador David Friedman ”was not aware of the image thrust in front of him” when he was handed a doctored photograph with Jerusalem’s Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa mosque replaced by a Jewish Temple.Kikar HaShabbat

David Sheen- 13 June 2018

When US ambassador to Israel David Friedman received a framed photograph of the Old City of Jerusalem last month it confirmed something obvious: Donald Trump’s envoys don’t just support the positions of Israel’s far-right government but stand even further to the right of it.

The picture showed the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa mosque photoshopped out and replaced with a Jewish temple.

In the photo, first published by the Israeli news site Kikar HaShabbat, Friedman is seen grinning from ear to ear while being presented with the framed image, just days after he presided over the US moving its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Friedman appears to be delighted at the erasure of the al-Aqsa compound, among the most monumental architecture in historic Palestine, one of the principal sites revered by Muslims all over the world and an iconic symbol of Palestinian identity and nationalism.

The doctored image represents the fantasies of followers of the Temple movement, messianic Jewish extremists who seek the destruction of the al-Aqsa compound and its replacement with a Jewish temple where they would conduct ritual animal sacrifice of around 10,000 animals at a time on Jewish holy days.

The group’s religious supporters believe building the temple will speed up the transition of Israel’s system of government from a mostly secular ethnocracy that privileges Jews, into total theocracy, where Orthodox Judaism is the only law of the land.

The movement’s secular supporters would lose many liberties under a Jewish theocracy, but they campaign for the construction of a Jewish temple regardless, believing it would mean slam-dunking on the Palestinian national movement once and for all.

The chief rabbi of the Temple movement, Yisrael Ariel, formerly served as the deputy of the late Israeli arch-racist Meir Kahane in the 1980s when he was a member of the Knesset, Israel’s parliament.

Over the years, Ariel has held fast to Kahane’s genocidal views. In 2015, he called to assassinate then-US President Barack Obama, and for a Jewish army to conquer the entire Middle East, including Iran and Turkey, destroying all mosques and churches and killing all Muslims and Christians who do not renounce their religions.

After Friedman’s picture was published, the US embassy to Israel insisted that – despite appearances to the contrary – the photo did not represent any change in Washington’s official stance on al-Aqsa, stating, “The US policy is absolutely clear: we support the status quo on the Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount.”

The embassy also claimed that Friedman “was not aware of the image thrust in front of him when the photo was taken.”

But the Temple movement is so certain that the current US administration does in fact quietly support its maximalist goals that it recently minted a coin in honor of Trump.

The coin bears Trump’s face, alongside that of Cyrus the Great, a king of ancient Persia who Jewish tradition holds allowed the construction of a temple on the same spot about 2,500 years ago.

As for Friedman, it would not be out of character for him to support a movement led by supporters of Kahane who want to turn Israel into a total theocracy.

Just days before the US embassy move, it emerged that until the moment he was appointed US ambassador to Israel, Friedman headed a group – American Friends of Beit El Yeshiva Center – that funded the far-right Israeli organization Komemiut.

The family foundation of Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and senior advisor, has also donated to the Friedman-headed group that funded the fanatical Komemiut.

Komemiut’s chief rabbi is Dov Lior, who regularly eulogizes Meir Kahane at the memorials held annually in his honor.

Lior is also a supporter of The King’s Torah – a religious text that permits Jews to murder non-Jews, even children, if one suspects that they may grow up to pose a threat to Jews.

The Kushners even made a donation to the Od Yosef Chai Yeshiva, a religious seminary in the occupied West Bank whose head rabbi Yitzhak Shapira had authored The King’s Torah.
Lior, notably, is one of the rabbis who issued religious edicts that made Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin fair game for the assassin who shot him dead in November 1995 because he had signed the Oslo agreements with the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Far-right ideology goes mainstream

The ideology of Israel’s far-right is gradually being adopted by the mainstream.
But if Friedman and Kushner have been supporting Israel’s most racist rabbis, they have not acted alone in this.

Yisrael Ariel’s Temple Institute receives funding from Israel’s education ministry to teach Jewish youth, religious and secular, about Jewish temples, past and future.

Dov Lior’s Komemiut movement has hosted at its conferences not only government lawmakers and ministers, but also opposition lawmakers from the supposedly centrist parties Labor, Zionist Union and Yesh Atid, as well as former and current judges of Israel’s high court.

And the Derech Chaim movement, headed by founder of the Kushner-funded Od Yosef Chai seminary, is now supporting legislation that would neuter that very high court, stripping it of the ability – which the court seldom uses anyway – to nullify laws that discriminate against Palestinians, other non-Jews and minority groups in general.

The fact that Trump’s envoys to Israel are signaling their support for these extremist groups, who all aspire to replace the al-Aqsa mosque with a Jewish temple, is indeed worrying. But it is especially unsettling when one considers that until relatively recently, these beliefs were nearly absent from the mainstream political discourse, even in Israel.

Just a few years ago, the Temple movement’s chief advocate in the Knesset was Moshe Feiglin, considered a far-right extremist.

In 1997, Feiglin was convicted of incitement because of the violent protests the movement he led engaged in prior to the assassination of Rabin, and for calling for actions against Palestinians.

But in more recent years, Feiglin and his followers worked from within the ruling Likud Party to promote his goals, including support for a Jewish temple.

And while he lost four Likud leadership races to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Feiglin’s presence in the party – and his promotion to deputy speaker of the Knesset – legitimized the most extreme sentiments of Israel’s far right.

During Israel’s brutal assault on Gaza in the summer of 2014, Feiglin – then deputy speaker – called for the “conquest of the entire Gaza Strip, and annihilation of all fighting forces and their supporters.”
He called for the Palestinian civilian population to be deprived of water and electricity,
“concentrated” in tent encampments along the Egyptian border and then expelled.
Increasingly frustrated at his inability to unseat Netanyahu, Feiglin eventually started his own political party in 2015, Zehut.

