Middle East Policy

Lebanon Bids Gemayel Farewell as Father Announces 'Countdown' for New President Naharnet 23 Nov 2006 Hundreds of thousands of mourners Thursday bid slain Christian politician Pierre Gemayel farewell as his father announced that the "countdown for the election of a new president has started." "Independence can only be achieved through the election of new president," said former President Amine Gemayel, father of Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel who was gunned down along with a bodyguard Tuesday. The young politician was the sixth outspoken opponent of Syria to be assassinated in the past two years. Anti-Syrian leaders have been calling for the resignation of Syrian protégé President Emile Lahoud whose mandate was extended for three years through a controversial Syrian-inspired constitutional amendment in 2004. Prominent Lebanese leaders and ambassadors packed the St. George Cathedral as the casket was placed on the altar along with the coffin of his bodyguar...

A list of 13 "enemies of the internet" has been released by human rights group Reporters Without Borders ( RSF ). As usual, it is mostly the same countries with five Middle Eastern countries but with an unexpected surprise this time with Egypt added to the list. Egypt unexpectedly is moving back as regards the freedom of expression despite some previous improvements of political and democratic rights thanks to external and domestic pressures. See Egypt Democracy Watch here and here . I think that Mr. Mubarak knows that he got too old and his days became few, so he is really worried about inheriting power by his son. And as usual, the Egyptian democratic intellectuals and activists are paying for his concerns. I hope that Mr. Mubarak will clearly understand that Egypt is not Syria and he should show some respect for his country and people and for a great civilization which unfortunately was attacked and hurt by a band of authoritarian thugs. On other listed regime, I warmly c...

This is the news section of the October issue of Arab Reform Bulletin Published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace: Headlines: Iraq: Parliament Passes Federalism Bill Yemen: Presidential and Local Election Results Bahrain: Run-Up to Elections UAE: First Elections Coming; Crackdown on Human Rights Activists Kuwait: MPs Blame Government for Electoral Violations Jordan: King Pardons MPs; Parliament Approves Laws Syria: Human Rights Developments Libya: Verdicts by Abolished Courts Upheld; Prison Clashes Upcoming Political Events Iraq: Parliament Passes Federalism Bill After months of deadlock, the Iraqi parliament passed a law on October 11 setting up a mechanism to implement a constitution provision allowing the formation of federal regions in Iraq, despite vehement opposition by the Sunni coalition and two Shiite parties. The bill was submitted by the largest Shiite bloc, the United Iraqi Alliance, with the aim of creating a Shiite autonomous state in southern Iraq with ...

The White House had released a fact sheet summarizing President Bush's address to the UN General Assembly last September. I will post this fact sheet because of its importance since it reflects the White House's ideology on the key Middle East affairs, and it complements another recent important fact sheet on the U.S. Middle East strategy I have already posted. As we, the liberal intellectuals and scholars, cheered the long-awaited U.S. new deal and strategy in the Middle East after 9/11, I, for my part, still stress the regional dimension, and in many places and meanings, the regional nature of the entire Iraqi question and issue. I still do not know how much the American government perceives this fact, and if so, we need this perception to take shape in the U.S. Middle East policy. This policy should deal regionally with the Iraqi issue, and should include besides dialogue, where applicable, all kinds of pressure and force, where needed and productive, starting with the weak...

Iran Freedom Support Act (H. R. 6198) has been adopted by Congress. This is definitely an important step in the right course towards the new Middle East. It becomes clearer day by day that the fate of the Middle East will be determined by the outcomes of the war between Middle East totalitarians led by Iran and democratic forces backed or represented by determined democratic international powers led by the US. To be accurate, I stress on the term 'totalitarian' because the general authoritarian Arab states are weaker than taking this war. Hence, what matters now is the totalitarian axis. This totalitarian axis, the terror umbrella, as already became obvious and in public consists of the Iranian regime as leader and the remnants of al-Ba'ath party (or the 'last Ba'ath' as I would love to call) besides Hezbullah and Hamas as proxies and hit men. There will be no salvation, peace, stability and of course freedom and democracy in the Middle East without targeting th...

Freedom House has just published their Freedom in the World 2006 (see the map of freedom ), which provides their rating and analysis of the freedom of each state and territory in the world for mid-2005. Also, Freedom House has published a special report, Worst of the Worst: The World's Most Repressive Societies 2006 , which I live in one of them . There has been progress. The number of electoral democracies has increased to 123, and of them, liberal democracies to 89. The following is from the overview by Arch Puddington followed by the list of the worst of the worst: In a year in which the state of world freedom showed striking improvement in major countries from Ukraine to Indonesia, several places in the Arab Middle East saw modest but notable increases in political rights and civil liberties—even though none there yet approach the status of a free society. Although the region continues to suffer from a marked deficit of freedom, this progress was the most significant develo...

Continuing my effort to spotlight the various academic and scholarly views on Middle East democratization policy in Middle East Policy blog , I will post some interesting excerpts from Tamara Cofman Wittes' article, " Arab Democracy, American Ambivalence; Will Bush's rhetoric about transforming the Middle East be matched by American deeds?" appeared in the Weekly Standard , 02/23/2004, Volume 009, Issue 23: Previous View on Middle East Democratization Policy (Tamara Cofman Wittes is a research fellow in the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution.) The premise underlying America's embrace of this gradual approach is that we can avoid the risk of Islamist victories and minimize bilateral tensions if we help existing governments reform, even if they resist opening up political competition and sharing power. In theory, our new assistance under the Middle East Partnership Initiative and the National Endowment for Democracy is also supposed to...

Here are the recent news and developments concerning the political life and democratic stirring in Egypt gathered from the Egypt Monitor . Egypt watch is of extreme importance to the Middle East democratization research. For my comment on this subject go to Arab Democracy and Egypt Paradigm . Previous Egypt Democracy Watch Egypt Democracy Watch: (Covers the latest two months) Egyptian Judges Oppose New Law on Elections The Judges Club might is preparing for conflict with the government over its introduction of a constitutional amendment. In the debate on constitutional amendments, the government wants to amend Article 88 of the constitution, that stipulates that the judiciary is the authority that monitors elections. The regime wants to create a new body to oversee the election. Limited Cabinet Reshuffle On Monday August 28, new cabinet members were sworn in. The limited cabinet reshuffle included the appointment of Mamdouh Marei- former chairman of the presidential elections commiss...

Max Boot from the CFR wrote an interesting op-ed on the U.S. efforts to promote democracy after 9/11. I don't agree with all points of this piece, but it still spotlights some good and important points. Some related articles of mine: - The Neo-Internationalism After 9/11 - The End of International Isolationism - Defining the Iraqi Question - U.S. Foreign Aid and Democracy Promotion - Bush, Americans and Spreading Democracy Here is Boot's piece: Democracy, Our Best Protector Max Boot September 13, 2006 Los Angeles Times For the last five years the standard critique of Bush administration foreign policy has run as follows: The president did a great job of rallying the nation after 9/11 and of toppling the Taliban. But then he blundered by invading Iraq and trying to spread democracy at gunpoint. He should have concentrated on working with other countries to track down terrorists. The reality—or so it seems to me—is nearly the opposite. Bush has done a good job of capturing or ki...