Rouhani Wags the Dog

Behind the Trump/Rouhani war of words.
by Michael Isenberg.

"NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE."

So declared President Trump last night in what the interwebz has dubbed "The Mother of all Tweets." His words, rendered in all caps, were in response to a speech that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani delivered earlier in the day to a gathering of Iranian diplomats. Rouhani’s remark that “Americans must [understand] that peace with Iran [is] the mother of all peace, war with Iran the mother of all wars” was the most widely reported excerpt from the speech, but it was just the tip of the iceberg. More extensive quotes, appearing on President Rouhani’s website (sadly, there isn’t a full transcript) reveal a bellicose and paranoid rant against the United States, President Trump, and the State of Israel. In addition to outlining five “conspiracies” by the United States against the Iranian people, President Rouhani said,

"The current US administration is fighting the world and its own national interests at the same time." "What [the] US always does is conspiracy against Iran and the great Iranian nation." "Iran acted wisely against Trump's inexperience." "They have been saying that Israel is the model of democracy in the region; today, it was proved that it is the centre of apartheid." "Iran's strategic depth stretches in east to the subcontinent, in the west to the Mediterranean, in the south to the Red Sea, and in the north to the Caucasus." "Anybody who knows a little politics doesn't say he will stop Iran's oil export. We have a lot of straits; Hormuz is just one of them." "Today, speaking with [the] US has no meaning except surrender and end of people's achievements. Mr. Trump! We are the people of dignity and guarantor of security of the waterway of the region throughout the history. Don't play with the lion's tail; you will regret it."

The last three quotes are particularly troubling because they express Iran’s ambitions to be the dominant power in the region and they repeat a threat that President Rouhani made earlier this month to close the Straits of Hormuz to international shipping if the Trump administration proceeds with its plans to re-impose nuclear sanctions on Iran. That threat was seconded by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamanei at the gathering of diplomats this weekend.

Rouhani’s speech was not delivered in a vacuum. The Iranian regime faces serious domestic problems, specifically a weakening economy and popular protest against the regime’s hardline enforcement of Islamic law, especially its restrictions on women’s dress and behavior.

The economy was a major issue in the May 2017 Iranian presidential election. Iran had suffered many years of economic stagnation—the BBC reported “Iran’s economy had been close to collapse”—thanks to western sanctions. But with the signing of the nuclear deal in 2015, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA, sanctions were lifted, and by the time of the election the economy was enjoying 7% growth. However, despite an expanding GDP, double digit unemployment lingered. President Rouhani’s election opponent, Ibrahim Raisi, hammered the incumbent for relying too heavily on foreign investment, especially western investment.

The Iranian people decided they were satisfied with President Rouhani—they handed him a 57%-39% victory over Raisi—but their satisfaction did not last long. Protests over high prices in Mashhad during the New Year’s weekend received international attention and spread to several other cities before they were violently stamped out by authorities. Since then the economic situation has deteriorated considerably. In anticipation of President Trump’s withdrawal from the JCPOA and the re-imposition of US sanctions, which he formally announced May 8, the Iranian rial has collapsed against the dollar. Prices of foreign goods have skyrocketed. In Teheran last month, shopkeepers in the Grand Bazaar closed their doors in protest, and thousands of demonstrators attempted to march to Parliament until they were dispersed by riot police.

But not all protests in Iran are economic. When Vida Movahedi removed her hijab at a demonstration on Revolution Street in Teheran in December, she inspired women all over Iran to defy the country’s strict dress code. But she is merely the most visible symbol that Iranian women are fed up with theocracy. In recent months, they have proven themselves ingenious at devising a thousand small acts of defiance. Whether by going out hijab-less, dancing in public (sometimes with men, sometimes by themselves), or disguising themselves as men to sneak into soccer games, they have, little by little, cracked the façade of fundamentalism.

There is no doubt that the economic and social protests were on President Rouhani’s mind when he addressed the gathering of diplomats yesterday. He alluded to the government’s responsibility “to pave the way for private sector's activity in the country.” And he attempted to discredit the protests by blaming them on the United States. “You can't incite Iranian people against Iran's security and interests.” I find it likely that this is the real motive for Rouhani’s attacks—to distract the Iranian people from domestic problems by drawing their attention to international ones. To wag the dog.

