Israel’s military offensive drives Arab and Muslim vote in US presidential race, Arab-American convention confirms
Israel’s military offensive drives Arab and Muslim vote in US presidential race, Arab-American convention confirms/node/2572277/world
Israel’s military offensive drives Arab and Muslim vote in US presidential race, Arab-American convention confirms
People gather at Harvard University to show their support for Palestinians in Gaza at a rally in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Oct. 14, 2023. (AFP/File)
Israel’s military offensive drives Arab and Muslim vote in US presidential race, Arab-American convention confirms
Speakers were pressed by attendees on whether they would denounce Israel’s violence
Updated 14 sec ago
RAY HANANIA
DEARBORN, IL: Community anger over US support for Israel’s bombardment in the Gaza Strip spilled open among Arab and Muslim voters and activists during a convention organized by the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee in Dearborn, Michigan last week.
The ADC’s Annual National Convention, which ran from Sept. 12-15, was hosted outside Washington for the first time — an intentional choice aimed at answering the Wall Street Journal’s accusations that Dearborn was the city of terrorists in the US, ADC Chairman Safa Rifka told Arab News.
Dearborn is a “city of fantastic citizens, proud American citizens” and “we wanted to make a statement that it is the capital of Arab America,” he said.
The majority of the nearly 1,000 attendees demanded that Democratic officeholders support the third-party candidacy of Dr. Jill Stein, who many believe is the only presidential contender to strongly criticize the actions of Israel’s government and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
More than 50,000 Gazans have been killed during the near yearlong war, but independent sources banned by Israel’s government from entering Gaza contend the number is in excess of 150,000.
Speaker after speaker were pressed by audience members on whether they would stand up and denounce Israel’s violence.
“The Gaza war dominates our concerns,” Rifka said “Clearly the community is concerned about how the elected officials in this country will respond to the carnage.”
Several attendees, activists and elected officials told The Ray Hanania Radio Show that the US government needed to do more than simply criticize Hamas for its assault on Oct. 7, which provoked Israel’s invasion of Gaza.
A few attendees expressed support for Republican candidate Donald Trump and others said they were hoping for Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris to not only condemn Hamas’ violence but also expand it to condemn the military campaign by Netanyahu’s government.
Michigan State Rep. Alabas Farhat said that when he and his colleagues called for a ceasefire, “dozens of representatives and elected officials” signed the letter.
“I think the Arab community right now has said very loudly, very clearly, they want a nominee for a ceasefire,” he said.
Many attendees believe it is still not too late for candidates to take action. With roughly six weeks until the election, Illinois State Rep. Abdelnasser Rashid said that not only was the door open but there was a need for candidates to “change policy, protect lives and to earn the support of so many people who care deeply about this issue.”
“People need to vote in November and people need to engage with their elected officials to let them know where they stand,” he said.
Amid growing frustrating and political uncertainty, Georgia State Rep. Ruwa Romman said it was important not to give up.
Her biggest concern, she said, was the growing idea of “nihilism” and “cynicism” and “the idea that nothing matters, nothing will change, so there’s no point in trying.”
“That is making us surrender before we’ve even tried. My goal is to make sure nobody gives up,” she said.
The Ray Hanania Radio Show is broadcast on the US Arab Radio Network on Thursday at 5 p.m. EST and again on Mondays in Michigan on WNZK AM 690 radio. It is also broadcast on Facebook.com/ArabNews and on Youtube, and podcast at ArabNews.com/rayradioshow. For more information on the host, visit www.Hanania.com.
Trump says ‘too late’ for another debate against Harris
Updated 48 sec ago
AFP
WILMINGTON, US: US presidential candidate Donald Trump on Saturday rejected a proposal from Democratic opponent Kamala Harris to face off in another debate, saying it was “too late” to do so.
“The problem with another debate is that it’s just too late, voting has already started,” the Republican said at a rally in North Carolina, with early voting already underway in three states.
Somalia accuses Ethiopia of shipping arms to unstable region
Foreign Ministry says documented evidence confirms the arrival of two lorries transporting weapons in Puntland region
We demand an immediate halt and call on international partners to support peace efforts in the Horn of Africa
Updated 20 min 26 sec ago
AFP
NAIROBI: Somalia has accused neighboring Ethiopia of supplying weapons to its northeastern Puntland region, which this year unilaterally declared it would act as an independent state despite protests from the central government.