There have been no elections since he formed the party, and polls indicate Zehut would struggle to break the minimum threshold to enter the Knesset if it ran on its own.

But Feiglin’s efforts to pull Netanyahu’s Likud Party even further to the right were wildly successful.
In recent years, multiple ministers in Netanyahu’s government have publicly embraced the goals of the Temple movement.

Just two weeks ago, Israel’s Jerusalem affairs minister Zeev Elkin, also vying to become Israel’s next mayor of Jerusalem, announced the launch of a new government body to promote Temple movement propaganda, or hasbara.

The new body reportedly has the blessing of Netanyahu.

Now that Feiglin’s fanatical fantasies are receiving a tailwind from top Israeli officials, and even from Trump’s ambassador David Friedman, it might be prudent to take note of Feiglin’s current activities, as they could very well foretell Israel’s trajectory, if its reactionary leaders are left to their own devices.

Campaign video portrays politician slaying Palestinians

To be fair, incitement against Palestinian people, their leaders and others defending their rights has long been a staple of Israeli political discourse.

In 2015, for example, Avigdor Lieberman – then Israel’s foreign minister and today its defense minister – called for Palestinian citizens of Israel who he deemed disloyal to the state to be decapitated.

But anti-Palestinian provocations recently hit a new low, with incitement to murder moving from the verbal domain to video.

In a new campaign video, Zehut’s Moshe Feiglin is depicted killing Palestinians, as well as Israelis and others whom he considers insufficiently hawkish.

The six-minute video, which has since been taken offline, depicts Feiglin as a swordsman, hacking and slashing through a legion of enemies, including Palestinian member of the Knesset Ahmad Tibi and a series of characters with flags labelling them as the embodiment of Palestine, the European Union and the United Nations.

Feiglin is also portrayed slaying characters meant to represent liberal Zionist Israeli organizations, such as the New Israel Fund and Women of the Wall.

A character representing the left-leaning Israeli newspaper Haaretz is also killed by decapitation, and the death blow is delivered by a soldier with the face of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Viewers are not left wondering whether this wanton killing should mostly fall on Feiglin’s shoulders.
The video also depicts Feiglin delivering his political manifesto to his soldiers assembled for battle.

One of the gladiators – who include popular pundits from Israel’s far-right – is heard shouting back to Feiglin, “We are with you, sire! For freedom – to the death!”

The film was uploaded on 18 May by the Facebook page “Make Israel Great Again,” an account belonging to Feiglin’s Zehut party, but it had already been removed by 23 May.

It is unclear whether the video was taken down because its fight sequences contain unlicensed footage from a Hollywood feature film, 2014’s 300: Rise of an Empire, or because the video could constitute incitement to violence.

Other postings on the same page clearly incite the killing of Palestinian political leaders.

While Israel is quick to convict Palestinians it accuses of “incitement” over innocuous Facebook postingsincluding poems, Jewish citizens are hardly ever charged with the crime, much less convicted, although the Internet, especially Facebook is chock full of their calls to visit suffering and pain on Palestinians.

As such, Feiglin is unlikely to suffer any negative repercussions over the video.

But if Israeli support for far-right opinions only increased during the Obama administration, how long will it be before Feiglin’s message to murder Palestinians and and their alleged allies becomes normalized with Trump in the White House and the likes of Friedman and Kushner leading US policy on Israel?

Gunmen kill newspaper editor Shujaat Bukhari, two security guards in Kashmir

Bullet marks are seen on the car of Syed Shujaat Bukhari, the editor of Rising Kashmir daily newspaper, after unidentified gunmen attacked him outside his office in Srinagar, June 14, 2018. REUTERS/Stringer

Fayaz Bukhari-JUNE 14, 2018

SRINAGAR, India (Reuters) - Unidentified gunmen shot dead a prominent newspaper editor and two security guards in Kashmir on Thursday, police said.

Syed Shujaat Bukhari, editor of the Rising Kashmir newspaper, was leaving his office in the city centre of Srinagar when he was shot by three assailants on motorbikes, Senior Superintendent of Police Imtiyaz Ismail told Reuters.

Bukhari, who was given police protection following an attack on him 18 years ago, was hit by multiple bullets fired at a close range, Ismail said. There was no immediate word from police on the identity or possible motive of the gunmen.

Bukhari had been a strong advocate of peace in disputed Kashmir, at the heart of decades of hostility between India and Pakistan, both of which claim the Muslim majority region.

India had suspended operations against militants fighting its rule in Kashmir during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan which began last month, after weeks of sporadic violence there.

Waseem Ahmad, a local journalist, told Reuters that he heard gunfire ringing out and, reaching the location, found Bukhari and his two guards lying in a pool of blood in their car.

“Extremely shocking news,” said Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, who broke down in front of cameras.

“Terrorism has hit a new low with Shujaat’s killing,” Mufti said on Twitter. “We must unite against forces seeking to undermine our attempts to restore peace. Justice will be done.”

Bukhari had been part of India’s delegation for informal peace talks on Kashmir with Pakistani representatives held in Dubai last year. He was instrumental in organising several conferences for Kashmir peace.

Condemnation of his killing in Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir state, and condolences poured in from across the country.

 

People carry the body of Syed Shujaat Bukhari, the editor of Rising Kashmir daily newspaper, who was killed by unidentified gunmen outside his office in Srinagar, June 14, 2018. REUTERS/Danish Ismail

Calling Bukhari a fearless journalist, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on Twitter the killing was an act of cowardice and “an attempt to silence the saner voices of Kashmir”.

More than 130 people have been killed this year in militant violence in Kashmir.

“Forces inimical to restoring peace in the Kashmir valley have silenced a voice of reason, logic and peace,” the Press Club of India said in a statement, mourning the loss of Bukhari.

India has long accused Pakistan of training and arming militants and helping them infiltrate across the heavily militarised Line of Control (LoC) that separates the two sides in the region, a charge Islamabad denies.

