In this mailing:
- Peter Martino: Russia's Masterstroke: Bailing Out Cyprus
- Tarek Heggy: Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood: Personal, to Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton
- Amir Taheri: Review of Should Israel Exist?
Russia's Masterstroke: Bailing Out Cyprus
by Peter Martino
June 25, 2012 at 5:00 am
June 25, 2012 at 5:00 am
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Cyprus is a
prey Russia has long been eyeing, both as a substitute for Syria, and as a
permanent naval base for the Russian fleet in the Mediterranean.
What a fine mess the Europeans have made with
their deluded dream of a common European currency for 17 countries with
different languages, cultures, traditions and economic systems. As a result of
the experiment with the euro, almost all countries along Europe's southern rim
are on the brink of bankruptcy. One of them is Cyprus. It, too, urgently needs
a bailout. This week, the Cypriotic government needs €4bn to recapitalize the
country's second largest bank.
Cyprus, however, is in a comfortable position.
The other beggars are forced to accept bailout from the European Union in
exchange for diminished national sovereignty, EU imposed austerity measures and
direct supervision from Brussels over their budgets and economies. Cyprus,
however, has an alternative. "We have other options," the Cypriotic
Finance Minister Vassos Shiarly recently told journalists in Nicosia.
Economists expect that to keep Cyprus afloat, it will need between €25 and 50bn
in the coming years. Nicosia, however, is resisting
pressure from the other EU countries to take a first bailout package worth
as much as €10bn.
Cyprus does not want to accept the strings
attached to the European offer. The Cypriotic alternative is called Russia.
Last December, Moscow already gave Nicosia a bilateral loan of €3bn. Eager,
since the era of Peter the Great, to acquire a strategic foothold in the
Eastern Mediterranean, Russia is now offering even more. And with President
Demetris Christofias of Cyprus happy to accommodate his friend Vladimir Putin,
there is no doubt that Nicosia will turn to Moscow rather than to Brussels.
Christofias is a Communist – he is, in fact,
the only Communist leader in the European Union – and, under the EU's rotating
chairmanship, he will be chairing the EU meetings from July 1st
until the end of the year.
As pointed out earlier in this Gatestone
column, if Russia steps in, the strategic situation in the entire Eastern
Mediterranean could change. Russia stands to gain most out of the eurozone
crisis. Cyprus is a prey which it has long been eying. If Moscow loses Syria as
its ally, it needs Cyprus as a substitute. Bailing out Nicosia is a bargain
price to acquire a permanent naval base for the Russian fleet in the Eastern
Mediterranean.
Cyprus is said to be so high on Russia's
priority list that President
Putin himself is currently dealing with the €4bn loan request from Nicosia.
The interest charged by the Russians is 4.5%, which is far better than Cyprus
can get anywhere else. The financial risk for the Russians is limited. There is
every chance that Cyprus will be able to repay their bilateral loans fairly
soon. Nicosia hopes to start exploiting the huge gas reserves off the Cypriotic
coast in the coming decade. With Russian help, it might even be able to exploit
these gas fields within the next five years.
The gas fields are an additional reason why
Cyprus is a good long-term investment for the Russians. But there are many
other reasons. The Russian presence in Cyprus is already very strong. Cyprus is
a favourite holiday resort for the Russian middle and upper classes. It could
easily become a Russian Florida. Some 50,000 Russians – mostly retirees – are
already living permanently on the island. They are attracted by its climate and
by the cultural affinities with the Cypriots, who, like the Russians, are
Orthodox Christians. Cyprus is also used by Russians as an offshore banking
center. This, too, is why the Russians will do their best to support the
Cypriotic banking system.
A Russian deal is a win-win situation for both
Russia and Cyprus. As soon as Russia has acquired a solid foothold on Cyprus,
the third largest island of the Mediterranean Sea, it will be able to drop
Assad, thereby reducing the current diplomatic tensions between Washington and
Moscow over Syria. Cyprus, on the other hand, welcomes Russian backing: its
intention to exploit the gas fields has merely led to tensions with Turkey.