There is a history of stormy relations between Ethiopia and Somalia — a fragile jigsaw of federal states whose instability weakens the central government’s ability to counter a long-running insurgency by militant group Al-Shabab.
Tensions between the Horn of Africa countries increased on Jan. 1, when Addis Ababa signed a deal with another northern region of Somalia — the breakaway territory of Somaliland — giving landlocked Ethiopia long-sought-after ocean access.
“Somalia strongly condemns unauthorized arms shipments from Ethiopia to Somalia’s Puntland region, violating our sovereignty and threatening regional security,” the Foreign Ministry in Mogadishu said.
“We demand an immediate halt and call on international partners to support peace efforts in the Horn of Africa.”
Somaliland is located between the Ethiopian border and Puntland.
The latter, a semi-autonomous part of Somalia since 1998, said it would operate as an independent state in January due to a row with the central government over constitutional changes.
In its post on X, the Somali Foreign Ministry said: “Documented evidence confirms the arrival of two lorries transporting weapons from Ethiopia to the Puntland region of Somalia, executed without any diplomatic engagement or clearance.”
“This activity constitutes a grave infringement on Somalia’s sovereignty and poses serious implications for national and regional security.”
It did not say when the shipment occurred or to whom the weapons were sent.
Ethiopia’s Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Under the January deal, Somaliland, which unilaterally broke away from Somalia in 1991, agreed to lease 20 km of its coast for 50 years to Ethiopia, which wants to set up a naval base and a commercial port.
In return, Somaliland — whose independence is not endorsed by Mogadishu — has said Ethiopia would become the first country in the world to give it formal recognition, although Addis Ababa has not confirmed these assertions.
Senior officials in Mogadishu have said this agreement means thousands of Ethiopian soldiers stationed in Somalia to fight Al-Shabab will now have to leave.
The troops are deployed on Somali territory under a bilateral accord and an agreement with the African Union.
On Aug.14, Mogadishu signed a military pact with Ethiopia’s rival Egypt, which has offered to join the AU force in Somalia in 2025.
Turkiye has been mediating between Somalia and Ethiopia since July in discussions to resolve their differences.
Two rounds of talks in Ankara failed to produce tangible progress, and a third round, scheduled for last week, was canceled without any comment from either the host or the protagonists.
Church of England bishops accuse Israel of ‘acting above the law’ in West Bank
In a letter, the bishops said there is now “little distinction between settler violence and state violence”
They demanded that the Israeli government “stop acting as if it is uniquely above the law”
Updated 38 min 8 sec ago
Arab News
LONDON: Israel is acting as if it is above the law, four of the most senior Church of England bishops said in a letter about state and settler violence in the occupied West Bank.
The bishops added that there is now “little distinction between settler violence and state violence,” The Guardian reported on Saturday.
“There has been a drastic acceleration and intensification of settlement construction, land confiscation and home demolition in the West Bank, exacerbating longstanding patterns of oppression, violence and discrimination against Palestinians,” they said in the letter.
“There has always been a close relationship between successive Israeli governments and the settler movement, but there now seems to be little distinction between settler violence and state violence.”
The bishops demanded that the Israeli government “stop acting as if it is uniquely above the law.”
They said the UN General Assembly’s call last week for Israel to end its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territories “can’t be another false dawn.”
The UN must “move beyond strong words and agree a robust set of measures to ensure Israel’s compliance” with international law, they added.
The UNGA strongly supported a non-binding Palestinian resolution on Wednesday demanding that Israel end its “unlawful presence” in Gaza and the occupied West Bank within a year.
While the resolution is not legally binding, the extent of its support reflects world opinion.
The resolution also demands the withdrawal of all Israeli forces and the evacuation of settlers from the Occupied Palestinian Territories “without delay.”
It urges countries to impose sanctions on those responsible for maintaining Israel’s presence in the territories and halt arms exports if weapons are suspected of being used there.
The letter’s signatories were Rachel Treweek, the bishop of Gloucester; Guli Francis-Dehqani, bishop of Chelmsford; Graham Usher, bishop of Norwich; and Christopher Chessun, bishop of Southwark.