Slideshow (2 Images)

The attack on Bukhari coincided with discussions being held over an extension of a ceasefire by security forces in Kashmir.

Earlier, India rejected a U.N. report that accused it of having used excessive force in disputed Kashmir to kill and wound civilians since 2016, and which called for an international inquiry into accusations of rights violations.

Writing by Malini Menon; Editing by Mark Heinrich

Spy Chronicles and Ideology of Independence in Jammu Kashmir

Should we hope that a day will come when policymakers at Delhi and Islamabad also think like Durrani and Dulat? Let’s keep the hopes alive for a better future of sub-continent.

by Nayyar N Khan-Jun 14, 2018

( June 14, 2018, Boston, Sri Lanka Guardian) Authored by former intelligence agency chiefs from India and Pakistan, the newly released book, The Spy Chronicles: RAW, ISI and the Illusion of Peace, has already created instigating pandemonium in Pakistan’s intelligence and military spheres. The book is a sequence of discourses, facilitated by journalist Aditya Sinha, between former Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) chief Lt. Gen. (retired) Asad Durrani and former Indian Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) chief A.S. Dulat.

The authors being two ex- intelligence heads from India and Pakistan, it was anticipated that the Kashmir issue would be debated among the authors. Durrani and Dulat’s tête-à-têtes on Kashmir contributes much to this book, with six chapters utterly concentrating on India and Pakistan’s featuring role in the disputed territory of Kashmir. Remarkably, in the book Durrani orates that the existing stalemate in Kashmir isn’t essentially “unfavorable to Pakistan,” proposing that “Pakistan could be comfortable with the unrest except that Kashmiris died.” His proposed Kashmir policy takes shape when he submits, “…Because of what is happening in the Valley, Pakistan should simply sit back and watch the fun.” Dulat, on the other hand, proclaims that if Kashmiris were happy, then they would not turn to Pakistan, as Kashmiris need Pakistan only when they’re in “trouble.”

In this way, the two spy chiefs are in agreement that India has effectively positioned its assertion on Kashmir, while Pakistan may not be somewhat as linked as it likes to carry to the disputed territory of Kashmir. This apparent agreement between Durrani and Dulat gives the impression which is conflicting to the official position of Pakistan towards Kashmir, which espouses that the Kashmir is not an integral part of India, and that the Pakistani government imparts “unwavering political, moral, and diplomatic support” to the cause of Kashmiris.

When the influential intelligence executives from India and Pakistan meet in a friendly environment, Afghanistan is another inescapable region for confab. Yet, for such a provocative subject, there is an astounding amount of unanimity between Dulat and Durrani within The Spy Chronicles. In terms of the tactical calculus, the former RAW chief couldn’t have been more honest when proposing, “Afghanistan is as crucial to Pakistan as Nepal is to us.” On this, the two sides are in agreement that any Indian interference in Afghanistan would be equivalent to Pakistan interfering in Nepal.

However, the scope of this write-up would be limited to dispute in Jammu Kashmir and the agreements, suggestions and hopes to support an independent Kashmir movement discussed in the book. Both personally feel to come out of the stalemate and give some relief to Kashmiris but again both admit that they do not have sufficient support from the policy making institutions in Delhi and Islamabad. Talking about the possibility of an Independent Kashmir Durrani gives the impression of a compassionate factor when he describes “But if they (Kashmiris) decide on independence, enough would say; why not? We (Pakistanis) always claimed the Kashmiris’ heart is with us, so an independent Kashmir should gravitate towards us. I (Durrani) have no problem with independence (of Kashmir)” but the establishment is not convinced.

Admiring late Amman Ullah Khan’s firm commitment to restore independence of Jammu Kashmir Durrani admired Mr. Khan by saying “That’s why if someone talks about independence then we have no business getting in the way. So Amman Ullah was not handled well by us (Pakistanis). He was not the ISI’s favorite, not Pakistan’s favorite.”

Durrani further spoke about the possibility of Independent Kashmir in the view that which country would lose more if Kashmir becomes Independent? His assessment was India would lose more because India has more Kashmir as compared to Pakistan and if after 70 years of living in a status quo Kashmiris want independence, “that sentiment must count for something”. However, Durrani while talking about establishment as a whole says that “some stupidly say that an independent Kashmir would be disastrous and logic behind this disaster is paranoia.” Durrani admired Amman Ullah Khan’s commitment for Independence, but at the same time reveals that his ideology was not favored by establishment, although he had a massive following in Kashmir. Therefore, establishment had to bring in Hizbul Mujahahideen and other outfits to counter Amman Ullah Khan in Kashmir.

However, Durrani fears that in case of independence, due to its strategic importance, Kashmiris could attract “America, Germany and Japan, including others”. The China factor was also discussed by both; how in case of independent country, Kashmiris can reach out to China for better relations due to the fact that both share the borders with each other. They fear that these countries would like to establish bases as they did in Afghanistan and Kashmiris’ relationship with these countries would be friendlier as compared to India and Pakistan. Dulat’s personal interaction with Yasin Malick (a pro-independence leader) was very fascinating. When Dulat discussed Kashmir dispute with Malick, he categorically said in Urdu “Aapke sath kya baat Karenge, hum tau Azadi chahte hain (What we will talk with you? We only want independence)”. Dulat’s response to Malick was very passionate “If you could get independence then I would wave the Kashmiri flag with you” but the hard reality is “India will never countenance it”

Dulat, however, mentions on record that “Geelani Saheb (Syed Ali Geelani) in 1989-1990 at the beginning of militancy in Kashmir referred to these boys (JKLF) as terrorists. Then he was summoned to a meeting in Kathmandu (by Pakistan) and things changed”. Dulat explains it was because, in the beginning Pakistan lost control of movement in valley due to JKLF’s ideology of creating an Independent country, therefore, Pakistan had to bring Jamaat (Jamaat-e-Islami) in to counter JKLF.