If that is the case, then President Trump—who has domestic problems of his own—played into President Rouhani’s hands by responding the way he did. Still, I’m not sure he had a lot of choice. The threats to the Straits of Hormuz need to be taken seriously and couldn’t go unanswered. It will be interesting to see, in the weeks ahead, whether the hard line he has taken will cause Iran, like most bullies, to back down. As a number of commentators have pointed out, a similar tack brought North Korea to the negotiating table—albeit how those negotiations will play out is anybody’s guess at this point. When it comes to Twitter diplomacy, we’re all still learning.

Michael Isenberg drinks bourbon and writes novels. His latest book, The Thread of Reason, is a murder mystery that takes place in Baghdad in the year 1092, and tells the story of the conflict between science and shari’ah in medieval Islam. It is available on Amazon.com Photo Credits: NPR, Twitter

The UN General Assembly: Hypocrites on Parade

We all saw highlights of President Trump’s speech. But what did other world leaders have to say?

Sure, Donald Trump got all the publicity. That’s par for the course when you threaten to “totally destroy North Korea.”

But this is a blog about Islam, so rather than North Korea, the focus here is the Muslim world. What did the various world leaders have to say about that?

I'll start with President Trump: he called out the “vile and sinister ideology” of “radical Islamic terrorism.” In particular, he singled out Iran’s “corrupt dictatorship” and “murderous regime.” Good stuff, noticeably absent from his 9/11 and Afghanistan speeches. Still, it's mostly a rehash of his May 21 address in Riyadh, which I covered previously.

Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel shared President Trump’s concern about Iran: “From the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean,” he said, “from Tehran to Tartus, an Iranian curtain is descending across the Middle East.” (If you don’t follow the reference, look it up. “Iron Curtain speech.” Get it? Iron Curtain/Iranian Curtain).

Hassan Rouhani of Iran came back swinging. He called the accusations against his country “ignorant, absurd, and hateful rhetoric” from a “rogue newcomer.”

Overall, President Rouhani wins the award for smarminess. “Our ambassadors are our poets, our mystics, and our philosophers,” he intoned piously. But my favorite part was, “The path of moderation nurtures beauty. Deadly-weapons exports are not beautiful; rather peace is.” He should know; his country is exporting weapons all over the Middle East to fight its proxy wars, including the humanitarian catastrophes in Yemen and Syria.

Rouhani concluded with a sales pitch for investment in the Iranian economy. He invited “all those who seek peace, security, and progress through partnership and cooperation among nations to visit Iran.” I’d actually like to take him up on that. I discovered in the course of research for my book The Thread of Reason that Iran is a country of spectacular and diverse natural beauty which, to its credit, takes great pride in its wealth of historical monuments, even pre-Islamic ones. Those who seek to destroy the monuments of the Confederate States of America could take a lesson from the Iranians. Still I think I’ll postpone my visit until I can travel in Iran without fear of being arrested and tried behind closed doors on dubious charges of espionage, as has been the fate of other Americans in that country.

Abdu’l-Fattah as-Sisi of Egypt presides over one of the world’s worst human rights abusers. It’s a place where Giulio Regeni, a Cambridge University student who was researching trade unions in 2016 mysteriously disappeared. His corpse, showing signs of excruciating torture, turned up in a ditch along a highway nine days later. In another story, just this week, an Egyptian court sentenced some 500 people in a mass trial for their role in the 2013 anti-government demonstrations. Amnesty International reported that 330 of them had already been detained for four years or more, and among these, there was evidence against only two of them. So one can only marvel at the irony of President as-Sisi lecturing the world body on “upholding the notion of the modern nation-state, which is based on the principles of citizenship, equality, rule of law, and human rights.” In a less hypocritical vein, he continued that he intended to defeat “any attempts at retracting to doctrinal, sectarian, ethnic, or tribal loyalties.” You read that right. No loyalty to religion, culture, or ideas allowed. One must be loyal only to the State.

On the subject of terror, President as-Sisi said, “We in the Muslim world need to face our reality and work together to rectify misconstrued notions which have become an ideological pretext for terrorism and their destructive discourse. As you may recall, Egypt has launched an initiative to rectify religious discourse in order to revive the moderate and tolerant values of Islam.” This showed some insight in that the roots of terror are ideological, but as-Sisi is mistaken that Islam has been misconstrued. While the ideology of ISIS and al-Qaeda isn’t the only possible interpretation of Muslim scripture, it’s certainly an interpretation with deep roots in that scripture. As for the prospect of any government “rectifying” religious discourse, or any discourse—that is truly chilling.

President as-Sisi also called for “global order that can face challenges, such as climate change.”