Kyiv says struck ammo depots in southern and western Russia
Updated 21 September 2024
AFP
KYIV, Ukraine: Kyiv said Saturday it struck two weapons depots in southern and western Russia — including a key site for Moscow’s forces — with Russian authorities announcing some evacuations and declaring a local emergency situation.
Kyiv also said a Russian nighttime strike on President Volodymyr Zelensky’s home city of Kryvyi Rig killed a 12-year-old boy and two elderly women.
The attacks came ahead of an upcoming trip by Zelensky to the United States, where he is due to present his plans on how to end the nearly 31-month-long war.
Kyiv’s army said it had hit an arms depot near the city of Tikhoretsk in the southern Krasnodar region, calling it one of Moscow’s “three largest ammunition storage bases” important to the Russian army’s logistics for its Ukraine invasion.
It also said it struck an arsenal in the western Tver region.
Authorities in Tver and Krasnodar said they had been attacked but Russia did not say exactly what was struck.
Krasnodar governor Vieniamin Kondratyev announced the evacuation of 1,200 people from villagers, saying a drone attack caused a fire that “spread to explosive objects” near Tikhoretsk.
He later said a state of a “local emergency situation” was introduced in Tikhoretsk — a city of some 50,000 people — in the southern region.
Authorities said most villagers were staying with relatives, while others were in temporary accommodation in Tikhoretsk.
“It is important that there is no threat to people. But it will take time to fully check the territory,” Kondratyev warned.
Videos on social media showed a massive explosion in the dark resembling fireworks at first before blowing up loudly.
Footage online later showed sirens ringing around Tikhoretsk, a city of some 50,000 people in daylight, with smoke rising into the air in the distance.
Authorities said villagers had been evacuated, with most staying with relatives while others were placed in temporary accommodation in Tikhoretsk.
Authorities published footage of villagers — mostly elderly people — arriving to a room with set-up beds, as well as volunteers greeting evacuees arriving by bus.
The local government said they are being provided with medical and psychological assistance.
The Krasnodar region is separated from occupied Ukraine by the Azov sea and has been relatively spared from the type of attacks on Russian border or other southern regions.
But over the last year it has seen increased assaults.
In the western Tver region, authorities announced the temporary closure of a major federal road after the Ukrainian attack near the city of Toropets.
In the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rig, authorities said Russia had struck “private houses” at night, releasing images of brick houses razed to the ground.
“The boy killed by Russians in Kryvyi Rig was 12-years-old,” the head of the Dnipropetrovsk region, Sergiy Lisak, said on Telegram.
“The missile strike also ended the lives of two women, aged 75 and 79,” he added.
Authorities earlier said that a night-time strike had destroyed two houses and damaged “two dozen,” also damaging a school.
Kryvyi Rig, where Zelensky was born, has been targeted by Russia throughout its more than two-year-long invasion.
Ukraine also said two people were wounded in a Russian drone attack in the southern Kherson region on Saturday.
UK must tackle racists and people who take law into their hands head on, says former Tory chancellor and author of ‘The Boy from Baghdad’ Nadhim Zahawi
In wide-ranging interview, Zahawi describes PM Starmer’s decision to remove Margaret Thatcher’s portrait from office as “vindictive” and “petty” behavior
Updated 21 September 2024
Arab News
DUBAI: Britain is still the most tolerant place on earth, but it must tackle head on both the scourge of racism in society and those who are intent upon taking the law into their own hands, former Conservative MP and minister Nadhim Zahawi said.
His remarks follow a summer of unrest in the UK, where a knife attack in the town of Southport that killed three children and injured 10 sparked nationwide riots, exploited by far-right fringe groups to whip up hatred against immigrants.
“We have to address the racists head-on,” said Zahawi, appearing on the first episode of the new season of the Arab News current affairs program “Frankly Speaking.”
“And I think it’s important that we send a very clear message that taking things into your own hands and going out and antagonizing, bullying, beating people just because of their background or color is completely unacceptable.
“And we have to deliver that message very, very clearly. It’s incumbent on the leadership, from the prime minister down, to do that.”
