Kerry authorizes $1.3 billion in military aid to Egypt
(JNS.org) U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry authorized $1.3 billion in U.S. military aid to Egypt last month despite writing himself in a memo that the U.S. is “not satisfied with the extent of Egypt’s progress” on its democracy, Reuters reported Thursday.
The Secretary of State, according to U.S. law, needs to confirm that Egypt “is supporting the transition to civilian government, including holding free and fair elections, implementing policies to protect freedom of expression, association and religion, and due process of law” prior to transferring the military aid.
But Kerry’s May 9 memo stated that waiving the restrictions on Foreign Military Financing (FMF) was necessary to ensure “a strong U.S. security partnership with Egypt” that “maintains a channel to Egyptian military leadership, who are key opinion makers in the country.”
“A decision to waive restrictions on FMF to Egypt is necessary to uphold these interests as we encourage Egypt to continue its transition to democracy,” Kerry wrote.
Tamara Cofman Wittes, director of the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution, told Reuters that the U.S. State Department’s issuing of the waiver without any public discussion “has at the very least missed a significant opportunity to… raise its concerns about the political trajectory in Egypt.”
Syrian rebels briefly seize control of Golan border crossing
(JNS.org) Syrian rebels fighting the regime of President Bashar al-Assad briefly took control of the Quneitra border crossing between Israel and Syria in the Golan Heights on Thursday, forcing the Austrian U.N. peacekeepers stationed there to flee.
As a result of the incident, Austria has decided to pull its 380 peacekeepers following the battle there, Reuters reported.
The 1,000-strong United Nations Disengagement Observer Force has been monitoring the Quneitra crossing since the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Israeli International Relations Minister Yuval Steinitz issued a statement expressing regret over the Austrian withdrawal, while also extrapolating a lesson for Israel.
“Even as part of peace agreements, Israel cannot place its security in the hands of international forces instead of relying on the presence of IDF soldiers,” Steinitz said, according to the Jerusalem Post.
A spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Ban is urgently looking for a country to replace the Austrian contingent, calling the peacekeeping mission “essential.”
Ireland leads opposition to Hezbollah terrorist label
(JNS.org) Israeli government officials are accusing Ireland of leading EU opposition to officially labeling Hezbollah a terrorist group. Major European nations such as Germany and France now support the move to blacklist Hezbollah’s military wing, but 27 EU states must first agree on the issue.
Ireland, which currently presides over the EU, opposed the issue along with Finland and Sweden at a discussion of the issue Tuesday, Israeli officials reportedly said. A spokesman at Ireland’s embassy in Tel Aviv neither confirmed nor denied this, only saying that more discussion is needed to “arrive at an agreed position on the proposal,” the Jerusalem Post reported.
The allegations come in the wake of a reversal in the position of the new Socialist Bulgarian government regarding Hezbollah’s reponsibility for the Burgas bus attack in July. The government now believes only an “indication” of Hezbollah’s responsibility for the attack exists after Bulgaria’s previous government claimed to have concrete evidence for Hezbollah’s role.
Russian seniors, Hasidim are poorest Jews in New York
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) According to a UJA-Federation of New York report, Jewish poverty in the New York area is on the rise. More than 560,000 people live in poverty in the New York area, amounting to one in five New York-area Jewish households.
Over the past 20 years, according to the report entitled Jewish Community Study of New York: 2011 Special Report on Poverty, Jewish poverty has grown much faster than the Jewish community as a whole. Factors that make a family more likely to be poor include having children under 18, households with seniors, and households that include someone who is divorced, separated, or widowed.
The largest group of poor Jewish households in the New York area is Russian-speaking seniors. The Hasidic community has the second-largest number of poor households and the third-highest incidence of poverty of any group.
Former Anglican bishop warns against Mideast ‘tyranny of the majority’
(JNS.org) Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali, the Pakistani-born former Anglican Bishop of Rochester, England and co-head of the Anglican-Al Azhar Dialogue, warned against the rising threat of a “tyranny of the majority” in countries affected by the Arab Spring in a speech hosted by Christian Solidarity International, a Christian human rights group.
In a lecture entitled, “The Arab Spring and its Aftermath: Implications for Muslim-Christian relations,” Bishop Nazir-Ali criticized the West for its “love affair” with democracy promotion in the Middle East while overlooking the influence of Sharia law in those countries that has historically related women, Christians and other religious minorities to second-class citizens.
Bishop Nazir-Ali also warned against the “Islamic resurgence” in the region and the coming “huge-scale Shi’a-Sunni conflict” that will determine the fate of the region’s Christian minorities.
Since the “Arab Spring” revolutions began in late 2010, Middle Eastern Christian minority groups, especially in Syria and Egypt, have come under increasing persecution as a result of the decline of state protections and the rise of Islamic fundamentalists.
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