With the Russian bear behind its back, it will be easier to deter the Turks.
The pro-Turkish attitude of the EU authorities in Brussels has long angered the
Cypriots.
Few regions in Europe have the importance of
Cyprus. Situated on the doorstep of both North Africa and the Middle East, the
island has been of strategic importance since ancient times. From Cyprus, the Russians
will be able to reach the whole area surrounding Israel. Russia, an ally of
Syria, has never been a close friend of Israel. This might change once Assad is
toppled. Although the Russian bear has interests rather than friends, is in
dread of anything resembling a democracy, and always on the prowl for its next
lunch, the presence in Israel of many Jewish immigrants of Russian origin may
lead to a slight rapprochement between Jerusalem and Moscow. If Russia, as a
result of its interference in Cyprus, becomes involved in a quarrel with
Turkey, this, too, might lead to superficially better, if unreliable, relations
with Israel. The animosity between Israel and its NATO ally Turkey has been
rising lately. There is little doubt that Putin, during this week's visit to
Israel, will discuss not just Syria, Iran and Turkey with the Israeli
leadership, but also Russia's growing involvement in Cyprus.
If Cyprus proves to be better off with Russia's
financial, political and strategic backing than Greece with the assistance of
the European Union, the close relations between the Greeks and the Cypriots
might convince Greece that it, too, should turn to Moscow rather than to
Brussels for financial and economic help. A strategic realignment in the
Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East might then be in the offing. If the
EU and NATO keep regarding the pro-Islamic government in Turkey as their
preferred ally, before they know it they might be confronted with an alliance
of Russia, Cyprus and Greece – a strong Christian-Orthodox axis against the
Turks. And whom would this alliance target after that?
Related Topics: Russia
| Peter
Martino
Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood: Personal, to Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton
by Tarek Heggy
June 25, 2012 at 4:30 am
June 25, 2012 at 4:30 am
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Political
Islam, which is the heart of the Muslim Brotherhood, is anti-modernity,
anti-progress, anti-human rights, anti-democracy, anti-peace, anti-otherness,
anti-pluralism, anti-women's rights, anti-liberal education, and
anti-free-and-critical thinking -- BY DEFINITION.
I cannot believe the "rumors" that
the US wants to see members of the Muslim Brotherhood as Egypt's new rulers. If
this "rumor" is correct, that policy decision will be the most
gigantic, monumental strategic mistake made by the US since the end of WWII. Such
a policy decision would also reflect nothing but an amazing inability to
understand that while there are many moderate Muslims, there does not exist
such a thing as even one moderate Islamist.
Political Islam, the essence of the Muslim
Brotherhood, is anti-modernity, anti-progress, anti-human rights,
anti-democracy, anti-peace, anti-otherness, anti-pluralism, anti-women's
rights, anti-liberal education and anti-free and critical thinking -- BY
DEFINITION.
Those who speak about "moderate Muslim
Brothers" desperately need a great deal of education about the history,
nature and literature of political Islam -- and by world-class scholars, not by
the likes of of Tarek Ramadan and his peers at ICNA, ISNA and CAIR who, by
falsely claiming they speak for all Muslims have mastered the game of
"fooling the West."
Finally, I hope that the US shall not repeat
its grave mistake of 1979, when the US and Saudi Arabia formed the Mujahedeen
movement(s) in Afghanistan -- a mistake which ultimately drove the world
towards September 11th, 2001.
Related Topics: Egypt
| Tarek
Heggy
Should
Israel Exist?
A Sovereign Nation under Attack by
the International Community
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Imagine if someone
suggested that you should read a book that discusses whether or not Norway, or
the United States for that matter, should exist. You would be shocked or at
least surprised that anyone would want to question the right of a sovereign
nation, and a member of the United Nations, to exist. In the case of Israel,
however, posing that question does not seem to be out-of-bounds. At any given
time, you might hear of or even attend conferences and seminars on that very
subject in some American or Western European university.