Dulat passionately spoke about the sufferings of people living across the Line of control (LoC) in Jammu Kashmir. “Let there be peace on the LoC, where life is tough because of constant shelling”.

Durrani during the whole conversation blamed India, for not willing to come out of status quo and stalemate, not only on Kashmir issue but on other bilateral issues too. At the same time, he fears that if conflict in Kashmir is resolved peacefully, it might trigger other dynamics. He refers to Indus Water Treaty and other impediments and complications that would arise after settlement of Kashmir dispute. He mentions that “the price for peace is at times higher than the price of conflict”.

While talking about the role of Hurriyat and others Dulat categorically labelled hurriyat as Pakistani team and claimed that India has its own team too and those who favor real independence are in between. Both preferred to make Jammu Kashmir a bridge of peace between India and Pakistan and offered their volunteer services to negotiate and materialize the concept, if both India and Pakistan allow them to go ahead. Both Durrani and Dulat talked about the current legal situation of Jammu Kashmir that Indian Kashmir has a special status under article 370 of Indian constitution, while on the other hand they have prime minister and a president, thus admitting that it is a disputed territory and needs to be negotiated and settled. Musharraf’s four point agenda for empowering both parts of Kashmir is also discussed in the book and both admired it as a window to tackle the stalemate in Kashmir.

Out of mainstream politicians of Kashmir, both Durrani and Dulat admired Farooq Abdullah as the man who is wise enough to convert conflict into co-operation but both doubted Delhi and Islamabad to accept Farooq Abdullah as interlocutor. As a whole the book offers a hope from both the spy chiefs that if the serious deliberations could kick start, somewhere the cycle of stalemate could break and people in Kashmir, India and Pakistan focus on going ahead without fears of another bloody war. I personally got an impression that both the spy chiefs have laid a foundation to resolve Kashmir dispute and let the people free for the betterment of entire sub-continent. Therefore, they even dared to discuss the idea of united India as it existed before 1947 by using the typical terminology of “Akhand Bharat”.

Should we hope that a day will come when policymakers at Delhi and Islamabad also think like Durrani and Dulat? Let’s keep the hopes alive for a better future of sub-continent.

---

Nayyar N Khan is a US-based political analyst, human rights activist and a freelance journalist of Kashmiri origin. He regularly writes on peace and conflict resolution. He can be reached at globalpeace2002@hotmail.com

China Smells Opportunity in the Middle East’s Crisis

Beijing is using the region's ongoing woes to solidify its own geopolitical agenda.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang (R) shakes hands with Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (L) at the Great Hall of the People on March 17, 2017 in Beijing, China. (Photo by Lintao Zhang - Pool/Getty Images)

BY DANIEL KLIMAN, ABIGAIL GRACE-

JUNE 14, 2018, 9:03 AM

As the Middle East becomes ever more unstable, a surprising victor may be emerging: China. Under President Xi Jinping, China has accelerated its engagement with the Middle East — a region Beijing once treated as peripheral to its interests. Increased trade and investment, invigorated diplomatic exchanges, and expanded military ties are gradually transforming China’s position in the Middle East. Unless Washington can free its focus from the crises of the moment, Beijing may realize its ambitions: a Middle East more squarely within its own economic and diplomatic orbit, where the United States remains responsible for addressing the region’s most intractable challenges.

Oil has traditionally served as the glue holding together America’s relationships with key Arab states. Yet while the United States has revitalized its domestic petroleum production through the fracking revolution and reduced its dependence on foreign oil, China’s energy imports from the region have surged as the Middle East’s demand for energy at home has grown. Today, even as Beijing seeks to diversify its sources of foreign oil away from the region, it remains the among the top three importers from Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Iran.

China’s appetite for Middle Eastern energy is creating the conditions for economic interdependence that mirrors the ties that have bound the United States to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries. This co-dependency runs the risk of curbing U.S. influence and rendering key Arab states more susceptible to Chinese demands. Indeed, Beijing has not shied away from using its leverage as a leading energy importer — in a recent example, it threatened to scale back oil imports from Saudi Arabia over a pricing dispute.

Beyond energy trade, China’s economic influence across the Middle East has expanded through its investment. Arab countries, eager to reduce their dependency on oil exports and diversify their economies through creating new industries, are welcoming Chinese investment. Saudi Arabia and Jordan are both in discussions with Beijing to harmonize their development plans with the Belt and Road Initiative — Xi’s signature piece of economic statecraft.

In the case of Saudi Arabia, this alignment of strategic visions has translated into a strong commercial signing package during King Salman’s March 2017 state visit to Beijing, totaling$65 billion of bilateral agreements in the oil, space, and renewable energy sectors. Additionally,

Egyptian collaboration with China on a new Suez Canal cooperation zone is underway. In Duqm, Oman, Chinese capital inflows transformed a backwater fishing village into a $10.7 billion “Sino-Oman Industrial City” featuring an oil refinery capable of processing 235,000 barrels per day.
In positioning its engagement with the Middle East as purely commercial in nature, China has enhanced its economic relations with the Arab states without endangering its similarly growing ties with Israel and Iran.

In Israel, China has invested in ports and railways, and it has become a growing player in the Israeli high-tech sector. At a time when the United States and its allies in Europe, Australia, and Japan increasingly regard Chinese investment as a threat to their long-term innovation edge, Israel, without taking appropriate precautions, could become a backdoor for China to obtain the technology it needs to realize its ambitions to dominate the critical industries of the 21st century.

China’s economic relationship with Iran, for which it is the No. 1 trading partner, has continued to deepen. As European firms fretted last year about a return of U.S. sanctions under President Donald Trump, Chinese state-owned investment arm CITIC Group established a $10 billion credit line for Iran. In 2017, China-Iran trade exceeded $37 billion, with year-on-year growth of 19 percent. U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal and the threat of new sanctions puts all foreign companies under growing pressure to scale down their presence in Iran. Yet the specter of sanctions does not appear to have dissuadedBeijing from continuing to enhance its trade and investment relationship with Tehran, which will — as it did prior to the nuclear deal — have few alternatives to China going forward.