In his new memoir, “The Boy from Baghdad,” Zahawi chronicles his family’s escape from the regime of Saddam Hussein in the 1970s. (Arab News photo)
Zahawi, who was a Conservative member of parliament for Stratford-upon-Avon from 2010 to 2024 and who served as chancellor of the exchequer in Boris Johnson’s cabinet, also spoke of his own struggles growing up in the UK as an Iraqi refugee.
In his new memoir, “The Boy from Baghdad,” Zahawi chronicles his family’s escape from the Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein in the late 1970s, the struggles of building a new life in Britain, and the onset of serious financial difficulties.
“I talk about my sort of impostor feeling that just because I came from a privileged family background in Iraq, landing in the UK in 1978-79, but not having the same financial struggles as, say, a refugee today that would land in the UK,” he said.
“We had different financial struggles much later on, which I address in the book, and pretty dire ones, including the bank taking away our home. But because of success and maybe because I don’t conform to the stereotype of what brown people should do in politics in the UK, that they should be socialist or they should be leftwing Labour.”
Indeed, Zahawi also had to contend with racial discrimination. Does he believe Britain has always had a racism problem?
A knife attack in the town of Southport that killed three children sparked riots nationwide. (AFP)
“In the 1980s, it was very different to today, including my own party,” he said. “I think the Conservative Party of the ’80s was a bit of a closed shop for people of my background, but I persevered.
“There are always going to be elements of racism. But I think, if you look at the evidence, the UK has dealt with it in a much better way than pretty much every other country around us in Europe.”
Because of his own experiences as a refugee who made his fortune and rose to the front bench of politics, it seems somewhat jarring that he would go on to support the Conservative government’s scheme to deport failed asylum-seekers to Rwanda.
“So, let me just unpack some of that,” said Zahawi.
“The net increase in migration into the UK was about 740,000 people last year. Clearly, our public services cannot cope with a city the size of Bath being built every year to be able to accommodate that level of migration.
“We’ve been promising, prime minister after prime minister, that we would bring down migration numbers. David Cameron said it would be tens of thousands. It has gone on one trajectory, and that’s up. And that has to be our priority, this government’s priority.”
Of particular concern to UK authorities — and especially to those who took part in the summer’s rioting — are the irregular migrants arriving in Britain on small boats, crossing the English Channel from northern France.
“Forty thousand are coming in illegally on these small boats,” said Zahawi. “Now, the problem with that is ... the unfairness of that, the perception that this is really bad, it’s unfair. Why should these people get to jump the queue to come into the UK? That poisons the well of goodwill with the British public. And so, Rwanda, in my view, was a good deterrent.”
King Charles paying tribute to the victims in Southport. (AFP)
Owing to repeated defeats in the UK’s highest courts over its human rights implications, the Rwanda scheme never got off the ground, and was immediately scrapped by the new Labour administration, which has pledged to tackle the smuggling gangs at the source.
If Europe wants to prevent hundreds of millions of migrants arriving on its doorstep, however, Zahawi says governments would do well to imitate the development agendas of the UAE, China, and others in helping countries in Africa and beyond to stabilize and prosper.
“In Libya and anything south of Libya, there are about half a billion people who will come under pressure and are capable of movement for political reasons, for environmental reasons, or economic reasons,” he said.
“Clearly, Europe cannot absorb half a billion people. So, we have to have some really serious work done upstream in those countries to stabilize them, to allow them to become prosperous.
“The UAE is doing a lot of that work. We should look at what they’re doing and see if we can partner with them, because the work they’re doing in Africa is second only to China and the investment China is making in Africa.”
In July, Zahawi’s party, under the leadership of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, suffered the worst election defeat in the party’s 190-year history, losing to Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour by a landslide.
Of particular concern to UK authorities are the irregular migrants arriving in Britain on small boats. (AFP)
Despite pledging to put “country first, party second,” Sir Keir has already ruffled feathers among his Tory rivals after deciding to remove a portrait of Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher from his office at 10 Downing Street.
Although he denied moving the portrait for ideological or party political reasons, opponents have used the new PM’s choice of decor to accuse him of pettiness. “I just think this sort of, dare I say, vindictive type behavior,” said Zahawi. “I thought it’s petty, honestly.”