It is, therefore, no surprise that Michael
Curtis, a distinguished scholar and professor emeritus at Rutgers University,
has devoted a whole book to examining the subject and refuting the claims of
those who question Israel's right to exist. The result is a masterly essay in
which the best tools of scholarship are employed in the service of what is,
after all, a moral case in support of Israel.
At first glance, Israel could be regarded as
typical of the 150 or so nation-states that have emerged in the four corners of
the globe in the wake of the World War II. Politically, it is the fruit of a
liberation struggle against an imperial power—in this case Great Britain.
Territorially, it is located in a chunk of an even older colonial power—in this
case the Ottoman Empire. Legally, it is a creature of the United Nations,
which, as successor to the British mandate on Palestine, endorsed the creation
of the Jewish state.
So, why should Israel be singled out as the
target of a campaign of vilification seldom waged against any other nation?
The answer, as Curtis dramatically shows, is
that Israel is different.
To start with, it is Jewish. That makes it the target
of anti-Semitic sentiments and resentments that have deep roots in many Western
and some Islamic societies. In many countries, anti-Semitism is no longer
regarded as just another opinion, it is a crime punishable by the law. The way
to get round that obstacle is to air anti-Semitic sentiments in the guise of a
critique of Israel as a nation-state. To make that somewhat more palatable, a
bit of spice is often added by evoking the sufferings of the Palestinians.
However, once the mayonnaise of political grievances against Israel is pushed
aside, one is often left with the old unpalatable hatred of the Jew.
Then there is the fact that Israel has been a
democratic island in a neighborhood of authoritarian and totalitarian regimes.
The emergence of new democracies in the Middle East may well change the
region's political landscape.
At the moment, however, as a democracy, Israel
remains a threat to the despotic systems still dominant in the region.
Worse still, from the point of view of its
detractors, Israel has been an outpost of the democratic world for more than
six decades. It is, in the sense that Curtis sees Israel, the proverbial
"canary in the coalmine." Throughout the Cold War, Israel acted as
the advance guard of the free world in a region of vital geostrategic
importance for the United States and its allies.
After the Cold War ended, Israel found itself
in the front line of the global war against Islamic jihad in its many different
forms. That, in turn, meant that Israel was regarded as arch-foe by Islamists
beating their chests about the "occupation" of a chunk of Islam's
territory by an "infidel" power. Centuries of resentments caused by
the "loss of Muslim lands" in Spain, Russia, and India, among others,
are blended into a single witch's brew of hatred of and desire for revenge
against Israel.
Thus, Israel's very existence, as Curtis shows,
has led to the emergence of a curious coalition in which traditional
anti-Semites, Stalinist Cold Warriors, useful idiots, pan-Arab hegemonists,
anti-Americans of all stripes, and Islamist revanchists are united against a
common foe.
In the Middle East, as Kenneth Bialkin notes in
his introduction to Curtis's essay, history is "in the making but without
a guidebook". What might emerge from the current wave of revolutionary
change is anybody's guess. The best-case scenario is that the creation of
democratic governments in at least some Arab states would remove a few of the
hurdles to the acceptance of Israel as a neighbor if, at least initially, not
as a friend. But even then, Israel's many enemies in the West would remain,
clinging to hatred for the Jewish state as the backbone of their moribund
ideologies.
Should Israel Exist? Curtis's answer is a
resounding "Yes" backed by a masterly historical exposé and an unfailing
moral commitment to what he regards as the justice of his cause.
An insightful historian, Curtis shows that he
is an equally persuasive rhetorician. Add to all that the passion that Curtis
injects into his work and you have a book that is both informative and
enjoyable.
Related Topics: Israel
| Amir
Taheri
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