China’s burgeoning ties with the Middle East — though still primarily economic — are not limited to commercial and financial activity. Xi is augmenting the country’s economic gains with diplomatic exchanges, notably his January 2016 tour of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Iran. Xi subsequently welcomed Saudi Arabia’s King Salman and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Beijing for official visits. China has also demonstrated a new, if cautious, willingness to make forays into some of the region’s disputes. For example, Beijing has given the Bashar al-Assad regime and its patron in Moscow diplomatic backing as well as consistent support in the Chinese media. Beijing has also hosted Israelis and Palestinians for a Peace Symposium. Although it is unlikely that China will ever play a prominent role as a mediator in either of these crises, its increasing willingness to wade into divisive regional issues demonstrates Beijing’s changing perception of its role in the region.
Beyond these diplomatic overtures, China has ramped up its military engagement across the Middle East.

 The Chinese navy has made efforts to demonstrate its presence in the vicinity of strategic chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz, the Bab el-Mandeb strait, and the Suez Canal. Since 2010, the navy has conducted port calls in every nation in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Egypt, Israel, and Iran. In June 2017, China and Iran conducted a joint naval exercise on the fringe of the Strait of Hormuz. Building on port visits and exercises, and leveraging dual-use infrastructure created by its regional investments, China could ultimately seek to obtain military access in the region — much as it did in nearby Djibouti.

China has also emerged as a boutique source of armaments for the Middle East, given its willingness to supply military-grade unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that until very recently were subject to U.S. export controls. Preliminary open-source satellite imagery indicates that China recently sold such UAVs to the United Arab Emirates. Reporting from Yemen indicates that these drones are being actively employed in the ongoing campaign to eliminate prominent Houthi leaders.

Moreover, China has reportedly inked an agreement to open a new facility in Saudi Arabia to manufacture military drones. Although China has little hope of displacing the United States as the region’s preeminent arms supplier, military sales to the Middle East generate new markets for China’s low-cost, high-tech weapons systems, which further incentivize Chinese indigenous research, development, and production. And China’s willingness to sellweapons to nearly any actor, regardless of its intentions, could exacerbate regional conflicts by providing countries with the means to wage war at attractive prices.

Now is the time for the United States to engage key regional allies and partners on China’s growing involvement in the Middle East. This can start by debunking Beijing’s narrative that it is a purely commercial actor without a geopolitical agenda.

 The Trump administration should, in particular, publicly and privately highlight to the GCC members and Israel the nature of China’s relationship with Iran, which has too often remained overlooked. The United States should also have a quiet — and candid — dialogue with Israel on the challenges posed by China’s investment in its high-tech sector, and it should work to align their screening processes.

In the economic domain, the United States need not match the level of Chinese trade and investment. But it must advance a positive vision for the Middle East. This could take the form of a new infrastructure initiative in partnership with Saudi Arabia and the UAE, U.S. allies that are keen to play the role of hubs linking the region both internally and to Africa and the Indian Ocean.

With many countries in the Middle East eager to diversify their sources of domestic energy production away from fossil fuels, the United States should consider a regional energy agenda premised on efficiency and the use of renewables. On both infrastructure and energy, Japan, which ranks among the top five export destinations for all GCC countries, could play a pivotal — and reinforcing — role in counterbalancing China’s regional economic influence.

Finally, the United States should continue pressing China to expand the Belt and Road Initiative to countries in need of reconstruction assistance, such as Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. Washington should be unafraid of comparing the hypocrisy of Xi’s “community with shared future for mankind” with Beijing’s tepid interest in post-conflict reconstruction efforts.

With tensions roiling the Middle East, it would be easy for the United States to simply ignore China’s quiet power play. But that would be a mistake — one that will enable Beijing to continue to capitalize on economic opportunities across the region and solidify its diplomatic influence while leaving Washington to carry the burden of crisis management.

Pay Asian workers fair wages, World Cup sportswear giants Adidas, Nike told

(File) A worker irons a print onto a shirt in a Indonesian textile factory. Source: Kzenon/Shutterstock

 14th June 2018

AHEAD of the start of the 2018 World Cup in Russia this weekend, campaigners have urged global sportswear manufacturers Adidas and Nike to pay workers at their supplier factories in Asia a fair wage.

The Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC) released a report this week which claimed that workers in countries like Indonesia, Cambodia and Vietnam, where most of these companies’ products are produced, have seen share of the price of a pair of shoes drop by 30 percent between 1995 and 2017.

In the three nations, garment workers’ average salaries are 45 to 65 percent below the so-called “living wage” that would allow them to cover their families’ basic needs, said the global coalition of trade unions, workers and human rights groups.

SEE ALSO: Five years after deadly factory fire, Bangladesh’s garment workers are still vulnerable

“The brands decided to spend their money on football players rather than on the workers stitching their shirts and shoes,” the CCC said in a statement.

Adidas and Nike are the manufacturers for 22 out of the 32 teams competing in this year’s World Cup tournament. The German team alone is being paid more than $75 million per year under a contract negotiated with Adidas in 2016 – the largest such contract in football history.

Responding to the report, German manufacturer Adidas said it adhered to safe working conditions and fair wages throughout its supply chains, and obliged suppliers to pay at least the minimum wage required by law.

“The average monthly take-home wage of production workers in the facilities Adidas works with in Indonesia is currently well above the current minimum wage,” an Adidas spokeswoman said.

A fan takes a selfie with Germany’s Mats Vatutinki at the CSKA Sports Center in Moscow, Russia on June 13, 2018 Hummels Source: Reuters/ Axel Schmidt

US brand Nike said its suppliers must pay their employees at least the local minimum wage or prevailing wage, including premiums for overtime worked and legally mandated benefits.

“We remain invested in conversations with governments, manufacturers, NGOs, brands, unions, and factory workers to support long-lasting, systemic change,” a Nike spokeswoman said.