Mahmud Abbas, leader of the Palestinians, called Israel a colonial, Apartheid, occupying power, but nevertheless he promised that “upon Israel’s withdrawal from the Palestinian and Arab territories occupied in 1967, the Arab and Islamic States would recognize Israel and normalize relations with it.” One has to wonder about his sincerity, since he then went on to denounce the “historical injustice” of the 1917 Balfour Declaration, the document which laid the foundation for Israel’s right to existence in the first place. In any case, we're unlikely ever to put Mr. Abbas's sincerity to the test. There's only a small chance he'll ever have to follow through on this promise. Territories "occupied" in 1967 include East Jerusalem, which Israel views as part of its eternal, undivided capital.

As for Abbas’s view of the roots of terror, he claimed that “draining the swamp of colonial occupation of our land and ending its unjust, oppressive, and illegal practices against our people would greatly affect the fight against terrorism, depriving terrorist groups of one of the key rallying cries they exploit to promote their repugnant ideas.” This is an argument that Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, recently called “pure, unadulterated insanity.”

Mr. Abbas also said, “We once again affirm our commitment to…the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.”

Aung San Suu Kyi, First State Counsellor of Myanmar, chose not to attend, due to the anti-Muslim violence engulfing Rakhine State in her country; I wrote about that earlier this week. Instead, Counsellor Suu Kyi sent Vice President U Henry Van Thio, who for the most part parroted the awful speech that the First Counsellor delivered on Tuesday. But not to worry. Despite the atrocities in Rakhine, Mr. Van Thio assured the world that, “Myanmar welcomes the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.”

Well, that gives you some flavor of the 72nd UN General Assembly. As I read through page after page of self-inflicted grievances and smug hypocrisy, not to mention the pathological obsession with climate change, there was one question that kept nagging at me:

Why is the United States part of this?

Michael Isenberg drinks bourbon and writes novels. His latest book, The Thread of Reason, is a murder mystery that takes place in Baghdad in the year 1092, and tells the story of the conflict between science and shari’ah in medieval Islam. It is available on Amazon.com Transcripts and video of the speeches from the 72nd UNGA may be found on the UN Website.

Mideast Week in Review

Trump in Saudi, Israel

Turkey State of Emergency

Iran Election Aftermath

Liberation of Mosul

Manchester Bombing

Egypt Bus Attack

by Michael Isenberg

Trump in Saudi, Israel: Donald Trump visited Saudi Arabia and Israel this week, as the first two stops on his first foreign tour as President of the United States.

On Sunday, Mr. Trump addressed the Arab Islamic American Summit. Those of you who follow me on social media know that I’m not a fan of the president, but I’m willing to give credit where credit is due. His Riyadh speech hit the bullseye. He called out terrorists for what they are, “barbaric criminals who seek to obliterate human life.” What a welcome change from the cringing, apologetic tone of Mr. Obama! I found it significant that he mentioned ideology six times. IMHO, he showed real insight into the War on Terror: it's a War of Ideas. Terrorists become terrorists because they accept an ideology that tells them to become terrorists.

Following his speech, he joined King Salman of Saudi Arabia and President as-Sisi of Egypt at the opening of the Global Center for Combating Extremist Ideology. As far as I can tell, the Center, which is located in Riyadh, is a boiler room for countering jihadism on social media. While combating extremist ideology is pretty much my raison d'etre these days, there’s something creepily Orwellian about governments, some of which are already highly repressive, countering any form of speech. In any case, the three heads of state let themselves be photographed holding on to a glowing orb. The unfortunate visual, combined with the Center's sinister mission, put many in mind of a certain organization of supervillains, and #HailHydra trended for a day. But by Monday Mr. Trump was in Israel and the Interwebs had a new thing to speculate about: what did he write in the note that he left at the Western Wall?

Read more—

Trump Gets One Right

Make Hydra Great Again

So, just what did Trump's note in the Western Wall say? (BBC)

 

Turkey State of Emergency: The New York Times reported that in Turkey on Sunday, President Recep Erdogan stated that the state of emergency put into place after last year’s coup attempt would stay in place until “welfare and peace” returned to the nation of 80 million. According to the Times report, under the emergency measures, thousands have been jailed, and websites blocked, with no parliamentary oversight.

Read more—

Erdogan Says He Will Extend His Sweeping Rule Over Turkey (NYT)

The Real Problem with Erdogan

 

Iran Election Aftermath:Iran President Hasan Rouhani is getting back to work following his overwhelming victory in the May 19 election. The BBC reports that he faces three major challenges: 1) unemployment, 2) opposition to reform from Supreme Leader Ali Khamanei, and 3) relations with the United States.