In early September, Zahawi faced a backlash of his own after posting a photograph on social media of a homeless person sleeping on the pavement in Mayfair, one of the British capital’s wealthiest neighborhoods.
Although Zahawi insists he was merely drawing attention to the high rates of rough sleeping, critics pointed out that homelessness had risen significantly under Conservative rule, and attacked Zahawi’s personal wealth.
“I just happened to be walking through Hertford Street, and I saw this poor, tragic human being lying on the pavement in the morning, and I wanted to highlight that this really is an issue. And it’s heartbreaking,” said Zahawi.
“But then you’ve got the Twitter pile-on from the lefties, who then attack your success, as if I’m somehow affronted by this just because it happens to be Mayfair. No.”
Zahawi appeared on the first episode of the new season of the Arab News current affairs program “Frankly Speaking.”
Zahawi says he is concerned the scale of rough sleeping on London’s streets, combined with rates of crime and antisocial behavior, leaves foreign visitors with a bad impression.
“The perception around the world, in the UAE, of their citizens going to England and getting mugged or hurt by some of these criminal gangs, at the moment is reaching a level that I think is deeply damaging to the image of the UK and to London,” he said.
Another recent controversy involved Zahawi’s stance on Iraq. Although he did not have a hand in the UK’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003 — indeed, this was the work of a Labour government, and long predated Zahawi’s election to parliament — the Guardian newspaper criticized him for refusing to condemn the war in his new memoir.
Zahawi has since clarified that he supported the toppling of Saddam, but not the way the post-war situation was handled. Indeed, analysts are united in the view that these failures led directly to the emergence of Daesh.
“What Saddam did to the Kurds and the Shiite community in the south was abominable,” he said, referring to the regime’s successive bouts of repression.
“It was murderous. It was criminal. The Anfal program alone is responsible for 182,000 innocent souls being murdered, 4,000 Kurdish villages burnt to the ground. And so I think it’s only right that the world helped these unfortunate souls, these communities, depose such an evil tyrant.
“Post war, I think actually we really made a terrible error of judgment. And I would very easily explain to those interested that I think Tony Blair should have been much more robust to our most important ally, the US, by saying, look, show me the plan.”
Britain is still the most tolerant place on earth, Zahawi told Arab News. (AFP)
He highlighted the de-Baathification campaign and the disbanding of the Iraqi army as particularly grave errors that sparked the extremist insurgency that followed.
“You send home 700,000 men with no hope of a job, no way to put food on the table, and a gun in their pocket. What do you think is going to happen? The end is Daesh. That was a terrible, terrible decision,” he said.
“It’s right to be able to almost disaggregate those two things and say, actually, the removal of an evil dictator was right. But we never really planned for the day after properly. And we have to take part of that responsibility in the UK.”
Returning to domestic affairs, Zahawi says he is concerned about the prospect of growth in the UK economy unless the tax burden can be reduced, inflation brought under control, and the flight of wealthy individuals abroad can be stemmed.
“If you really care about the British economy, why are you exporting talent? Second only to China in losing millionaires,” he said.
“Now, I know wealth is not the only proxy, as I said, to talent. But it’s a pretty good proxy. And we’re only second to China in losing people to Abu Dhabi and Dubai and elsewhere around the world. And we’re importing low-skilled labor.”
Having stood down ahead of the last general election, Zahawi is now free to return to his business ventures. One new acquisition he is said to be keen on is The Daily Telegraph — one of the Western world’s oldest conservative-leaning publications.
“It would be an honor and a privilege to lead a great newspaper like The Daily Telegraph and it is one of our great products,” he said.
Zahawi was a Conservative member of parliament for Stratford-upon-Avon from 2010 to 2024 and served as chancellor of the exchequer in Boris Johnson’s cabinet. (AFP)
The sale has met with controversy, however, after a UAE-backed bid to buy the paper was effectively blocked when the UK government published proposed laws banning foreign states or government officials from holding any direct stakes in newspaper assets.
Although he remains in the running to buy the paper, Zahawi feels the country was sending out the wrong signal. “The UK should always be open for business,” he said.
“The way you protect particular sectors of the economy, if they require protection, whether it’s nuclear or media, is through regulation, good regulation, not legislation.”