Much of Adidas’ and Nike’s sportswear is made in Indonesia, where 80 percent of workers in the garment sector are women and some make as little as $102 a month while others do not earn the legal minimum wage, according to the CCC’s report.

SEE ALSO: Slave labour at Ivanka Trump’s clothing factory in Indonesia? Not really

“We demand a new protocol on wages. Brands should change their buying practices because they affect the working conditions,” said Raja, an Indonesian trade unionist in a statement released by CCC.

“Knowing that the labour cost of a t-shirt produced in Indonesia is hardly 1 percent of the price, it seems logical to me that the labour cost can be increased a bit, right? But the sportswear brands until now refuse to engage.”

Weekly wages should be enough to meet workers’ basic needs and afford them extra income to improve their lives in order to avoid them remaining “trapped in a cycle of poverty”, according to Martin Buttle of the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI).

Source: Clean Clothes Campaign

“Brands like Nike and Adidas need to take their responsibilities seriously … and pay suppliers a fair price,” Buttle told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “Failure to do that can often result in low pay and poor conditions.”

Having signed an agreement in 2011 on trade unions’ rights in Indonesia, Nike and Adidas should now follow up on their pledges to address job security and living wages, the CCC said.

“This is a longstanding problem of poverty level wages … brands are squeezing the prices which then has an impact on the workers,” said Anannya Bhattacharjee of the Asia Floor Wage Alliance (AFWA), a group which represents garment workers.

SEE ALSO: Women, ethnic minorities most likely to lose jobs to robots

“(Soccer) is an inspirational sport but what everybody needs to remember is that the labour that goes behind the scenes to clothe the inspirational sportspeople is extreme exploitation and agony,” Bhattacharjee said. “That is what we need to stop.”

According to the International Labour Organisation, automated factory models being introduced by Nike and Adidas could threaten between 64 and 88 percent of industry jobs in Indonesia, Vietnam and Cambodia by 2050.

The sector currently provides for more than 9 million jobs in Southeast Asia, most of which are held by women.

Additional reporting from Reuters.

Trump and family sued by New York attorney general over alleged charity violations

Suit brought by Barbara Underwood says Trump Foundation is ‘little more than an empty shell’ and seeks $2.8m in restitution
In addition to Trump, the lawsuit names his children Donald Jr, Ivanka and Eric. Photograph: Shannon Stapleton/Reuters

Tom McCarthy -Thu 14 Jun 2018 

The attorney general of New York state sued the Donald J Trump charitable foundation, President Trump and three of his children on Thursday for violating state charity laws, alleging that the Trumps used charitable assets as “little more than a checkbook for payments to not-for-profits from Mr Trump” and his companies.

Foundation assets, acquired through tax-deductible donations, were used to settle legal claims against one of Trump’s golf clubs and to buy a painting of Trump to be displayed at another club, the suit alleges.

The lawsuit, filed by the attorney general, Barbara Underwood, on the morning of Trump’s 72nd birthday, seeks $2.8m in restitution and penalties from Trump and asks for the distribution of $1m in assets to other charities.

The lawsuit also seeks to dissolve the Trump Foundation and bar the Trumps from serving on the boards of any charitable organizations – Trump senior for 10 years and three of his children for one year.

In addition to Trump, the lawsuit names his children Donald Jr, Ivanka and Eric.

Trump began tweeting soon after the charges were filed, dismissing the lawsuit as the work of “the sleazy New York Democrats” and claiming the foundation “took in $18,800,000 and gave out to charity more money than it took in, $19,200,000”.

“I won’t settle this case!” Trump tweeted on Thursday. If he does not settle the case, a trial could result, casting a prolonged spotlight on the inner workings of the Trump Organization and probably requiring the president’s personal involvement.

A statement from the Trump Foundation declared “this is politics at its very worst” and painted Underwood as a partisan apparatchik. Underwood, a career staffer and former acting US solicitor general who was promoted last month after her predecessor, Eric Schneiderman, resigned in disgrace, has said she will not seek election to the position which she plans to leave in the fall.

The lawsuit alleges that the foundation engaged in “at least five self-dealing transactions that were unlawful because they benefited Mr Trump or businesses he controls”, Underwood said in a statement.

“These include a $100,000 payment to settle legal claims against Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, $158,000 to settle legal claims against Trump National Golf Club, and $10,000 to purchase a painting of Mr Trump displayed at the Trump National Doral.”

Money used to pay those bills came not from Trump but from would-be charitable donors who paid into the foundation, the lawsuit said. “From 1987 through 2008, Mr Trump personally donated funds to support the foundation,” the suit reads. “Since 2008, however, Mr Trump has not contributed any personal funds to the foundation, which instead has been supported by donations from other persons and entities.”

“The foundation is little more than an empty shell that functions with no oversight from its board of directors,” the lawsuit alleges. “Trump ran the foundation according to whim, rather than law.”

The lawsuit follows an investigation of the Trump foundation that began in June 2016 under the previous New York attorney general, Schneiderman. That investigation followed on the Pulitzer prize-winning work of the Washington Post journalist David Farenthold and others.

Episodes of alleged wrongdoing highlighted by the lawsuit include a charity fundraiser for veterans that Trump held on 28 January 2016, when he was a presidential candidate. Trump held the benefit in lieu of participating in a presidential debate.

The lawsuit alleges that a Trump foundation filing claiming that the event was “to raise funds for veterans’ organizations” was in fact false, because “in reality, the fundraiser was a Trump campaign event in which the Foundation participated”.

“In violation of state and federal law, senior Trump campaign staff, including campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, dictated the timing, amounts and recipients of grants by the foundation to non-profits,” Underwood said in a statement.

To maintain their charitable status under New York state law, organizations are barred from engaging in most political activity.

Schneiderman, who served for seven years, had previously sued the Trump Organization on multiple fronts, and after the inauguration, Schneiderman’s office sued the Trump administration and congressional Republicans at least 100 times.