The third challenge was underscored by Mr. Trump during the course of his travels. In his Riyadh speech he said, “Until the Iranian regime is willing to be a partner for peace, all nations of conscience must work together to isolate Iran, deny it funding for terrorism, and pray for the day when the Iranian people have the just and righteous government they deserve.” In Israel, he vowed, “Iran will never have nuclear weapons, that I can tell you.” But Mr. Rouhani scoffed at the words of his American counterpart, which he called, “Just a show.”

Read more—

Iran's President Rouhani has quite the to-do list (BBC)

Trump tells Israel Iran will never have nuclear weapons (BBC)

Rouhani dismisses Trump warning over Iran 'threat' (BBC)

 

Liberation of Mosul: The slow but steady advance of the Iraqi army and its allies into the city of Mosul continues. While east Mosul is now under government control, ISIS remains entrenched in the western sector of the city.

Liberation has not been without its cost in human life. The United States confirmed on Friday that 105 civilians died in a US air strike in March. The US had targeted two ISIS snipers with precision-guided munitions, tragically unaware that the building was used to store explosives and was also a place of refuge for residents who had been driven from their homes.

With liberation, come the stories: the true horrors of life under ISIS. According to the BBC, these include the murder of a seven year old girl. She died screaming in front of her mother, who was also screaming, as female members of the religious police bit and pinched her to death for the crime of being alone with a male shop owner when she went to buy candy.

Read more—

US air strike on IS killed 105 civilians in Iraq's Mosul (BBC)

Lipstick and dresses return to Mosul’s streets (BBC)

 

Manchester Bombing:Tragedy struck Manchester, England Monday night when a suicide bomber detonated an explosion at an Ariane Grande concert. Twenty-two victims, as young as eight years old, died in the calamity, their hopes and dreams snuffed out in an instant.

As the week progressed, a portrait, albeit a fuzzy one, emerged of the monster responsible. Twenty-two-year old Salman Abedi was born in England, but his ties to the Mideast are extensive. His parents are Libyan refugees. The Telegraph reports that his father belongs to the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, "a well-known militant Islamist group in Libya, which is proscribed in Britain." The younger Abedi is thought to have traveled recently in Syria and Libya. There is some question as to when and how he became radicalized. According to some reports, he drank alcohol until as late as last year, but his travels changed him. His sister said, “I think he saw children—Muslim children—dying everywhere, and wanted revenge.” I am skeptical. IMHO, jihadism is motivated primarily by its own ideology; anything the West has done is secondary. There is some evidence this was the case with Abedi. Contradicting accounts of a recent conversion to jihadism, The Telegraph writes there were at least five reports to authorities of incidents, going back five years, of Abedi showing sympathy to terrorists. These included telling friends that "being a suicide bomber was okay," and getting banned from the local mosque after a run-in with an imam who had given a sermon condemning terrorism.

So Abedi was on the authorities' radar long before he launched his hideous attack. It occurred to me that he had that in common with Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the older of the Boston Marathon bombers, and Omar Mateen, the Pulse nightclub shooter. In all three cases, the authorities failed to prevent them from carrying out their evil intentions. There hasn’t been much discussion about why counter-terrorist agencies have been unable to do more in these cases. Possibly they are overwhelmed with such reports, and are unable to distinguish the real threats. Possibly red tape limits their ability to act. Clearly it’s something that the US and its allies need to take a closer look at.

Read more—

Remembering the Manchester Victims

Everything we know about Manchester suicide bomber Salman Abedi (Telegraph)

Security services missed five opportunities to stop the Manchester bomber (Telegraph)

Manchester attack: The Libya-jihad connection (BBC)

 

Egypt Bus Attack: Alas, Manchester was not the only significant terrorist attack this week. Near Cairo on Friday, armed militants stopped and boarded a bus full of Coptic Christians on their way to a monastery in the desert. The militants, who wore masks, opened fire, murdering at least 29. ISIS has claimed responsibility.

Read more—

Egypt: At least 28 dead as gunmen fire on bus carrying Coptic Christians (CNN)

Michael Isenberg writes about the Muslim world, medieval and modern, exposing Islamists and supporting reformers. His forthcoming novel, The Thread of Reason, is a murder mystery that takes place in Baghdad in the year 1092 and depicts the battle for the Muslim soul between those who embraced science and tolerance, and those who threw in their lot with mysticism and persecution instead.

Photo credit: The Telegraph