 

Shortly before his inauguration, Trump settled a fraud case brought against Trump University by the state attorney general’s office, then run by Schneiderman, for $25m.

New York files suit against President Trump, alleging his charity engaged in ‘illegal conduct’

Donald Trump directed millions of dollars to his tax-exempt foundation. Here's how.(Video: Peter Stevenson, Lee Powell/Photo: Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

By David A. FahrentholdJune 14 at 12:20 PM

The New York attorney general filed suit against President Trump and his three eldest children Thursday, alleging “persistently illegal conduct” at the president’s personal charity, saying Trump repeatedly misused the nonprofit organization — to pay off his businesses’ creditors, to decorate one of his golf clubs and to stage a multimillion-dollar giveaway at his 2016 campaign events.

In the suit, filed Thursday morning, Attorney General Barbara Underwood asked a state judge to dissolve the Donald J. Trump Foundation. She asked that its remaining $1 million in assets be distributed to other charities and that Trump be forced to pay at least $2.8 million in restitution and penalties.

Underwood said that oversight of spending at Trump’s foundation was so loose that its board of directors hadn’t met in 19 years, and its official treasurer wasn’t even aware that he was on the board.

Instead, she said, the foundation came to serve the spending needs of Trump — and then, in 2016, the needs of his presidential campaign. She cited emails from Trump campaign staff members, directing which charities should receive gifts from the Trump Foundation, and in what amounts.

Underwood also asked that Trump be banned from leading any other New York nonprofit organization for 10 years — seeking to apply a penalty usually reserved for the operators of small-time charity frauds to the president of the United States.

In the suit, Underwood noted that Trump had paid more than $330,000 in reimbursements and penalty taxes since 2016. New York state began looking into the Trump Foundation in response to an investigation by The Washington Post.

In 2013, President Trump's charitable foundation paid $5,000 to the nonprofit D.C. Preservation League, to buy ad space in the program for the league's annual gala. Trump then placed this ad in the program, promoting his for-profit hotel chain. The New York Attorney General used this ad in a lawsuit filed Thursday. (New York attorney general lawsuit)

[Trump boasts about his philanthropy. But his giving falls short of his words.]

But she asked the judge to go further, and require Trump to pay millions more. She said a 20-month state investigation found that Trump had repeatedly violated laws that set the ground rules for tax-exempt foundations — most important, that their money is meant to serve the public good, not to provide private benefits to their founders.

“This resulted in multiple violations of state and federal law,” she wrote in the legal complaint.

Underwood was promoted to attorney general only weeks ago, succeeding Eric Schneiderman (D) after he resigned following allegations that he had physically abused several romantic partners.

In tweets Thursday morning, Trump suggested that the lawsuit was politically motivated.

This note, written by President Trump, allegedly directed his staff to pay $100,000 from the Donald J. Trump Foundation to a charity, to settle a long-running legal dispute between the city of Palm Beach, Fla., and Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort. It was included in a lawsuit filed Thursday against Trump. (New York attorney general lawsuit)

“The sleazy New York Democrats, and their now disgraced (and run out of town) A.G. Eric Schneiderman, are doing everything they can to sue me on a foundation that took in $18,800,000 and gave out to charity more money than it took in, $19,200,000. I won’t settle this case!” he wrote, adding: “Schneiderman, who ran the Clinton campaign in New York, never had the guts to bring this ridiculous case, which lingered in their office for almost 2 years. Now he resigned his office in disgrace, and his disciples brought it when we would not settle.”

The Trump Foundation has no employees. On Thursday, Amanda Miller, a spokeswoman for Trump’s company, responded on its behalf. She echoed Trump’s assertion that this was a politically driven lawsuit, saying: “This is politics at its very worst.”

Underwood is a career staff member, not an elected official. She has said she will not seek election for a full term as attorney general in the fall. She declined to comment on the case beyond issuing a written statement.

“As our investigation reveals, the Trump Foundation was little more than a checkbook for payments from Mr. Trump or his businesses to nonprofits, regardless of their purpose or legality,” she said in the statement.

Underwood said she had sent letters to the Internal Revenue Service and the Federal Election Commission, identifying what she called “possible violations” of tax law and federal campaign law by Trump’s foundation.

Underwood has jurisdiction over the Trump Foundation because the charity is based at Trump Tower in Manhattan and is registered in New York state.

Trump has been president of the foundation since he founded it in 1987. In late 2016, he had promised to shut it down — but could not while the attorney general’s investigation continued.

Three of Trump’s adult children — Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump — also were named in the lawsuit because they have been official board members of the foundation for years. Under the law, Underwood said, board members are supposed to scrutinize a charity’s spending for signs that its leader — in this case, their father — was misusing money.

But in reality, Underwood wrote, the three Trump children exercised no such oversight. The board had not met since 1999.

“The Foundation’s directors failed to meet basic fiduciary duties and abdicated all responsibility for ensuring that the Foundation’s assets were used in compliance with the law,” she wrote.

Underwood asked the judge to ban each of the three from serving as a director of a New York nonprofit organization for a year. It was not clear whether any of the three are serving on the board of any such charities. Eric Trump, for instance, stepped down from the board of the Eric Trump Foundation after the 2016 election, and the charity was renamed Curetivity.

Although Donald Trump’s name is on the foundation, in recent years most of its money was not actually his. Trump did not donate any money to the foundation between 2008 and 2015 — instead, its largest benefactors in recent years have been wrestling moguls Vince and Linda McMahon, who gave $5 million total in 2007 and 2009. Linda McMahon was later appointed by Trump as head of the Small Business Administration. The McMahons have declined to answer questions about the reasons for their gifts.

The lawsuit shows that the Trump Foundation — which Trump founded to give away some of the royalties from his 1987 book, “The Art of the Deal” — looked, on paper, like other tax-exempt nonprofit organizations. It filed annual reports with New York state and the IRS. It listed directors and donations.

But behind the scenes, Underwood said, the foundation was essentially one of Trump’s personal checkbooks — a pool of money that his accounting clerks knew to use whenever Trump wanted to pay a nonprofit organization. By law, Trump wasn’t allowed to buy things for himself using the charity’s money, even if he was buying them from nonprofit groups.

At one point, during a deposition, a New York state investigator asked Allen Weisselberg — a Trump Organization employee who was also listed as treasurer of the Trump Foundation — whether the foundation had a policy for determining which specific payments it was allowed to make.

“There’s no policy, just so you understand,” Weisselberg said. The interviewer asked whether Weisselberg had understood that he was actually on the board of the Trump Foundation, and had been for more than a decade.

“I did not,” he replied.

With no outside oversight of Trump’s use of foundation money, Underwood said, the future president had repeatedly used his charity’s money to help his businesses, and himself.

Twice, for instance, Trump used the charity’s money to settle legal disputesthat involved his for-profit businesses.

[Trump used $258,000 from his charity to settle legal problems]

In 2007, he settled a dispute with the city of Palm Beach, Fla., over code violations at his Mar-a-Lago resort. The city agreed to waive outstanding fines if Mar-a-Lago gave $100,000 to a charity.

But the donation, to an organization called Fisher House, came instead from the foundation, Underwood said — after Trump wrote a note to Weisselberg. “Allen W, DJT Foundation, $100,000 to Fisher House (Settlement of flag issue in Palm Beach),” said the note, which is included in the lawsuit.

In addition, in 2012, a Trump golf club agreed to pay $158,000 to settle a lawsuit with a man who was denied a $1 million hole-in-one prize during a tournament at the club. The Trump Foundation paid the money instead of the club, Underwood said.

Both of those payments were first reported by The Post. In March, after the attorney general’s investigation was underway, Trump repaid his foundation all $258,000, plus more than $12,000 in interest, Underwood said.

Underwood also listed several smaller instances of what she called “self-dealing,” meaning Trump using foundation money to help his businesses. The charity paid $5,000 to place an ad for Trump hotels in a program for a charity gala. It paid $32,000 to satisfy an obligation of a Trump company that manages a New York estate. It paid $10,000 to buy a portrait of Trump, which was later found hanging in the sports bar at Trump’s Doral golf resort.

Underwood said Trump already had repaid amounts spent by the foundation, plus penalty taxes totaling more than $4,000.

In the case of the portrait, she said Trump’s golf club has now paid the foundation the “fair rental value” of using the foundation-owned painting as decoration: $182.

IRS rules also prohibit tax-exempt foundations from aiding political campaigns. But Underwood listed two instances in which Trump’s foundation had seemed to do so.

In August 2013, Trump donated $25,000 from his foundation to a Florida political group aiding the reelection effort of state Attorney General Pam Bondi (R). Around the same time, Bondi’s office was considering whether to join an ongoing lawsuit by Schneiderman, then the New York attorney general, alleging that Trump had defrauded students at his now-defunct Trump University.

Afterward, the Trump Foundation omitted any mention of Bondi’s political group — called And Justice for All — from its annual report to the IRS, and instead said the $25,000 donation had gone to a nonprofit organization in Kansas with a similar-sounding name.

Underwood said Trump’s staff blamed confusion among accounting clerks for the foundation’s money being spent, instead of Trump’s own. As for the incorrect IRS filing, Underwood wrote, “The Foundation has no credible explanation for the false reporting of grant recipients.”

After The Post reported on the donation to Bondi’s group in 2016, Trump repaid the $25,000 and paid a penalty tax of $2,500 for an improper political gift.

But Underwood alleged that the campaign Trump’s foundation helped the most was his own.

In January 2016, Trump skipped a debate among Republican candidates because he was feuding with Fox News Channel, the debate’s host. Instead, Trump held a televised fundraiser for veterans — drawing millions from wealthy friends and small-dollar donors, and giving much of it to the Trump Foundation.

In his deposition, Weisselberg said he was surprised to be told that he needed to go to Iowa on short notice, to have the foundation’s checkbook ready in case Trump wanted to make donations on the night of the fundraiser.

“I wanted to know why I was going to Iowa. I had never gone anywhere with Donald on any kind of — anything,” he said. But he told another executive to get ready. “He grabbed the checkbook. And later, we flew to Des Moines.”

Underwood said that, afterward, “the Foundation ceded control over the charitable funds it raised to senior Trump Campaign staff.” She cited emails in which Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s campaign manager at the time, directed which veterans’ charities should receive money.

At one point, Lewandowski emailed Weisselberg to ask whether the Trump Foundation’s money could be ready to distribute during Trump’s last campaign events before the Iowa caucuses: “Is there any way we can make some disbursements [from the proceeds of the fundraiser] this week while in Iowa? Specifically on Saturday,” Lewandowski wrote, in an email cited by Underwood.

At one point, the lawsuit says, Trump gave an oversize $100,000 Trump Foundation check to a charity at a campaign event in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

The problem: Nobody appears to have told the Trump Foundation.

“This ‘check’ was given out (see video). This is not one of the charities we’ve cut a check to yet. Are there other charities like this?” Jeff McConney, a Trump Organization staff member, wrote in an email to Lewandowski that was cited in the lawsuit.

The check was later cut.

In 2016, Trump sought to excuse his foundation’s actions in a letter to the New York attorney general, saying that the Iowa fundraiser was a charity event. “This statement was false,” Underwood wrote, “because, in reality, the Fundraiser was a Trump Campaign event in which the Foundation participated.”

She wrote that Trump had repeatedly signed charity documents saying that nonprofit organizations like his were not allowed to become involved in political campaigns. “Mr. Trump’s wrongful use of the Foundation to benefit his Campaign was willful and knowing,” she wrote.

As president, Trump has repeatedly called for the repeal of the Johnson Amendment, a 1954 tax code provision that imposed the ban on political activity by nonprofit groups.